In case you haven’t seen this graphic depicting what a potential 16-team College Football Playoff would look like, scope it out here:
What a 16-team College Football Playoff would look like… pic.twitter.com/hAa6wasuZo
— CFB Kings (@CFBKings) November 16, 2018
First of all, this is anything but “a simple fix.” So, get that shit out of your heads. The logistics of a 16-team playoff would be a nightmare, and you’d have to start asking teams and conferences to give up very lucrative home games and championship games for this to even remotely be a possibility. That isn’t going to happen. You’d essentially need the playoffs to start on Thanksgiving to get through the rounds of a 16-team tournament.
Second, my issue with this format is that it doesn’t truly give everyone in the FBS a chance to win the National Championship. That’s my major issue with the format the way it is at four teams. You’re leaving out teams that deserve a shot based on a subjective criteria. Think about it – at least one team’s been snubbed practically every year they’ve executed the playoffs at four teams. One or two teams that actually deserve the shot as much as one of the teams that did make the cut – Penn State immediately comes to mind the year they won the Big Ten Championship, but Ohio State got in. And, why’s the ‘Group of Five’ even competing in the FBS?
(Sidenote: I do actually think the ‘Group of Five’ should just break away from the major conferences and form their own playoffs with their own National Championship.)
I would not take the “16 best teams” as pictured above – that’s ludicrous. You’re telling me you’re going to put Iowa State in the hunt for a National Championship? What have they won? No, you take the 16 most deserving teams, and then rank those in order of best to worst. Every conference champ goes. People are going to disagree with this, but it’s the only fair way to include the entirety of the FBS.
Right now, that list of playoff teams would look like this:
1. Alabama
2. Michigan
3. Notre Dame
4. Georgia
5. Clemson
6. Oklahoma
7. Washington State
8. LSU
9. Ohio State
10. West Virginia
11. Texas
12. UCF
13. Utah State
14. UAB
15. Buffalo
16. Troy
It gives every single fucking team in the FBS a path to competing for a National Championship – if you don’t have that, then what’s the point of even competing in the FBS?!?! Someone tell me. But, this is the only way 16 teams makes sense to me, is if you really open it up so that EVERY conference champ gets in, with only a handful of wild card spots to give out. That’s going to dramatically lessen the odds of some of these three or four loss teams getting in. I don’t care if Troy would get beat by a hundred in Tuscaloosa. At least they are a champion, and earned the right to be there accordingly.
But, how would you even execute this? Like I said, you’d have to start at Thanksgiving in order to get down to four teams by bowl season. You think the conferences are giving up those conference championships? You think teams are going to be willing to give up a home game? No….no way!
And, the truth of the matter is that if you’re not one of the eight best teams in the country, you don’t really deserve to be in the hunt. People clamoring for this are likely people who don’t recognize that the college football season is practically one big playoff from September through the first weekend in December. These folks just like brackets, I’d guess.
It’s just too much. I say expand to eight and tack on a week at the end of the regular season, but it needs to stay at eight and no more. G ive each of the power five conference champions a spot, give a spot to the highest ranking group of five representative, and then you have two wild cards left over to spend on teams like Penn State and Baylor/TCU in 2014. Theoretically, that potentially opens the door for everyone without watering down the game too much.
Stoney Keeley is the Editor in Chief of The SoBros Network. He is a strong supporter of Team GSD and #BeBetter. “Big Natural” covers the Tennessee Titans, Alabama Crimson Tide football, the WWE, and a whole wealth of nonsense. Follow on Twitter @StoneyKeeley
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