TCU football coach Gary Patterson thinks the Big 12 has a national media problem. He may be right, but the league only has itself blame for that this season.
"There is perception bias. There is laundry bias _ you put on a burnt orange uniform and everyone thinks they should be great no matter what," long time college football voice Pat Forde of Sports Illustrated told me Tuesday.
"But this year, when you start the season losing to Sun Belt teams, and then those teams start beating Oklahoma, or Texas, then you got a problem."
Iowa State losing at home to Louisiana is not a good look for a league that could feature the Cyclones in the Big 12 title game.
Kansas State losing at home to Arkansas State is a TED Talk in terrible PR. Kansas State follows that by winning at Oklahoma, and the Sooners basically end their season by losing at Iowa State last week.
Texas Tech's two-point win over Houston Baptist is essentially a loss.
Texas needs a miracle to win in Lubbock against Texas Tech, and then returns home to lose to TCU.
Patterson is correct that the Big 12 continues to suffer from an image that says it's only quality if it's Oklahoma or Texas, Forde's point is that 2020 belongs solely on the Big 12 and no one else.
It's Red River week, and not even Oklahoma is ranked. The only reason Texas is ranked 22nd is because it moved up to ninth after its overtime win at Texas Tech.
This will be the first Red River game since 2005 in which Oklahoma is unranked while Texas is.
As such, the entire league suffers.
"It starts with the media," Patterson said Tuesday on his Zoom call with the local media.
Typically the blanket statement "blame the media" is a tired, excuse-laden cliche. In this case, it fits.
With the possible exception of the Pac-12, no Power 5 league is treated like an unwanted step-brother more than the Big 12.
"The SEC only has one team and have some guys down. Couple of years ago they had a couple of top (teams) and lost some bowls but nobody really talked about it," Patterson said. "You have to give credit where credit is due."
This is a problem not just for the Big 12, but for all of college football.
Since the creation of the "BcS" Plus 2 playoff format in 2014, the Wal-Marts of college football only grow bigger, and more powerful.
College football is a parody of parity.
Those in power have no incentive to change it.
TCU is the one that could change it. Or schools just like it.
"The only way to fix it is if one of those teams gets a shot (at the playoffs), and wins a game," Forde said.
To date, TCU and Baylor, in 2014, remain the only non-traditional power to even come close to an invite. If you want to stretch what qualifies as a "non-traditional" power, you can include Oregon, which made the title game in 2014.
"I still feel bad for TCU. I talked to (former West Virginia AD) and (former Big East commissioner) Mike Tranghese, who were on that selection committee in 2014," Forde said. "They both said the committee was split over TCU and Baylor."
TCU's lone loss that season was a 3-point defeat at Baylor. Baylor's only loss was the following week by two touchdowns at No. 9 West Virginia.
Ohio State jumped both in the final poll to gain a spot in the first playoff.
"It was Ohio State because that's the brand name we can latch on it," Forde said. "Now, Ohio State justified it by winning the title. But that was the year to change it."
Since 2014, only the traditional powers have flirted with making the playoffs.
"It's an absolute problem, and I don't know how you fix it," Forde said. "One of the things I love about college football is the diversity. You can have one team in a different part of the country win on a certain style that's different from somewhere else. It's less diverse now than ever. The top recruits keep going to the same programs, and that builds on itself. I think it's really unfortunate."
Little in the 2020 college football season feels like college football, because it's not.
The only thing that is normal is the Big 12 maintaining its image problem in a flawed system that does not help.
