Big Ten commissioner Tony Petitti is not some rogue agent when he suggests a 24-team College Football Playoff format is the future. His league’s network partner, FOX, is on board with Petitti’s proposal.
Speaking at the SBJ’s World Congress of Sports event this week, FOX Sports CEO Eric Shanks argued that an expanded Playoff field — one that is double the size of the current field — would actually make the sport’s regular season more enjoyable. Critics of further expanding the CFP say doing so would devalue the regular season, which is among the most consequential in all of sports.
“One of the big knocks against college football is in the first 3 weeks. It’s actually hard to find great games,” Shanks said, per SBJ’s Ben Portnoy. “If you don’t get penalized for playing those big non-conference games early and there’s a bigger pool of teams that can get into a [24-team] playoff, the schedule gets better in September because you won’t be penalized for playing great games.”
Texas jumps to the front of the conversation here. The Longhorns played Ohio State to open the 2025 season in a colossal clash of proverbial titans. Texas lost that game, and when it was shut out of the CFP, Texas officials suggested that Week 1 fixture was solely to blame.
The Texas argument: If teams aren’t rewarded for playing challenging schedules, teams won’t play challenging schedules.
Shanks’ argument seems to be one in the same.
It is, to an extent, arguing semantics. A 24-team Playoff might lead to bigger brands playing each other in the first 3 weeks of the regular season. That doesn’t necessarily guarantee the games will be good. South Carolina and Virginia Tech played a marquee early-season game last fall and those programs combined to lose 17 regular-season games. Clemson played LSU in a slop fest. Alabama played Wisconsin in a Week 3 game that featured a 35-7 score going into the fourth quarter.
And if the sting of losing a game like Texas-Ohio State is removed from the equation, the game isn’t as good because the stakes aren’t as important. It becomes more exhibition than anything else.
More matchups between big brands in the nonconference slate also means fewer buy games. While those don’t move the needle for television partners, they’re often the lifeblood of smaller schools who rely on the extra money. Those games also help the home team get some game experience for younger players.
Additionally, and most importantly, fans don’t have the appetite for an expanded Playoff field.
Derek Peterson does a bit of everything, not unlike Taysom Hill. He has covered Oklahoma, Nebraska, the Pac-12, and now delivers CFB-wide content.
