Good article on playoff expansion and why bowl games are part of the problem

Here's one chaotic scenario that could lead to College Football Playoff expansion

Dan Wetzel

Columnist, Yahoo Sports

November 14, 2018





Paul Hoolahan announced his retirement as CEO of the Sugar Bowl earlier this month. He’d been on the job for 22 years.



In a press release announcing it, Big 12 commissioner Bob Bowlsby called him “an integral part of the college football landscape.” ACC commissioner John Swofford hailed his “incredible standard of excellence.” SEC commissioner Greg Sankey said “Hoolahan has served as a great steward of this revered bowl game.”



Hoolahan is a nice person and a good businessman. Nothing against him here. And all of the above platitudes are accurate. He was all of those things.



Yet his retirement press release should have been full of compliments flowing the other way. Hoolahan should have been thanking all those commissioners for continuing to nonsensically outsource to bowl games the most valuable property in college athletics — the football playoff. It’s how he and his peers have made millions.



College sports’ old-boy network is a strange one though. The idea of the NFL cutting in some independent contractors on their playoffs or Super Bowl is beyond laughable. Nah, I think we’ll just continue to rent the stadium, run the game and keep all the money to ourselves. Appreciate the offer, though.



In college football, it’s backward. They thank the guy they inexplicably cut in on the action. It’s a bizarre and nearly impossible bond to break. And it’s a big reason why college football has a four-team playoff, not a preferable and more profitable eight-team playoff.



One round bigger would require the first round to be played on campus and the old bowl cronies sure aren’t in favor of that. Next thing you know they might lose the semifinals too.



One of the things that can change that thinking is when enough of college football is repeatedly left out of the playoff, rendering even historic, so-called Power Five conferences to second-tier status. Many believe the 2012 BCS title game featuring two SEC schools — Alabama and LSU — was a chief motivation for the other leagues to ditch the BCS and create the four-team playoff.



Well, if you think eight is great, if you want to increase not only the number of thrilling playoff games, but also turn these snoozy November Saturdays into a free for all where all the major conference championship races matter, then the tipping point is laying right there to be had.



All it requires is seven results, all but one of which is the predicted outcome.



Notre Dame wins out, defeating Syracuse and USC.



Alabama defeats the Citadel and Auburn.



Georgia defeats Massachusetts and Georgia Tech.



And then … Georgia upsets Alabama in the SEC title game.



That’s it. If those seven games go like that, then the College Football Playoff will feature two SEC teams (Georgia and Alabama, which isn’t dropping past four due to one loss) and an independent (Notre Dame).



One other conference will claim the other spot. It’s most likely the ACC, since Clemson is heavily favored to win out.



It could be any league though. It doesn’t matter because you’d have just two conferences represented in the playoff field … and three major conferences wondering how in the world they ever agreed to a playoff of just four squads?



Even if it doesn’t pan out, this scenario should terrify leagues into action. The Big Ten could see a 12-1 Michigan beat Ohio State and capture the league title, finishing the season on a 12-game win streak, and be left out. The Big 12 could have Oklahoma, whose only defeat was to Texas on a final-second, neutral-site field goal, stay home. The Pac-12 could have a 12-1 Washington State team not even get serious discussion, just another year of its conference season playing out in relative obscurity because of the playoff.



Much of the debate this fall about the playoff has centered on whether it is inherently unfair to programs outside the Power Five — most notably Central Florida, which is on 22-game win streak but stands virtually no chance of making the playoff.



UCF, due to its schedule, isn’t being mistreated by the committee, though. That said, an eight-team playoff would allow room for it to come in as a No. 8 seed and take an underdog swing at whoever earned the right to be No. 1. It would be a fun embrace of Cinderella for a sport that hates Cinderella.



The bigger issue is that the small playoff has rendered so many major conference games and so many major conference races obsolete. Rather than every game mattering, we have so many otherwise good games not mattering at all. Check this weekend’s schedule. Or last weekend’s.



How many years do the other big conferences want to sit around and effectively play for nothing before they demand an eight-teamer with five automatic bids? How many times do they want to explain on a recruiting trail that their champion isn’t considered big time enough, but the SEC’s runner-up, or even third-place team, is.



To combat that, they could embrace progress. Playing first-round games on campus would be epic, the money would be huge and every league race would remain significant until the end.



Or the powers that be can just sit back and watch two leagues and Notre Dame hog the playoff spotlight. Maybe their blazer-wearing bowl buddies will take them golfing to make them feel better about it.



https://sports.yahoo.com/heres-one-chaotic-scenario-lead-college-football-playoff-expansion-202745969.html

Good arguments.

The major College bowls are historical, charming and nostalgic. And a relic of an era when transportation of teams and fans was expensive and time-consuming, along with independent regional fiefdoms that couldn't solve a coordination failure.

I have never ever understood the argument that expanding the playoff field somehow makes in-season games less relevant. It makes more teams relevant, and continue to be relevant after a loss, and therefore makes more and more games relevant. National attention and interest, and therefor eyeballs and advertising opportunities, will be on more teams for much longer.

I have long been a fan of expanding ... but not to 8 teams ... go to16!! I think by re-scheduling some of the bowls, the bowls keep the playoffs.



