College football playoff approved

[El Caliente]

College Basketball isn't as popular as college football, but it amazingly jumps from low ratings during the regular season to ratingon roids for the tourney. This amazing jump is made only by the fact that the tourney provides excitement and surprise. A CFB playoff system would take the current tv ratings and probably double or triple them seeing as how you would have a world full of new possibilities that you don't get with a 4 team playoff.

College football doesn't rat as well as the NFL either.The Oakland vs Jacksonville can go up against a Oklahoma v OK St., or LSU vs Florida and out rate it according to Nielson tv ratings. Having a smaller field of teams to pull from isnt hurting the NFL. They provide a playoff where 37.5% of it's teams can make the playoffs. Certainly having a 16 team playoff wouldn't kill things, it would only enhance it.

How the NCAA says they would lose money on this is beyond me....oh wait, the NCAA doesn't lose money on this, the thought of one of the top tier conferences not making as much money in case of an upset is the fear.

[VVextreme]

Originally Posted by El Caliente

College Basketball isn't as popular as college football, but it amazingly jumps from low ratings during the regular season to ratingon roids for the tourney. This amazing jump is made only by the fact that the tourney provides excitement and surprise. A CFB playoff system would take the current tv ratings and probably double or triple them seeing as how you would have a world full of new possibilities that you don't get with a 4 team playoff.

College football doesn't rat as well as the NFL either.The Oakland vs Jacksonville can go up against a Oklahoma v OK St., or LSU vs Florida and out rate it according to Nielson tv ratings. Having a smaller field of teams to pull from isnt hurting the NFL. They provide a playoff where 37.5% of it's teams can make the playoffs. Certainly having a 16 team playoff wouldn't kill things, it would only enhance it.

How the NCAA says they would lose money on this is beyond me....oh wait, the NCAA doesn't lose money on this, the thought of one of the top tier conferences not making as much money in case of an upset is the fear.

Wow, epic fail of a post. You're grasp of statistics is just embarrassing. You do realize that the NFL only has 32 teams, but that college football has approximately 120 schools in Division 1... another 120 schools or so in Division 2, etc... You're not comparing apples to apples. You're also making giant assumptions about the success of other leagues that you simply can't make. You even admit that the regular season in basketball isn't as near as popular as the postseason, so the danger of devaluing the college football regular season is clearly a possibility that many schools just can't afford.

At the most, the NFL can only play 16 games on a single day... but then you're forgetting the MNF and any other tweaks they might have going on.

I'm not even going to try and guess how many college football games are going on in a single day. Ya think the country's football fans' attention might be a little more divided during college football?

The Saints are also a perfect example. They are a REGIONAL team. They are pulling in fans from Louisiana, Mississippi, Arkansas, etc... LSU can't even unite all of the fans in Louisiana due to the loyalties of ULL, Tech, Tulane, Southern, Grambling, etc.

Also the NFL is the gold-standard PROFESSIONAL league. At best, college is the unofficial, beloved minor-league for the NFL. How many minor league games get the same kind of viewing as college football?

You have a point that many will agree with, but your supporting arguments are terrible and easily defeated.

Fact of the matter is that college football is an epic CASH COW for all the universities. It drives the bus for every sport to pay the bills. It's a huge marketing opportunity for each school to sell their product to today's youth, so they will continue to mortgage away their future for increasingly diminishing returns. State budget cuts are slashing university budgets, so they are increasingly relying on these cash cows to keep the lights on, literally at the school too.

You might believe that dramatic, rapid change makes smart business sense... but the rest of the world would disagree with you. College football is headed in the right direction. See the big picture, they are getting there.

Bottom line is that the passion of the regular season and the end of the year bowl game has SIGNIFICANT value as it is. Regardless of the reason, only about 30 to 40 Universities will ever really have a shot at the playoffs anyways. I'm talking lifetime here. For some schools, going to a bowl game is all they have to look forward to year-in and year-out. It's a way to end the year on a positive note. Another chance to market the school to future applicants. Another chance to wine and dine the big donors into paying more money for that new building while whisking them away on a vacation of non-stop school spirit brainwashing messages to milk them dry.

If you go to a 16 team playoff, how much do you think the other bowl games will mean if you even still have them? If you're not consistently getting into the playoff, then your school will take a massive marketing hit with future applicants/donors, etc. too.

I may not agree with every decision they are making, but I definitely do agree with the idea of taking this slow to see how the changes actually play-out first. I think 4 teams is the perfect NEXT step in the grand scheme of things, with the knowledge that things will continue to evolve in the future.

[El Caliente]

Don't pee on my leg and tell me it's raining. If every sport in the world can have a playoff system college football can certainly have a playoff system consisting of more than 4 teams. The only reason they can't is money. Are viewers the reason you play a sport? Are endorsements the reason you play a sport? There are sports going on in BFE Quatar that are going on in spite of not having the viewership or tv deals of CFB.

