A workable 8 team playoff?

I am in favor of a 12 team playoff.

5-12
6-11
7-10
8-9
Hosted by higher seed

Winners play @1-4

Semis and national championship as they are now.




10 conference champions get auto bids.
2 at larges.

Committee picks seeding and the two at larges.
At larges seeded 5th at highest.


I like this setup for a number of reasons. Every conference game has national implications all year.
Never a debate about whether or not a team like UCF gets a chance. Go win 4 games and you are champs.


The real reasons I like it are:
Avoids subjectivity of the teams in playoff. Just 1/6 of the field is determined by people’s opinions.
The even bigger one is that it creates an incentive for smaller regional conferences that make football more fun. Texas and Oklahoma would never be added to any conference because it would hurt both of their national title hopes as well as every team in the conference they are joining. In fact, the real reason for superconferences is more games. You can get more games by two conferences partnering (think ACC Big Ten challenge for hoops) rather than combining. At the same time, it never creates an incentive to avoid scheduling tough games early in the year because all conference champions go.

Fundamentally I like that. The only issue I have with automatic bids for conference champions is it promotes breaking up the conferences to form smaller conferences so that your team has a better chance to make the tourney. That's what's been happening to the NCAA B-Ball tourney for years. They kept adding automatic bids and that finally pushed the 64 teams to 68. If there ends up being 13 conferences (not completely unreasonable, makes roughly 10 team conferences), then you have to expand.
 

I'm not for anything that would give all Group of 5 conferences a bid into the playoff. It's just unnecessary. Teams like Florida Atlantic and Toledo had their chances against Power 5 teams and both got beat pretty good. Even Kiffin laughed it off when someone asked him about the FAU fans chanting "We Want Bama". If we must expand just let in the top ranked Group of 5 champ. With the limited number of games in football it is just unnecessary to let all of them in. Plus it just seems silly to let in Toledo over a Penn State or Miami just because we want to make Group of 5 conferences feel good.

And I have no problem with the committee deciding it. I think they've gotten it right every year. IMO even the BCS got it right every year. I don't see the need to change something that is working.
 

Fundamentally I like that. The only issue I have with automatic bids for conference champions is it promotes breaking up the conferences to form smaller conferences so that your team has a better chance to make the tourney. That's what's been happening to the NCAA B-Ball tourney for years. They kept adding automatic bids and that finally pushed the 64 teams to 68. If there ends up being 13 conferences (not completely unreasonable, makes roughly 10 team conferences), then you have to expand.

If you don’t like small conferences than this option is not for you.

In order to get an Auto Bid your conference needs to be recognized as a conference by the committee.

I’d actually love to see a 16 team playoff with 13 conference of 10 schools in each conference. Could get back to the old big ten. Could actually play schools I like seeing often. That’ll never happen due to tv contracts. I am in favor of smaller conferenxes. The old 9-School ACC was awesome. The Big 8 was awesome. The Big T1E1N was awesome. The big Ten was awesome. The pac 10 was awesome. The old mountain west with Utah was fun. The years it had TCU and Boise were fun.

I like smaller conferences and conferences getting bids because it means more games are more important for more teams.
 

I'm not for anything that would give all Group of 5 conferences a bid into the playoff. It's just unnecessary. Teams like Florida Atlantic and Toledo had their chances against Power 5 teams and both got beat pretty good. Even Kiffin laughed it off when someone asked him about the FAU fans chanting "We Want Bama". If we must expand just let in the top ranked Group of 5 champ. With the limited number of games in football it is just unnecessary to let all of them in. Plus it just seems silly to let in Toledo over a Penn State or Miami just because we want to make Group of 5 conferences feel good.

And I have no problem with the committee deciding it. I think they've gotten it right every year. IMO even the BCS got it right every year. I don't see the need to change something that is working.

I get that. I’d rather see Toledo or Florida Atlantic play a game that hasn’t been played yet.
I like watching UCF vs Memphis.
I like watching Troy vs LSU.
I like watching Air Force vs Colorado State.
 

