If you've read anything by me in other college sports forums -- and if you haven't, how you found my blog is something of a mystery -- you know I'm an unabashed playoff advocate, and favor a sixteen team playoff. However, there are still professional college football comentators, and even fan blogs, that dislike the idea of playoffs. I'm going to attempt to show that they're wrong.
1. Playoffs (especially with sixteen or more teams) would result in college students playing too many games.
In theory, a college team could play as many as eighteen games if a sixteen-team tournament replaced the regular season and the regular season was unchanged -- twelve regular season games, a game at Hawaii, a conference championship game, and four playoff games. That's not very likely, if only because no one in a conference that plays a championship game is going to schedule a game at Hawaii. But even if it happened...
High school teams play sixteen games in many states if they reach the state finals.
I-AA/FCS teams play sixteen games if the reach the NCAA Championship, as do some lower-division teams.
NFL teams can play up to 25 games (up to 5 preseason games, 16 regular season games, and up to 4 playoff games).
So players younger than I-A/FBS players can handle sixteen games, players older than I-A FBS players can handle at least twenty games, and players the same age but less skilled can handle sixteen games. So I think I-A/FBS players can manage sixteen or seventeen games (or even eighteen, in the unlikely scenario outlined above).
2. Playoffs would make football a two-semester sport.
Not unless you tried to placate the bowls by starting the playoffs after the bowl games. If you started the playoffs a week or two after the conference championship games and played every week, they'd be done by the second weekend in January, before almost all colleges start their spring semester or winter trimester.
3. Playoffs would destroy the history and tradition of the bowls.
That ship has sailed. The Big Ten champion has played the Pac 10 champion in the Rose Bowl once in the BCS era (the upcoming Penn State/USC game will make it twice). The Cotton Bowl has become a decidedly second-tier game. Many bowls have dropped their traditional name and strictly go by the name of their sponsor. There's no history or tradition left with the bowls; it's long gone already.
4. Playoffs would just replace arguments over who's #2 with arguments over who's number 4/8/16...
In a world where there's often no meaningful difference among the top 3-8 teams, we call that progress. The last team out of the NCAA basketball tournament -- which has been my Orange in recent years -- isn't the #65 team; they're usually a lot better than many of the low-major champions. But they're usually not a serious threat to win the title, either. Granted, a four team playoff or an eight team playoff with autobids for the BCS 6 champs would sometimes leave out serious threats to win the title, but it would leave out fewer serious contenders than the current system.
5. Playoffs (with eight or more teams) would make it possible for an undeserving team to make a run at the title, like the 2007 New York Giants.
That's not a bug, that's a feature. Upsets and unlikely runs are fun to watch. And considering the gauntlet a lower-seeded team would have to survive in order to win the title, I don't think you could consider anyone who won an eight or sixteen team football tournament undeserving. Besides, this is college football, not pro football or baseball; there are large talent differences between teams, and home field advantage (which will certainly exist in an 8+ team playoff, at least for the first round) is huge.
6. Playoffs are impossible to implement in the real world.
That's not an argument against playoffs, that's an implementation detail.
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Here's my take on these arguments:
1. Playoffs (especially with sixteen or more teams) would result in college students playing too many games.
This is a valid concern but not a primary one. I think it's necessary to ensure that the season doesn't extend to more than 16 or so games just because of the physical strain of playing football. The only place I disagree with you here is your comparison with the NFL. You just can't compare guys who get paid to play with students who have to split their time between football and classes.
2. Playoffs would make football a two-semester sport.
I've personally never heard this argument. Why would that matter? Basketball is a two semester sport. So is Baseball if you count the Summer.