No, the only reason we can't have a bigger playoff system is a bunch of guys in suits would be asking "who moved my cheese?" And those guys make all the rules in the BCS system. And that is what is different between CFB on the D1 and D2 level's. One isn't about money as much as it is just letting the chips fall. The other wants this to be as calculated as possible. Why both can't let the chips fall is beyond me. If it works everywhere in the world, how would it hurt in D1 CFB? But then you have the difference in the National Championship as well, one level is awarded a NCAA Championship, while the other gets a crystal ball and a cash prize, like at the end of American Idol or some game show like that.

[VVextreme]

Originally Posted by El Caliente

Don't pee on my leg and tell me it's raining. If every sport in the world can have a playoff system college football can certainly have a playoff system consisting of more than 4 teams. The only reason they can't is money. Are viewers the reason you play a sport? Are endorsements the reason you play a sport? There are sports going on in BFE Quatar that are going on in spite of not having the viewership or tv deals of CFB.

No, the only reason we can't have a bigger playoff system is a bunch of guys in suits would be asking "who moved my cheese?" And those guys make all the rules in the BCS system. And that is what is different between CFB on the D1 and D2 level's. One isn't about money as much as it is just letting the chips fall. The other wants this to be as calculated as possible. Why both can't let the chips fall is beyond me. If it works everywhere in the world, how would it hurt in D1 CFB? But then you have the difference in the National Championship as well, one level is awarded a NCAA Championship, while the other gets a crystal ball and a cash prize, like at the end of American Idol or some game show like that.

1.) College football has had a playoff for over a decade now, it was called the BCS with the top two participants playing for the win. Now, we are expanding that playoff into four teams. Quit acting like a playoff doesn't exist. Right now, we are merely arguing over the # of playoff teams that should be admitted. As of right now, college football is like every other sport in that we do have a playoff too. So strike that point of yours. And let's be serious, college football will not stop at 4 team playoffs forever. More teams will be admitted in the future, we all know it will happen eventually.

2.) How many other sports play only 12 to 13 games a year total amongst a field of 120ish teams? Football IS different. These are student-athletes playing for just a scholarship. Injuries do happen and happen more frequently and severely than in other sports. Most of these kids will never play professional football of any kind. Especially at the highest levels of college football, I gotta wonder what kind of impact all these games have on their bodies. Let's ease into this and see what happens. The NFL is already fighting the concussion issue, etc. Conferences are starting to look into this too. What good is their scholarship-funded education if their brains are scrambled eggs once they've finished playing? They probably hit a lot harder and faster in the elite football games than the lessor games. Just on personal experience, the really intense games seem to have significant amount of injuries in them! You know, the kind of games that top-level playoff games would produce? That's reason #1 I'd like to ease into expanding the playoffs. I wanna see how healthy these teams are after finishing just these two playoff games. Also how much fun will the championship game be if all the star players are out on injury?

3.) You mention D2 and CFB, etc... how many people give a flyin flip as to what happens in those sports? You might be in a hurry to turn a cash cow into just another sport, but college football is different for a reason. We have a level of passion that can't be matched anywhere else outside of that crazy european soccer nonsense. In general, people do not react favorably to rapid change.

4.) Playing 16 teams in a play-off would only prove what we already knew to be true anyways 99% of the time. The #1 team in the country will absolutely destroy the 16th seed. The difference in level of competition between #1 and #16 is just a joke. I don't need to see Alabama destroy another 16th ranked team in the country to figure out that they were #1 last year. That's why I'm not upset about the 4-team play-off next STEP.

5.) And how would football schedules evolve if we DID have a 16-team play-off schedule that included every conference champ? Well first of all, every team would suddenly reduce their SOS as much as possible thus further destroying the regular season even more than you already have. And then suddenly there are far less games worth watching the entire year because everyone is trying to get into the top 16. *Yawn* So boring! SOS needs to be rewarded, not punished!

But your problem isn't really about anything that you posted. The reality is that you are a fan of these BFE programs that don't have a shot in a billion of ever winning the national championship. You don't even care if they are the best team that year, you just wanna see them win one and take down that mean old Alabama power school in the process. And you realize that a bigger playoff is your only HAIL MARY of a chance of actually winning one of these things. The schools you keep pushing are horrible, they are a waste of time and need to be eliminated completely from contention just so we can see the matchups that people actually care about and have actually earned it.

[El Caliente]

What are you talking about? I am a Michigan fan. I went to SDSU for undergrad and Ross for B School. If your talking about college football programs with prestige get back at me when your LSU team has the legacy and titles of my boys in Blue. While it would be nice to see SDSU and other (previously) non-AQ schools but it is what it is. I am a fan of fairness. This system still doesn't promote fairness, but instead promotes "who will get us the most money." That is fine, we agree to disagree. One day in the future more teams will be allowed to play in this playoff system, as of now it still has a long way to go.

[JimEverett]

I am not sure i understand the argument that the current system (and past systems) mean more money.

It seems to me that money is driving, in large part, conference expansion and postseason playoffs. Its the traditionalists that are fighting against the tide - trying to maintain the uniqueness of college football that has made it so great.