Orrin Hatch is undoubtedly merely responding to his constituents’ demands with this nonsense. The Utah Utes finished 13-0 last season, with notable wins over Michigan, Oregon State, ranked teams TCU and BYU, and a BCS bowl defeat of Alabama. It’s a pretty impressive resume. They were the only undefeated team in Div I-A (FBS). But they’re not the Champion. Florida, who finished 13-1 (with their sole loss being to Mississippi) is the Champion.

I understand the complaint. If a mid-major team like Utah can have the season they’ve had, beat the teams they beat, and still fall behind a one-loss school from a “major” conference, then no mid-major will ever be crowned Champion. Granted, Florida may have been the best team in college football (as the Patriots were the best team in the NFL in ’07-8 despite not winning Super Bowl XLII), but I don’t think the system for determining a Champion is very fair.

It’s not a system I like. It’s also not a system that Orrin Hatch likes, but he’s sticking the full power of the federal government into the debate:

Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, may be a skinny guy with a high voice. But he’s angrily setting out to tackle the biggest powers in college football, vowing to pound them until they reform the Bowl Championship Series. He called them out Wednesday, as he and Sen. Herb Kohl, D-Wisc. — respectively the top Republican and Democrat on a Judiciary subcommittee on antitrust — released a list of topics that panel plans to consider this year. A bit buried on Page 4 of an eight-page list, amid somewhat sleep-inducing reading on oil and railroad antitrust, is a nifty paragraph about the BCS. “The BCS system leaves nearly half of all the teams in college football at a competitive disadvantage when it comes to qualifying for the millions of dollars paid out every year,” their joint statement says. Then it drops its first unexpected bomb: “The subcommittee will hold hearings to investigate these issues.” That is followed by a second: “Sen. Hatch will introduce legislation to rectify this situation.”

I realize that Congress believes it has purview over everything that occurs within our borders, but if their “fixes” for other problems are anywhere near as effective as this one will be, I’m not sure anyone will want to watch college football afterwards. I really wish they’d waste their time ruining something else, because I quite enjoy spending fall Saturdays watching one of the few worthwhile sports left.