I get that. I’d rather see Toledo or Florida Atlantic play a game that hasn’t been played yet.
I like watching UCF vs Memphis.
I like watching Troy vs LSU.
I like watching Air Force vs Colorado State.

I like watching them too. I just think determining national championship contenders and watching a game for enjoyment are not the same thing. If the goal is to crown the best team as the national champion then I don't think the path to doing that is to create as many games as possible. If the goal is strictly entertainment, then heck yeah, let's play a 64 team tournament running all the way through February.
 


I like watching them too. I just think determining national championship contenders and watching a game for enjoyment are not the same thing. If the goal is to crown the best team as the national champion then I don't think the path to doing that is to create as many games as possible. If the goal is strictly entertainment, then heck yeah, let's play a 64 team tournament running all the way through February.

What is "the best" team? Is one team "the best" team every week of the season, every quarter of each game? No way.

Was Clemson "the best" team when they lost to Syracuse?
Oklahoma when they lost to Iowa State?
Was Iowa State "the best" team during a 4 week stretch when they backed up their Oklahoma road win by routing Kansas, then Texas Tech, and then giving #4 TCU their 1st loss of the season?
Penn State when they routed Michigan to get to 7-0?
How about Miami (Fla.) when they smoked #3 Notre Dame 41-8 to get to 9-0?
Leach's Washington State Cougars after they beat #5 USC, then won at Oregon the next week to go to 6-0 (6-0 also included a win against a good Boise State team in their season opener.)?
Was Alabama "the best" when they squeaked by a pretty average Mississippi State team in the final seconds?
Maybe a 2 loss Auburn team was "the best" when they smoked #1 and undefeated Georgia and then backed that up by handling #1 and undefeated Alabama 2 weeks later?

You could argue that all of those teams mentioned were "the best" team at that moment. Yeah, Iowa State sounds preposterous. I mean, it's IOWA STATE. But, that was one heck of an impressive stretch! The point is, there is no "the best" team from Day 1 of the season to the final poll. No team is "the best" team every week. Some teams look like "the best" team a lot of weeks. I would say Auburn looked like "the best" team, or potentially the team playing the best, before they lost to Georgia in the SEC Championship by 21 points. After that loss most people wouldn't consider them to be playing the best or looking like "the best" team. Go figure. It constantly changes.

Let's take the Clemson loss at Syracuse and add some hypothetical stuff to give another angle. Their QB was hurt if I remember correctly when they lost to Syracuse. What if Clemson had all sorts of injuries to start the year and lost to Auburn and at Louisville as well? However, following the Syracuse loss, they got everyone back and won out including crushing Miami (Fla.), like they did, in the ACC Championship game. They would be playing as well as they are in reality but would have 3 losses on their resume. The team that is #1 in the College Playoff this year wouldn't be playing in the playoff because of 3 losses due to injuries earlier in the year. People could argue that they are playing the best right now and could compete with "the best", but, sorry, they lost 3 games when the team was decimated with injuries. They're out. Even though the won the Atlantic Division and crushed Miami (Fla.) in the ACC Championship game.

What if Baker Mayfield wins the Heisman and decides to sit out the playoff so he doesn't risk injury and his draft position? Nothing indicates that he is going to do that but if he did Oklahoma probably would not be looking like what some would argue is "the best" team going into the playoff.

Infinite scenarios throughout the year influence our perception of who is "the best" even though in many cases it will never be definitively known.

We will know WHO wins the 4 team playoff after the games are played. That's about it. We'll know who won it. Maybe a month from now Auburn will beat UCF by 75 points and a lot of people will think they are "the best" again. They arguably would be...for that day.

