Per Sports Illustrated- new 12 team playoff being discussed
According to sports illustrated a new 12 team proposal is being talked about. Same as before but one difference, 1 g5 team is guaranteed a spot.
https://www.si.com/college/2021/11/11/college-football-playoff-12-teams-alternate-format-proposed
I personally think it should be a very standard format. 16 teams, all 10 conference champions qualify. 6 at large bids should be plenty to take care of any oddities any given year. A true playoff should have a defined guaranteed path of inclusion for all teams within that sport. Any format being decided by polls and committees is simply an invitational. This allows teams to settle it on the field. I also believe this can help the sport as a whole in the future. Most seem to look at these proposals and only consider them from our perspective today, not considering that a change like this to the system can have major effects on the future. I would think with a little more inclusion we could see much better competition down the road.
November 12th, 2021 at 8:13 AM ^
It should be top 2 from each of the top 6 conferences (these conferences could vary year to year) who play round 1 in a conf championship game. And four at large in round one. (You could do top 5 conferences and 6 at large, i prefer top 6 because it open up the playoffs to more teams and lessens possibility of the 4th or 5th place team from a conference making it in)
The conferences have autonomy in deciding how the determine top 2.
This incorporates the ccg into the playoffs and is actually less games than ccg and then 12 team playoff. There will be imbalances in difficulty of games in round 1, but you can eliminate that by reseeding going into round of 8.
Imho, besides subjective determination of byes, a 12 team playoff suffers from having to choose from losers of conference championship games and teams from those same conferences that didn't even make the ccg.
November 12th, 2021 at 8:47 AM ^
If that's what the format is, then I'll take it. I'd normally say that I'm not sure the 9th to 12th best teams in the country are really that deserving to play for a national title, but I don't seem to have a problem with the 11 seed sneaking into the NCAA tournament and then running off to the Final Four, so what do I know?
Just my thoughts, I'd probably keep it at 8. Five auto-bids for conference champions, two at-larges for those teams who wind up in stacked divisions and just miss out on their conference title games but still finish something like 11-1 or 10-2, and then I'd say a spot can be reserved for one G5 team, as long as there is one ranked somewhere in the CFP top 15 in the final regular season poll. If there isn't, the door opens for a third P5 at large.
November 12th, 2021 at 8:58 AM ^
Can't do 16. Need to have a few teams with bye weeks to incentivize playing hard through the end of the season.
November 12th, 2021 at 9:19 AM ^
With 12 teams why would you have to guarantee any conference champions a spot? There should be a selection process for all the spots. Of course many of the league champions will make the cut, but who wants to see a 3 or 4 loss MAC champ get blown out?
November 12th, 2021 at 9:25 AM ^
After realignment it’s going to be obvious we don’t need more than 1 G5 spot reserved. The new G5 is going to be Boise State and a bunch of garbage.
November 12th, 2021 at 11:49 AM ^
November 12th, 2021 at 12:33 PM ^
There hasn't been a single season in the playoff era where a G5 conference wasn't the 5th best league minimum in that season. Pac 12 has had multiple seasons of being the 7th best league in the sport. The Big 12 is a glorified G5 right now and it's losing the only program that can win any games in a couple of seasons.
It is bizarre to grant special status to the Big 12 or Pac 12 or ACC as if they're better than the Mountain West or AAC in any real way that matters.
November 12th, 2021 at 1:22 PM ^
Yup, 1 G5 maximum. Zero would be fine almost every year; if they’re actually that good then maybe they sneak in as the last at-large. Really I’m just curious when there’s a 13-0 G5 how good are they really. Throw them into a road game against the best team in the country in round 1. If they can somehow win that then yeah they belong there. If not, then it’s a nice reward for the 1 seed to have an easy opening round game.
This is only viable for a field larger than 8 though.
November 12th, 2021 at 2:02 PM ^
Why would you be so skeptical of a 13-0 G5 and not skeptical at all of the Big 12 or Pac 12 champions? Those leagues are pickled dogshit. How can you draw a line and say a league like the Pac 12 is worthy of an auto bid but the AAC isn't?
November 12th, 2021 at 3:18 PM ^
I’m saying 1 G5 at most each year might be worthy, particularly going forward when Houston, UCF, BYU, Cincinnati are no longer G5.
The difference between a G5 conference and the worst P5 conference in a given year is schedule strength. In non-conference play in 2021 so far, P5 teams are 72-20 against G5 teams (removing those 4 teams going to the big 12 would increase the disparity to 75-13). G5 teams will have maybe 1 or 2 games against P5 teams, then 10 or 11 against mostly horrible G5 teams. A typical G5 schedule is extremely weak; it’d be like playing the very bottom of the big ten or worse for half the season. Any top 25 P5 team is going 10-2 or better against that, so the standard for accepting a G5 as worthy of a 12 team playoff needs to be 13-0 with at least one win against a P5. Cincinnati is in the conversation because they meet that criteria so far; UTSA isn’t because they don’t.
