8-Team College Football Playoff Proposal

[robcac26]

It doesn't matter whether the #1 seeded team wins or the #8 seeded team wins, as long as every great team that deserves a chance at the National Title gets to play for it on the field.

In 2014, TCU had a great team that was ranked #6 by the college football committee.

In 2015, Ohio State had a great team that was ranked #7 by the college football committee.

The current 4-team playoff system neglected those great teams.

Have there been any great teams that did not make the top 8 of the college football committee ?

Conference Champions can certainly be factored into an 8-team playoff system. But, it would be difficult to restrict the FBS college football playoff system to only conference champions while there are 5 unequal Power 5 and 5 unequal Group of 5 conference champions that are classified as FBS.

In many conferences, it is also possible for two teams to remain undefeated at the end of the regular season. Should a conference champion tiebreaker eliminate all teams that are on the losing end of those types of tiebreakers ?

So basically it seems like your point is that eight is a good number because it will allow all of the "great" teams to be in the playoff, but suppose #8 isn't a "great" team and neither is #9, but #9 could have a case for why they should be ranked higher and #8 makes it to the championship game. Now #9 can still claim they were robbed by the selection committee just as 2014 #6 TCU and 2015 #7 OSU could. The only way to solve this is by making the national playoffs something you have to qualify for by winning your conference.

The G5 can have their own separate championship, and the ACC and SEC not being equal is no different than the AFC West and AFC East not being equal, but nobody has any issue with the NFL's playoff format because that is how it is in pretty much every sport league that has multiple divisions/conferences. To answer the question at the end of your post, either yes tiebreakers should be used because that is way better than a selection committee just handpicking one team over the other, or the conference should just have a championship game to avoid these scenarios.

 

[PSUPOWER]

So basically it seems like your point is that eight is a good number because it will allow all of the "great" teams to be in the playoff, but suppose #8 isn't a "great" team and neither is #9, but #9 could have a case for why they should be ranked higher and #8 makes it to the championship game. Now #9 can still claim they were robbed by the selection committee just as 2014 #6 TCU and 2015 #7 OSU could. The only way to solve this is by making the national playoffs something you have to qualify for by winning your conference.

The G5 can have their own separate championship, and the ACC and SEC not being equal is no different than the AFC West and AFC East not being equal, but nobody has any issue with the NFL's playoff format because that is how it is in pretty much every sport league that has multiple divisions/conferences. To answer the question at the end of your post, either yes tiebreakers should be used because that is way better than a selection committee just handpicking one team over the other, or the conference should just have a championship game to avoid these scenarios.

Yes. My point is that an 8-team playoff system would be best.
And there are a variety of ways that those 8 teams can be selected, (ie: Power 5 conference champions & 3 best at large,
8 best selected by committees, major polls, computer based calculations or combinations thereof, etc).

There is no perfect playoff system for the current 128-team FBS world and someone will complain regardless of what system is selected. But, an 8-team playoff system gives us a much better chance that we will get a true National Champ than the current 4-team playoff system and it will make all 128 FBS programs more money.

PS
There is a lot more parity across NFL teams than there is across FBS teams and a lot more parity across NFL conferences than there is across FBS conferences. It isn't even close and that is a key issue to understand.

 

[robcac26]

Yes. My point is that an 8-team playoff system would be best.
And there are a variety of ways that those 8 teams can be selected, (ie: Power 5 conference champions & 3 best at large,
8 best selected by committees, major polls, computer based calculations or combinations thereof, etc).

There is no perfect playoff system for the current 128-team FBS world and someone will complain regardless of what system is selected. But, an 8-team playoff system gives us a much better chance that we will get a true National Champ than the current 4-team playoff system and it will make all 128 FBS programs more money.

PS
There is a lot more parity across NFL teams than there is across FBS teams and a lot more parity across NFL conferences than there is across FBS conferences. It isn't even close and that is a key issue to understand.

Of course people will complain no matter what system is selected, but I think making sure everything is decided on the field and not in a conference room should be the #1 priority in determining the most sensible playoff format. I understand there is more parity in the NFL, obviously because there is a quarter the number of teams and a draft designed for the exact purpose of creating parity, but I would still rather see a simple playoff format in which the only way to get into the playoffs is to win your conference. Even if you take the P5 champions and then three at-large bids, you still have three of eight teams getting to that point because they were chosen by a committee.