3. Playoffs would destroy the history and tradition of the bowls.
This is a big deal to me. Beyond their specific conference tie-ins the bowls represent a celebration of college football. A week where teams that wouldn't normally play in the regular season square off for bragging rights. I'm not opposed to the recent proliferation of bowl games either, although I think we've pretty much hit the practical limit for the number of possible bowl games. The newer bowl games are letting the mid-major conferences get a piece of the post-season and in no way are they diminishing the importance of the more major bowls. I think the Rose Bowl has lost sight of this. Its representatives are full of undeserved self-importance and are clinging on to some false notion that the Rose Bowl IS college football and that the world wouldn't be whole without a Big Ten/Pac-10 matchup. I think it's important to preserve the classic tie-ins as much as is possible but it's ok if that can't be done. As for the Cotton Bowl, correct me if I'm wrong, but I think it lost it's status as one of the "big four" when the Southwest Conference imploded in the late 80s and early 90s. So despite the corporate sponsors and name changes, the spirit of the bowls still exists and anyone who wants to implement a playoff needs to be respectful of the 100 years of tradition that the bowl games represent.
4. Playoffs would just replace arguments over who's #2 with arguments over who's number 4/8/16...
This is a pretty stupid argument. The more inclusive a playoff the higher the probability that the field will include the "best" team and that the teams on the bubble will not be the "best" team.
5. Playoffs (with eight or more teams) would make it possible for an undeserving team to make a run at the title, like the 2007 New York Giants.
This doesn't bother me that much, because, as you said, any team that wins out in a playoff has proven that they are deserving. That said, I'm against unnecessarily large playoffs. College football does not have enough parity to logically support a 16 team playoff. When the field of 16 includes teams with 4 losses which weren't even competitive in their own conferences, there's no reason to have a 16 team playoff. Consider the women's NCAA basketball tournament. They have the same 65 team format as the men, but the lack of depth in women's basketball all but ensures that there will be no upsets until the 3rd or 4th rounds.
6. Playoffs are impossible to implement in the real world.
Don't just dismiss this as an implementation detail. It's an important consideration. To make any radical changes to the way the football season plays out you have to go through 11 conferences, 120 university presidents and athletic directors, and a score of bowl committees who wield multi-million dollar television contracts. This is why any idea for a playoff has to be practical and pragmatic.
I think you missed another very common argument here:
A playoff would diminish the importance of the games played in the regular season.
To me, this is THE reason for not having a large playoff. Once you go past 8 teams you get away from the elite 1 and 2 loss teams and into the also-rans. No team with three or four losses should ever be allowed to play for a title. The one thing that college football gets right is that the only teams considered for a national title are the most elite who distinguish themselves in the regular season. I think they should take it even further and only allow conference champions into the title game. Any playoff should be limited enough in size to keep out all but the absolute best teams and should also put an emphasis on teams that have won their conference.
Consider an 8 team playoff where the 6 highest-ranked conference champions get auto-bids and the two at-large spots are given to the two highest ranking teams not already included.
This season:
Auto-Bids
1. Oklahoma
2. Florida
3. USC
4. Utah
5. Penn State
6. Boise State
At-Large
3. Texas
4. Alabama
Texas Tech is the only team that can complain about this, but the Big XII South was an impossible situation. Last year, Hawaii would have been left out, but as shown by this year's results, any undefeated team with a reasonably difficult schedule would be included. Likewise an undefeated Ball State would've been left out, but I don't think anyone can reasonably argue that, as with Hawaii, Ball State was a real contender. Go back to 2006 and Boise State makes the cut, so this is also mid-major friendly format. I'd even be willing to cut the playoff down to just the six conference champions and give byes to #1 and #2 just to avoid the controversy involving at-large teams. My point here, is that there's no good argument for a large field playoff that isn't satisfied by a smaller playoff which, in my opinion is better for college football.
When the field of 16 includes teams with 4 losses which weren't even competitive in their own conferences, there's no reason to have a 16 team playoff.
A 16-team playoff might include four-loss teams that won their conference, if you use a format that guarantees some or all conference champions playoff spots. If you don't... a quick look back at how many 4-loss teams were in the final AP top 20 (the BCS rankings don't seem to be listed with won-loss records)....
2008 - 0
2007 - 1 (#16 Tennessee)
2006 - 0
2005 - 0
2004 - 1 (#20 Florida)
2003 - 1 (#16 Florida)
2002 - 2 (#16 Florida State, #20 Auburn)
So no four-loss team in the last 7 years has had a final regular season AP ranking above 16, and as often as not there were none. I don't think this is a major cause for concern.
