The committee experiment failed

[Rolltide94]

So in other words, 3 head football coaches. I'm failing to see how having a Harvard MBA, being a former Chief of Staff of the US Army, or a sportswriter means they're good at selecting football teams. Maybe they need to bring back Condoleeza Rice or Andrew Luck's dad.

Director of Athletics or just being a former player doesn't really matter to me either. There are some real dumbass former players and ADs. If you're objecting to me calling them retards then fine. I'm just trying to insult them because I don't think they do a good job.

The real point I'm making here is that it's just a bunch of people in a room. Why leave it to human opinion when you can have teams play their way in on the field? They have repeatedly let teams because those teams sat at home and didn't play.

Like I said, you're too stupid to recognize how stupid you are...

Condoleeza Rice was the fucking Secretary of State...Oliver Luck was a 3 time Academic All-American, A Rhodes Scholar finalist, the General Manager of two Pro teams, the President of NFL Europe and the current commissioner of the XFL, I'm pretty sure I would take their opinion over yours 1000 times out of 1000...or any of the other people who have served on the committee.

The real point you're making is that you're dumber than a box of rocks. If we collectively are having a hard time figuring out who the 4th team should be every year, that hardly seems to call for adding teams 5 through 8.

Every team can play there way in on the field now....schedule appropriately and win all your games and you're in. Play in a shit conference and play a shit OOC schedule and you put your fate in the hands of the committee. Play in a good conference and lose a game and you put your fate in the hands of the committee. I would much rather have that than a playoff full of scrubs.

 

[WizardHawk]

Probably not. I don't see how 4 more teams is a "fuckton" though

The more teams you add, the more we normalize accepting multi loss teams as acceptable playoff teams. I wasn't in favor of going to 4 even because a 2 loss team would eventually get in. 8 would attempt to normalize 2-3 losses.

Damn it, losses matter at this level. It is the ONLY level of football they really do. It is the single best remaining element they haven't already taken from the sport that feeds that adrenaline junkie side of fans.

I really don't want to normalize accepting losses as ok in college football. It really does boil down to that.

 

[Rolltide94]

That is true. A UCF/Boise St will never have an opportunity to potentially show us they're legit in a 4 team playoff, though.

Would Cincinnati be in right now if they beat tOSU 42-0 or even 24-10 and won the rest of their games convincingly?

 

[WNY_FOOTBALL_DUDE]

With the CFP playoff committee we are literally right back to where we were pre-BCS era. With humans picking the rankings and deciding who goes to what bowl, and essentially picking their national champion by having complete control over the top 4.

I am a little confused by the post here. But I think you're both correct and incorrect.

The whole point of the committee was to create a consensus ranking system and to have a discussion/debate. FCS does this. So does College hoops, baseball, and so forth.

The first three seeds goes to the 3 schools/teams with the most points, the last seed must be agreed upon everybody in the room.

If you think the committee was put in, so Boise State or Central Florida would be given a shot, you would be incorrect. Just look at the make-up of the committee, you only have AD representation from the power five conferences. The other five pretty much have nobody. As a now, Terry Mohajir is the only G5 AD representative.

The problem here is you cannot logically complain about subjective hands, and then endorse a subjective hands for picking the teams. The AP and Coach's poll are not magically less biased or "unreasonable" than having a group of people having a discussion.

I would think having a group discussion would be superior to everybody submitting their own ballots and nobody explaining their logical base.

Point #2 seems very muddled to me. No sport is only going to allow in CC champs only. I thought the proposal was CC only and undefeated Notre Dame, if ranked in the top 6. Meaning, if there are 4 conference champions/undefeated Notre Dame in the top 6, then the first four CCs/undefeated Notre Dame, would get in. For example in 2011, we had LSU, Alabama, Oklahoma State, Stanford, Oregon, and Arkansas in the top 6. LSU, OSU, and Oregon would get in, due being a conference champion. Alabama would still get in, because we have only 3 CCs in the top 6. In 2012, we had Notre Dame, Alabama, Florida, Oregon, Georgia, and K-State in the top 6. Under the modified CC format, ND, Alabama, and K-State would get in, and Florida would have been the wildcard team. In other words, it would have been #1 Notre Dame vs. #6 K-State, #2 Alabama vs. #3 Florida.

What I do not understand is this "power 6" thing. College football has 10 conferences. The ACC, Big-10, Big-12, Pac-12, and SEC are the major ones. The American Conference and the Mountain West have extremely good reputation and have shown to beat the giants of college football. Which one would get "power conference" status?

