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Abstract:
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The majority of statistical work on college football's Bowl Championship Series (BCS) has involved proposing or categorizing computer ratings of teams. Computer algorithms, a coaches' poll, and a media poll make up the three ratings systems that are currently equally weighted to produce an overall BCS rating, which ultimately determines which schools will compete in lucrative post-season BCS bowls. We focus on investigating the performance of the BCS as implemented for the 2004, 2005, and 2006 seasons to determine whether equal weights are appropriate. Our Bayesian analysis shows that while the posterior mode places more than half the weight on the media poll, the 95% HPD credible interval contains the equally weighted scheme. We relate our work to the ongoing controversies over the BCS.
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