Any playoff should be limited enough in size to keep out all but the absolute best teams and should also put an emphasis on teams that have won their conference.
The thing is that I don't trust pollsters, a selection committee, or computer rankings to have perfect understanding of which confernces were good and which ones weren't, or whether a team that ran through a weak conference was really good or just better than everyone it played. So I want every team (except for the handful of I-A independents) to have a definite shot at earning a playoff spot on the field by winning their conference no matter what anybody thinks of their merits. And you need a few at-large spots to cover for ties, independents, and very good teams that didn't win their conference. Besides, I think byes in football playoffs are tremendously unfair; the home teams win in the divisional round of the NFL playoffs 75% of the time, and that's with all sorts of rules in place to create parity.
Ok, so the 4-loss team bit was a more hype than substance, but as I stated later on, I don't even want 3 loss teams, conference champs or otherwise, in my playoff.
The thing is that I don't trust pollsters, a selection committee, or computer rankings to have perfect understanding of which conferences were good and which ones weren't, or whether a team that ran through a weak conference was really good or just better than everyone it played.
One of the points of a playoff system is that you don't have to trust pollsters to be perfect and I don't think they are. But they are good enough. Take a look at any of the two final polls for any season (from any source, they basically all end up the same). There might be a couple rankings that are suspect and several of the positions for teams could be coin-flips as to who is really better, but they do tend to reflect a reasonable picture of reality. As we've already discussed the larger you make the playoff field, the more ranking error is acceptable. (It doesn't really matter too much if you get #16 and #17 mixed up. Although #17 might disagree.) The key is finding that sweet spot where the playoff field is just big enough that you've eliminated most of the ranking error. With the current BCS system, by limiting the "playoff" to 2 teams it forces the polls to be 100% correct or else the system erupts in controversy.
So we've determined that a playoff is typically better than no playoff. So the difference comes down to implementation. And here's a big issue where we differ: You cannot allow all conference champions into a playoff. This totally wrecks the value of the non-conference matchups. You basically end up with 7-9 "real games" and 3-5 exhibitions. And as I've said before, there's just not enough parity for allowing the champs from the Sun Belt or the MAC, or CUSA an auto-bid to a playoff. While it seems "right" to say "Win your conference and you're in.", it actually makes the system less fair. Why should Florida Atlantic get a playoff bid after winning the Sun Belt with a 7-5 record when Texas Tech or Georgia or Oregon finish 9-3 against better competition but don't make the cut? That's social welfare, not football.
This is why an 8 team playoff makes so much sense. It leverages a ranking system that has proven itself over 50+ years to be "good enough". By giving 6 auto bids to the top ranked conference champions it puts emphasis on both winning the conference and doing well in the non-conference games. By disposing of the BCS's preference for certain conferences it is both inclusive and fair. If bye's aren't fair, fill the two remaining slots with high ranking at-large teams. On top of all of this, by keeping the first round at 4 games the playoffs can be framed in the context of the four major bowl games. By keeping the number of teams to 8 it only adds a single week to the football schedule for the semi-final round. It's a combination of correctness, fairness, and practicality that can't be achieved by any other sized playoff.
Why should Florida Atlantic get a playoff bid after winning the Sun Belt with a 7-5 record when Texas Tech or Georgia or Oregon finish 9-3 against better competition but don't make the cut?
For the same reason that 10-15 low-major champs that couldn't hold a candle to Syracuse made the men's basketball tournament in the last two years (this year, barring an epic collapse in Big East play, the Orange are in), and Syracuse didn't. They won their conference, and that gives them a shot. This isn't particularly fair to teams that were better than low-major champs in the regular season, but that's a sacrifice the system makes so that the system is fair.
Teams from the BCS conferences have a much, much better shot at at-large bids in my system (this year's TCU team is the only non-BCS team that would have gained an at-large bid in the BCS era), and are almost certain to get higher seeds (and therefore a home game).
And you're just not going to convince me that there's anything special about the bowls that makes preserving them a good idea.
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