Point #2 also doesn't make sense because of Alabama and Wisconsin in 2011. Consider the BCS computer ratings:

ALABAMA
Sagarin, Massey and Wolfe - 2nd best
A&H, Billingsley, and Colley Matrix, - 3rd best

WISCONSIN (4th highest rated CC)
SAG & Massey - 9th
Wolfe - 13th
Billingsley - 11th
A&H and CM - 16th

I am all for doing a six-team model, but perhaps we should combine together an ELO model and an earned model. In other words, use the six BCS computers and whatever top 6 spits out is your playoff teams.

 

[WNY_FOOTBALL_DUDE]

The more teams you add, the more we normalize accepting multi loss teams as acceptable playoff teams. I wasn't in favor of going to 4 even because a 2 loss team would eventually get in. 8 would attempt to normalize 2-3 losses.

Damn it, losses matter at this level. It is the ONLY level of football they really do. It is the single best remaining element they haven't already taken from the sport that feeds that adrenaline junkie side of fans.

I really don't want to normalize accepting losses as ok in college football. It really does boil down to that.

I know we go through this every year, but so what if a 2-loss team gets into a playoff.

FBS has 130 teams and 10 conferences. 8/130 = 6% of the population. 6/130 = 5%

Are you really that scared of taking 5-6% of college football teams? You still have between 94-95% of teams not making the playoffs.

Winning 10-13 games in a season is no walk-in the park.

The obvious logical flaw is not all schedules are built the same. Stronger the schedule, the more likely losses happen. Your logical base only discourages tough scheduling. Sounds to me like you would rather take a 1-loss team which played a light schedule vs. a 2-loss team playing a heavy schedule.

 

[CJH9972]

Like I said, you're too stupid to recognize how stupid you are...

Condoleeza Rice was the fucking Secretary of State...Oliver Luck was a 3 time Academic All-American, A Rhodes Scholar finalist, the General Manager of two Pro teams, the President of NFL Europe and the current commissioner of the XFL, I'm pretty sure I would take their opinion over yours 1000 times out of 1000...or any of the other people who have served on the committee.

The real point you're making is that you're dumber than a box of rocks. If we collectively are having a hard time figuring out who the 4th team should be every year, that hardly seems to call for adding teams 5 through 8.

Every team can play there way in on the field now....schedule appropriately and win all your games and you're in. Play in a shit conference and play a shit OOC schedule and you put your fate in the hands of the committee. Play in a good conference and lose a game and you put your fate in the hands of the committee. I would much rather have that than a playoff full of scrubs.

How smart does anyone need to be to pick four playoff teams?

 

[CJH9972]

I know we go through this every year, but so what if a 2-loss team gets into a playoff.

FBS has 130 teams and 10 conferences. 8/130 = 6% of the population. 6/130 = 5%

Are you really that scared of taking 5-6% of college football teams? You still have between 94-95% of teams not making the playoffs.

Winning 10-13 games in a season is no walk-in the park.

The obvious logical flaw is not all schedules are built the same. Stronger the schedule, the more likely losses happen. Your logical base only discourages tough scheduling. Sounds to me like you would rather take a 1-loss team which played a light schedule vs. a 2-loss team playing a heavy schedule.

So many want strong scheduling and no parity so every year a few teams lose no more than once and rest are considered scrubs.

 

[WizardHawk]

I know we go through this every year, but so what if a 2-loss team gets into a playoff.

FBS has 130 teams and 10 conferences. 8/130 = 6% of the population. 6/130 = 5%

Are you really that scared of taking 5-6% of college football teams? You still have between 94-95% of teams not making the playoffs.

Winning 10-13 games in a season is no walk-in the park.

The obvious logical flaw is not all schedules are built the same. Stronger the schedule, the more likely losses happen. Your logical base only discourages tough scheduling. Sounds to me like you would rather take a 1-loss team which played a light schedule vs. a 2-loss team playing a heavy schedule.

Every time one of you tries this it requires putting words in mouths or otherwise leaving logic behind.

No, I would not rather take a 1 loss team from a tougher schedule. Never said it nor implied it. There is nothing in anything I've said that leans that way or hints at it. It's pure made up bullshit.

I want the 4 teams that were the best in football that year. Oh, wait, we get that now.

When you add teams you get more teams with more losses. It normalizes accepting losses in the regular season. That takes away the most intense part of college football. Why? So taking a couple of extra teams might create an extra good game or two at seasons end? It's pure nonsense.