So, instead of SUBJECTIVELY (It is 100% subjective the way these teams are picked.) picking teams that "are the best" to play in a 4 team tournament, lets give the champions of all the conferences a chance to play in one tournament to see who wins. That is all it will do. Entertain us and and let us watch and see who wins. Just like the 4 team playoff is going to do in a smaller, less inclusive, totally subjective way. The very important difference is that 15 of the 16 teams in my proposal, will be chosen using HARD OBJECTIVE criteria. Win your Division if you are from a Power 5 conference. Win your Conference Championship if you are Group of 5. Only one of the teams will be a subjective at large choice of the committee. It gives them one instance to handle a situation like Alabama or Notre Dame ($$). The tournament would likely include a great majority of very good teams from the 'Power 5 conferences', and would CERTAINLY include the 'Group of 5' teams that won their respective conferences.

"Upsets" may happen. Syracuse-like, Iowa State-like, and Washington State-like results may happen. Or, put another way, teams that everyone didn't think were "the best" would be "the best" for a game, or two, or three, or four (!!) and it would be a ton of fun to watch. Of course, maybe all of the top seeds would "hold serve" all throughout the tournament. That would be fun to watch as well because it is likely that at least some of them would be severely tested along the way. Sometimes by teams no one would have ever dreamed would test them. In the end, no matter what happened along the way, someone would eventually win it. Making them "the best" against their opponents for 4 straight games. Just like Iowa State was this year...
 

This seems entirely reasonable and workable to me. By ditching the conference championships, you don't even add any more games.

https://sports.yahoo.com/heres-make-college-football-playoff-even-better-032144320.html

Thoughts?
My eight team:
Round 1 four NYD bowls with traditional P5 tie ins. At large teams are selected by committee (SEC 2,3,4?) and matched to the open slots based on seeding, but Big Ten always plays Pac 12 whether they are the 1 & 2 seeds or 7 & 8 seeds.
Round 2 semifinals are played at neutral sites, survivors' round 1 seeds dictate pairings.
Round 3 at predetermined neutral site
 

What is "the best" team? Is one team "the best" team every week of the season, every quarter of each game? No way.

Was Clemson "the best" team when they lost to Syracuse?
Oklahoma when they lost to Iowa State?
Was Iowa State "the best" team during a 4 week stretch when they backed up their Oklahoma road win by routing Kansas, then Texas Tech, and then giving #4 TCU their 1st loss of the season?
Penn State when they routed Michigan to get to 7-0?
How about Miami (Fla.) when they smoked #3 Notre Dame 41-8 to get to 9-0?
Leach's Washington State Cougars after they beat #5 USC, then won at Oregon the next week to go to 6-0 (6-0 also included a win against a good Boise State team in their season opener.)?
Was Alabama "the best" when they squeaked by a pretty average Mississippi State team in the final seconds?
Maybe a 2 loss Auburn team was "the best" when they smoked #1 and undefeated Georgia and then backed that up by handling #1 and undefeated Alabama 2 weeks later?

You could argue that all of those teams mentioned were "the best" team at that moment. Yeah, Iowa State sounds preposterous. I mean, it's IOWA STATE. But, that was one heck of an impressive stretch! The point is, there is no "the best" team from Day 1 of the season to the final poll. No team is "the best" team every week. Some teams look like "the best" team a lot of weeks. I would say Auburn looked like "the best" team, or potentially the team playing the best, before they lost to Georgia in the SEC Championship by 21 points. After that loss most people wouldn't consider them to be playing the best or looking like "the best" team. Go figure. It constantly changes.

Let's take the Clemson loss at Syracuse and add some hypothetical stuff to give another angle. Their QB was hurt if I remember correctly when they lost to Syracuse. What if Clemson had all sorts of injuries to start the year and lost to Auburn and at Louisville as well? However, following the Syracuse loss, they got everyone back and won out including crushing Miami (Fla.), like they did, in the ACC Championship game. They would be playing as well as they are in reality but would have 3 losses on their resume. The team that is #1 in the College Playoff this year wouldn't be playing in the playoff because of 3 losses due to injuries earlier in the year. People could argue that they are playing the best right now and could compete with "the best", but, sorry, they lost 3 games when the team was decimated with injuries. They're out. Even though the won the Atlantic Division and crushed Miami (Fla.) in the ACC Championship game.

