Press Release from PlayoffPAc:
The Wall Street Journal is reporting that 21 prominent economists and antitrust experts have sent a letter to the Justice Department’s Antitrust Division, urging it to launch a formal antitrust investigation of college football’s Bowl Championship Series and calling the BCS a “cartel.” This is the first time a group of outside experts has formally weighed-in on this topic with the Department. The list of signatories can be found here.
From the letter:
“The BCS secures a fixed and dominant portion of market access and revenue for its founding members …, regardless of their performance on the field or in the marketplace. These acts injure schools in major college football’s five other conferences … and also harm consumers by restraining output, fixing prices, and reducing quality. We believe the case here for government enforcement of the Sherman Antitrust Act is strong and potentially pursuable under multiple legal theories.”
“Market-access rules and conditions for BCS Bowls result in a system that is at odds with consumer preferences, as shown by BCS Bowl selection decisions, television ratings, and attendance figures.”
“The BCS revenue scheme is objectionable … because financial rewards do not correlate with consumer appeal. In three of the past four post-seasons, non-AQs earned either the highest or second-highest game attendance figures of any BCS Bowl. Furthermore, for three years in a row, BCS Bowls featuring non-AQs have garnered significantly better television ratings than contests between only AQs.”
“On-the-field performance, which drives market preferences, also fails to justify the BCS’s disparate revenue allocation. AQs boast only a meager one-win, four-loss record against non-AQs in post-season BCS Bowls. And in 2010, a year recognized as the high-water mark for “outsider” participation, the BCS handed each AQ conference that placed one BCS Bowl team $17.7 million but gave two non-AQ conferences just $9.8 million and $7.8 million, respectively, for accomplishing an identical feat.”
Playoff PAC co-founder Bentley Peay said: “The lawyers hired by the BCS repeatedly claim that the BCS poses absolutely no antitrust problems. If that were true, why are twenty-one independent and respected experts saying otherwise?”