No, I don't want to trade the intensity of all 12 regular season games. The drama that happens over the 13 week season. I don't want to throw that away because a handful of fans have to have a massive tournament at seasons end to feel better about a sport. This isn't a sport where a season ending tournament fits. If you need that, try the NFL. Leave ours alone.

Why say there is any fear in that? I like college football. I like it the way it is. I don't believe it needs to be 'fixed'. I like EVERY week of it, not just the last couple and I don't want to lose that.

Ironic you accuse the current system of promoting bad OOC games, but this is a discussion about auto bids for every P5 conf champ and not one of those will get in with any care or measure on even one OOC game. They become irrelevant. Entirely meaningless. The insistence that it frees them up then to play even tougher ones is pure lunacy. Risk more injury and spend more time game planning and all the energy that goes into top flight college matchups, for a game that won't count. This seems more likely to you guys than the OOC's get even weaker and are treated as byes and training games for underclassmen so they can rest up for the conf games that matter. I mean the SEC already does it now so of course it's going to get worse under such a system. It's basic logic.

 

[CJH9972]

Every time one of you tries this it requires putting words in mouths or otherwise leaving logic behind.

No, I would not rather take a 1 loss team from a tougher schedule. Never said it nor implied it. There is nothing in anything I've said that leans that way or hints at it. It's pure made up bullshit.

I want the 4 teams that were the best in football that year. Oh, wait, we get that now.

When you add teams you get more teams with more losses. It normalizes accepting losses in the regular season. That takes away the most intense part of college football. Why? So taking a couple of extra teams might create an extra good game or two at seasons end? It's pure nonsense.

No, I don't want to trade the intensity of all 12 regular season games. The drama that happens over the 13 week season. I don't want to throw that away because a handful of fans have to have a massive tournament at seasons end to feel better about a sport. This isn't a sport where a season ending tournament fits. If you need that, try the NFL. Leave ours alone.

Why say there is any fear in that? I like college football. I like it the way it is. I don't believe it needs to be 'fixed'. I like EVERY week of it, not just the last couple and I don't want to lose that.

Ironic you accuse the current system of promoting bad OOC games, but this is a discussion about auto bids for every P5 conf champ and not one of those will get in with any care or measure on even one OOC game. They become irrelevant. Entirely meaningless. The insistence that it frees them up then to play even tougher ones is pure lunacy. Risk more injury and spend more time game planning and all the energy that goes into top flight college matchups, for a game that won't count. This seems more likely to you guys than the OOC's get even weaker and are treated as byes and training games for underclassmen so they can rest up for the conf games that matter. I mean the SEC already does it now so of course it's going to get worse under such a system. It's basic logic.

Not that you have to be for any such format but the importance of OOC games depends on the overall format even with auto bids. Teams need to win those games to keep themselves in contention for at-large bids plus some eight team formats include homefield advantage. And you can use rules to compel stronger OOC scheduling where the risk/reward of playing Alabama vs New Mexico State is significant. While I see the arguments against auto bids, the idea that teams would have no regard for their OOC schedule seems illogical.

 

[WizardHawk]

Not that you have to be for any such format but the importance of OOC games depends on the overall format even with auto bids. Teams need to win those games to keep themselves in contention for at-large bids plus some eight team formats include homefield advantage. And you can use rules to compel stronger OOC scheduling where the risk/reward of playing Alabama vs New Mexico State is significant. While I see the arguments against auto bids, the idea that teams would have no regard for their OOC schedule seems illogical.

Again, I'm not for any 8 team expansion at all, but this was just about autobids. I fail to see how going from 4 spots now that do take OOC into account and yet we see one of the five conferences already watering down and treating OOC like bye weeks, going to 8 and giving a free ride to 5 teams and only having 3 left, how the logic lines up that it somehow treats OOC better. It doesn't make sense based on what we know and see today.

People hate the committee and yet we still have to have one with an 8 team autobid system to pick those last slots. It's not logical.

People want winning a conference to mean more and really don't care if that means a team ranked lower than 15 gets in and leaves more deserving teams home. Conference champs that are picked on 8 or 9 games only, yet we expect the others to be viewed on their entire body of work. All 12 count ONLY for the 3 the committee are picking.

That entire proposal is a hot mess. I want no part of it. And thankfully it has basically no chance of happening.