What if Baker Mayfield wins the Heisman and decides to sit out the playoff so he doesn't risk injury and his draft position? Nothing indicates that he is going to do that but if he did Oklahoma probably would not be looking like what some would argue is "the best" team going into the playoff.

Infinite scenarios throughout the year influence our perception of who is "the best" even though in many cases it will never be definitively known.

We will know WHO wins the 4 team playoff after the games are played. That's about it. We'll know who won it. Maybe a month from now Auburn will beat UCF by 75 points and a lot of people will think they are "the best" again. They arguably would be...for that day.

So, instead of SUBJECTIVELY (It is 100% subjective the way these teams are picked.) picking teams that "are the best" to play in a 4 team tournament, lets give the champions of all the conferences a chance to play in one tournament to see who wins. That is all it will do. Entertain us and and let us watch and see who wins. Just like the 4 team playoff is going to do in a smaller, less inclusive, totally subjective way. The very important difference is that 15 of the 16 teams in my proposal, will be chosen using HARD OBJECTIVE criteria. Win your Division if you are from a Power 5 conference. Win your Conference Championship if you are Group of 5. Only one of the teams will be a subjective at large choice of the committee. It gives them one instance to handle a situation like Alabama or Notre Dame ($$). The tournament would likely include a great majority of very good teams from the 'Power 5 conferences', and would CERTAINLY include the 'Group of 5' teams that won their respective conferences.

"Upsets" may happen. Syracuse-like, Iowa State-like, and Washington State-like results may happen. Or, put another way, teams that everyone didn't think were "the best" would be "the best" for a game, or two, or three, or four (!!) and it would be a ton of fun to watch. Of course, maybe all of the top seeds would "hold serve" all throughout the tournament. That would be fun to watch as well because it is likely that at least some of them would be severely tested along the way. Sometimes by teams no one would have ever dreamed would test them. In the end, no matter what happened along the way, someone would eventually win it. Making them "the best" against their opponents for 4 straight games. Just like Iowa State was this year...

You pretty much made my argument for me, but I'll augment it.

1. Injuries are already taken into account. That's why it is good to have people making the decisions and not computers.
2. Teams that lose a couple games early on can still win their conference. I've said all along that I could probably be convinced that an 8 team tournament with all the Power 5 champs getting automatic bids would work.
3. Iowa State is a great example. They might have been the best team over a four game stretch there, but that is why the regular season is 12 games and not four. Flaws can be masked for a game or two or three, but eventually they show. That's why the committee doesn't do any rankings until 2/3 of the way through the season.
4. Sure, no one can really say with 100% certainty who the best team is after the regular season or the playoff. Adding more teams to a playoff doesn't solve this.
5. I have never disputed that a large playoff would be fun to watch. I'm simply saying "fun to watch" and "best way to crown a champion" are not the same thing. Of course upsets are fun. Everyone loves to see the underdog win.
6. Objective doesn't mean equal. Winning the SEC West or B1G East is a lot more difficult than winning the B1G West or ACC Coastal. Subjectivity is absolutely necessary. And those subjective measures have been getting it right so why change?
 

I'm not for anything that would give all Group of 5 conferences a bid into the playoff. It's just unnecessary. Teams like Florida Atlantic and Toledo had their chances against Power 5 teams and both got beat pretty good. Even Kiffin laughed it off when someone asked him about the FAU fans chanting "We Want Bama". If we must expand just let in the top ranked Group of 5 champ. With the limited number of games in football it is just unnecessary to let all of them in. Plus it just seems silly to let in Toledo over a Penn State or Miami just because we want to make Group of 5 conferences feel good.

And I have no problem with the committee deciding it. I think they've gotten it right every year. IMO even the BCS got it right every year. I don't see the need to change something that is working.

The Buckeyes wouldn’t have sniffed the Championship if the BCS was still around. The problem with college football back in the BCS era and still today is a cohort of fans and commentators still want to decide the best team based on a very limited sample size of games. That, and reputation.