I think 128 teams is way too many to be at the same level. Clearly there is a disparity between the P5 and G5 conferences, and I think these need to be separated in order to make the playoffs make sense. Let the G5 conferences have their own championship. Maybe let the G5 champion play in the P5 playoffs so that there are six teams. That one team would have to play a lot of games to get to the national championship, but maybe that is a reasonable trade-off for playing against weaker competition.

 

[PSUPOWER]

,

Of course people will complain no matter what system is selected, but I think making sure everything is decided on the field and not in a conference room should be the #1 priority in determining the most sensible playoff format. I understand there is more parity in the NFL, obviously because there is a quarter the number of teams and a draft designed for the exact purpose of creating parity, but I would still rather see a simple playoff format in which the only way to get into the playoffs is to win your conference. Even if you take the P5 champions and then three at-large bids, you still have three of eight teams getting to that point because they were chosen by a committee.

I think 128 teams is way too many to be at the same level. Clearly there is a disparity between the P5 and G5 conferences, and I think these need to be separated in order to make the playoffs make sense. Let the G5 conferences have their own championship. Maybe let the G5 champion play in the P5 playoffs so that there are six teams. That one team would have to play a lot of games to get to the national championship, but maybe that is a reasonable trade-off for playing against weaker competition.

128 teams is way too many to compete at the same level. But, until those 128 teams are divided up into more competitive groups, a playoff system must be in place to give all 128 of those teams a chance at the national title.

Since the 10 FBS Conferences are not equal, it would be impractical to base the entire FBS playoff field solely on conference winners.

If the two best teams in the country appear to be from the same conference, both of those great teams are more deserving of a playoff spot than many conference champions that are clearly not top 10 teams.

14-team conferences like the ACC & SEC only play 8-game conference slates, where some of their best teams don't always play each other. Occasionally, there are FBS independents that are great teams. Frequently, 14-team conferences like the ACC, B1G & SEC have two teams that are much better than any Group of 5 team or Big 12 team, where only 10 teams reside despite the name Big 12.

Let's get the best 8 teams in a playoff to decide the national champion on the field. Some years there are 4 great teams. Other years there are 5 great teams. Some years there are 6 great teams. And other years there are 7 great teams.

With an 8-team playoff system that gives teams extra credit for winning their conference beyond their record and overall Strength Of Schedule, a great team can earn a true national championship on the field by winning 3 playoff games. This would be much better than the 4-team playoff system that we have now.

 

[robcac26]

,

128 teams is way too many to compete at the same level. But, until those 128 teams are divided up into more competitive groups, a playoff system must be in place to give all 128 of those teams a chance at the national title.

Since the 10 FBS Conferences are not equal, it would be impractical to base the entire FBS playoff field solely on conference winners.

If the two best teams in the country appear to be from the same conference, both of those great teams are more deserving of a playoff spot than many conference champions that are clearly not top 10 teams.

14-team conferences like the ACC & SEC only play 8-game conference slates, where some of their best teams don't always play each other. Occasionally, there are FBS independents that are great teams. Frequently, 14-team conferences like the ACC, B1G & SEC have two teams that are much better than any Group of 5 team or Big 12 team, where only 10 teams reside despite the name Big 12.

Let's get the best 8 teams in a playoff to decide the national champion on the field. Some years there are 4 great teams. Other years there are 5 great teams. Some years there are 6 great teams. And other years there are 7 great teams.

With an 8-team playoff system that gives teams extra credit for winning their conference beyond their record and overall Strength Of Schedule, a great team can earn a true national championship on the field by winning 3 playoff games.

If the two best teams in the country are from the same conference, then it should have already been established which team prevails over the other by virtue of the conference championship game. One team wins to advance to the national playoffs, and the other team lost and doesn't advance. This is how sports work. It doesn't matter that the other teams in the playoffs might not be perceived to be as good as the team that lost that conference's championship game. If the two best teams in the NFL meet in the AFC championship game, then so be it. Why should college be any different? Just because there is less parity? I'm not buying it.