 

[CJH9972]

Again, I'm not for any 8 team expansion at all, but this was just about autobids. I fail to see how going from 4 spots now that do take OOC into account and yet we see one of the five conferences already watering down and treating OOC like bye weeks, going to 8 and giving a free ride to 5 teams and only having 3 left, how the logic lines up that it somehow treats OOC better. It doesn't make sense based on what we know and see today.

People hate the committee and yet we still have to have one with an 8 team autobid system to pick those last slots. It's not logical.

People want winning a conference to mean more and really don't care if that means a team ranked lower than 15 gets in and leaves more deserving teams home. Conference champs that are picked on 8 or 9 games only, yet we expect the others to be viewed on their entire body of work. All 12 count ONLY for the 3 the committee are picking.

That entire proposal is a hot mess. I want no part of it. And thankfully it has basically no chance of happening.

Again, I realize what you are for and I'm not trying to convince you otherwise. But OOC games even with auto bids can have a great deal of value under such a format. And I wouldn't use a committee to pick any teams under any format.

 

[CJH9972]

How smart does anyone need to be to pick four playoff teams?

This gets a facepalm from my biggest fan? I love it.

 

[WizardHawk]

Again, I realize what you are for and I'm not trying to convince you otherwise. But OOC games even with auto bids can have a great deal of value under such a format. And I wouldn't use a committee to pick any teams under any format.

So what format seeds 8 teams into a playoff without any human picking?

Again to be clear, I don't want 8 in any format, but I'm unaware of any method to pick 8 that doesn't have humans doing some part of it.

 

[Robotech]

It seems like a futile effort to try to put together a 100% legit way to decide a college football champion. The current system is better than past systems, but you'll never get anything like what you have in the NFL.

This is probably impossible for practical reasons such as TV deals, traditions, lack of leverage by non P5 teams, etc., but my idea would be to organize the 129 FBS teams into eight sixteen-team super conferences and keep Notre Dame independent. The eight conference champs go into the CFP. If Notre Dame finishes in the top 8 of the rankings (and I think you'd have to exclude coaches from the voting), then they play the lowest ranked conference champion in a play-in game.

 

[CJH9972]

So what format seeds 8 teams into a playoff without any human picking?

Again to be clear, I don't want 8 in any format, but I'm unaware of any method to pick 8 that doesn't have humans doing some part of it.

Come up with rules that define what beats what based on the results of the games.

 

[WizardHawk]

Come up with rules that define what beats what based on the results of the games.

Example? What rules exactly.

The problem is the results on the field are not equal in this sport. Less so than every other at any level.
A win in the Pac is not the same as a win in the B1G. The ACC is a total joke outside of Clemson so we really don't know even what Clemson is because their league is weak. Several SEC teams get losses that shouldn't hurt as much as say Oregon losing to ASU (lulz).

We had computer models that went through complex formulas to rank teams in the BCS. There were enough anomalies to not rely on them entirely so they added the human polls to balance it out.

You want a fictitious system that takes humans out. Spell out exactly how that would work. No one has cracked that code in the last 20 years or so of trying.

Again, we don't need it. What we have works. Go win out the schedule in front of you. Win every game. If you don't, you have no committee or anyone else to blame for not making the playoff. You still have your conference to play for and the best bowl you can reach as well as rivalries and other goals from week to week. It doesn't destroy your whole season to lose even if it takes you out of playoff contention (which it doesn't always do).

 

[CJH9972]

Example? What rules exactly.

The problem is the results on the field are not equal in this sport. Less so than every other at any level.
A win in the Pac is not the same as a win in the B1G. The ACC is a total joke outside of Clemson so we really don't know even what Clemson is because their league is weak. Several SEC teams get losses that shouldn't hurt as much as say Oregon losing to ASU (lulz).

We had computer models that went through complex formulas to rank teams in the BCS. There were enough anomalies to not rely on them entirely so they added the human polls to balance it out.

You want a fictitious system that takes humans out. Spell out exactly how that would work. No one has cracked that code in the last 20 years or so of trying.

Again, we don't need it. What we have works. Go win out the schedule in front of you. Win every game. If you don't, you have no committee or anyone else to blame for not making the playoff. You still have your conference to play for and the best bowl you can reach as well as rivalries and other goals from week to week. It doesn't destroy your whole season to lose even if it takes you out of playoff contention (which it doesn't always do).

