What if the BCS existed in the days of Jesus? His bio would read something like this:
Jesus made his first splash on the Division 1 scene with an early season upset of eternal heavyweight Satan. In a slow-paced game that felt like it lasted forty days and forty nights, Jesus scored three key touchdowns to ensure the win. Jesus took advantage of the momentum from that game into the rest of his season as the mid-major to beat, taking that torch from John the Baptist who lost his head in a key matchup against Herod. Would Jesus be the first mid-major to bust into one of the key Passover week bowl games? Critics debated Jesus’ résumé, noting that some of Jesus’ wins were gimmicky, especially his overtime win in Cana. Long-time powerhouse conferences the Pharisees and Sadducees argued that the BCS bowls were earned by those who have paid their dues over hundreds of years and were able to sell-out the Temple. Jesus, by contrast, was a newcomer to Division 1 and at most played in front of 5000 men. In fact, after a big win against the Loaves and Fishes his attendance actually went down when the two faced off again. Jesus’ strength of schedule was also debated as he mostly faced off against rural teams like the Demons and Lepers. (Mid-major fans would argue that the BCS formula is stacked against them looking at a team like Legion, whom few power-conference schools would dare schedule. “We can only beat the teams we schedule,” they would say as they argued for a playoff. Meanwhile the Romans would point at their conference schedule saying they played teams like Legion “week in and week out.”) Yet Jesus continued to pile up wins and each year preseason polls would rank him a little higher. Then, in his third year Jesus began the season ranked in the top-10. Conference realignment rumors surfaced as the Pharisees were looking to expand and split into two divisions: David and Abraham, aka Leaders and Legends. But Jesus wasn’t distracted by the rumors and continued his winning ways with his biggest win coming against Death, avenging a blowout of his close friend Lazarus. Fans were sure this would be the year he would make a Passover bowl. Finally speaking out against the system, Jesus claimed that he would destroy the BCS and rebuild it in three days. That statement would prove to be his undoing as poll voters never rated him high enough to have enough points in the complicated computer ranking system used for bowl selection. Mid-major Peter, who had a vote in the coaches poll, when pressed by reporters answered three times, “Jesus, who?” Fans were hoping for Jesus to square off against Herod in the postseason, but instead he would end up facing Barabbas in the Golgotha Bowl- a small bowl held outside of Jerusalem, as Pilate and Caiaphas would play for the championship in a rematch of game played earlier that season. Jesus would go on and lose his bowl game, getting nailed at the end, but for some reason three days later bowl officials would crown Jesus with the win. And just as Jesus predicted, fan outrage forced the BCS to change to a four team playoff. Yet, as if he were sent from heaven to force change upon a broken system bound too tightly to tradition, Jesus was never seen again.