Note: The title is intentionally composed to attract attention, and I may be overselling to some degree... but we'll see what people think...

There are some details that would make the already-word-heavy graphic even more so, but conceptually, I would just make a FAQ to cover those if it ever came to that.




Why did I do this? Well, this kind of thing is a recreational puzzle of sorts to my brain in the way that a crossword puzzle might be to someone else... challenging myself to see what I can come up with, and maybe keeping me sharper than I otherwise might be for the actually important usually stressful professional puzzles that need resolution every day, week, month and/or year.

Stuck in conference play

What fun is that

And enough with the ESPN terminology to hype something that isn’t.


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Every school wants a "should win" game to start the season. It's an extra home game and the equivalent of a preseason game. It's usually a critical revenue generator for both teams.

Game 8 has no value. How does 7-0 Clemson playing 1-6 whoever support their inclusion in the CFP? Schools like UCF get dinged for "weak schedules" and this would further weaken their schedule.

Games 9-12 have no value for the rest of the world. They are essentially a slew of consolation games.

End-of-season rivalry games are also critical. What if Georgia can't play Georgia Tech because one of them is in the pool?

(11-06-2018 07:49 PM)indianasniff Wrote:  Stuck in conference play

What fun is that

And enough with the ESPN terminology to hype something that isn’t.


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"Stuck in conference play"... not sure I'm understanding your perception.

I'm going to respond to what I *think* you mean, but correct me if I'm missing it.

Effectively what happens here is that for the 7-team division conferences, it shifts the beginning of conference play forward by 2-3 weeks.

And then, you effectively end up with some of those OOC match-ups at the other end of the season--which *importantly* are games that end up being more competitive simply because they're assigned 2/3 through the season, when teams have actually accumulated some record, and can be matched-up with teams with similar records.

So, you still end up with the traditional number of conference games for the most part, or close to it.

Ask me and I'll clarify.

I don't know that I can say I've thought through ever nook and cranny here, but I can say it's pretty close to that, or at least it's close enough to put it out there for people to react to it.

(11-06-2018 07:52 PM)Wolfman Wrote:  Every school wants a "should win" game to start the season. It's an extra home game and the equivalent of a preseason game. It's usually a critical revenue generator for both teams.

Right. And this doesn't affect that. You seem to think it does, though, so I'm open to how you think it does. No conference team has more than 6 in-division games (ie, for those divisions with 7 teams).

(11-06-2018 07:52 PM)Wolfman Wrote:  Game 8 has no value. How does 7-0 Clemson playing 1-6 whoever support their inclusion in the CFP? Schools like UCF get dinged for "weak schedules" and this would further weaken their schedule.

A premise of the framework is that no school can argue that they did not have *any* chance at the national title, and thus, there has to be some way given that premise that 130 teams have that path explicitly known.

Thus, the point here is to empirically tease out the 1/3 of the teams that are not going anywhere anyhow, and the 1/3 of the teams that have proven they merit the opportunity, and for that middle 1/3, let them fight it out for who does and doesn't deserve to advance by pitting them in a consequential game.

And the reality is, practically every conference has its in-conference bodybag games on their schedules from year to year anyhow. It doesn't actually make any difference in the big picture that, for the best teams, this will be that weekend when they have one of those games they routinely would have played sometime during the season under the current framework anyhow.

Where is any of that misguided... if I'm missing something, I'm open to hearing you out.

(11-06-2018 07:52 PM)Wolfman Wrote:  Games 9-12 have no value for the rest of the world. They are essentially a slew of consolation games.

Games 9-12 for those who win week after week in the NC Pool are, of course, the big games. Those are the ones that really matter.

And now they matter a little more because there's actually a consequence every week for losing... as opposed to, under the current framework... you lose a game, and you start scoreboard watching, and hoping that some committee of subjective minds will somehow rationalize that your team is more deserving than some others competing for the final 4.