The existence of a conference championship game should put to rest the opportunity for anyone to say, "The two best teams in the conference didn't play each other." One team won Division A and one team won Division B, then they played each other and one team beat the other. Any team that doesn't play in their conference championship game didn't deserve to be there because they didn't win the games they needed to. Again, this is all decided on the field, not in a conference room.

The FBS independents should be forced to join a conference if they want to be eligible for the national playoffs. In what other sport is it realistic for the league to design its structure around a couple of teams that want special treatment?

Yeah nobody is going to argue with "let's get the best 8 teams in a playoff to decide the national championship on the field," but the issue is that what you are proposing requires that the selection of those eight teams is NOT decided on the field. The reason I say that it should just be the conference champions is so that everything IS decided on the field. No selection committees, no at-large bids, just regular old-fashioned win and you advance, lose and you go home.

 

[PSUPOWER]

If the two best teams in the country are from the same conference, then it should have already been established which team prevails over the other by virtue of the conference championship game. One team wins to advance to the national playoffs, and the other team lost and doesn't advance. This is how sports work. It doesn't matter that the other teams in the playoffs might not be perceived to be as good as the team that lost that conference's championship game. If the two best teams in the NFL meet in the AFC championship game, then so be it. Why should college be any different? Just because there is less parity? I'm not buying it.

The existence of a conference championship game should put to rest the opportunity for anyone to say, "The two best teams in the conference didn't play each other." One team won Division A and one team won Division B, then they played each other and one team beat the other. Any team that doesn't play in their conference championship game didn't deserve to be there because they didn't win the games they needed to. Again, this is all decided on the field, not in a conference room.

The FBS independents should be forced to join a conference if they want to be eligible for the national playoffs. In what other sport is it realistic for the league to design its structure around a couple of teams that want special treatment?

Yeah nobody is going to argue with "let's get the best 8 teams in a playoff to decide the national championship on the field," but the issue is that what you are proposing requires that the selection of those eight teams is NOT decided on the field. The reason I say that it should just be the conference champions is so that everything IS decided on the field. No selection committees, no at-large bids, just regular old-fashioned win and you advance, lose and you go home.

When you say that the entire playoff field is decided on the field by your conference championship methodology in a fair manner, you are incorrect.

FBS Football is very different from the NFL. There are 10 FBS Conferences. You can't just eliminate 6 of those conferences and there isn't enough conference parity to eliminate 2 to get 8 equal conference champions.

There are 4 FBS independents. You can't just eliminate those independents or force them to join an FBS Conference.

Division tiebreaker rules aren't decided on the field.

There are many FBS OOC games. You can't just eliminate the results of those games from the resumes of potential national playoff teams. OOC games are important too.

If ACC team #1 wins 6 ACC Conference games, their division and their ACC Championship game and loses 4 OOC games finishing their regular season with 6 losses, are they more deserving of a national title playoff bid than an SEC West team #2 that lost their conference opener by 1 point to division rival SEC team #1 and finished their season with 1 loss ?

All regular season games that are played on the field need to be considered, if you want the national title to be determined on the field.

 

[sherrane]

Regular season is meaningless if you lose two games as well...a playoff might make more games matter.

If they got rid of conference championship games (which often feature one worthy team and one OK team) and went straight to an 8 team playoff, I'd be all for it.

Would be 12 games + up to 3 playoff games = 15 games.

Currently 12 games + Conference Championship Game + up to 2 playoff games = 15 games

I'm not for an 8-team playoff at this point largely because I consider the Conference Championship Games the first round of the playoffs. This is especially true now that every conference can stage one. The advantage of the current arrangement over an 8-team playoff is that we have a better chance to have no wildcards. If you cannot win your conference, you can't complain about being excluded from a national championship tournament in my opinion. We are not trying to determine which conference is the best, but which team is worthy of being crowned as the best.

One of the problems with the BCS system as well as the linked proposal is the emphasis of going undefeated. Western Michigan is undefeated and will likely remain that way to qualify for the playoffs in this scenario. The best team they've defeated this year is 4-4 Northwestern by 1 on the road. The idea they belong in the playoffs is a stretch because I'm not convinced they are better than 6-1 Troy whose only loss was by 6 points at #3 Clemson. An 8-team playoff at this point would include at least one team that does not deserve to be there because they either played a schedule easier than some who are excluded or you begin to add second and third place finishers in a stronger conference.

