What's your best argument against expanding the CFP to eight teams? (Poll!)

[MJMGator]

The idea that the same teams are in the playoff because they automatically get all the best recruits is stupid. You can either recruit or you can’t. What you do with the talent is what’s the difference. Dabo wins. Saban has won. Urbs won. Kirby can’t. Jimbo can’t (unless he had Rapeis).

 

[soflagator]

I feel like this has been addressed already. It's almost like you're being deliberately obtuse. But just to recap, the reason that neither Florida nor hardly any other NCAA team can beat the ones you mentioned is that those teams have all the best players. The reason they have all the best players is that we have a 4-team playoff, and those teams are perceived as having a stranglehold on the four playoff berths, so that's where all the best HS players go.

However...

If talent were only signing because they feel they have a chance at a NC, then you wouldn't see 5* kids flipping to Maryland. Nor would a place like Usce land multiple 5* kids, or a place like A&M, which hasn't been relevant since the 50s have a top 6 class. The three programs COMBINED for 14 wins in 2019. But they also have one thing in common--great recruiters selling their programs. That's how talent gets dispersed. We have elected to allow talent to go elsewhere through a lack of facilities and insistence that we are the best. All an 8 team playoff would do is give us, and all other teams ranked 5th-8th, one more loss. How would potentially losing to OhSt o Clemson in ugly fashion help make our case that kids should come here instead?

If we're honest, what the entire notion of the playoff has done is prove the opposite. Rather than ND playing in the Sugar, Washington in the Rose, and Oklahoma in the Fiesta, all finishing on a high note in winnable games and able to sell kids on "we're so close, if only we'd had a shot", painting a picture of what a game against Clemson/Alabama may have looked like, kids have watched them being drug up and down the field for 60 minutes by superior teams, and finish on the wrong end of a blowout. Yay.

 

[t-gator]

You really think expanding it will somehow change it from bama, clemson, ohio state and oklahoma year in and year out? The only thing that would change simply from expansion is another loss to any of those teams for anyone else who plays them, including us if we get in only because of the expansion.

Those teams are in until somebody steps up and starts out recruiting them and outscoring them, and that includes us.

This this and this!

 

[78]

It won’t always follow form, not when turnovers are factored in.

 

[Swamp Donkey]

Eliminating divisions within conferences and then seeding the four highest ranking conference champions would have the effect of more than doubling the number of potential contenders in December without adding a single extra game.

so, you have years like this year when you have an undefeated LSU having to replay a1 loss Alabama? while a one-loss Ugly or Florida gets left out so the West could play again? depending on what? poll numbers? Youd really dislike this if they did it.

 

[ThreatMatrix]

If UF wins the SEC they are one of the top 2 teams in the country. Why in God's name do we want to play one or even two playoff games to get to the NC.

Plus 8 teams is ghey.

 

[Swamp Donkey]

It works with basketball because there are more regular-season games...

it works with college basketball because no one watches college basketball until March.

They needed a gimmick and they didn't care about killing the regular season because nobody watched anyway.

 

[soflagator]

If UF wins the SEC they are one of the top 2 teams in the country. Why in God's name do we want to play one or even two playoff games to get to the NC.

Plus 8 teams is ghey.

 

[G. Gordon Gator]

Your premise is fvkktarded. I can feel IQ points being sucked away by anyone silly enough to read this

LSU had good players and good recruiting, but no "strangle hold on the playoff". They figured out that scoring points was better than ball control, that throwing the ball down field is how you scores, switched their offense and now they are undefeated #1.

We could do the same thing if we didnt throw and run sideways instead of scoring points.

I can understand your confusion because this is a Gator sports forum, and ideally the thread topics are supposed to be about Gator sports. But this particular discussion isn't all about Florida. I'm not proposing expanding the playoff as a way to offset Mullen's mediocre recruiting and our sub-par facilities. We still need dramatic improvement in both those areas, regardless.

This is about breaking the boring stagnation in college football. It was prompted by the ESD results yesterday. A handful of teams keep getting nearly all the top recruits. Teams on the cusp of that group, like LSU this year, need to catch lightning in a bottle and have an all-but-miraculous season to earn themselves a shot.

We tried having no playoff and using the BCS system to pit the two top teams against each other. Under that system, about 3-4 teams were the dominant powers at any given time. Then we went to a 4-team playoff, and now about 5-7 teams are the ones who seem to get most of the best recruits year after year. Expand it to eight teams, and obviously it becomes a lot easier for other teams besides those tip-top elite ones to persuade recruits that they, too, have a shot to make the CFP.

 

[Swamp Donkey]

so when we only had two teams and the BCS that meant only two teams had a lock on the talent?

you don't understand the causation. teams go to the playoffs or the BCS because they recruited well and then develop their players will also.

you don't get to the playoffs and then recruit well because you got to the playoffs.

some people can recruit and some cannot.