The other games aren't much different than the "other games" we already have, with the important exception that... as opposed to being arranged years in advance with no real feel for how good the teams will be and as opposed to being played early in the season... these other games have been assigned in-season as a slate of 4 games, and so at least for games 9 and 10, you have more teams pitted against each other that are more alike each other competitively... more 5-4 teams playing more 4-5 teams, and more 7-2 teams playing more 8-1 teams, and at the other end, more 2-7 teams playing more 3-6 teams... so rationally-speaking, you're bound to have more interesting games.

Now, the losers each week in the NC Pool are also likely to yield some particularly nice games to watch, by virtue of the fact that all the 32 teams that lose that first week become part of a pool that will play each other in those last 3 games... all the 16 teams that lose that second week will get games against each other for the last 2 games... all the 8 teams that lose that third week... you get the idea.

Seems to bode well for yielding more interesting games into the 4th quarter.

(11-06-2018 07:52 PM)Wolfman Wrote:  End-of-season rivalry games are also critical. What if Georgia can't play Georgia Tech because one of them is in the pool?

There you have something that could be a sore toe for some, and a bridge too far.

And you picked out a match-up that would be especially potentially affected, because both of those schools will play 6 division games in those first 7 weeks by design... would only have a single opportunity to insert that game into their mix, and it would not be at the end of the season.

Army/Navy is another example, at least in terms of timing--couldn't be assured of playing it unless it was scheduled in those first 7 weeks.

I don't have a ready answer to that one. Will think more on it.

Did some study on it, and again, appreciate the troubleshooting to make me think about this hiccup to the concept, as represented by the Georgia/Georgia Tech end-of-year rivalry game.



There are three other games that meet the same criteria as the Georgia/Georgia Tech: (a) can be considered "historically significant," in that have been played for more than 100 years, (b) are still intact (ie, continue to be played consistently every year), and © pit teams against each other that are not in the same conference. Those are South Carolina/Clemson, New Mexico/NM State, and of course, Army/Navy.

There are several other rivalry games that pit different-conference teams and that have been played for more than 100 years but that aren't still intact, such as Texas/Texas A&M. And of course, there are several rivalry games that are still intact, but that fall short of the 100-year threshold. Examples would be Army/Air Force and Navy/Air Force.

Then, you have one more outlier that this brings out--Hawaii has traditionally received a 13th game in their regular season, and then Hawaii has been allowed the privilege of starting the regular season on the Saturday before the Thursday before Labor Day as a consequence in order to allow some extra scheduling flexibility (as well as, naturally, whoever their first opponent would be).

The regular season for all other teams is established as beginning on the Thursday prior to Labor Day, and extending to the Sunday after the 2nd Saturday of December. Traditionally, of course, conference championship games take place on the weekend of the 1st Saturday of December the only contest extending beyond that to the 2nd Saturday been the Army/Navy game.



So, given all of that, here's how I would amend the concept to deal with what I'll call these "classic game" exceptions (ie, for Georgia, Georgia Tech, South Carolina, Clemson, New Mexico, New Mexico State, Army and Navy).

In short, we give them and Hawaii the already-precedented Hawaii treatment: (a) they get a 13th game, and (b) they start their seasons on the Saturday before the Thursday before Labor Day (a week earlier than everyone else)... as does, naturally, whoever each plays in that first contest.



"But wait, there's more."

These classic games may be scheduled either on the 2nd Saturday of December, as Army/Navy does it (probably not, since all but NM State play in a conference with a championship game), or (more likely) would be played during the regularly-scheduled bye-weekend in the 9th week--in which case, the participating teams would be permitted to take a different weekend during the first 7 weeks as their bye-week.

An appealing by-product of this, is that it creates some greater, and I would think welcomed, national hype/focus on those games... being that they're the only 3 that would be on the slate for that Saturday.

