With the ranking of Division I college football teams being the opinion of people and schools not being able to earn their way to the playoffs, I keep thinking of ways to improve my playoff ideas.
It is time to separate football from the typical conference scheduling alliances. My idea is for football only. The current conference alignments for all other sports are working well.
In my book, “Go for 25”, available on Amazon, I first detailed a plan to have a 64 school top tier for football, breaking into eight eight-team groups. An eight-school playoff would include only the winner of each group.
I detailed a relegation and promotion scheme to allow up-and-coming schools to be included in the 64 team tier, dropping the underperforming schools. To be promoted, schools must win a bowl game.
The top schools in each group were included in the playoffs, and the bottom three schools in each group played a bowl game to keep their place in the top tier. By winning their bowl game, a school could prevent relegation.
In my posting, College Football Playoff Expansion, I added meaning to 16 bowl games for those schools that did not make the playoffs and did not risk relegation.
Rather than using geographical location to determine members of groups, let the schools pick their group.
This process could be a made-for-TV money maker. The “group selection” show could be scheduled for the dead time between the Super Bowl and March Madness. Early enough in the year to start selling season tickets.
For each year, the schools would be ranked from 1 to 128. The top 64 schools would be placed in Tier 1 and the remaining teams in Tier 2.
Initial Year: Going into the first year, all schools wanting to be in Tier 1 or Tier 2 would need to be ranked based on opinion and bowl game performance.
The four teams playing in the College Football Playoff would be the top four seeds.
The subsequent 36 opinion-ranked schools would be paired in bowl games. The results of the bowl games would be used to determine the pick ranking.
The following 48 opinion-ranked schools would be paired in bowl games. The bowl game winners would be ranked for group selection into Tier 1, and the losers would go into Tier 2.
If more than 128 schools want to be in Tier 1 or Tier 2, there would be play-in games to trim off the excess teams. These games would be created between the lowest opinion ranked schools. The play-in games would be held during bowl season at the higher-ranked school’s facility.
If there are more bowl games than the 42 required for seeding, the play-in games could be held as a bowl game, or schools not in a bowl or play-in game could be used in the bowls.
Subsequent Years: In previous postings, I described how schools would be ranked, promoted, and relegated.
Schools losing bowl games and remaining in Tier 1 would be required to stay in their prior-year group.
The top eight schools placed in Tier 2 will be the first seed in a group.
The following 16 schools that are being placed in Tier 2 will make a selection of their group.
The remaining schools not be relegated from Tier 2 to Tier 3 would remain in their prior-year group.
Lastly, schools promoted from Tier 3 to Tier 2 would go through the group selection process.
Group Selection Show: Before the show begins, we will know the eight schools that top the Tier 1 groups, the eight schools that top the Tier 2 groups, which schools forced into a group because of losing a bowl game, and the selection sequence.
Tier 1 schools with a choice will have 3 minutes to make a group selection.
Tier 2 schools with a choice will have 2 minutes to make a group selection.
The groups need to stay balanced.
For example, before a group can have a third team, all other groups must have two schools. Thus, the 16th ranked team doesn’t have a choice.
This leveling concept will work at each seed in the Tiers.
Those schools relegated to Tier 3 would need to be adopted by one of the Tier 3 conferences.
Just a dream and things I think about during long runs. It stops me from yelling, “get off my lawn.”