I would argue some very good teams have been left out every year. I don’t trust the “resume” process because it is inherently flawed in college football (or any level of football”. Play the games on the field.
 



The Buckeyes wouldn’t have sniffed the Championship if the BCS was still around. The problem with college football back in the BCS era and still today is a cohort of fans and commentators still want to decide the best team based on a very limited sample size of games. That, and reputation.

I would argue some very good teams have been left out every year. I don’t trust the “resume” process because it is inherently flawed in college football (or any level of football”. Play the games on the field.

It's certainly not perfect, but letting Clemson beat the snot out of FAU in a 16 team playoff doesn't solve anything. And I don't think it would be particularly entertaining either. You might get one G5 champ who puts the pieces together and has a good game or even wins against a Power 5 team in one game. But I think you'd get more blowouts than close games if you let in all G5 champs.

I've said all along I could live with going to 8. If they take all the P5 champs, the top-ranked G5 champ, and two at-larges I think that is plenty. If a team still can't get in with 8 teams making it then they just aren't a serious national title contender and don't deserve a shot. TCU, Stanford, Miami, Toledo, Boise St, etc. are all good teams. But they had their chances and it has been shown that they aren't legitimate national title contenders.

To me the key is still scheduling. Mandate that any P5 team must play 10 games against other P5s to be eligible for the playoff. Every P5 should play at least one game against a G5 too. There will always be sample size issues in football, but if the schedules are more balanced then at least we'd have a more even playing field in terms of evaluating teams.
 

It's certainly not perfect, but letting Clemson beat the snot out of FAU in a 16 team playoff doesn't solve anything. And I don't think it would be particularly entertaining either. You might get one G5 champ who puts the pieces together and has a good game or even wins against a Power 5 team in one game. But I think you'd get more blowouts than close games if you let in all G5 champs.

I've said all along I could live with going to 8. If they take all the P5 champs, the top-ranked G5 champ, and two at-larges I think that is plenty. If a team still can't get in with 8 teams making it then they just aren't a serious national title contender and don't deserve a shot. TCU, Stanford, Miami, Toledo, Boise St, etc. are all good teams. But they had their chances and it has been shown that they aren't legitimate national title contenders.

To me the key is still scheduling. Mandate that any P5 team must play 10 games against other P5s to be eligible for the playoff. Every P5 should play at least one game against a G5 too. There will always be sample size issues in football, but if the schedules are more balanced then at least we'd have a more even playing field in terms of evaluating teams.

I agree with everything you say. However, I’ve seen enough listless performances from juggernauts over the years to justify an opportunity for a good G5 team to compete.

I’d argue for 6-8 teams. The how’s and the whys are debatable. These guys work their asses off-to deny an opportunity because a star was injured or sick, or a fluke play caused a loss seems harmful. I also love the rare Cinderella stories, and Goliath toppling even more.
 

I like watching them too. I just think determining national championship contenders and watching a game for enjoyment are not the same thing. If the goal is to crown the best team as the national champion then I don't think the path to doing that is to create as many games as possible. If the goal is strictly entertainment, then heck yeah, let's play a 64 team tournament running all the way through February.
Don’t want a 64 team playoff.

FAU is proven to not be the best team in the country this year.
UCF has not been proven to not be the best team. The only way to guarantee a team like UCF is ALWAYS guaranteed a shot is to give every conference champ a bid. It is possible for multiple G5 to be unbeaten. Those teams deserve a shot in my opinion rather than the third best team from the SEC like we have this year. If FAU isn’t the best team in the country, they’ll lose. They’ll hang a banner in their stadium and nobody will be worse off. In fact, guys are probably less likely to get injured in a blowout than in a close bowl game.
 

Don’t want a 64 team playoff.

