Although SBR is scrupulously apolitical, we realize that sometimes you have to dig deep to find fresh college football arguments. Thus, a piece from Political Affairs Magazine, wherein the author suggests that maybe we should add another element to the national title game decision:

Let me make a modest proposal to the NCAA powers that be. Why not take into account the academic quality of a university in determining who plays for the national championship?

This would clearly put Rutgers above Arkansas and other SEC teams. Rutgers, which has some of the best academic “programs” in the liberal arts, sciences, and public policy professional schools, could more than hold its own as a center of scholarship and teaching against one-loss schools like USC and Notre Dame. That should more than compensate for their harder overall football schedule. Also, two teams from the same conference Michigan and Ohio State, really shouldn’t play in a national championship game and Rutgers as a university more than hold its own against Ohio State. (As the holder of a Masters degree and PhD from the University of Michigan, I would hesitate to make that statement about the great public university that sports fans know as the Wolverines).

By the way, the article is entitled “College Football, Scholar-Athletes, and the Dialectics of the NCAA National Championship.” If you can tell us what “Dialectics of the NCAA National Championship” means, we’ll give you a cookie.