 

[RUfinal4]

Just go with the 28 team playoff :)

http://www.printyourbrackets.com/pdfbrackets/28-team-single-portrait-seeded.pdf

Top 4 conference champions get a 1st round bye.
1st round - Dec 10 (28 schools alive and played on campus)
2nd round - Dec 17 (16 schools alive and played on campus)
quarterfinals - Dec 24 weekend (8 teams alive and played in bowl sites)
semifinals - Jan 1 (4 teams alive and played in bowl sites)
Championship - Jan 9 at bowl site

Losers of 1st round get bowl games
4 select losers from Dec 17th get bowl games

 

[sherrane]

Hate this "every game matters" argument.

No, not every game matters. Ohio State still controls it's own destiny despite losing Saturday. Just because they are Ohio State.

There is no true "every game matters" scenario unless only undefeated teams make the playoff. This format is as close to that as I've seen.

Ohio State's schedule is the reason they still control their playoff destiny. There are currently 5 undefeated teams: Alabama, Clemson, Michigan, Washington, and Western Michigan. I'm pretty confident there won't be anyone who would disagree with dropping Western Michigan from the list of potential playoff teams. The Big 12 may have been eliminated by Ohio State after they defeated Oklahoma (5-0 in the conference with 6-0 likely after Thursday night's game against Iowa State). They also defeated Wisconsin (whose only losses are to Ohio State and Michigan). They play Nebraska this week (who lost to Wisconsin) and will have to defeat currently undefeated Michigan to get to the B1G Championship Game.

Examine the Big 12. 6-2 Oklahoma (5-0) has lost to now unranked Houston and #6 Ohio State and their best win is currently against 5-3 Kansas State. 6-1 Baylor (3-1) has played nobody and lost to now 4-4 Texas. 6-1 West Virginia (3-1) has played nobody and lost to Oklahoma State. 6-2 Oklahoma State (3-1) has played nobody and lost to Central Michigan and Baylor.

Just because Ohio State lost to Penn State doesn't mean the game didn't matter. Baylor could have finished the season undefeated and threatened a 12-1 Ohio State's chances to make the playoffs. There would be plenty of people screaming how the difficulty of their schedule should allow us to overlook their poor performance. The reason they could get a mulligan is because the Big 12 has allowed it.

 

[sherrane]

That argument doesn't fly. The NFL has had the current playoff format since 2002. If what you say is true, then the ratings should have gone down years ago.



Yes I can. Wisconsin vs. Purdue doesn't matter. Pitt vs. Virginia Tech doesn't matter. UCLA vs. Oregon St doesn't matter. Georgia vs. Kentucky doesn't matter. Texas vs. Kansas St. doesn't matter. The games only matter for a handful of teams (like 5 or 6). The reason the NFL has been so successful over the years is that so many teams have a realistic shot at making the playoffs. In college football, 90% of the teams have been eliminated from national championship contention after the first few weeks.



No they wouldn't. Even in the poll era, half the time the national champion had a loss.

Major fail right there. Wisconsin has lost to Ohio State and Michigan while beating Nebraska and LSU. If Ohio State defeats Nebraska this week and Wisconsin wins out, they will likely play Michigan or Ohio State in the B1G Championship Game. Considering the Big 12 failed to schedule anyone with a pulse this year and their current leader lost to the only teams with a pulse the conference has scheduled (Houston and Ohio State), Wisconsin makes the playoffs if they win out. Therefore, Wisconsin vs Purdue matters unless Wisconsin loses it (which means it mattered).

 

[RUfinal4]

Major fail right there. Wisconsin has lost to Ohio State and Michigan while beating Nebraska and LSU. If Ohio State defeats Nebraska this week and Wisconsin wins out, they will likely play Michigan or Ohio State in the B1G Championship Game. Considering the Big 12 failed to schedule anyone with a pulse this year and their current leader lost to the only teams with a pulse the conference has scheduled (Houston and Ohio State), Wisconsin makes the playoffs if they win out. Therefore, Wisconsin vs Purdue matters unless Wisconsin loses it (which means it mattered).

