I get some of the disappointment expressed by some of you, but still, I disagree with most of the complaints. Overall, I think this helps ND's chances to make the playoffs and stay independent much more than it hurts. I also think this is a net positive for college football overall. Would it have been much better if they had expanded to 8 teams with no byes or CCG guarantees? Absolutely. There are at least a few other alternative playoff proposals that would have been much better than the one they came up with, but it's clear two things were driving this subcommittee's recommendation more than anything else:
- The conferences (mainly P5 conferences) were never going to budge on requiring that a certain number of spots will be guaranteed to some conference champions if the playoffs are going to be expanded in any way.
- The G5 conferences had to be included to avoid any more talk of them creating their own playoff system
So if we accept that there was no way to get around those hurdles, I think Swarbrick and the rest of the subcommittee came up with the best realistic way to expand the playoffs that wouldn't have totally screwed ND. Obviously, I don't expect to convince everyone, but here are some points that I think will address some concerns some of you have as well as rebuttals to some of the arguments being made.
But in order to buy what I'm selling here, you really have to change the way you're looking at things starting with this premise:
- There really won't be a 1st round bye for any teams. There will be de facto two parts to round 1, with the "1a" first-round games being the CCGs and the "1b" first-round games taking place two weeks later with seeds #5-12 playing each other. At the end of it all, everyone will have played roughly the same number of games with the exception of the two guaranteed-spot CCG winners (but not guaranteed seeds) and 1 or more CCG losers who will have played 1 more game each. Just think of that - 2 of the CCG game winners will still have to play another game to stay in the playoffs and they won't necessarily get favorable seeding.
If you can't accept that framing as a legitimate way to look at the new proposal then you probably won't' be happy with the rest of what I have to say but here it goes anyway.
The next point to make is this:
- There is nothing special about getting a 1st round bye (which really isn't a 1st round bye anyway).
In effect, seeds 1-4 get the following:
- No chance for a home playoff game
- They get their pick of bowl games... but so what? No one will actually have a home-field advantage. Tickets will be divided equally. The teams that have the best traveling fan bases will have an advantage and that would include ND.
That's basically it.
As for some of the other rebuttals...
- ND is MUCH less likely to join a conference with this format. If we weren't joining a conference for opportunities to play in CCGs and, therefore, get greater (perceived) access to a smaller playoff system, we certainly aren't going to do it just to have an opportunity for a (perceived) bye, especially when playoff expansion means our path to the playoffs is much easier and we have an opportunity for one more high profile, money-generating home game.
- Rankings are going to be as important as they've ever been if not moreso, which means the regular season will NOT be diminished. There has been no talk about the CFP committee changing the way they rank teams so strength of schedule, resume, and style points will mean as much as they've always been. Early games will still matter.
- This helps the college football postseason overall. Here's why
- Many more teams will be in the playoff hunt near the end of the season which means many more meaningful games
- Fewer, if any, players will be sitting out of the playoff bowl games to get ready for the NFL draft. This will eliminate a lot of the dud bowl games that featured rosters with star players on the sidelines. There's no doubt this was a big factor in the subcommittee's thinking to keep the big bowl games relevant.
- Only 2 teams will have to play as many as 16 (or 17) games. I think most players would jump at the chance to play a few more games to win a championship. The FCS has been doing that for a while now.
- ND (or any other team) making it to the playoffs won't mean as much. That's true but so what? Winning 1 playoff game will mean a lot, and making it to the semifinals will mean much, much more.
Here are two other things to consider:
- 11-1 will likely mean we are always in the playoffs, 10-2 will still get us in the playoffs a lot of the time. We couldn't say that before.
- If ND gets beat in a semifinal game - even if it is a blowout - we will still have two big playoff wins to point to as having had a successful post-season.
Hey, I still believe CCGs are mostly BS money grabs and I hate the fact there is no concrete rankings penalty for teams that play FCS teams, but there have been too many deaf ears when anyone tries to bring up those points, so any playoff expansion was likely going to contain CCG guarantees and the only way to make such an expansion fair and even beneficial to ND was to expand to 12 or more teams. Any less than that would have put ND at a distinct disadvantage.
I think this proposed system is the best realistic option they could have come up with even if the ideal options would have been much, much better.
