Change is the only constant. Well, the college football landscape is guided by this idea in and out. The transfer portal came up with a flurry of player swaps. Just when the fans might have thought ‘enough is enough’ for this offseason, the College Football Playoff committee pulled out the cat out of the hat. For decades, at the Division 1-A level, college football viewed the word “playoff” as a four-letter word. From there it took to get a four-team playoff, and from there another decade to expand to a 12-team playoff. Unfortunately, the College Football Playoff committee is not okay with stagnancy. Here, they are on the cusp of going to 16 teams in a matter of months, not years. That’s when an analyst walked on Josh Pate’s path to share his take. Meanwhile, Greg Sanke is blowing the wind the other way.

Ten conference commissioners and Notre Dame’s athletic director, Pete Bevacqua, came to the unanimous agreement that they needed to shift the model that drew complaints last season. Now, a 16-team College Football Playoff model features the top five conference champions. Going by the reports, the 16-team proposal to give the SEC and Big Ten the most playoff berths. The College Football Playoff committee’s latest decision will reward a winning conference, even for non-Power Five teams. Yes, it has got its share of pros and cons. As programs will be exposed to less bias that prevails towards traditional powerhouses. But at the same time, the College Football Playoff committee also invited many troubles. 

For instance, a longer season could increase injury risks, dilute the exclusivity of the postseason. On the May 29th episode of the Cover 3 Podcast, host Danny Kanell identified himself as an “anti-expansionist.” The reason? The analyst shared, “12 was the number; 12 was perfection. It was there, sure you could tweak it just a hair, but I am very concerned we’re skipping right past 14.” The College Football Playoff committee’s current 12-team playoff model follows a rewards excellence without exclusion stance. The top 4 conference champions get first-round byes, encouraging teams to win their conference and schedule tough non-conference games. Kanell further shared, “They’re like, ‘All right if you want nine conference games we’ll go 5 plus 11, so we’re protected against losses.’ Which bothers me because why are we worried about losses like I thought it was winning and losing?”

Kanell is not the only person who is against the College Football Playoff committee’s decision. He has also found Joel Klatt by his side. As Klatt shared, “OK, so what do those three at-large berths actually represent?… It’s a safety net, and it’s unneeded, it’s unwarranted, and it’s greedy. I do not like the 16-team model for this reason: it is not needed. We do not need to be redundant.” Just like for Klatt, a 14-team model suits the college football landscape the best. That’s because the off-season will now turn boring. “As soon as we go to 16 (teams), now the games late in the season don’t really matter. Now we get what a college basketball regular season is, which is, let’s face it, unimportant until we get to March Madness,” Klatt shared. Amidst all this, Greg Sankey stands firm on his ground. 

Greg Sankey, the loyal supporter of the College Football Playoff committee

While the College Football Playoff committee is getting side-eyes for looming concerns of fairness and competitive integrity of the 5 plus 11 model, Sankey himself is calling out the critics. “There are critics all over the place. If you actually go back and do the research, that kind of format could cost us positions depending on the number of teams.” But what makes Sankey so focused on the mission to bring in a 16-playoff model?

Well, he is the SEC commissioner. And as we have seen, last season, the SEC conference sent three teams to the 12-team playoff. Unfortunately, the Alabama Crimson Tide could not make it. From then on, Sankey has been on a mission to shake up the format of the College Football Playoff. And he may do so in a big way very soon. So, he tries to calm things down by portraying that the College Football Playoff committee will make a decision that is best-suited. 

As Greg Sankey shared, “I think where we are right now is, we have used a political process inside a room to come to decisions about football. We should be using football information to come to football decisions.” Already, problems are springing up. That argument generally comes from the ACC and Big 12 about falling prey to bias. They are projected to get just two bids each, half of what the SEC and Big Ten are expected to receive in the College Football Playoff’s new format. So, the clock is ticking for yet another big shake-up.