The results on the field are not equal in any sport and most play by rules that tell us what results are worth more than others. My own idea is a point system that is defeated opponents' wins - defeated by opponents' losses. Beyond that, it really isn't that difficult to come up with something that says this record/schedule combination beats this record/schedule combination based on the number of games won and lost.

 

[WizardHawk]

The results on the field are not equal in any sport and most play by rules that tell us what results are worth more than others. My own idea is a point system that is defeated opponents' wins - defeated by opponents' losses. Beyond that, it really isn't that difficult to come up with something that says this record/schedule combination beats this record/schedule combination based on the number of games won and lost.

NFL has schedule parity. The losses very much are equatable. 14 of their 16 game schedule is the same as everyone else in their division. Their seeding for the playoffs is not. Every division plays a very different path. You are rewarded for being in a division with less competition for sure. The path to HFA is easier. So yes, the problems exist in every large playoff format. Another reason we do not need a large playoff format.

You have your ideas, however if they were actually viable they would have already been created and used in the initial BCS formula when they were deeply looking into this issue. No one has found a viable way to remove the human element.

At the time people were pushing for 4 we were told - We need this because the line between 2nd and 3rd is too thin. There won't be a need to go past 4. 5th isn't as important. Those of us against expansion accurately predicted those in favor of 4 would largely go to complaining we need 8 and it wouldn't take that long. Those saying 8 is enough now will also be clamoring over the unfairness of how we rank who is 8th or 9th so we need 12 and bye weeks, or 16.

We don't need any of it. We are fine as we are now. If anything, going back to 2 would be the only change I would vote for.

 

[mrwallace2ku]

With the CFP playoff committee we are literally right back to where we were pre-BCS era. With humans picking the rankings and deciding who goes to what bowl, and essentially picking their national champion by having complete control over the top 4.

They tried to get the outcome of college football national champion out of human's hand by installing the BCS, and that failed, so they went back to people picking the outcome, which doesn't make sense. They have teams climbing and dropping in the polls by 8 spots a week.

I think they need to do something different.

1.) The Committee was basically put into place to avoid a couple of things, give teams like Boise St a chance if they were to have an undefeated season and to keep non conf champions out of the playoff. Well, they've failed on both fronts, UCF and their obsession with keeping Alabama in the talks. So to avoid this, let's have the BCS rankings still and the committee reviews the rankings and either approves or doesn't approve. Basically they have the authority to override a LSU/Alabama type matchup again, or if a deserving Boise State should get that 4th spot over a 2 loss Georgia team, they give it to Boise. So they just review the BCS rankings and step in to prevent previous mistakes the BCS made.

2.) Keep it mostly out of humans hands and just do Power 5 champs, maybe move one other conference up to give it a Power 6 and just have Power 6 champions go to the playoffs. 1 and 2 seeds get a BYE. The committee is there only to rank the seeds, which basically can be hinted to them by the combination of the Coaches and AP poll.

NO WORRIES…your team will plummet out of the top20 after the Oregon State University Beavers fully dismantle that smoke-n-mirrors oregon duck team today.

 

[CJH9972]

NFL has schedule parity. The losses very much are equatable. 14 of their 16 game schedule is the same as everyone else in their division. Their seeding for the playoffs is not. Every division plays a very different path. You are rewarded for being in a division with less competition for sure. The path to HFA is easier. So yes, the problems exist in every large playoff format. Another reason we do not need a large playoff format.

You have your ideas, however if they were actually viable they would have already been created and used in the initial BCS formula when they were deeply looking into this issue. No one has found a viable way to remove the human element.

At the time people were pushing for 4 we were told - We need this because the line between 2nd and 3rd is too thin. There won't be a need to go past 4. 5th isn't as important. Those of us against expansion accurately predicted those in favor of 4 would largely go to complaining we need 8 and it wouldn't take that long. Those saying 8 is enough now will also be clamoring over the unfairness of how we rank who is 8th or 9th so we need 12 and bye weeks, or 16.

We don't need any of it. We are fine as we are now. If anything, going back to 2 would be the only change I would vote for.

Removing the human element is very easy.........the problem is too many in college football think competition is about teams proving subjective claims about best team.

Again, favor whatever playoff you want...............that said, with any size playoff, the problem about who gets in will always be there so long as it is decided by make it up as you go opinions. The NFL could change its format to eliminate the problems you see with the current one. However, what matters is that every team makes the playoffs according to the rules in play. There is no debate and the rules apply the same to every team. We don't wait a day for a committee to tell us they picked A over B for reason X with no idea why X counts more this time around.