To say college football has never gotten their postseason right is an understatement. And, once again, despite what appears to be a successful expansion of the college football postseason in 2024, the powers that be have created a system that is exclusive, not inclusive. Ultimately, it’s a system that could shrink the world of college football in a way that, long term, will cost everyone.  

All any college football fan has wanted over the last 40 years is to create a better way to crown a champion. And all the “powers that be” have done is find a way to benefit the biggest programs more and more, while potentially starving and shrinking anyone else that is not part of the two largest conferences. 

A prime example is Miami, a school I’ve been a fan of since childhood. It appears the Hurricanes will be left out of the 12-team playoff field (it will be announced on Sunday), with their 10-2 record in favor of a 9-3 Alabama team. Miami plays in the ACC with a smaller fan base and smaller TV contract. Alabama plays in the SEC with a larger fan base and a larger TV contract. The rationale the playoff committee had for ranking No. 11 Alabama ahead of No. 12 Miami despite having one less win and one more loss was they had “better” wins and “better” losses against stronger competition.

The problem with that rationale, as Stuart Mandel of The Athletic meticulously pointed out this week, is that what truly matters to the committee changes from year to year, and even week to week. 

Most years, a close loss is considered a good thing compared to a blowout loss. But this season, Alabama, who was destroyed 24-3 by a 6-6 Oklahoma team two weeks ago, is considered to have a better résumé than Miami. The Hurricanes, for comparison, have two losses and both were by a combined nine points! 

Except the committee this year has decided the Crimson Tide have better “good wins” despite a worse record. 

I’m not here to make the case of which metric should hold more value. You can argue wins vs. fewer losses, total points of margin of victory and strength of schedule. All I’m asking for is for the rules to be the same every year, for the rules to be the same every week, and for the rules to be the same for every team you rank.

This college football committee fails on all three of those fronts. 

They’ve been inconsistent in deciding whether margin of victory matters or not, as they only applied it to certain teams in the rankings. Winning 10 games used to be the difference between a good season and an average season. Apparently having only nine wins is now good enough. This is the first year where having three losses was not considered a demerit.   

And for the second year in a row, a subjective college football committee with much stronger ties and financial motivations with the SEC than any other conference is deciding to put an SEC team with one more loss over an ACC team. 

You may believe that I’m only this angry this year because Miami is getting hurt by this. Well, last year I was pretty angry too because a Florida State got hosed despite being undefeated before the playoffs. I knew what the committee did to the Seminoles could easily be done to Miami this year and lo and behold that’s exactly what’s happened. Next year, it could be Clemson or Colorado or Iowa State. 

What we need is full transparency: If the ACC is not going to get a team in the playoff with two or more losses without winning the conference championship game, then say that at the beginning of the season. If the ACC and Big 12 are going to face a higher bar, then say so. 

I get it. As my friend Tony Kornheiser is fond of saying, “It’s a TV show.” But it’s not a playoff and it’s not fully based on merit. It’s based on fan bases and historical perception.  

Ultimately, trying to keep more teams and conferences out of the SEC and Big Ten duopoly is bad for business. Creating this two-conference invitational is not going to create more college football fans collectively.  

Here’s my solution: Have some basic metrics upfront. 

A 3-loss team only gets in if they win their conference title or there aren’t enough 1 or 2-loss teams to qualify. I have this wild notion that wins automatically should count more than losses. Call me crazy. 

After that, if you want to rank the conferences based on strength of schedule, great. Maybe the top conference gets four teams. The No. 2 conference gets three bids, No. 3 gets two bids and the fourth and fifth are guaranteed one team each.  

But that ranking should be at the end of the year, based on the actual wins and losses of that year, not on the projections of wins and losses at the beginning of the year, which is what the committee does now.  

Whether you take these recommendations or something else, just make the process transparent. Don’t have it change week to week based on the whims of your business partners either in conferences or in the media. Let’s make college football great.