November 12th, 2021 at 4:10 PM ^
We're going to get a season where a 9-3 team wins the Pac 12 and a sorry as hell 10-2 team wins the Big 12 and they're going to get instead of a 12-0 MAC or Sun Belt team and if you think that's fair I dunno what to tell you.
Instead of boxing this in by saying the G5 can only get 1 team ever, they should just do WHAT THEY ORIGINALLY PROPOSED and have the 6 highest ranked conference champions get the auto bid so we don't get stuck with some lucky automatic bid pile of shit team that's less deserving than a good G5 team.
9/10 it'll work out the same way as what they're proposing, but why lock in an auto bid to the Big 12 when the Big 12 doesn't deserve it? Why do they get a golden ticket every year instead of the Mountain West or AAC? You cannot honestly tell me that you think like, Oklahoma State is more deserving than UTSA, but that's what you'll be getting in this proposed format.
November 12th, 2021 at 4:47 PM ^
Not sure I’ve ever encountered someone who carried water so hard for the G5, especially over a hypothetical scenario; fascinating.
I think the G5 should get representation, and one auto bid for that is plenty. There would still be 6 to 10 at large spots available if there’s a couple 13-0 G5 teams; nothing wrong with inviting one of them at-large if they’ve been impressive.
I just don’t see the point of taking away an auto bid from a P5 because once a decade there are two G5 conferences that have better champions (which again, is even less likely to be the case after re-alignment). That can be resolved through seeding and at-large bids, like in the NCAA tournament.
For example, sometimes there will be an upset in the conference championship, like say Utah were to beat Oregon in the P12 title game. Oregon would then get an at-large bid, and Utah is probably the last seed in the field, bumping the G5 auto bid up a line. Is that a bad thing? I’d argue that’s a better situation for the G5, otherwise they’d be thrown in as the last seed every time and never have a chance.
November 12th, 2021 at 6:55 PM ^
I just hate the idea of pretending there's a power five. There isn't. There's a power two and there's three other conferences that stink. And the original 12 team proposal was so great and we're watching it get watered down into something shitty just to appease the ACC and that sucks ass.
The reality is Cincy/Houston/UCF/BYU are joining the Big 12 from the ranks of the G5 and ALL FOUR OF THEM are better programs than any of the rump Big 12 still there, and all four will finish at the top of the Big 12 except maybe UCF because that Malzahn hire seems like it was bad. If that's the case, how the hell can you call that a Power 5 league that deserves an automatic benefit of the doubt over the champion of the reconstituted AAC or Mountain West? And what does it say that this G5 as hell Big 12 is a significantly better league in quality than the Pac 12?
November 12th, 2021 at 10:42 PM ^
It’s quite a leap to claim 3/4 of the new big 12 teams will finish at the top of the conference immediately. Houston is 8-1, and their loss was by 17 at home to Texas Tech, who is currently 2-4 in that “weak” big 12. BYU is 0-1 against the big 12 this year, losing by 14 at Baylor. You conceded UCF, so that leaves just Cincinnati.
Yes, there’s clearly a gap between the SEC/Big Ten and the other 3, but lumping them in collectively with the G5 where only 1 team (Cincinnati) has an argument they’d be a contender in a P5 right now is hyperbole.
November 12th, 2021 at 11:22 AM ^
Read Bo's first book he talks about too much influence from tv and that was 30 years ago.The new playoff should include 16-24 teams and play games on campus until the finals.Imagine Michigan vs LSU in A2 in December in the quarters or semis
November 12th, 2021 at 11:27 AM ^
Amen....any playoff must recognize conference champions!! Keeps more teams (hence fans) invested, either as contenders or spoilers, for a longer period of time. Early season losses in high interest/highly competitive games don't destroy your season.
Seed teams based on the conferences they represent, not just individual team results. Results matter, yes, but also award conferences for playing stronger schedules, more inter-regional games...again, a nod to fan interest and involvement.
November 12th, 2021 at 12:25 PM ^
This is so much shittier than the original proposal. Instead of giving 6 auto bids to the BEST conference champions, we've got to make sure an 8-4 champion from the Pac 12/ACC/Big 12 gets protected and gets to waste a spot in the playoff. Big 12 isn't even a fucking power conference any more, this is The Big East Gets to Send It's Champion to the Fiesta Bowl even when it's UConn all over again.
Heaven forbid college football give an auto bid to a 12-0 MAC champion instead of fucking, Pitt or Kansas State or some shit.
November 12th, 2021 at 1:39 PM ^
This proposal sounds good to me. All 5 major conference champs in. Top rated lesser conference champ in. 6 at-large bids.
Sounds good. Get it done and let's start having a real playoff. I'd rather have 16 because I think BYEs are lame and give too much weight to the polls but 12 is still an infinite improvement over 4.
November 12th, 2021 at 2:24 PM ^
One minor quibble, there aren't actually 5 "major" conferences right now.
November 12th, 2021 at 4:12 PM ^
There aren't even 3 major conferences. There's two.
November 13th, 2021 at 2:53 AM ^
I'm maybe down with six, five power five conference champions one non-power 5 team, and ND can get fucked. Top 2 teams get a bye.
12 is too much. Regular season mattering is one of the things that makes CFB unique.