Does Anyone Have Cure for Ills of Seeding?

Sniffing, sniveling and whining.

Happens during flu and cold season.

Happens during playoff selections.

Happens every year.

The Birmingham High football team wins one, ties one and loses five in Northwest Valley Conference action yet still goes to the City Section playoffs.

Some applaud. Others sniff.

Carson is forced to forfeit three victories, dropping its official record to 2-8, yet the Colts go to the playoffs.

Some cheer. Others snivel.

Reseda wins six of its final seven games to finish second behind undefeated Sylmar in the Valley Pac-8 League, yet the Regents--reportedly at the request of their coach--avoid the big boys of 4-A and are granted a place in the softer 3-A field.

Some celebrate. Others whine.

Barbara Fiege, commissioner of City Section athletics, hears it mostly from one side. Seems like the jilted always make more noise.

“You’re never going to please everyone, but I think this is a good seeding,” Fiege said Saturday afternoon, a day after invitations were extended. “I can defend it with a clear conscience.”

Attention critics: Listen and learn.

Top priority for the eight-member selection committee was to include the section’s best 32 teams in the playoffs. Once the overall field was determined, the goal was to place the top 16 teams in the 4-A division.

Decisions were made after a study of four criteria. They are, in order:

* A rating developed by football coaches, who ranked each of the teams in their respective conferences 1 through 8.

* Conference record and place in standings.

* Strength of conference, based, Fiege said, on results from the past three seasons.

* Nonconference record.

The only automatic bids went to the section’s six conference champions, which were seeded in the 4-A bracket.

Among conferences, the big winners were the Southern Pacific and Northwest Valley, which each sent seven of their eight teams to the playoffs. Conversely, the Valley Pac-8 and Coastal conferences each placed only four teams.

Birmingham, from the Northwest Valley, and North Hollywood, of the Valley Pac- 8, were “bubble teams,” Fiege said. Birmingham, which was seeded last in the 3-A bracket, made the cut based on its league’s overall strength and a 3-0 nonleague record. North Hollywood had a 3-4 record in the conference but was 0-4 against nonleague opposition.

Determining Carson’s fate was less complicated but more time-consuming. Several coaches said the Colts, who were caught using an ineligible player, should have been banned from postseason competition.

Coach Jeff Engilman of top-ranked Sylmar wasn’t among them. “I couldn’t see a 4-A playoff without Carson,” he said. “They’ve been a City power for so long.

“You want the best teams in there. If you win it, you don’t want anybody to be able to say, ‘Yeah, but what about Carson?’ ”

Further muddling matters were requests by Reseda and Wilson--second-place teams in their respective conferences--to compete in the 3-A playoffs.

Reportedly, the committee granted those requests.

Not so, according to Fiege. “Those requests didn’t mean anything to the committee,” she said. “If the committee thought they belonged in the top 16, they would have been in 4-A.”

In past years, City teams were designated 4-A and 3-A before the season and the top two teams from each league plus a handful of wild-card teams advanced to the playoffs.

The Southern Section utilizes such a format, and Engilman wishes the City Section would return to it. “Why play all your league and conference games to win and then have that all thrown out because other people don’t believe your conference is that strong?” he said.

“I don’t like the way (committee members) get to pick and choose. It makes a mockery of your league season.”

But Engilman also said the playoff field was “the most even” he had seen and that the best 16 teams in the City were those listed in the 4-A bracket.

So, any other ideas? Engilman has none.

“There is no perfect system,” he said. “That’s why you have people complaining every year.”

NCAA officials, take note. Here’s that playoff system you’ve been considering: experts representing each conference and region picking the top teams and matching them based on record and strength of schedule.

Still there is grumbling.

If you have a better plan, call Fiege. Maybe she will get back to you.

Maybe not. Hers is a thankless job, hence the voice on her answering machine.

It says your call will be returned--if she “feels like it.”