The more, the merrier

Wishful thinking, or honest assessment?

“I like it for several reasons,” Thompson said. “I’ve been espousing a playoff the 14 year history of the Mountain West. I testified in Congress. I think it’s a great step forward. I’m probably in the minority in that I don’t think we’re going to stay at four for the next 12 years. I know that’s what the contracts say and everybody’s following that script these days. We’ll see. Who knows where we’ll be down the road.

“But I like it for several reasons. One, America has an insatiable appetite for a playoff, for this team versus that team. Maybe they aren’t the right teams all the time, or maybe the (NFC) West snuck into the playoffs at 8-8, but if they win a couple games and get hot, they can go to the Super Bowl. That’s what we’re accustomed to in every sport, except college football. Going back in the history of the Mountain West, maybe one of those TCU teams, maybe one of the Utah teams could have gone into a four-team playoff instead of just playing in a BCS bowl.

“But I like the opportunity for the student-athletes. I understand the pitfalls of expanding and playing 15, 16 games and the wear and tear on kids, but we would be able to figure that out…”

You’ve got to love how these guys have a unique product that they’re just dying to crap all over.  For the right amount of money, they’ll do it, too.  But as long as it’s for the student-athletes…

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Instant lack of credibility

jesusgawdmakeitstopnowaynohowholycraptheycan’tbeserious.

ACC coaches are in favor of having the coaches’ poll be a part of the criteria used by the selection committee to determine the four teams in the College Football Playoff.

I can’t think of any single step the BCS poobahs could take that would more effectively undermine the new playoffs than to let the Coaches Poll back in the door.  And, yes, I say that recognizing that a few changes are being proposed.

Duke coach David Cutcliffe, serving as league coaches’ chair, told ESPN.com on Wednesday during the league’s spring meetings that his group also is in favor of having every single coach have a vote in the poll and complete transparency in the voting. They also favor doing away with a preseason poll and releasing their first poll at some point during the season — much in the way the BCS standings are released.

Whoop-dee-do.  The conflicts of interest and bias will still be there.  And giving every single coach a vote means there will be that many more coaches handing off the job to somebody else to complete.

It’s a bad idea.  I just hope it’s a nonstarter, too.

Tuesday morning buffet

Lots of goodies to sample today.

• Seriously, why did it take so long to figure out Tommie Frazier belongs in the College Football Hall of Fame?
• Georgia’s new young alumni ticket deal is off to a fast start… which probably means students had better start showing up at games.
• Rodney Garner, staying in touch.
• Not just no, but “Oh, hell no.”
• Kolton Houston is the subject of next Sunday’s ESPN’s “Between The Lines”.  I hope his situation gets plenty of attention from it.
• One way you know the preseason is really underway – Paul Myerberg’s previews have started.  Hooray!
• President Obama plays to the crowd at Ohio State.
• I wouldn’t count on much, but if you’re interested in Matthew Thomas’ options after announcing he doesn’t want to go to FSU, John Infante has the info.
• Rumor has it that ESPN and the SEC will split the profits from the SEC Network 50/50.
• This, on the other hand, bites.

What’s better than awesome?

More awesome, of course.

“Is this (the new four-team playoff) better for all of us in college football?” Petersen asked. “I think a playoff system and a four-team structure, no, I don’t think anybody’s going, ‘That is the answer.’ But it’s moving in the right direction.

“How do you get an eight-team (playoff)? I think that would be the next really awesome step, and then how do you go even bigger than that? Well, how do we get that all done? We can only play so many games. This is college football. They’re students, and you have finals and injuries. I don’t have the answers.”

While it sure sounds like Petersen would prefer a 16-team playoff format, he says he “doesn’t have a clue” how it would get worked out, “because you have to cut down your regular season games for sure. There’s probably enough money for everybody to share in that if they did that. I do think bigger than four is what a lot of people would like to see.”

You can’t blame Petersen for the sentiment.  The way things are set up now, Mountain West dwellers like Boise State are going to have a tough time cracking the four-team field because of strength of schedule considerations.  So move that bad boy out to eight or sixteen teams and watch his frown turn upside down.

That already makes two high-profile coaches who’ve come out advocating a bigger tourney before the commissioners have even settled the details on the new one.  Wanna bet there are more to come?

Just getting started.

They haven’t even settled on the selection committee details, and Notre Dame’s Brian Kelly is already indulging his inner Jim Boeheim with a little playoff expansion talk.

“I don’t know that four is where we’re going to finish this thing. I think it’s a great entry into where we want to go,” said Kelly, who toured the stadium in preparation for his team’s Oct. 5 matchup in Cowboys Stadium against Arizona State. “Moving forward, I think the focus … will be on whether it’s eight or 16 (teams) or whatever the number is.”

