Why I Want Ohio State And Oklahoma State To Win Out

Oklahoma State is currently overrated by the CFB Playoff committee. How’s that for a lede? I do not think Oklahoma State is the 11th best team in the country. It should not be ranked in the top 11 even though that is where OSU was ranked on Tuesday evening by the CFB Playoff committee.

I’m not the only one who thinks this, either, if the goal is to determine the best teams. Vegas doesn’t think so either (and this is part of my broader point which I’ll get into in a minute). First, here’s a look at how Vegas would rank the teams.

Vegas Rankings compared to Playoff Committee Rankings … pic.twitter.com/NDV0kgkada

— RJ Bell (@RJinVegas) November 16, 2016

With all my cards on the table there, can we put aside for a minute that I’m writing this as a piece of Oklahoma State propaganda? I simply want to look at the logic behind crowning a national champion in the second-most popular sport in the United States.

The CFB Playoff committee’s intended goal is to find the four best teams in the country every year. We looked at this yesterday. That’s a worthwhile goal. A worthy cause. And Oklahoma State has certainly not proven itself to be in that four (or eight, or even 12) so far this season … yet. It just hasn’t happened.

You can’t play Central Michigan, Texas Tech, Kansas State and Iowa State to within one possession and expect to be considered one of the best. You just can’t. If the committee was choosing “most resilient” or “best at playing above its talent level” or “teams with coaches with the best hair” then maybe OSU is in the top four. But not right now. No reasonable person would argue that OSU is even one of the 10 best teams in the country, much less four.

But the reality is that OSU still has a very clear path to win its conference championship. Beat TCU. Beat OU. Big 12 champions. That’s the simplicity of it. It is a straightforward 120 minutes to hoisting its second Big 12 trophy in six seasons. Then what? Probably nothing. A Sugar Bowl against Auburn.

As it stands right now, there is a scenario where No. 2 Ohio State could win out, get to 11-1, lose its division, not play for its conference championship and still make the CFB Playoff. It would be the first time a non-champion got in the Playoff (and it would be well deserved based on the committee’s criteria of “best teams”).

Conference champions matter, until they dont with Ohio State. #CollegeFootballPlayoff

— Doug Gottlieb (@GottliebShow) November 16, 2016

This is actually what I want to happen. I want both Oklahoma State and Ohio State to win out and for Penn State to win the Big 10.

I want the committee to have to look at the two OSUs — one that won its conference and the other that didn’t win its division — and pick the one that didn’t win its division. I badly want that to happen because I think it’s the thing that would effect change. It would be 2016’s version of 2011 all over again.

My issue is not with the committee. I think they do a very good job (biases aside). My issue is not with Ohio State. They are pretty obviously one of the three best teams in the country.

My issue is with the process. The process being to pick the four best teams in the country. This seems like a reasonable way to go about things, doesn’t it? Just pick the teams that are best. But it creates a thicket of issues when trying to measure inequitable schedules and performances across 128 teams. It’s an exercise in absurdity, and it is getting more difficult.

My real issue, I suppose, is with the power structure I see slipping from the Big 12. You almost have to go 12-0 as a non-OU or non-Texas Big 12 team to even be considered for the CFB Playoff. As the perception that the Big 12 stinks pervades among college football fans everywhere, this idea will only be exacerbated.

This goes to my point about North Texas yesterday — why are they even in the same division of football as Alabama when they can never win the national championship? What are they playing for? I ask the same about the Big 12 — what are they playing for? If you’re saying “these are the five conferences that matter — this is who we’re picking from” but then don’t pick a Big 12 team because all the other Big 12 teams stink, then why even include them in the exercise? Oklahoma can’t change how putrid Kansas and Iowa State are.

So should the choices be the “best” teams or “most deserving based on what happened on the field”? Because right now the CFP Playoff committee literally has a clause in its intended purpose that states that injuries should be taken into account when determining the best teams. This is outrageous. Here is that clause.

Other relevant factors such as key injuries that may have affected a team’s performance during the season or likely will affect its postseason performance.

What?! This is insane. Injuries are part of football. You are trying to have the best of both worlds here, and it’s silliness. You might as well let Vegas decide which teams are “best” if that’s what you’re going for.

Consider the following illustration. I like to take scenarios out to their natural end to reveal the lunacy inherent in a structure that is built on shaky ground.

What if next year Alabama, Auburn, Georgia and Florida all play three elite non-conference games and win them all by three touchdowns? Then what if they all run through their SEC schedules and finish 11-0 before they face each other in the final SEC game of the year. What if Auburn beats Alabama in a thriller and Georgia does the same to Florida. And then Georgia beats Auburn in the SEC title game so that you have the following:

• Alabama: 11-1
• Florida: 11-1
• Auburn: 12-1
• Georgia: 13-0

Are you telling me Alabama and Auburn are getting left out of the CFB Playoff because they didn’t win their conference? Please. So you can see if you take this out to its extreme end point, the lunacy prevails. Can you imagine the revolt if all four of these teams were included and four other conference champions were not? Or vice versa? And if this is true, then why even have conferences? Why not tell teams “go play whoever you want and we’ll sort it all out at the end”?

This is where I actually feel sort of bad for OU. What if OU had played, say, Pittsburgh at home in a non-conference game instead of Ohio State? It would probably be in the top six with a clear path to the Playoff, right? So it gets punished for playing Ohio State early in the season before it was fully formed as a team? It is going to win 16 straight Big 12 games and miss the CFB Playoff? That’s crazy.

There is a disincentive for teams to play big-time non-conference games right now, and that stinks because we need more OU-Ohio State in our lives. That was everything college football should be about. Of course there is a simple solution to all of this, and Utah coach Kyle Whittingham mentioned it on Wednesday morning: Eight teams.

Utah’s Kyle Whittingham tells @outkick CFB playoff should be expanded to 8 teams & all five major conference champs should get auto bids.

— Clay Travis (@ClayTravis) November 16, 2016

This solves so many issues. Every conference would always get a team and you would provide a life raft for, say, Ohio State this year which should definitely make any sort of postseason tournament college football puts on. The regular season would be still be incredibly meaningful (maybe even more so) because teams like Oklahoma State and West Virginia would know they’re still alive for the national championship.

To not let conference champs settle things is to let your biases take over as a governing body. It’s impossible to help this — it always will be. So you have to let games be games and wins and losses decide national champions.

There would still be arguments about the Nos. 8-9-10 teams which is great because arguments are part of what makes all of this supremely enjoyable. But there would also be a clear path to the playoff. Win your conference. That’s it. And if you’re elite but somehow didn’t win your conference, we’ll pick you up as one of the three wildcard teams. Plus you could throw in the random Boise St. or Western Michigan and see what happens.

Let the top four teams (I’m actually fine if the committee sorts them out) play home games to emphasize the importance of finishing strong in the regular season. This incentivizes teams to play elite non-conference schedules if they want to (doesn’t matter if you lose) and enhances the postseason conference bragging rights match-ups. That’s the best you could send at our conference champ, ACC?

It almost makes too much sense.

Do I want this playoff to eventually expand to 16 teams? I do not. And if it doesn’t include all conference champions then I am in favor of moving the North Texas’ and Texas States to a different division altogether. But I also don’t want it to stay at just four teams.

Because while four is better than two and the CFB Playoff is far better than the BCS for that reason, there still is not a clear and unadulterated path to playing for the national championship trophy. And is that what we want college football to be, Nick Saban?

No, it is not.