(04-29-2021 12:00 AM)Frank the Tank Wrote:  

(04-28-2021 08:53 PM)quo vadis Wrote:  

(04-28-2021 08:39 PM)ken d Wrote:  Somewhere buried deep inside this thread someone pointed to Frank the Tank's advice to "think like a university president". So I'll try to apply that to this conversation, especially the part about all the extra money that would be made if the playoffs were expanded. I'll assume there would be some additional money. I don't think it would be nearly as much as some of the estimates I've seen, and on a per school basis it might not seem worth it.

That's my belief. I am not sure TV is going to be willing to pay a *large* amount over and above what is currently being paid for the CFP to repackage matchups they already pretty much get as NY6 bowl games as playoff games.

I've got to say that I don't agree at all. Honestly, every time that we don't think that TV networks won't pay more for sports... they break new records. That's still happening in the middle of this pandemic. The NFL just got a gargantuan raise in its new contracts. Heck, the *NHL* just got a huge raise with nothing really new to offer.

So, there's a lot of reason to be *very* bullish on what an expanded CFP would get. There's simply no comparison between the value of elimination playoff games and secondary exhibition NY6 bowl games. When you're adding multiple rounds of elimination playoff games to the second most watched sport in the country (after the NFL), it would be crazy to think that's not worth a LOT of money.

Once again, the *NHL* (much less the NFL) just signed record-breaking TV contracts. A 12-team CFP would reasonably obtain a monster increase - to think otherwise would be ignoring how much TV networks are paying for lesser properties by comparison.

Stewart Mandel noted that the average G5 school received $1.4 million from the CFP in 2017. Doubling that amount or more isn't chump change and all it takes is simply expanding the playoff that they're not likely to even participate in. That is basically the easiest decision that university presidents can make to raise instant revenue in this environment. (Note that the figures for the P5 schools are MUCH higher, so the incentives are even more for them.)

I mean, I get it if people are personally traditionalists or don't want to see further playoff expansion. However, a 12-team playoff would be worth MASSIVE money compared to the current system. I honestly think people are going to underestimate what it's worth (and then wonder why they didn't expand it years ago).

Frankly, what I would really prefer to see is a contraction to four 18 team power conferences, with each of them staging a four team conference championship tournament. No need to include the lesser conferences, as the addition of 7 schools to the "P" ranks would essentially create a separate subdivision within the FBS that includes every school that has even an outside chance of winning a national championship.

Those CCT's are the first two rounds of a 16 team playoff, culminating in a Final Four beginning with the New Year's bowls and consisting of the four conference champions, with no selection committee needed. Now that playoff would generate the big bucks.

While some would like to see a tournament that includes all FBS champions, like the men's basketball tournament, that's just not practical. The bottom 20 or so hoops conferences are just there so they can tell their grandkids they played against this superstar or that (whether true or not) and they are disposed of quickly at little relative cost in terms of the length of the tournament. That's just not practical in football when a team can't play more than once a week and games are much longer and more physical. Let's just acknowledge that difference and not slavishly try to fit the square peg of football into the round hole of basketball.