My turn....

[Gator]

​

"saturdaysarebetter" has tried numerous time to start discussions with little success, so I figured I'd give it a try.

According to ESPN, the idiot, "Bret Bielema wants to see the College Football Playoff expand to 16 teams in 2026, but only if all the major conferences, including the SEC, play nine league games per season."

#1
Just because the B1G was stupid enough to expand to 18 teams doesn't mean the rest of the world should try to make them look smarter by going to 9 conference games.

#2
Look the B1g has 18 teams and plays a nine games conference schedule. 9/18 = 0.5000.
The SEC has 16 teams and plays an 8 game conference schedule. 8/16= 0.5000. Why should the SEC play more in conference games?

#3
The SEC on average already plays the toughest regular season schedules in CFP. Again, why should the SEC play more in conference games?
Since 2000,


#4
The problem is NOT whether or not the SEC plays 8 or 9 conference games. The problem IS teams don't play ENOUGH meaningful OOC games! IF teams/conferences would play more and better OOC games there would be NO need for auto-bids. Teams would have to EARN their way into the CFP. That is assuming the CFP committee use SOS as an elimination tool!

 

[dtgold88]

All for more/better OOC matchups. But by your "logic" should the SEC only have played 6 conference games when league was 12 teams? BIG only 5 when was actually a 10 team league?

Hopefully you understand that, yes, were times most thought SEC was better but more recently the BIG for sure has narrowed the gap quite a bit and toughest schedule is not exactly factual as I hope you understand.

Do you hope one day you can get back to caring more about a relevant team than conference?

 

[Gator]

All for more/better OOC matchups. But by your "logic" should the SEC only have played 6 conference games when league was 12 teams? BIG only 5 when was actually a 10 team league?

Hopefully you understand that, yes, were times most thought SEC was better but more recently the BIG for sure has narrowed the gap quite a bit and toughest schedule is not exactly factual as I hope you understand.

Do you hope one day you can get back to caring more about a relevant team than conference?

No, the logic is that the SEC and B1G RIGHT NOW play the same percentage of in -conference games. Thus, the SEC doesn't NEED to move to 9 games to make things equitable - they ARE equitable!

 

[dtgold88]

No, the logic is that the SEC and B1G RIGHT NOW play the same percentage of in -conference games. Thus, the SEC doesn't NEED to move to 9 games to make things equitable - they ARE equitable!

so if the SEC was only 12 you'd lobby for 6 so as not to have imbalance?

You must really not think much of your precious conference if you think a game against, say, an FCS team or G5 no different than playing an SEC foe.

 

[Gator]

Hopefully you understand that, yes, were times most thought SEC was better but more recently the BIG for sure has narrowed the gap quite a bit and toughest schedule is not exactly factual as I hope you understand.

I don't want to belabor the point but just because Michigan and Ohio State won the last two NC is NOT defacto proof that the B1G is better/worse/equivalent to the SEC. I thought we were discussing "conferences". I believe that most rankings system had the SEC as the better conference in 2023 and 2024.

Do you hope one day you can get back to caring more about a relevant team than conference?

Oh, I care about my team but there isn't much to cheer about at UF (in Football, Basket Ball NC's AREN'T doing it for me!).

 

[Gator]

so if the SEC was only 12 you'd lobby for 6 so as not to have imbalance?

You must really not think much of your precious conference if you think a game against, say, an FCS team or G5 no different than playing an SEC foe.

Why not? Again, just because the B1G was stupid and expanded to 18 isn't our problem.

 

[dtgold88]

I don't want to belabor the point but just because Michigan and Ohio State won the last two NC is NOT defacto proof that the B1G is better/worse/equivalent to the SEC. I thought we were discussing "conferences". I believe that most rankings system had the SEC as the better conference in 2023 and 2024.



Oh, I care about my team but there isn't much to cheer about at UF (in Football, Basket Ball NC's AREN'T doing it for me!).

Totally agree about OSU/UM.....and why Bama and UGA (little LSU mixed in) winning titles does not make the SEC great.

No idea what ranking systems had between them in 2023 and 2024 but often based on subjective rankings of the teams in each conference.

 

[dtgold88]

Why not? Again, just because the B1G was stupid and expanded to 18 isn't our problem.

No issue expanding to 18 and assuming will eventually get past 20.

But, again, you must really not think much of your conference if you think a FCS or G5 opponent no different than facing another SEC team.

 

[Gator]

No issue expanding to 18 and assuming will eventually get past 20.

But, again, you must really not think much of your conference if you think a FCS or G5 opponent no different than facing another SEC team.

Why have a conference with that many teams. If you want to "break away" from the G5 teams just come out and say so. You seem to think higher of a team that plays bad P4 teams than one that plays G5 teams or even FCS teams. Why?

Stop looking at name tags and look at some quantitative measure of a teams strength instead.
Look at AP rankings, Sagarin, Massey composite, whatever. Take two schedules, sort them by rankings, then compare them side-by-side.

There are things that conferences CAN do to help college football in general and there are things that the CFP committee MUST change or things will fall apart completely (and soon).

 

[Gator]

No issue expanding to 18 and assuming will eventually get past 20.

But, again, you must really not think much of your conference if you think a FCS or G5 opponent no different than facing another SEC team.

Conference need to address the topic of OOC games. Playing MORE in-conference games is moving in the WRONG direction. I've said this before but people just don't want to listen. There is a limit to what IN-conference games can tell us.

Again, consider TWO P4 conferences, A and B, each with 9 teams. Each plays a "round-robin" conference schedule (each team plays all 8 of the other conference members.
Suppose conference A finish with records of 8-0, 7-1, 6-2, 5-3, 4-4, 3-5, 2-6, 1-7, and 0-8. Meanwhile, conference B finished with all teams 4-4.

One is tempted to say that teams A1 - A4 are better than any team if conference B. Based on what? Simply because both have the label of "P4" doesn't guarantee anything.

Suppose the two conference decided to play their OOC games against each other. Each team play 4 random teams fro the other conference.

First, lets suppose the results are that each team in conference A won all four games. The results would be Conference A would be 12-0. 11-1, 10,2, 9-3, 8-4, 7-5, 6-6, 5-7, and 4-8. The teams in conference B would all have a record of 4-8. Now the perception would be that 8 of the teams in A were better than all nine in B and one team in A was a good any any team in B.

Next, lets suppose the results are that each team in conference B won all four games. The results would be Conference A would be 8-4. 7-5, 6-6, 5-7, 4-8, 3-9, 2-10, 1-11, 0-12. The teams in conference B would all have a record of 8-4. Now the perception would be that 9 of the teams in B were better than all 9 teams in A. (Even though one team in A has the same records as all teams in B, the A team lost to every B team it played (not half which the B teams did).

The point is that NO MATTER how many games are played IN-conference - they don't tell you ANYTHING about the relative strength of the conferences - ONLY OOC games can do that.

 

[Gator]

No issue expanding to 18 and assuming will eventually get past 20.

But, again, you must really not think much of your conference if you think a FCS or G5 opponent no different than facing another SEC team.

The CFP committee needs to address the problem associated with strength of schedules.
Compare Boise States resume' to the P4 teams. Just because BSU wins their conference and goes 12-0 it MEANS NOTHING. These are averages for P4 teams plus BSU from 2000-2024.