FAU is proven to not be the best team in the country this year.
UCF has not been proven to not be the best team. The only way to guarantee a team like UCF is ALWAYS guaranteed a shot is to give every conference champ a bid. It is possible for multiple G5 to be unbeaten. Those teams deserve a shot in my opinion rather than the third best team from the SEC like we have this year. If FAU isn’t the best team in the country, they’ll lose. They’ll hang a banner in their stadium and nobody will be worse off. In fact, guys are probably less likely to get injured in a blowout than in a close bowl game.

Who said anything about injuries?

Instead of creating a 16 team playoff just so all G5 champs can get in (which is ridiculous) then just say any undefeated G5 team gets one of the at-large spots in an 8 team playoff if there is more than one undefeated G5. I'd also add in a qualifier than a G5 team has to play at least one P5 to be eligible, or something along those lines.

It's really rare for that to happen anyways. There have been maybe 3 G5 teams that went undefeated since college football went to a 12 game regular season plus a conference championship game. There have never been two undefeated G5 teams in the same year since then. Utah and Boise both went undefeated in the regular season in 2008. But neither played a conference championship game. And that was when Boise was playing in the WAC which was basically disbanded and sold off for parts a few years later.
 



Why might we create a system that forgives LSU for losing to Troy but wouldn’t forgive Troy for losing to LSU?
Why would we create a system that mandates playing a team that could refuse to play them?


In a 16 team playoff LSU would’ve been the first team left out yet Troy who beat them head to head AND had more wins would not even get consideration. Interesting. LSU is better because they are better I suppose we should just accept that.
 

Why might we create a system that forgives LSU for losing to Troy but wouldn’t forgive Troy for losing to LSU?
Why would we create a system that mandates playing a team that could refuse to play them?


In a 16 team playoff LSU would’ve been the first team left out yet Troy who beat them head to head AND had more wins would not even get consideration. Interesting. LSU is better because they are better I suppose we should just accept that.

I'm not advocating for 16 team playoff. You are. In my playoff LSU wouldn't be close to making it.

I'd mandate it for both sides. P5s have to play at least one G5 and G5s have to play at least one P5. Will you be able to get the exact one you want? Probably not. But you gotta find a dance partner.
 

I'm not advocating for 16 team playoff. You are. In my playoff LSU wouldn't be close to making it.

I'd mandate it for both sides. P5s have to play at least one G5 and G5s have to play at least one P5. Will you be able to get the exact one you want? Probably not. But you gotta find a dance partner.
NCAA doesn’t have the power to mandate non conference scheduling nor would any conference agree to it. Either you’d be mandating P5s to play home and homes with lower conferences or you’d be mandating g5 teams to play road games with no return games.

Both of these ideas are acceptable if the individual institution makes the decision. They would never let it be a mandate.
 

NCAA doesn’t have the power to mandate non conference scheduling nor would any conference agree to it. Either you’d be mandating P5s to play home and homes with lower conferences or you’d be mandating g5 teams to play road games with no return games.

Both of these ideas are acceptable if the individual institution makes the decision. They would never let it be a mandate.

The NCAA doesn't control the playoff so they wouldn't need to mandate anything. The CFP is the governing body in control. The members of the CFP are the ten conferences and Notre Dame. They can mandate it. I don't know how their voting system works, but I guarantee you that all 5 of the Group of 5 would vote for it and they'd only need one more vote for a majority. You are much more likely to get a majority on that than you would a proposal to give each G5 conference a spot in a playoff.

They wouldn't really even need to mandate it, because pretty much every P5 team already plays at least one G5. I'm not going to spend the time looking it up, but I bet at least 95% of P5 teams already play at least one G5 team.

The tougher one would be mandating that P5 teams play at least ten games against other P5 teams. Get that done and we're a little closer to balanced schedules which makes picking teams for the postseason easier.
 

The NCAA doesn't control the playoff so they wouldn't need to mandate anything. The CFP is the governing body in control. The members of the CFP are the ten conferences and Notre Dame. They can mandate it. I don't know how their voting system works, but I guarantee you that all 5 of the Group of 5 would vote for it and they'd only need one more vote for a majority. You are much more likely to get a majority on that than you would a proposal to give each G5 conference a spot in a playoff.

