Jimbo Fisher again explains why College Football Playoff should be expanded
The Texas A&M Aggies had the unenviable position of being No. 5 in the final College Football Playoff rankings of the season, essentially serving as the “first team out” of the field of 4 teams.
Many fans and analysts have argued that the Aggies deserved to be in the field over a team like Ohio State, which didn’t play as many games as the other top teams.
Aggies coach Jimbo Fisher has advocated expanding the Playoff, and he continued to back that stance on Tuesday during an appearance on “The Paul Finebaum Show”:
https://twitter.com/ESPNCFB/status/1356705593222979585
“I think if you’re going to find the best teams — the object was to have the 4 best teams. That’s what we always said we wanted when we got into the Playoff,” Fisher says. “I think, in my opinion, the Playoff has to expand. I think it has to go to 8 teams and maybe more, whatever it becomes. Incorporate the bowls in it. … I think it would enhance all the bowls if we put them in a Playoff situation. I think you’d find the best teams in the Playoff. I think, with 4, you’re still leaving it out a little bit, in my opinion.”
It seems momentum is building toward a Playoff expansion, but nothing has happened yet. We’ll see if the CFP head honchos finally cave in and expand the tournament over the next couple of years.
I’m all for it. More good games to watch that have more meaning.
More good games? You mean like this year’s playoffs? You do remember the margin of victory in those 3 games were 17, 21, and 28, right? So by all means let us put more teams in there like Coastal Carolina so that we can raise the level of competition. Then we can watch more good games.
The vast majority of semi final games have been blowouts. If they base it off that then go back to two teams. If it has no bearing then they need to expand.
Exactly! Expanding the playoffs to 8 teams would decrease the number of bowl games tarnished by the opt-out scourge and turn them into more compelling entertainment.
It would also account for the fact that some teams may hit their stride at the right time for the playoffs. Leaving Bama out of the equation, it’s easy to imagine a 1-loss team being a far better team at year’s end than a no-loss playoff team from a weaker conference.
They’d probably need to give a guaranteed spot to the PAC-12 and Big-12 winners (1 slot to each conference champ). It would add a couple of blowout games, but would quash the conference dominance questions.
It is not the job, or the purpose of the playoffs to stop opting out or anything else that has to do with the bowls. Your example of having some teams hit their stride is another way of saying make the earlier games that they lost meaningless. The playoffs will expand, but not for the reasons so many of you give. It will be about money. There will be more blowouts with fewer viewers and the same teams will still be making the final 4. There is a reason they make the final 4 and the only thing adding 4 teams to the mix is going to do is show it is not by luck that the same teams keep making it there. Remember in 2007 Bama was a 7-6 team. People used to think they should work hard and improve. Now those teams that do not have the combination of investment, coaching, and recruiting, want an everyone gets a trophy mentality and in the end they are still going to be whining that they did not get in when they should have been the number 8 team.
I am fine with 2.
If my team had to beat out Nick Saban just about every year to even be considered I’d feel the same way, wait, my team does, yes – definitely expand!!!
It’s going to get expanded.. But be ready to accept the 5 power 5 conference champs, the best G 5 team, and 2 wildcards.. Is that the best way? Who knows, but the each power 5 conference is going to want a slice of the pie..
Good deal then we just make the regular season less important because we will be letting teams in with 2 losses, or even more, simply because they won their conference. Then you will have teams screeching that they deserved to get in because they had fewer losses than the team from the bad conference that won that conference. It is never going to end the whining.
That’s why you set a criteria like every other tournament in existence. Win your conference in the NFL, ncaa basketball, etc? You’re in.
The difference is the number of conferences and teams that want a piece of the pie, without the investment in that pie. Also football is not like Basketball where you can play a game every other day. There will never be enough teams in the CFPs to stop the whining. They still have whining about the 66 that make the NCAA tournament. So quit trying to please everyone and watering down the product and tell those teams that want to play to do what is necessary to be one of the 4.
How can you tell them what is necessary to do if they don’t know what to do? Cincy, UCF, Baylor, TCU all had cases but weren’t “chosen”. That’s not a true playoff. A playoff has set criteria on how to get into it.
And that criteria is just what Tide8x5 is talking about. This year Washington got in the playoffs with a losing record while at least 1 team in the NFC had a better record but sat home. They also got rewarded a home playoff game because apparently being 7-9 should be rewarded over a 11-5 season. Since the object of the game is to win how do reward someone who has more losses just because they won a weak division ( not conferences in anything but NCAA Basketball). I wonder if you would think the same thing if an 11-1 Auburn team was left out because an 8-4 PAC 12 team won their conference CCG? Don’t think that’s possible? Easy… 12-0 Bama meets 12-0 Georgia. Both are in. Same scenario in another Power 5 CCG. The bigger chance is if 2 11-1 teams don’t make their CCG. It will then come down to SOS or had the worse loss. Either way it is possible to not make the playoffs while only having 1 loss while multiple loss teams do.
But there is a set criteria in the NFL. Everyone knows if you when your division, you’re in. No one knows if you’re in if you win your conference in college football.
How do reward someone of getting in the playoff if they can’t even win their own division, much less conference? (Bama and OSU).
It’s also possible that all P5 conference champions are undefeated. Who gets in then? It’s an unlikely scenario, just as yours is.
There is not a set criteria that the committee goes by. There’s no requirements for the CFB “playoff”. That’s the issue with it.
His scenario isn’t that wild. Wisconsin won the Big 10 in 2012 with an 8-5 record, but I haven’t seen all P5 conferences have an undefeated champion.
2012 was also during the BCS and undefeated OSU was ineligible for postseason and conference championship.
I think you have to stop with eight, unless you shorten the regular season. You are getting into finals and the holidays as it is.
