CFB Observation

[KingCoug]

Sure, the 4 team playoff is a step in the right direction, but it's still largely a joke. Nothing against Clemson, who remains undefeated after today, but why are they the CFB #1? Several other teams are also unbeaten and have had as hard or harder schedules. As long as it's left up to opinion, the legitimacy of it all is in question.

Just saying.

[mtnradio]

Agreed. They will next try to pacify the masses with an 8 team play-off ... and that will be better, but not enough. It REALLY should be a 32 team play-off, which would mean the season should be shortened a little (5 weeks of play-offs is too much with the current long season) ... but this is probably one reason the 32 team play-off won't work, too many weeks of working it down to the championship. Maybe 16 is the best we'll get ... EVER.

[hawkwing]

Agreed. They will next try to pacify the masses with an 8 team play-off ... and that will be better, but not enough. It REALLY should be a 32 team play-off, which would mean the season should be shortened a little (5 weeks of play-offs is too much with the current long season) ... but this is probably one reason the 32 team play-off won't work, too many weeks of working it down to the championship. Maybe 16 is the best we'll get ... EVER.

I would love to have a 32 team playoff, but don't shorten the season. Let the players play over 2 semesters.

[Screamineagle]

I like the way they do it in Division 2. 24 teams top two seeds in each bracket get a bye in the first round. The most a team would play is 5 games a lot of them are during the Holidays.Shorten the season by a game start the playoffs 2 weeks after end of season so playoff goes through December ends early January. Incorporate the Bowls.If you dont make playoffs let them still play some bowl games.This works for the lower Divisions.

[imuakahuku]

I like a 16 team playoff. All the conf champs and six at large. All conf champ games on first week of dec. next week is 1st round played at higher seed home or contract with stadiums. Losers now can take invites to bowl games. Second round losers play in two of the old BCS bowl games. Losers of semifinal play in 3rd place "BCS" bowl game and last two standing play in final game.

I wish the bball tourney would play the final four losers in a 3rd place game the day before the champ game.

[ Post made via Mobile Device ]

[BYULV]

I like a 16 team playoff. All the conf champs and six at large. All conf champ games on first week of dec. next week is 1st round played at higher seed home or contract with stadiums. Losers now can take invites to bowl games. Second round losers play in two of the old BCS bowl games. Losers of semifinal play in 3rd place "BCS" bowl game and last two standing play in final game.

I wish the bball tourney would play the final four losers in a 3rd place game the day before the champ game.

[ Post made via Mobile Device ]

Not sure why they don't play that 3rd place consolation game, it would be a huge draw and money maker.

[mtnradio]

I like a 16 team playoff. All the conf champs and six at large. All conf champ games on first week of dec. next week is 1st round played at higher seed home or contract with stadiums. Losers now can take invites to bowl games. Second round losers play in two of the old BCS bowl games. Losers of semifinal play in 3rd place "BCS" bowl game and last two standing play in final game.

I wish the bball tourney would play the final four losers in a 3rd place game the day before the champ game.

[ Post made via Mobile Device ]

This does interfere with finals ... which, in theory anyway, is why these athletes are aligned with a school. I think the bowls would object to being the games for losers ... it would be much more palatable to the bowls if they were the playoff games ... and possibly more fair for the teams involved. But, I really do agree with you comments about 3rd place games!

[redneckjedi]

If you replaced some of the OOC schedule at the start of the season with a group stage played at teams' home stadiums, you could have an 8-team playoff in which every team in the nation controlled their own destiny in reaching that playoff, without significantly lengthening the season, and it makes the regular season so much more interesting and important.

Here's how you do it: all conferences get 8 games to decide their pecking order, however they choose. Teams can also schedule 1 OOC rivalry game if they like to preserve traditional rivalries. If a conference does 7 games plus a CCG, they would be allowed 2 OOC games. Each conference is allotted a minimum of 1 spot in the 40-team group stage, with the ability to earn more based top-to-bottom conference performance in the group stages of past years. The conference determines the rankings of their own teams based on W-L records and whatever other tie-breaking criteria they choose, and then if the conference has N spots, the top N teams go into that playoff group stage.

The playoff group stage is 8 groups of 5 teams, and consists of 2 home games, 2 away games, and 1 bye for each team. Teams are seeded into their groups based on W-L records, and the top seed picks who they want at home and when they get their bye first, followed by the second seed, etc. You get a point for winning, nothing for losing, and whoever gets the most points in each group advances to the playoff. The other 32 teams would be bowl bound.

There would also be a bowl group stage, and a consolation group stage, consisting of the middle tier and bottom tier of teams, played in a similar way as the playoff group stage. This ensures everyone gets the home games they needs, and that they get to play at least a couple of games against similar talent each season. Group winners (and some runners up) in the bowl group stage would go on to play in bowl games against losers of the playoff group stage. The consolation group stage would not be bowl eligible, but they are playing to win more playoff group stage spots for the conference, so it still matters a lot.

This format ensures everyone plays 12 games, and you'd only have to play 15 games to win the playoff, which is what teams in a conference with a CCG would have to do now anyway. Win all your games, you are the national champion, guaranteed.

The number of spots a conference gets in the playoff group is determined by some metric of overall conference strength based on all group-stage games. I haven't worked out what that looks like mathematically, but basically if, on average, your teams are outperforming their seeding, you would take spots from conferences that underperform. Eventually, you would expect the outperform/underperform numbers to be pretty close to even once the correct number of spots was reached. The nice thing is that if it's wrong, it would self-correct fairly quickly.

[CrimsonCoug]

Whoa, slow down there my red-necked amigo.
That sounds more like futbol than football.

Solutions from foreigners don't work for Americana, no matter how elegant and equitable.

Too bad, though. Applying the World Cup / Premier League model to CFB would solve a lot of problems. I just don't think many of your fellow red-necks could wrap their heads around it.

[ABYUFAN]

I'm just wondering why they still don't call the "FBS" the "FCS," we now have a Championship game - right?