This just shows that a bigger playoff is needed.

8 is a good number while 12 or 16 may even be better.

In college sports teams are rewarded for not losing even if they play cupcakes.In college basketball we get this every year where a team like Wichita St or Stephen F Austin ends up 30-5 with an undefeated conference schedule. Boise St in football has had this a few times where they ran the table in conference while they had out of conference matchups against teams not in the top 25. We even did this type of scheduling after 2006 where 3 of our 4 OOC games were very winnable to try and guarantee 6 wins and a bowl bid.

With a 9 game conference schedule it is tougher for the B10 or B12. I guess Rutgers can schedule Army, New mexico type team, and Fla Atlantic / UMass to guarantee 3 wins and hope to win 3 conference games.

Back when the Big East was 7 conference games we had to schedule 5 games. In 2011 our OOC schedule was: NC central, Ohio, Navy, Army, and UNC where we went 4 and 1.

 

[ivan brunetti]

If this was the NFL, then the solution would be to move to a 16 team playoff. Fortunately or unfortunately (depending on one's view), that won't be happening in the foreseeable future.

The NFL has strong central control of a small league and all the teams receive an EQUAL share of TV money. College ball is four times as large and some teams (SEC & Big Ten) receive maybe 40x TV money as some G5 teams. Some teams make up to $5 million per home game (Alabama, Ohio State etc), while others are lucky to make $100,000. There is no strong central control in college. Just a bunch of loosely connected fiefdoms.
In the NFL the players are well compensated and negotiate just how many games they have to play. College players are not paid and they have no say in how many games they have to endure. College fans usually want a longer season and longer playoff, but the players do not share that desire. And the college ADs do not want to risk pushing the players towards more of a professional model which might lead to the end of amateurism.

To sum up, in looking at the future of college football, you need to think more like an AD or college president and less like a college football junkie fan. I could see four conferences (SEC, Big Ten, ACC & PAC) splitting off to form a separate division. Divisions champs then advance to a simple four team playoff. Everyone understands the rules, everyone knows what has to be done to move on. Most of the TV money would be split between fewer schools. Those left behind would be free to set up their own playoff if they wanted. The left behind schools would squawk but they really can't stop this from happening.

 

[robcac26]

When you say that the entire playoff field is decided on the field by your conference championship methodology in a fair manner, you are incorrect.

FBS Football is very different from the NFL. There are 10 FBS Conferences. You can't just eliminate 6 of those conferences and there isn't enough conference parity to eliminate 2 to get 8 equal conference champions.

There are 4 FBS independents. You can't just eliminate those independents or force them to join an FBS Conference.

Division tiebreaker rules aren't decided on the field.

There are many FBS OOC games. You can't just eliminate the results of those games from the resumes of potential national playoff teams. OOC games are important too.

If ACC team #1 wins 6 ACC Conference games, their division and their ACC Championship game and loses 4 OOC games finishing their regular season with 6 losses, are they more deserving of a national title playoff bid than an SEC West team #2 that lost their conference opener by 1 point to division rival SEC team #1 and finished their season with 1 loss ?

All regular season games that are played on the field need to be considered, if you want the national title to be determined on the field.

How does my proposal eliminate conferences? If you give a playoff spot to the G5 champion, every team in every conference has a chance to contend for the national championship. Why can't you force the independents to join a conference? In what other sport can a team say they don't want to be part of any division or conference? I'm sure they won't be happy about it, but oh well, we are making a sensible playoff format and you're either in or out.

How are division tiebreakers not decided on the field? The rules are established before any games begin, and if it seems a tiebreaker will be necessary, the teams go into their last game knowing what they need to do to win the tiebreaker. Ties are usually broken based on which team beat the other when they met head to head, so I'm not sure how you can say tiebreakers aren't decided on the field. Yeah the criteria (which is clearly laid out for them rather than one team simply being hand-chosen by a committee) isn't decided on the field, but who beats the other based on that criteria always is decided on the field in a quantifiable manner. That's like saying the rules of the game aren't decided on the field.