Whatever, indeed.  One thing I know.  A bigger postseason generally means more coaching security, as in “how can you fire the guy who took ‘em to the playoffs?”.

Suckers.

So, what exactly is “football expertise”?

‘Cause Mike Slive is looking for a few good men.

“Clearly what you want: we want a committee that has football expertise, and we need to find the right people,” said Slive, who met last week with College Football Playoff executive director Bill Hancock and other officials in Pasadena.

“We want integrity, and we want transparency, because this is our opportunity to make sure that not only are we comfortable but you’re (the media) comfortable and all the fans are comfortable that this process is the way it should be. It’s not going to be easy.”

More like it’s not going to happen.  Let’s face it, there are a ton of not-so-hidden agendas out there where the real battles over the selection committee will be fought.

Slive arguably has more at stake than anyone in the committee discussion. The BCS system has been highly favorable to the SEC, whose teams’ repeated postseason triumphs have helped bolster their favorability with the pollsters who currently vote teams into the title game. A committee untethered from the traditional polls could be more discerning and possibly less forgiving of the now 14-team league’s insistence on staying at eight conference games (the Big Ten will soon join the Big 12 and Pac-12 at nine) and feasting on Sun Belt and FCS foes.

Scott, who does not come from the basketball committee background, presumably wants his teams rewarded for their historically stronger nonconference schedules, but he’s also less familiar with the associated metrics. Delany, whose league has inarguably fallen behind of late, has spoken out in the past about valuing a conference championship and perhaps not rewarding a team like 2011 Alabama that did not win its own division. Bowlsby must be on guard that his conference won’t be penalized for its lack of a conference championship game.

It’s not outright dishonesty, or even the blatant conflicts of interest that have marred the Coaches Poll for years, that concern me.  It’s the more subtle tug-of-war that the committee members are likely to engage in with close calls and how much spreading the wealth, so to speak, between the conferences enters into the decision process that has me nervous.  (If there’s one lesson to be taken from the BCS experience, it’s that there will be a fair number of seasons with close calls.)  Don’t think that’s not in the minds of Slive and his peers right now as they try to build the better mousetrap.

It seems to me that Slive has already won a very significant concession with the agreement that a conference can have more than one participant in the playoffs.  Take a postseason that features two (or more) SEC teams on a regular basis, add the above vested interests and you’ve got a formula that virtually guarantees postseason expansion, Bill Hancock’s straight-faced denials notwithstanding.

Credibility problem

It’s not that Dennis Dodd makes taking Bill Hancock at less than his word look easy.  It’s that it is easy.

Rematch on steroids

No limit on the amount of teams from any one conference in any one year in the six bowls. Helloooo, SEC.—
Dennis Dodd (@dennisdoddcbs) April 25, 2013

Upon hearing that, Les Miles immediately began lobbying Mike Slive to go to a seven-game conference schedule.

Thursday morning buffet

Simple.  Nourishing.

• Finally, a media headline about college footballers not making money that points the finger in the NFL’s direction.
• Over the past five years, Georgia has been one of the slower offenses in the game.  But things have been speeding up recently.
• More Willie Martinez love:  “No Georgia defensive player has gone before the third round since the Indianapolis selected cornerback Tim Jennings in 2006 in round two with the 62nd overall pick.”
• It’s nice that the Peach Bowl name will be making a reappearance, but the BCS commissioners’ fixation with naming is getting a little weird.
• Richt says J.J. Green will stay on offense.  One thing about Green that impressed me at G-Day was that he showed good hands snagging a high, hard pass.  If he can offer some blitz protection, he definitely looks like a contributor on passing downs.
• You know this is shit Nick Saban doesn’t have time for.
• Sounds like Bill Hancock’s gotten a little sensitive about the old order he’s been defending:  “There are two letters that are not associated with this name,” Hancock said.  Hey, nobody ever said being a flack was easy.
• NCAA ponders waiving the waiver process for 6-7 teams that want to go bowling.

Nick Saban thinks the selection committee should have time for this.

Anything big happens in college football and it’s not validated until somebody gets Nick Saban’s opinion on the matter, right?  So he’s asked about the new playoff system and speaks very generally about it in his response.

With one exception, that is.

“I don’t think there’s enough weight put on the quality of your schedule and the opponents that you play, which in our league is very, very important, because we had six teams in the top 10 last year at the end of the season. We play each other, and that has a huge impact on the quality of team you have, regardless of how many games you lose. There are things like that that I think we can do better.”

Expect to hear more and more of this kind of talk from SEC coaches, especially if the pressure to go to a nine-game conference schedule increases.