If it feels like it’s a ridiculous time to be a college football fan, that’s because it is.
While the AP Top 25 poll has become a running joke, at least fans can comfort themselves with the knowledge that it has little importance when it matters. Then the College Football Playoff selection committee released their poll this week and, well, to say it was indefensibly bad is a charitable overstatement.
It’s atrocious. It’s humiliating. It’s disgraceful. And it requires an entire overhaul of the selection committee process.
WE NEED TO ABOLISH THE CFP SELECTION COMMITTEE AFTER YET ANOTHER EMBARRASSMENT
Don’t worry though, because starting in 2027, the powers that be have voted to make more money and further remove what made college football special with a participation trophy 24-team playoff. This proposal had widespread support among many coaches who will now have greater job security, as well as some conference commissioners who have never actually watched or followed college football.
Case in point? Big Ten conference commissioner Tony Petitti.
Just this week, he defended the enlarged format with “logic” that is so disconnected from actual objective reality and history that it beggars belief.
In an interview with College Sports Radio on Sirius XM, Petitti explained his “thinking” on the 24-team playoff coming next season and how it will impact the importance of games across the sport, week in and week out.
“More games are going to matter,” he said, inexplicably. “The way this format works is it’s got all different kinds of incentives, right? You’re going to fight like crazy to be inside the top 24, and then you want to get a home game, so you’re going to fight like crazy to be inside 16, and then you want to be inside eight, so you get a home game and a bye.
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“So you’re always playing for something. There’s a lot at stake across all of this, and I think this year has just proven that trying to separate 12 teams from everybody else is just going to be incredibly difficult in the way college football is structured right now, and how tough it is to win the road. How the talent has kind of been more dispersed over many more programs, and then last thing is we just need to have give fans games that matter … I don’t think there’s any controversy in that at all.”
It’s worth raising the question, do the people who run college football actually follow the sport? Has Petitti ever watched college football? Part of what makes it special and unique, as opposed to the NFL’s regular season slog, is that the games actually matter. There are stakes, because the margin for error is so small. Expanding the playoff removes those stakes, particularly for the superconference teams and especially the SEC.
This season, thanks to the selection committee’s incompetence, we’re already heading towards a three-loss SEC team, if not multiple three-loss teams, reaching the tournament. In a 24-team format, we’ll have four-loss teams, if not five-loss SEC teams, reaching the top-24. Results are going to matter less than ever.
In a roundabout way, this might actually help lead to more games between marquee opponents, specifically because the outcome doesn’t matter. But claiming that fans will feel the same level of intensity, stakes, excitement and energy over fighting to be in the top-8 so they can get a bye? That’s insanity.
To be fair to Petitti, he did identify that home playoff games would be a big draw for fans.
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“So I think look, and then when you get to the playoff, you know fans are going to show up,” Petitti said. “These on-campus games are one of the best parts about it. Going the 16 on-campus games is going to be absolutely great. You know, when fan bases get a home game, especially if that’s unexpected when the season started, you’re going to see incredible reactions across college football.”
The issue? They’ll be a big draw because the regular season is now so meaningless. We’ve already seen big programs struggle with attendance this year, outside marquee opponents. Just imagine how little interest there’ll be in USC-Maryland or Miami-Stanford when the results don’t mean anything.
What makes all this even more frustrating is that everyone knows the actual motivation behind the playoff expansion: money. More playoff games means more high-value television properties to sell. The 24-team format ensures that programs from the Big Ten and SEC with large, passionate fanbases will have reasons to watch games, even when they’re 6–4.
It’s rewarding mediocrity in search of more financial rewards. Which is what college football has become in recent years.