(07-11-2021 07:28 PM)Frank the Tank Wrote:  

(07-11-2021 06:13 PM)quo vadis Wrote:  

(07-11-2021 01:38 PM)Wedge Wrote:  

(07-11-2021 01:02 PM)quo vadis Wrote:  Kind of perversely, I think CFB could fall in to an NFL-trap.

An NFL team that is at .500 with 3 games remaining (now that they play 17) maintains fan interest because they still have a very realistic shot at the playoffs. That's not a trap; that's the ideal to which CFB can aspire but never reach.

Compare that to the current state of college football, in which every team is effectively eliminated from playoff contention the minute they pick up their second loss of the season.

If CFB teams with 2 losses still have a chance to reach the playoff, and some teams with 3 losses still have an outside chance in November, there will be a lot more teams playing November games that TV can sell as meaningful, and a lot more teams who can sell hope to their fans in November and not just in September.

CFB isn't the NFL. CFB has been popular for a century without playoffs and with the tiniest of playoffs. Fans care about their school and its teams and want to see them compete regardless of playoffs. We know that because it's been that way for a century+.

The NFL would not have been popular at all without playoffs, as the only reason for the teams existence is to compete for a league championship. Also, because the franchises are creations of the league, all fans are not only "Saints" fans or "Patriots" fans, they are "NFL fans", so they keep watching the playoff games even when their teams aren't in them. So it doesn't matter that in week 14 there are only 50,000 people at the Redskins games instead of 80,000 at the start of the year, because the media money is massive anyway.

I think CFB runs a grave risk if it trades its culture, which has never been playoffs-focused, for a playoffs-focused approach. Because people don't relate to their schools in that same kind of mercenary way that NFL fans relate to their NFL teams. As of now, fans care about their college teams throughout the season because playoffs are a minor part of the overall experience. Ole Miss fans care about Ole Miss all season even though Ole Miss almost never has any chance to make the BCS or the CFP. It's not based on that.

But make it based on that, and then you might have fans dropping out when they realize their 3-3 team isn't going anywhere, like they do in the NFL.

I think the mentality has greatly changed with the 4-team playoff already. The mistake that the powers that be made (or at least underestimated): they thought college football fans would look at the consolation prizes (such as the non-playoff Rose Bowl and other NY6 bowls) in the CFP system same way as they did in the BCS era and that simply hasn’t been the case. So, we are already in a world where the entire national college football discussion revolves around the 4-team playoff, which is why the limited access has been much more damaging to programs (and entire conferences like the Pac-12 recently) compared to the BCS system. There are many rea$on$ why the playoff is expanding, but the hyper-focus on the playoff to the exclusion of virtually everything else in the 4-team CFP system inherently meant that it eventually needed to expand in order to keep more fans interested.

Yes and No. Yes, I think among P5 conferences, the playoffs have become a big prestige-marker. E.g., despite being generally the better football conference than the ACC, the PAC has seen its image suffer the past five years because it hasn't had success getting a team in the playoffs, while Clemson's ongoing mega-success in doing so has given the ACC a free pass on some of the bad seasons it has had. I am surprised that this conference focus on the CFP has developed but it clearly has. Every P5 conference except for the SEC has made changes, or publicly proposed changes, to its structure or conference-title determination system to make it more playoffs-enhancing.

But I don't think that has applied at the program level. The vast majority of schools have no realistic expectations for the playoffs so not making them has been no big deal. And even at major programs with playoff aspirations - I'm thinking blue blood schools like Auburn, Tennessee, Michigan, Penn State, Nebraska, USC, Texas, FSU, Florida - I don't think there has been much heat on them about not having made the playoffs (or in FSU's case, not since year one). Even at really high-expectation programs, fans realize that you can be very, very good at not make the playoffs. Coaches at Texas and USC and Michigan and other top places have been fired during that time, or have been on a warm/hot seat, but IMO it hasn't been because of missing the playoffs. And even at those places, going to a NY6 bowl still has a lot of meaning and marks a very good season.

So this is a case where I think the issue is more a conference-thing than a school thing. Expanding to 12 would make it a school thing.