And a season that is as long as the NFL.
Jimbo I think you are full of crap and just searching for a way in. You say ” I think you’d find the best teams in the Playoff. I think, with 4, you’re still leaving it out a little bit, in my opinion.” Then if this is the case explain all the blowouts. Expanding the playoffs will not make them better, it will water down the teams that get there. Win the SEC and you are in. Everyone does not get a trophy, so go to work earning yours.
Because we love college FB so much, but there are too many games. Let’s go back to letting polls decide, and not have these sham playoffs. Nobody today questions Texas’ 1970 NC in which ND destroyed them in in Cotton Bowl.
Needs to go to eight teams. Look who would have been the bottom 4 this last playoffs A&M, OK, UF and UC. I think that would have been worth watching.
Would it? People complained this year about OSU/ Clemson and Bama/ND…
And Bama vs OSU.
This year the point differentials were 17, 21, and 28 points. TAMU could have a case but they did not get it done, OK had 2 losses, UF had 3, and UC does not have the talent or depth to hang with top P-5 teams. It does not need to change at all. People need to stop whining. Win the SEC and you are in.
Tidefan8x5, I remember Bama won the the championship 2011 but did not win the SEC. The same for NEB in 2001 and the Sooners in 2003.
They also did it in 2017. Different years make for different circumstances. But you can not keep expanding the playoffs until everyone is satisfied. There is always going to be whiners out there. Win and you are in. Don’t win and you have to hope for someone else to put you in.
All 3 had something in common. They only lost once while other Conference Champs lost more. Tide was referring to the fact that no SEC Champion in the playoff era has been left out.
Jimbo is wrong in his premise. The object isn’t to find the best four teams, but the best team. They do that by having four teams play. The Aggies had no argument whatsoever that they were the best team in the country. Jimbo is just looking for a participation trophy. That’s what bowl games are for.
Huh? Isn’t the best going to located among the best 4?
But the point should be to find the best team, not to worry about #4. Expand and you’ll have the same issues with the 8th spot. The difference is that there are a lot more teams that could have an argument to be #8, especially if 6 spots are taken by auto-bids.
It must be too early in the morning for me. I can’t grasp the concept of finding the best team without first identifying the best four.
You can have the #1, #2, #3, and #6 teams make the playoffs. You still include the best team.
Also, expand the concept to 8 teams. Would the new goal be to include the 8 best teams? How can we guarantee that if we can’t do it with 4?
I am just hesitant about any expansion because it can’t be undone. I would advocate for a change in the ranking system first. A 13 person poll is going to be biased.
You are assuming that the first five CFP seeds (P5 conf champs)are also top 5 rated teams…it is conceivable that a 16 ranked Ok team could knock off a 4th ranked Texas team to win the Big12…
The NFL model rarely gets it wrong, this can be adopted in the NCAA
The NFL is up to 14 now.
The NFL has built in parity. Less blowouts.
What I’ve seen most often suggested for an 8 team playoff includes an auto-bid for all P5 Champs and the top ranked G5 team. I’d be more willing to accept 8 teams if there were no auto-bids. I think there’s no reason an 8-5 Wisconsin or an 8-4 tu should be considered playoff teams.
Auto bids would take the bias out of any committee however…could you imagine if the committee had to decide if an 8-8 New Orleans team should have been excluded from the playoffs because an 11-5 3rd place NFC West team had a better record in 1990? The Saints won it all.
The best team at the end of the year doesn’t necessarily mean the best team throughout the year. In 1990 the Saints were 8-8 – Super Bowl Champs, 2005 Steelers and 2010 Packers both number 6 seeds (12th teams in)…
A wild card team hasn’t made the Super Bowl since 2013, that doesn’t mean it is time to move back to Div winners only does it?
NCAA P5 Conferences are ebbs and flows when it comes to balance of power. In this day and age the reward for winning your conference should be the opportunity to compete for the national title. Once a number 8 or 7 seed knocks off a number 1 or 2 CFP expansion will be justified imho but in any event something has to be done to make NY6 Bowls mean something. It’s all about revenue and right now the bowl product outside of CFP has become very stale….
The idea of saving the Bowls is dead. Eight teams might revive the NY6 but the rest sleep with the fishes.
Probably right, certainly can’t argue with that from a fan perspective, but you know what, if I’m a Boise St or a Marshall with pretty much zero CFP chance, making a few hundred grand from TV and sponsor revenue from a meaningless post season bowl could be huge for the entire athletic budget of their universities I suppose…
How much longer do you think ESPN is going to throw money at games no one is watching?
Can’t answer that, as long as there is a tax write off and a marketing incentive for the corporate sponsors I suppose…as long as there are corporations that can only afford 500k for marketing versus the companies that pony up 20M I’m guessing, I doubt Duke’s Mayo can afford the Peach or Rose Bowl but the Belk Bowl is certainly an affordable marketing option at 1/20th the cost Chick Fil A ponied up for Atlanta…
Not to be picky, but $500 wouldn’t come close to covering the cost of the Belk Bowl. Travel expenses, hotel, meals, goody bag, (for two teams and entourage) security, stadium rental. The list of costs is long.
500K, not 500$, which is exactly what Dukes paid for headline sponsor of the game this past year. I’m sure once you add in other sponsors and tv rev it was much needed for smaller schools even if it only nets 100k after expenses…
You can’t compare college football to the nfl. The regular season in the nfl is just to get you into the playoffs. The only incentive to do better is home field, and college doesn’t have that. In college football, the goal is to keep the regular season meaningful and the playoffs are there to determine who the regular season champ is. Big difference
A&M totally got screwed last year. If they hadn’t been in the SEC, they would have been in.
There’s no way to know that. What conference would have gotten them in?