Dorky Dan stands in the corner while everybody else gets the dances with the hot girls.

 

[ThreatMatrix]

I've never liked the way that one loss all but ends your season, and two losses definitely finishes it. It's too stressful leading up to that point when we fall out of contention, and too depressing afterward. I prefer a little more room for error so I can relax and enjoy the regular season more. Different strokes for different folks.

Maybe College football isn't for you.
Every game matters - personally I like that. Every game is like standing on the precipice where one misstep can mean death.

 

[G. Gordon Gator]

it works with college basketball because no one watches college basketball until March.

They needed a gimmick and they didn't care about killing the regular season because nobody watched anyway.

Ahhh, thanks for the reminder. Sometimes I forget that you really have no clue what you're talking about and are just pulling stuff completely out of your ass.

It gets the people going!

"No one watches college basketball until March." Meaning, you don't watch college basketball until March. Ergo, no one does. I love it! Some of the same things that make Trump my favorite president make you my favorite poster.

 

[G. Gordon Gator]

Maybe College football isn't for you.
Every game matters - personally I like that. Every game is like standing on the precipice where one misstep can mean death.

...and then when there's one or two missteps and the season is mercifully over, you can go back to gardening on Saturdays, right Nancy?

 

[78]

so when we only had two teams and the BCS that meant only two teams had a lock on the talent?

you don't understand the causation. teams go to the playoffs or the BCS because they recruited well and then develop their players will also.

you don't get to the playoffs and then recruit well because you got to the playoffs.

some people can recruit and some cannot.

Dorky Dan stands in the corner while everybody else gets the dances with the hot girls.

Please embellish me with the causation.

 

[78]

My post was not causation for getting Stoned.

A$$hole.

 

[ThreatMatrix]

...and then when there's one or two missteps and the season is mercifully over, you can go back to gardening on Saturdays, right Nancy?

I take my lumps like a man and then revel in the failures of my enemies.
You like playoffs - every week is a playoff. Win ur damn games or STFU. I honestly don't care about anyone but us. And winning the SEC is all we need to do otherwise we don't deserve to be the national champs.
And no, I don't believe 8 teams would increase recruiting parity - the same teams are going to be at the top or perceived to be at the top by recruits.
The exact opposite will happen. The teams that make it will be the teams with the most depth. The teams that can afford to lose players to injury with the extra game(s). And those teams will continue to dominate and stockpile talent.

 

[Swamp Donkey]

My post was not causation for getting Stoned.

A$$hole.

Getting stoned should cause you to not care as much.

 

[G. Gordon Gator]

so when we only had two teams and the BCS that meant only two teams had a lock on the talent?

you don't understand the causation. teams go to the playoffs or the BCS because they recruited well and then develop their players will also.

you don't get to the playoffs and then recruit well because you got to the playoffs.

some people can recruit and some cannot.

Dorky Dan stands in the corner while everybody else gets the dances with the hot girls.

No, when we only had two teams and the BCS, that meant a small handful of teams had a lock on the talent. Not just two, but not many more than that. Now we have a four team playoff, and there is still a handful of teams hoarding all the talent, but at least the group of teams in the handful is a little more fluid from one year to the next. Go to eight teams, and you will inevitably see the top talent distributed among more teams.

Do you think that going to an eight team playoff will not make any difference, and the ESDs after that will look the same as they do now?

 

[78]

Getting stoned should cause you to not care as much.

I see you have experience with this causation.

 

[SeabeeGator]

They oppose it for the same reason we would've opposed it in the 90s or mid-to-late 2000s. I remember Meyer was asked about whether or not we should have to play undefeated Boise after the 2006 NC game, and his response was a very quick "we're good". I'd imagine he wanted nothing to do with having to play yet another game against Texas, Usc or a rematch with Saban in 2008 either. Let's say this year we managed to narrowly win our 2 losses and then the SEC title game against Lsu. We could then possibly have to play uga again and Lsu a 3rd time. Fine if absolutely necessary. But why? So Ucf can get a chance, or so that Oregon can get a 3rd chance? No.

I'll throw another scenario out there. It was well documented that even at 4, Lsu and OhSt didn't even need to win their final regular season games to be in(or the Conf Championship for that matter). So you're a Tigers fan and your kid loves Joe Burrow. They're great this year so you can't get tickets until the final game against A&M. You drop 200 for the pair, and your kid couldn't be more excited to see his idol and the high flying Lsu offense. And then you show up, and watch 60 minutes of Jimmy McSecondstring running a base offense with the other walk-ons. Or you've always dreamed of seeing Ohst Mich and you basically see a walk-through by one or both teams as they prepare for the playoff.

Because....why again?

It’s happening now. Guys sitting out bowls to protect pro future. Not a valid argument. I’d also posit that additional rules could be placed - only 2 teams per conference max, etc. I’m not suggesting I’ve got all the answers, just a starting point.