.vresize.36.36.medium.0.png){kind=small}
.vresize.36.36.medium.0.png){kind=small}
The Southeastern Conference announced its "new" format for future schedules on Sunday, none of which is really new and all of which has ignited the discussion of what's fair and not in college football.
LSU coach Les Miles made strong comments Monday, calling out his own league for a "biased" schedule based on its decision to keep the permanent cross-division opponent.
That opponent for the Tigers is Florida.
"We play the toughest schedule in America in our conference, and then we have the bias of the permanent partner," Miles told The Advocate. "We're now also being mandated to take a BCS team. The bias of the schedule continues to be disproportionate. Fundamentally fair is not something they've given great thought to."
Miles' remarks about being forced to "take a BCS team" refers to the league's new rule addition that will require each team to play at least one non-conference game against a team from the ACC, Big 12, Pac-12 or Big Ten beginning in 2016.
While that could be awesome for fans, it adds more fuel to the fairness arguments for coaches like Miles.
One coach who doesn't care much for those gripes? None other than the wonderful Steve Spurrier. That's not to say the South Carolina coach disagrees with Miles -- it's actually the opposite.
It's just that, Spurrier being Spurrier, he's not going to make a big deal about it.
Instead, he's going to send a solid tongue-in-cheek barb (in this case, a compliment) to a rival competitor.
"There's nothing fair about college football," Spurrier told ESPN. "You know that, don't you?
"If it was fair, Alabama would have to sit out a year of recruiting. They've had the No. 1 class five out of six years. That's like giving an NFL team the first five picks in the first and second round every year -- almost."
There are other points to the fairness debate besides the permanent cross-division opponent. Some teams load up on home games (Texas A&M and Auburn had eight in 2013 compared to Florida's six), while some (hi, Aggies!) schedule incredibly soft non-league games.
"It's not exactly fair by any means," Spurrier told ESPN. "But that's the way we've always done it. We can still fill the ballparks, and the interest is at an all-time high. We'll worry about that fairness later on."
