Birk's Eye View: Jim Harbaugh slams the joke that is most non-conference schedules

"Michigan is a good school and I got a good education there," Harbaugh said. "But the athletic department has ways to get borderline guys in and, when they're in, they steer them to courses in sports communications. They're adulated when they're playing, but when they get out, the people who adulated them won't hire them."

At Pac-10 media day last week, Harbaugh fired another salvo, this one aimed at BCS programs (like many in the Big Ten) that fill their schedule with cupcakes every year.

From Bruce Feldman's Insider blog on ESPN:

"Somebody really ought to take notice of this stuff," Harbaugh said. "You have eight or nine wins and so you're a great football team? Well, what if you played four patsies in your non-conference and then you only won half your conference games and so you get to go play in the Alamo Bowl and everyone says you're a great team. That's what happens. ... There's no question that the Pac-10 doesn't get that respect for playing teams out of conference of like caliber."

The Pac-10 hasn't earned a second BCS bid since 2002, when Washington State won the conference and USC played in the Orange Bowl as an at-large team. Since the conference plays a true round-robin schedule - Pac-10 teams play nine conference games, whereas Big Ten teams, in an 11-team league, play only eight - some out west feel the league is unfairly penalized by its strength of schedule.

Harbaugh suggested half-jokingly that the Pac-10 go to five league games. Then, he said, everyone would be 9-2 and the computers would spit "out two Pac-10 teams for BCS bowls."

He has a point. Oregon State's season last year would have looked much better had it won a non-conference game against Montana instead of losing to Penn State. USC's one loss, by extension, wouldn't have looked as bad, and who knows if the Trojans would have slipped into the national title game.

With the money stake in a BCS bid - and bowl games in general - it's no wonder teams schedule the way they do. It pays to guarantee some FCS school half a million dollars to improve your chances of a seven-figure post-Christmas payday.

The better solution, and one Harbaugh would endorse, is to make strength of schedule an even bigger part of the BCS formula than it is now. Reward teams for playing good teams and road games, like they do in the NCAA tournament, and you'll see better football throughout the year.

I'm realistic enough to know that's not going to happen anytime soon. Minor conferences won't endorse a higher SOS component because of their built-in scheduling disadvantages, and major conferences prefer to keep hiding behind phony partnerships like the one bringing us 14 Big Ten-MAC games this year.

So until there's a playoff, get used to Delaware State and UMass on Michigan's schedule.