Yeah ... I know, 3 games are too tough to add in, it would require changing the schedules ...



I'm still a fan of it.

I have no desire to see an expanded playoff. I enjoy the fact that college football is different from every other sport. I love the bowl system.



I appreciate that there is a high barrier of entry to make the college football playoff. There are no .500 caliber teams making the playoffs like you frequently see in other sports. There is no “well they got hot at the right time” in college football. You have to be great throughout the year unlike any other sport. To make the playoff you have to be undefeated or close to it playing a tough schedule. No other sport comes close to having that high of standard.



But what about UCF? Shouldn’t they have a shot? No. They decided to eliminate themselves from playoff contention 5-6 years ago because of the way they schedule. They could have chosen to have a non conference schedule like Northern Illinois scheduled for themeselves this year, but chose not to. They might go undefeated, but they valued things like having more home games and positioning themselves for mere bowl eligibility rather than competing for a national title. And that is perfectly OK.



None of the players that have signed with UCF signed there with hopes of playing for a national title. They go in hoping to make a bowl game, or win their conference, or maybe just maybe make a NY6 bowl. If they were serious about making the playoff they wouldn’t have signed with UCF. They would have signed with or walked on at one of the few schools that actually can meet the high standards required to make the playoff.



UCF can look forward to playing another elite team in a special bowl game which is as good as any of the players that signed there could have hoped for. The members of the G5 understood that they don’t play at the same overall level as the Power 5 teams do. They know that the Sun Belt Champ is usually nowhere near the caliber of the SEC champ, and giving them both equal access to the same postseason tournament doesn’t make sense. The bowl system offers degrees of glory. I’m fine with that. There is no reason to turn FBS football into the NFL.

The current playoff has rendered many more games meaningless. Alabama could lose twice and still get in to the playoff over 1 loss teams from other conferences because the committee determines that they are still one of the best 4 teams (i.e. the results on the field were just a fluke). How does that help set a high bar? It’s all about a subjective “eye test”.



Any sport where winning the championship is impossible even if you never lose a game is beyond ridiculous.



Those arguments you are using mormonrasta is the kind of stuff that kills the G5 conferences and keeps them from ever having a shot. They don’t have the option of joining a tougher conference to increase the strength of schedule. They would have to schedule lopsided early game schedules were they would not get home and home deals. It’s all such a ridculous mess. The current system helps the rich to stay rich and makes it extremely hard to build a program; that affects BYU as well (in a negative way because they have to go through the indepence craziness to try to get a shot).



Explain to me why Michigan should be left out of the playoff and yet Alabama and Georgia would get in? It’s all subjective nonsense. Remember when LSU and Bama played for the “national championship” in the two team playoff?



I would be much more satisfied with an 8 team playoff.



I think the ideal scenario may be a 12 team playoff with a first round bye for the top ranked teams.

In Hoosiers that little school in Indiana did not deserve to play in the championship game?

Jarhead wrote:

The current playoff has rendered many more games meaningless. Alabama could lose twice and still get in to the playoff over 1 loss teams from other conferences because the committee determines that they are still one of the best 4 teams (i.e. the results on the field were just a fluke). How does that help set a high bar? It’s all about a subjective “eye test”.



Any sport where winning the championship is impossible even if you never lose a game is beyond ridiculous.



Those arguments you are using mormonrasta is the kind of stuff that kills the G5 conferences and keeps them from ever having a shot. They don’t have the option of joining a tougher conference to increase the strength of schedule. They would have to schedule lopsided early game schedules were they would not get home and home deals. It’s all such a ridculous mess. The current system helps the rich to stay rich and makes it extremely hard to build a program; that affects BYU as well (in a negative way because they have to go through the indepence craziness to try to get a shot).



Explain to me why Michigan should be left out of the playoff and yet Alabama and Georgia would get in? It’s all subjective nonsense. Remember when LSU and Bama played for the “national championship” in the two team playoff?



I would be much more satisfied with an 8 team playoff.



I think the ideal scenario may be a 12 team playoff with a first round bye for the top ranked teams.

Exactly. The current system is still ridiculous. You have some stupid committee making these decisions, rather than it being decided on the field.



G5 teams, no matter how tough their schedule is, have no shot at the playoff.



And even with P5 teams there is an obvious pecking order built on favoritism. The SEC gets was way to much of it. And let's say within the Big 10 in a given year, Ohio State and Purdue have the same record and comparable SOS at the end of the year. Who do you think will get the playoff bid or better bowl game?



It's a bull$h!+ system built on subjectivity, bias, and above all money.



And meanwhile, we have 40 stupid bowls, the vast majority of which mean absolutely nothing. Oh yay, we went 6-6 and got to go to the Who Gives a Rats A$$ Bowl! I honestly find myself sometimes wishing some terrorist cell would blow up the stinking Rose Parade.



And the entire CFP playoff committee, the P5 commissioners, and bowl executives need to be brought up on racketeering conspiracy and restraint of trade charges. With every P5 school president and AD named as unindicted co-conspirators. I'm serious.



That said, I also don't like the "Get hot at the right time" aspect of the NFL.



An 8 team playoff would be a good next step from what we have now.



But 12 teams, 11 conference champs and 1 at large (independents especially) would be the most fair.