The OOC games would still matter for potential national playoff teams because there would have to still be some sort of final poll to determine the rankings in order to determine who goes straight to the semifinals and who needs to win a play-in game. It will also set who plays who.

As for your last paragraph, yes, ACC #1 deserves to be there more than SEC #2 because the ACC team won their conference and SEC #2 didn't. The game that SEC #2 lost essentially was a playoff game for them. They already lost a key game, why should they get another chance?

EDIT: At the end of the day, it seems we just have different opinions on what the playoff should be. You think it should be the best eight teams in the country, which I think sounds reasonable except that with so many teams and so little games, it is too difficult to accurately determine who those eight teams should be without subjectively choosing one team over another. I say that the playoff should be something that you qualify for with indisputable quantifiable results, such as winning your conference. You may be better than a team that is there, but if you don't get there, it is because you either lost your conference championship game or you lost a key game at some point in the season that cost you a spot in your championship game. Even if Michigan and Ohio State are the two best teams in the Big Ten, one of them will not be playing in the championship game since they are in the same division, and there will be a team playing in that game that isn't as good as they are. Oh well, that is how playoffs works.

 

[WhiteBus]

Nothing is going to change until 2027 at the earliest. I don't know why you folks keep bringing this up with 10 more years left on the contract. Where the presidents and ESPN have zero desire to change things even if the contract allowed them to do so. And it does not.

 

[sherrane]

Major fail right there. Wisconsin has lost to Ohio State and Michigan while beating Nebraska and LSU. If Ohio State defeats Nebraska this week and Wisconsin wins out, they will likely play Michigan or Ohio State in the B1G Championship Game. Considering the Big 12 failed to schedule anyone with a pulse this year and their current leader lost to the only teams with a pulse the conference has scheduled (Houston and Ohio State), Wisconsin makes the playoffs if they win out. Therefore, Wisconsin vs Purdue matters unless Wisconsin loses it (which means it mattered).

This just shows that a bigger playoff is needed.

8 is a good number while 12 or 16 may even be better.

In college sports teams are rewarded for not losing even if they play cupcakes. In college basketball we get this every year where a team like Wichita St or Stephen F Austin ends up 30-5 with an undefeated conference schedule. Boise St in football has had this a few times where they ran the table in conference while they had out of conference matchups against teams not in the top 25. We even did this type of scheduling after 2006 where 3 of our 4 OOC games were very winnable to try and guarantee 6 wins and a bowl bid.

With a 9 game conference schedule it is tougher for the B10 or B12. I guess Rutgers can schedule Army, New mexico type team, and Fla Atlantic / UMass to guarantee 3 wins and hope to win 3 conference games.

Back when the Big East was 7 conference games we had to schedule 5 games. In 2011 our OOC schedule was: NC central, Ohio, Navy, Army, and UNC where we went 4 and 1.

Examine the bold statement in each of our replies.

Wisconsin, if they win out and Ohio State beats Nebraska, will make the playoffs because they beat previously undefeated Nebraska and LSU while losing to Ohio State and Michigan and then beating either (or Penn State) in the B1G Championship Game. Take a look at the Big 12 schedules and Oklahoma is the only team in contention to schedule a ranked team OOC (Houston and Ohio State). This is the reason why expanding the playoffs to 8 teams will not make the regular nor the post season better. The FAIL would be if a 1-loss Baylor (Northwestern State, SMU, Rice) or 1-loss West Virginia (Missouri, Youngstown State, BYU) makes the playoffs over a 2-loss Wisconsin. Expanding the playoffs to include wildcard teams would likely result in the watering down of the regular season as being a 1 or 2 loss runner up in a P5 conference gives you a chance to get in.

As a former "schedule tard", I agree that RU's OOC schedule had much to be desired.

 

[sherrane]

If this was the NFL, then the solution would be to move to a 16 team playoff. Fortunately or unfortunately (depending on one's view), that won't be happening in the foreseeable future.

I disagree. If this was the NFL we would have a 32-team or 48-team (with the top 16 getting a first week bye) playoff tournament.

 

[robcac26]

Nothing is going to change until 2027 at the earliest. I don't know why you folks keep bringing this up with 10 more years left on the contract. Where the presidents and ESPN have zero desire to change things even if the contract allowed them to do so. And it does not.

