Justice Dept. set to investigate BCS?

>>> as a threat.

>>> there is another football battle brewing. this one between the college football bowl system and the obama administration. bowl championship series , rose and orange bowls and three others is feeling the heat from the u.s. justice department . orrin hatch says the justice department is considering an investigation of possible violation of antitrust laws . joining us to talk about this director of the sports law gabrielle feldman. what do you make of them investigating under antitrust.

>> it's not a surprise. bcs has been under attack for 10 or 15 years. with a new administration in place you could see this coming of you've got a department of justice , antitrust department division that is looking to beef up its enforcement. president obama himself had said a year ago he was going to look into the bcs system and perhaps investigate some possible changes. so it's not really a surprise this is coming. we've heard a lot of rumors about this over the last ten years or so.

>> bcs , which is what they say on the website. five-game showcase of college football designed to ensure the top rated teams in the country meet in -- isn't the bottom line that a lot of football fans , including the president they don't want to see this bcs , they want to see some kind of tournament.

>> they do. general consensus among the fans and the president, the playoff would be a better system. if you look at every other sport in college sports they have a playoff. our professional sports leagues have a playoff. the question is why shouldn't we have a playoff in college football .

>> why not encourage that by using the bully pulpit of the white house as opposed to the justice department and lawyers.

>> they tried several ways. congress has been investigating this for years. the pressure that's been put on by smaller schools hasn't worked. the threat of an antitrust lawsuit usually works because antitrust lawsuits brings damages with it.

>> is there anything that -- i didn't mean to cut you off. is there anything the ncaa can do, since the ncaa and teams and conferences benefit from the bcs , could they say, to heck with bcs , we control our own destiny as far as this is concerned.

>> nba is different than bcs , this is just a group of the top power conferences coming together to agree on rules. ncaa doesn't have much to do with this. this is individual conferences. we might see that the bcs decides to be more inclusive. we've seen that in the past. when actual in a didn't get invited, they threatened action. they made it easier for nonconference schools to get in. we might see that as a result. the last thing they want is a big teem investigation brought against them.

>> "huffgton post" contributor, thank you so much. it will be interesting to see how they respond to pressure. we appreciate it.

>> thank you.

>> as the saints go marching