College football isn't NASCAR. We don't need to tweak sh_it every year to try and chase younger fans with the attention span of a gnat. Up until this abortion of a season the 4 team playoff worked fine. I see zero reason to expand it. Absolutely none.
This is especially true when it comes to opt outs. That needs to be dealt with from a financial and social perspective. If you betray your team and opt out, you should be treated as a non-person by the university and you should be required to repay every cent the university spent on you. If you won any awards the year you opt out, including the Heisman, you forfeit them. You should be removed from everything that was accomplished that year. No rings for conference champs. Nothing. If you don't want to play the games, then you get nothing.
Every time anything is changed (see targeting etc) it pussifies the sport and we move farther and farther away from the sport we grew up loving. This may be ok for children with little life experience, and those who have no respect for what football used to be. But its not to me. I want to see more hits like the one delivered to Joey Kent. Reggie Nelson would be thrown out of most of the games now. That's BS.
Alabama vs. UAB, Ohio State vs. Ball State & Clemson vs San Jose St. isn’t meaningful football. As far as reducing opt outs, if I’m Najee Harris and I’ve got to risk injury at the very end of my college career against a non-deserving UAB team just so the public can be happy that the “little guy” got his shot, I’d be inclined to say fcvk it, I’m opting out. And I nor any NFL scout would hold it against him. Same goes for an 8 team playoff. It’s just a watered down schyt show.
@Back Alley Gator
YEEEEEESSSS!!! I cannot like this post enough. When I read the thread title, these were my exact thoughts.
This me first, pussified generation of athletes has dampened my love of sports in a big way. If you wanna opt out of playing the game, you should lose your scholarship. It's that simple. The bowl game is still a part of that college football season. And as a student athlete, you should be required to play in it.
And I know I'm going to get crucified for this, but IDGAF what anyone thinks.
The bowls are meaningless ... and always have been. I've felt that way since being a Gator fan in the early '90s and I still feel that way today.
Something else I've felt since then?
We need a minimum 8 team playoff.
Today, I still want an 8 team playoff, but now that's the maximum.
Like JBoss said, tradition for the sake of tradition is stupid... just as change for the sake of change is. ALL other American sports have a playoff, professional and college. Why has college football been the only outlier? And WTF has this always been okay until only recently?
Undefeated teams like Cincy deserve a shot. Sure they might get annihilated, but they might shock a Bama who's not played a team like that. And that's what makes it fun.
The NCAA tournament is the greatest post season in sports. I think an 8 team playoff would have a similar effect. And if it's a bit watered down in that first round? So what! Many first round NCAA tourney games are just that too. Plus, it's more football and eventually the have-nots will likely get exposed anyway, and we'll be left with the best teams standing. And if not, well, that's the beauty of a playoff. So what's everyone crying about?
@GatorInGeorgia
Sorry, GatorInGeorgia, but I disagree. See my response above. If Harris doesn't want to play, scholarship revoked, kicked off the team IMO. What happened to playing for pride, for your University, for your damn teammates? Nope, instead let's put me above the team, because that's what today's generation of selfish a-holes is about.