It's just a fun discussion to have, none of us are going to be sending a proposal to the NCAA or anything like that.

 

[WhiteBus]

It's just a fun discussion to have, none of us are going to be sending a proposal to the NCAA or anything like that.

You mean reasonable people on here won't be sending proposals. PSUPOWER and a few others are demanding changes ASAP. [winking]

 

[PSUPOWER]

How does my proposal eliminate conferences? If you give a playoff spot to the G5 champion, every team in every conference has a chance to contend for the national championship. Why can't you force the independents to join a conference? In what other sport can a team say they don't want to be part of any division or conference? I'm sure they won't be happy about it, but oh well, we are making a sensible playoff format and you're either in or out.

How are division tiebreakers not decided on the field? The rules are established before any games begin, and if it seems a tiebreaker will be necessary, the teams go into their last game knowing what they need to do to win the tiebreaker. Ties are usually broken based on which team beat the other when they met head to head, so I'm not sure how you can say tiebreakers aren't decided on the field. Yeah the criteria (which is clearly laid out for them rather than one team simply being hand-chosen by a committee) isn't decided on the field, but who beats the other based on that criteria always is decided on the field in a quantifiable manner. That's like saying the rules of the game aren't decided on the field.

The OOC games would still matter for potential national playoff teams because there would have to still be some sort of final poll to determine the rankings in order to determine who goes straight to the semifinals and who needs to win a play-in game. It will also set who plays who.

As for your last paragraph, yes, ACC #1 deserves to be there more than SEC #2 because the ACC team won their conference and SEC #2 didn't. The game that SEC #2 lost essentially was a playoff game for them. They already lost a key game, why should they get another chance?

EDIT: At the end of the day, it seems we just have different opinions on what the playoff should be. You think it should be the best eight teams in the country, which I think sounds reasonable except that with so many teams and so little games, it is too difficult to accurately determine who those eight teams should be without subjectively choosing one team over another. I say that the playoff should be something that you qualify for with indisputable quantifiable results, such as winning your conference. You may be better than a team that is there, but if you don't get there, it is because you either lost your conference championship game or you lost a key game at some point in the season that cost you a spot in your championship game. Even if Michigan and Ohio State are the two best teams in the Big Ten, one of them will not be playing in the championship game since they are in the same division, and there will be a team playing in that game that isn't as good as they are. Oh well, that is how playoffs works.

You seem to be trying to change the FBS landscape to setup the playoff system that you want whereas I am trying to improve upon the playoff system that we have with the existing FBS landscape.

If the top 64 FBS teams were used to create 4 relatively equal 16-team conferences and each of those 64 teams played 12 conference games a year then an FBS playoff system that is based solely on conference winners would make sense. But, that isn’t what we have.

Your G5 champion would have to play too many games to win a national title in your 5 Power 5 conference winners & G5 champion 6-team FBS playoff system scenario.

Division tiebreakers are decided by a committee before any games begin and when there are 3-way or 4-way division ties they frequently don’t favor the best of the 3 or 4 teams.
When they don’t favor the best of those 3 or 4 teams then the fortunate undeserving team gets to go play in the conference championship to possibly earn a national title playoff system slot. Is that fair to the more deserving teams ?

I’m for getting the best 8 teams in a playoff so that from that point on the National Title is decided on the field. A true National Championship playoff system that is decided on the field.

You seem to want to use a poll to determine who gets a bye and who doesn’t from your 5 Power 5 conference winners and G5 champion, which puts way too much power in the hands of a committee of voters at a point when everything should have been turned over to a simple playoff system on the field. Do you realize how much of an advantage it is to get a bye in a relatively quick playoff ?

In the current FBS landscape, if ACC team #1 wins 6 ACC conference games, their division and their ACC Championship game and loses 4 OOC games finishing their regular season with 6 losses, they are a 7-6 team at the end of the regular season.

In the current FBS landscape, if SEC West team #2 loses their conference opener by 1 point to division rival SEC team #1 and finishes their season with 1 loss, they are an 11-1 team.

The fact that you would rather see the 7-6 ACC team in the playoffs instead of the 11-1 SEC team proves that your proposed system is flawed.

