Do I Like a 24-Team Playoff? No, Will I Watch? Of Course

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College football has been on a long walk toward a 24-team playoff for some time now, and the most recent mile-marker in that walk came Thursday.

ESPN’s Pete Thamel reported that the College Football Playoff is “nearing a deal” to expand to 24 teams. An announcement of a pending announcement of sorts, but the new format is supposed to hit the sport next season.

I’m not a fan, nor are many people I’ve seen react to the news, but it’s here because the powers that be said so.

College football has (maybe had?) the best regular season in all of sports. Sure, this makes some games around the proverbial bubble more meaningful, but will teams ranked 30th through 20th really have a shot at winning the whole thing? I don’t think so.

Then on top of that, what I think a 24-team playoff is going to do is lessen the stakes for the teams in the Top 10 — teams that can win the whole thing.

Alabama’s game against Georgia last week had massive stakes to it not only because it was this big rivalry game, but it also made the loser’s (in this case Alabama) margin for error for the rest of the year notably smaller. If that exact game played out in 2027, there would’ve been a level of “Ah, shucks, both of these teams will make it in anyway.”

I want to live and die with every Saturday, where one too many missteps end your season.

March Madness is a wonderful time of year, but college basketball’s regular season doesn’t mean a ton right now unless you’re a sicko (which I self-admittedly am). I don’t think college football wants to turn into college basketball.

In a lot of ways, this format will be better — or at least perceived better — for conferences not named the Big Ten or SEC.

The Big 12 should get multiple teams in every year now. I say should because 20 years ago, you would’ve probably thought the same thing about a 12-team playoff. But does finishing ranked 20th in a poll look better because it came with a playoff berth? If you catch fire and win a couple games, sure, but it feels like we’re just trying to change the optics of a good, not great season. Again, the fun in college football is the rollercoaster.

The four-team playoff was never going to last. It would be solely SEC and Big Ten schools by now if it were still in place.

I think eight teams would’ve been a good number, but we blew straight past that for the 12-team model. Eight teams would’ve given the four major conferences a spot at the table and kept teams on their toes every Saturday. I haven’t outright hated the 12-team model aside from it feeling like an SEC/Big Ten beauty contest at times.

But now we’re going to double that number.

This might seem odd coming from a guy who graduated from Oklahoma State, but I think with the deeper field, we should go back to computers picking the teams. A computer picking two teams was wild because there was often more nuance to the small sample, but if you’re team 27 and you’re mad the computer left you out, kick rocks. Let’s get a formula that eliminates biases and spits out 24 teams regardless of helmet sticker or conference affiliation.

Collecting my thoughts here has been tough because so many different decisions from the higher ups have led us to this point (like, did the Longhorn Network start this stream of dominoes?).

But, at least for now, we’re all going to keep watching because it’s college football. We’ve done this our whole lives. Hopefully whomever is running this thing has us in mind, but this is starting to feel like it’s beneficial for the pocketbooks of a few rather than the entertainment of many.