I wouldn’t put Michigan AD Dave Brandon on a “best of” list, but I have to admit I got a kick out of his grumble about a football playoff:
“This whole notion of a playoff is ridiculous because I don’t care what you come up with, it’s not going to be a fair playoff. You’ve got a bunch of teams that don’t play one another and play different competition and in different time zones in different conferences in different stadiums in front of different crowds and different weather and suddenly at some point in the year you are trying to arbitrarily decide which one is better and which one deserves to be in a four-team playoff or a six-team playoff.
“No matter where you draw that line, you’re going to have controversy and people who are honked off because their team got cut off.”
True ‘dat.
Now I think there’s a valid argument to be made for a larger playoff than the one we have – that there are enough years when there are more than two programs which deserve a shot at the national title to come up with a new arrangement to accommodate that – but the idea that a college football playoff fills a “settle it on the field” void is ludicrous.
Get The Picture 
And the reason those teams don’t play each other is candy*ss AD’s who won’t schedule other teams. We wouldn’t have been forced to the UF model of scheduling if not for the fact that you are in the minority and now at a disadvantage if you don’t schedule in such a manner. If teams played more diverse schedules, like those played 30-35 years ago, a playoff would not be needed nearly as much.
By the way, Michigan declined an opportunity for a home and home with UGA just a few years ago. They stated they would come to the dome but not Athens – Evans correctly said “no thanks.”
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This concept seems to have worked just fine for major league baseball and noone disputes that the winner of the world series is the actual champion.
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Baseball has a 162-game regular season. College football has a 12-game regular season.
What “concept” are you referring to?
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Lets have a 20 game season. More football!
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I’m down with that.
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Uh huh… That 83 win 2006 Cardinals team was clearly heads and shoulders above everybody else. Not like they got hot at the right time or anything.
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Hell, let’s talk about the 1997 and 2003 World Series Champion Florida Marlins teams. Neither could beat out the Braves in the division, and yet both went on to claim pennants and World Series wins. The 1997 team, in fact, faced the Braves in the NLCS and beat them thanks to Eric Gregg’s eight mile wide strike zone in the decisive game. Were the Marlins better than the Braves? The regular season says no. A playoff format expanded for TV money said yes. As a Braves fan, I’ll go to my grave believing the ’97 Braves were better than Florida.
Screw you, Kenny Lofton. Seriously.
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I’m glad to see I’m not the only one holding a fifteen year old grudge. Give ’em hell! 🙂
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Bad memories, man. I’m still bitter about that Eric Gregg game nearly 15 years later.
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Eric Gregg was a world class umpire compared to Drew Coble, who called Ron Gant out at first in the ’91 World Series after Kent Hrbek lifted Gant over his head and body slammed him. I guess Coble thought Gant could levitate, ala David Blaine.
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Oh man, I thought I was the only one who could still conjure up a healthy hatred for Coble and Gregg. You and Go Dawgs! really have a death grip on those old Braves grudges. I love it!
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Those episodes were a continuation of the long-standing curse that Pete Rose had his bookie put on the organization after Garber treated the situation (Pete) like it was the ninth inning of the 7th game of the World Series because Niekro would have given him a fastball to hit.
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“Now I think there’s a valid argument to be made for a larger playoff than the one we have – that there are enough years when there are more than two programs which deserve a shot at the national title to come up with a new arrangement to accommodate that”
Refreshing to see you say that, and no disagreement here re: people arguing about the “bubble” teams no matter where that line is. After all, Stephen A. Smith and Skip Bayless can’t argue about Tebow forever…
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I don’t think the Senator has ever been against a playoff. He’s against the same thing I am – an extended playoff.
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Any playoff has the unintended consequence of diminishing the importance if the regular season. This season any playoff was unnecessary and despite the fact that LSU was the most accomplished regular season team ever they will be forgotten. The team that didnt win it’s conference is declared champs. If we get a plus one you will see 3 and 4 seeds with sorry ass credentials and some of them will walk away with crystal footballs. Bottom line: a 2 team playoff is more than enough in almost every year. Sometimes, like this year, even that is unnecessary
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Brandon’s rambling about all the differences is exactly why there is such a compelling reason for a legit playoff. We can all have an opinion about how strong or weak a team/conference is, but their supporters deserve to be smashed on the field or they will wail for forever….with good reason.
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As Clint Eastwood once said, “Deserve’s got nothin’ to do with it.” 😉
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Apparently not, CFB fans’ wishes haven’t ever been high on the list for the powers-that-be.
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And then he blew his entire argument by also saying he didn’t favor a 16-team because those poor little guys at Northern Illinois would get hurt playing against the Big Boys. One excellent point, followed by one enormous facepalm.
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That’s the way the man rolls.
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