They wouldn't really even need to mandate it, because pretty much every P5 team already plays at least one G5. I'm not going to spend the time looking it up, but I bet at least 95% of P5 teams already play at least one G5 team.

The tougher one would be mandating that P5 teams play at least ten games against other P5 teams. Get that done and we're a little closer to balanced schedules which makes picking teams for the postseason easier.

If you think they are one vote away from mandating centralized control of scheduling requirements for all FBS football you’ve just outed yourself as having no knowledge at all
 

If you think they are one vote away from mandating centralized control of scheduling requirements for all FBS football you’ve just outed yourself as having no knowledge at all

Coming from the guy who wants all G5 champs in the playoff I'll take that as a compliment.

BTW The SEC, ACC, and Big 12 already mandate scheduling a P5 in nonconf. Big Ten already mandates a P5 and no FCS. They aren't making anyone cancel games that are already scheduled so it may take a few years for people to notice.

https://www.foxsports.com/south/sto...ength-of-schedule-requirement-for-2016-042714

https://www.usatoday.com/story/spor...nine-league-games-no-fcs-teams-2016/30938987/

http://m.sportsbusinessdaily.com/Daily/Issues/2015/12/09/Colleges/Big-12.aspx

https://www.si.com/college-football...cc-schedule-power-five-eight-conference-games
 

There are some very interesting ideas posted here. My ideal playoff would be 8 teams consisting of each of the Power 5 conference champions, plus the 3 best non-conference champions from the FBS. Independents would not get an automatic bid. How to select the remaining three teams is just as much a sticking point as it is now because it seems anytime humans are involved it turns into a combination of a money grab and personality contest. Maybe the fairest way would be to give three votes to each conference commissioner and annually rotate 3 votes to one of the independent schools' AD, with the stipulation they can only vote for one school in their conference, or group of independents. The voters won't meet or discuss, just use their knowledge, the different polls and any information available to them. Then the three schools with the most votes would be in the playoffs. If there happened to be a tie vote for the last spot, flip a coin or something. Also, make the votes public to help prevent any collusion.

There is certainly enough time for a 3 round playoff. Begin two weeks after the conference championships, and the playoff championship game can be when it is now. Maybe have the first round at the home field of the 4 highest ranked teams, and then play the last two rounds on a neutral field.
 

If five P champs get auto bids, it wouldn’t surprise me at all to see TV demand that the remaining three be all at-large. They want the highest ratings, and that’s all they care about.

Also zero chance that Notre Dame won’t continue to receive special treatment ... the Big Ten and SEC have an extremely vested interest in preventing ND from fully joining the ACC in football. That’s why both voted against the ACC plan to deregulate the championship games last year ... as that would’ve also made it easier for ND to join fully in football.
 

There are some very interesting ideas posted here. My ideal playoff would be 8 teams consisting of each of the Power 5 conference champions, plus the 3 best non-conference champions from the FBS. Independents would not get an automatic bid. How to select the remaining three teams is just as much a sticking point as it is now because it seems anytime humans are involved it turns into a combination of a money grab and personality contest. Maybe the fairest way would be to give three votes to each conference commissioner and annually rotate 3 votes to one of the independent schools' AD, with the stipulation they can only vote for one school in their conference, or group of independents. The voters won't meet or discuss, just use their knowledge, the different polls and any information available to them. Then the three schools with the most votes would be in the playoffs. If there happened to be a tie vote for the last spot, flip a coin or something. Also, make the votes public to help prevent any collusion.

There is certainly enough time for a 3 round playoff. Begin two weeks after the conference championships, and the playoff championship game can be when it is now. Maybe have the first round at the home field of the 4 highest ranked teams, and then play the last two rounds on a neutral field.

I think having the ADs throw footballs into a giant Dr. Pepper can would probably be more fair, equitable, and entertaining.
 

