(12-06-2017 04:22 PM)JRsec Wrote:  

(12-06-2017 04:00 PM)AllTideUp Wrote:  I can completely buy that administrators weren't interested up until this point. But if the prospect of consistently being left out arises then that could change minds.

There used to be a lot of resistance to any form of playoff whatsoever and then the dynamics changed. I'm not saying everybody will be on board with it, but I have to believe there are a lot of individuals today who are starting to think about a world where their conference gets consistently left out in exchange for multiple reps from one league or another...or in a situation where Notre Dame gets in perhaps. This sort of dynamic alone was enough to weaken support for maintaining the Big 12 from within its own ranks.

The conference commissioners don't really care about that. All five power conferences get the same share of the CFP whether they have a representative or not. In fact it might be argued that by not having a school involved you actually stand to make more because of the available number of schools to the normal bowl payouts.

IIRC, each P5 conference is guaranteed $50M. However, there is also money to be earned: $6M for each team in the semi-finals, only $4M for other NY6 games. Is $2M earth-shattering? NO, but it is something. Oh, almost forgot, playoff teams also get $2M travel expenses (in addition to the $6M), so there's simply no way it's ever better to miss the playoffs unless your AD spends money like pouring water...

Still, I think the prestige of being in the playoffs is the key thing, and I'm confident those Big Ten schools will not sit by and think "hey, we go nearly as much money this year"!