All regular season games are important. Your system doesn’t consider the importance of OOC games enough. By focusing on just conference games in the current FBS landscape all you are really doing is shrinking an already small sample size of games currently used to determine a true national champion even further.

Let’s get the best 8 teams in a playoff and see who wins a true national championship that is settled on the field for a change. It will make a lot of money and it is the right thing to do.

 

[robcac26]

You seem to be trying to change the FBS landscape to setup the playoff system that you want whereas I am trying to improve upon the playoff system that we have with the existing FBS landscape.

If the top 64 FBS teams were used to create 4 relatively equal 16-team conferences and each of those 64 teams played 12 conference games a year then an FBS playoff system that is based solely on conference winners would make sense. But, that isn’t what we have.

Your G5 champion would have to play too many games to win a national title in your 5 Power 5 conference winners & G5 champion 6-team FBS playoff system scenario.

Division tiebreakers are decided by a committee before any games begin and when there are 3-way or 4-way division ties they frequently don’t favor the best of the 3 or 4 teams.
When they don’t favor the best of those 3 or 4 teams then the fortunate undeserving team gets to go play in the conference championship to possibly earn a national title playoff system slot. Is that fair to the more deserving teams ?

I’m for getting the best 8 teams in a playoff so that from that point on the National Title is decided on the field. A true National Championship playoff system that is decided on the field.

You seem to want to use a poll to determine who gets a bye and who doesn’t from your 5 Power 5 conference winners and G5 champion, which puts way too much power in the hands of a committee of voters at a point when everything should have been turned over to a simple playoff system on the field. Do you realize how much of an advantage it is to get a bye in a relatively quick playoff ?

In the current FBS landscape, if ACC team #1 wins 6 ACC conference games, their division and their ACC Championship game and loses 4 OOC games finishing their regular season with 6 losses, they are a 7-6 team at the end of the regular season.

In the current FBS landscape, if SEC West team #2 loses their conference opener by 1 point to division rival SEC team #1 and finishes their season with 1 loss, they are an 11-1 team.

The fact that you would rather see the 7-6 ACC team in the playoffs instead of the 11-1 SEC team proves that your proposed system is flawed.

All regular season games are important. Your system doesn’t consider the importance of OOC games enough. By focusing on just conference games in the current FBS landscape all you are really doing is shrinking an already small sample size of games currently used to determine a true national champion even further.

Let’s get the best 8 teams in a playoff and see who wins a true national championship on the field.

Well, we are never going to agree on this. At the end of the day, my issue is that your opinion of the eight best teams might not be the same as someone else's, and I don't like that someone's season can continue or end based on a committee decision. Of course it is an advantage to have a bye, that's the reward for being ranked higher. However, this isn't nearly as much decided by a committee as allowing the committee to pick which teams are in and which are out.

 

[PSUPOWER]

Well, we are never going to agree on this. At the end of the day, my issue is that your opinion of the eight best teams might not be the same as someone else's, and I don't like that someone's season can continue or end based on a committee decision. Of course it is an advantage to have a bye, that's the reward for being ranked higher. However, this isn't nearly as much decided by a committee as allowing the committee to pick which teams are in and which are out.

Nice debate though. Good typing to you. I hope that we don't have another 2014 TCU or 2015 Ohio State this year. Take care.

 

[topdecktiger]

Major fail right there. Wisconsin has lost to Ohio State and Michigan while beating Nebraska and LSU. If Ohio State defeats Nebraska this week and Wisconsin wins out, they will likely play Michigan or Ohio State in the B1G Championship Game. Considering the Big 12 failed to schedule anyone with a pulse this year and their current leader lost to the only teams with a pulse the conference has scheduled (Houston and Ohio State), Wisconsin makes the playoffs if they win out. Therefore, Wisconsin vs Purdue matters unless Wisconsin loses it (which means it mattered).

It's not major fail. 2 loss teams aren't realistically making it into the playoffs, especially from what we've seen with the committee's rankings.

 

[robcac26]

Nice debate though. Good typing to you. I hope that we don't have another 2014 TCU or 2015 Ohio State this year. Take care.

Yep, both of our ideas have pros and cons, but I think both are better than the current format.