When the final College Football Playoff (CFP) rankings are announced on December 3, several teams will be on the outside looking in. Alabama, Miami or Georgia could be eliminated despite a single loss. Or Auburn and Ohio State could claim conference titles and find the Sugar or Rose Bowl as a reward despite having two losses.
It all depends on what a small group of people determine. That small group will decide which teams qualify for the playoffs based on an “eye test” or, if you like, a “résumé.”
Wisconsin currently has a better record than Clemson but the Badgers have failed the “eye test” for some reason. And so the undefeated Badgers are fifth in the CFP rankings, while the one-loss Tigers are ranked second.
Maybe it’s an effective system, but a quick glance around the other major sports reveals that no one else does it this way. Why? Because the CFP rankings are subjective and unfair. It’s difficult to imagine an NFL Committee keeping the AFC South winner out of the playoffs for lack of quality road wins.
In selecting which teams play for championships, college football is missing what every other sport has: objective criteria.
Admittedly, an NFL-style playoff is out of reach for a league sporting a huge number of teams and only four post-season slots. But the CFP could get three-quarters of the way to objectivity and fairness with one simple fix: limit playoff eligibility to conference champions only (plus an independent such as Notre Dame, when appropriate).
This easy change would have three important and positive impacts. First, a champions-only process would give real meaning to conference championship games by making them winner-take-all affairs. Last year, Big Ten champ Penn State missed the playoffs while the league’s third-place team (Ohio State) played for a national championship. The new system would eliminate that problem.
Second, limiting the field to conference champions would ensure that four of the five major conferences are represented in the playoff (or three out of five when Notre Dame is in play). The experts may tell us the Big Ten, Southeastern Conference or Atlantic Coast Conference is the best conference in the country, but why not let the conference champs decide? It’s worth remembering the experts’ opinion that Ohio State didn’t belong on the field with Miami in 2002 (final: Ohio State, 31-24) and that Florida had no business facing the Buckeyes in 2006 (final: Florida, 41-14).
Third, the teams that make the playoff will actually earn their bids. Every team in the country will start each season knowing the conference championship is the only path to a national championship. A big part of fairness is knowing what the rules are before the game starts. And a champions-only system keeps everything simple.
If this program were in place for 2017, the major conference championships would be captivating the college football world. Clemson-Miami would set up as the greatest showdown in the history of the ACC. In the SEC, the Auburn-Alabama matchup would serve as an effective playoff game, with the winner facing Georgia for all the marbles. There would be no speculation or worry as to whether a one-loss Alabama or one-loss Miami could still slip into the mix. The “eye test” would be replaced by the scoreboard test.
Subjectivity would still play a role in this new system – there’s no easy way to fit five conference champs into four slots. But the role of subjective selection would be reduced to determining the fourth slot in the playoff. Again, if the new system were in place this year, the BCS would likely be choosing either the Big 12 or Pac-12 champ for the fourth slot, while the ACC, Big Ten and SEC champs would take the first three positions.
It’s not perfect, but it’s miles ahead of the current system. And if we can eliminate the phrase “eye test” from the dictionary of college football, we will have done the sporting world a great service.
Stephen McGhee is a freelance writer.