Coming from the guy who wants all G5 champs in the playoff I'll take that as a compliment.

BTW The SEC, ACC, and Big 12 already mandate scheduling a P5 in nonconf. Big Ten already mandates a P5 and no FCS. They aren't making anyone cancel games that are already scheduled so it may take a few years for people to notice.

https://www.foxsports.com/south/sto...ength-of-schedule-requirement-for-2016-042714

https://www.usatoday.com/story/spor...nine-league-games-no-fcs-teams-2016/30938987/

http://m.sportsbusinessdaily.com/Daily/Issues/2015/12/09/Colleges/Big-12.aspx

https://www.si.com/college-football...cc-schedule-power-five-eight-conference-games
Yeah I literally already said conferences and institutions could do it but that a CFP or NCAA couldn’t because the conferences wouldn’t want to lose their own power in regards to scheduling. So in your own argument against me you just proved my point by talking about how conferences are doing it individually
 

- 8 team playoff with each P5 conference champion (to be determined by the conference not by an external committee) plus 3 other teams (to be selected by a committee). The "3 other teams" cannot be a member of any of the P5 conferences.
- If this means there's too many games then we should reduce the regular season schedule to 11 games, with a 12th game added at the end of the season for every team. The top 8 go to the playoffs, the rest of the teams are all paired off into a final game for the season. Half of these teams get selected using the current bowl system, the other half get assigned based on records with the intent that each team plays a team from another conference. So yes, you could have two 0-11 teams facing off against each other. This gets every team 12 games, with the top 2 teams in the county playing 14 games.
 

Yeah I literally already said conferences and institutions could do it but that a CFP or NCAA couldn’t because the conferences wouldn’t want to lose their own power in regards to scheduling. So in your own argument against me you just proved my point by talking about how conferences are doing it individually

Let me quote you:

"NCAA doesn’t have the power to mandate non conference scheduling nor would any conference agree to it."


You said no conference would agree to it. Your words. Four conferences already agreed amongst themselves to schedule at least one P5. One of them (B1G) also doesn't allow teams to schedule FCS schools, which means all nonconf opponents have to be either G5 or P5 which is actually even more stringent than I suggested.


"Both of these ideas are acceptable if the individual institution makes the decision. They would never let it be a mandate."


You said institutions would never let it be a mandate. Your words. And yet the institutions of four conferences have voted yes on mandating nonconference schedules.
 


Since a rule change last summer, a B1G team can now schedule an FCS team for a home game whenever that team has only 4 conference home games that year. I'm guessing the rule changed happened when it was hard to find an FBS team to play during the traditional conference season. Read more at:
https://www.hammerandrails.com/football/2017/7/20/16005338/big-ten-schools-can-now-schedule-fcs-schools-again

Ahhh, wasn't aware of that little quirk. Makes some sense. As long as they don't get rid of the P5 requirement that's fine with me. Nine conference games, one P5, one G5, and one FCS is good enough.
 

Ahhh, wasn't aware of that little quirk. Makes some sense. As long as they don't get rid of the P5 requirement that's fine with me. Nine conference games, one P5, one G5, and one FCS is good enough.

10 P5 games should be the gold standard, across P5 confs. Regardless if that's 10/0, 9/1, or 8/2 conf/non-conf games.
 


Let me quote you:

"NCAA doesn’t have the power to mandate non conference scheduling nor would any conference agree to it."


You said no conference would agree to it. Your words. Four conferences already agreed amongst themselves to schedule at least one P5. One of them (B1G) also doesn't allow teams to schedule FCS schools, which means all nonconf opponents have to be either G5 or P5 which is actually even more stringent than I suggested.


"Both of these ideas are acceptable if the individual institution makes the decision. They would never let it be a mandate."


You said institutions would never let it be a mandate. Your words. And yet the institutions of four conferences have voted yes on mandating nonconference schedules.

I said no conference would agree to letting NCAA or CFP committee mandate it. Because it would be giving too much power away.
 




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