Come to think of it, this actually could end up being quite the cash-cow for those schools TV-wise, at least those from autonomous (aka, "power") schools... and that seemingly would offer some compensation for giving up the end-of-year date they've traditionally held in SC and GA. (New Mexico/NM State has been a September game anyhow.)




One more thing in this way... I might add Air Force to the mix, just in terms of having the allowance to schedule a 13th game and being able to start early, just out of respect to them as the 3rd military academy, and out of the interest to make it easier for them to accommodate OOC games against Army and Navy into their self-scheduled regular season.

So... Hawaii, Georgia, Georgia Tech, South Carolina, Clemson, New Mexico, New Mexico State, Army, Navy and Air Force... 10 schools that have this special accommodation based on their special circumstances.



Then, this segues to a related topic... what about other rivalries... like Texas/Texas A&M... that don't fit the "classic game" criteria?

As teams drop out of the NC title chase, whether by virtue of going to the Regular Pool following a loss on Consequence Saturday, or by virtue of losing a game in the NC Pool on succeeding Saturdays, there is to be an explicit effort to generate rest-of-season schedules that are guided by (a) geography, (b) competitive achievement, and then I would add to that a history criterion... though, of course, geography often will also on its own provide grounds for scheduling teams like that to play each other.

That's another plus, when you think about it, because many of those games are not currently scheduled, not because of some passive "oh I forgot" motive, but to the contrary, some of these schools' ADs and admins have been "actively stubborn" in their determination to not play each other... regardless of what many of their fans would want... and Texas/Texas A&M would perhaps be one of the best examples of that.

So, the point being, in any given year, there's probably greater potential that some of these traditional rivalry games that aren't being played at all right now would, in fact, be re-ignited... ie, by the choice of the independent third-party objective decision-making mechanism... probably an algorithm written especially for the purpose, actually.

Teams would lose a lot of money in the form of lost home game revenue under this format.

Okay. I'm listening. What's your basis for saying that?

(11-07-2018 09:21 AM)_sturt_ Wrote:  Okay. I'm listening. What's your basis for saying that?

Power 5 Team A normally gets 6-7 home games. Those season tickets get sold in advance (you can’t pick and choose which games you go to) and they get money on concessions and merchandise and all. In the new system, in games 1-7 they could conceivably only get 3 home games (some teams will get 3 and some will get 4). Let’s say this team is Mississippi State or Auburn and they’ve had a disappointing year. In Game 8 this team is seeded 6th in the SEC West. Now they’re looking at a situation where they’re probably not hosting that 8th game because they’d be playing the #2 team in the East.

If I understand your model and this team keeps playing, despite not being in the championship tournament, how are home games determined and sold in short order in a way that makes this team the money it currently gets when all home games are known in advanced and pre-sold? How many of those tickets would even sell if fans are unhappy they didn’t make it into the tourney? What does this do for G5 teams that would most likely be forced to travel those last 4 weeks? They lose money from lack of home game too. What happens to tournament teams that lose in round 1 or 2? Is their season done at 9-10 games or do they fall back into the pool of non-championship teams?

IMO, some problems:

1) Don't like games 1-7 being about "seeding". That makes them a lot less meaningful, because a team could theoretically go 0-7, but then win on week 8 and voila, into the National Title pool, while a 7-0 team gets upset and they are out. Why not just get rid of week 8 and choose the national title pool based on record during weeks 1-7?

2) I agree with those who say weeks 9-12 in the non-title pool will suffer significantly attendance-wise. Everyone knows these are the "loser's bracket" games, a stigma that doesn't apply right now even to games between teams that are obviously out of title contention. Plus, it will be difficult to rustle up attendance for games where nobody knows the opponent until a week or so before the game is played.

3) How can conference CCG games be held with some conference teams, and the best ones, in the national title pool?

Why is everything so damn complicated? 10 conferences, 10 teams + two wildcards in the CFB playoff. Everyone will sleep on mattresses full of $100 bills.

You want it even more interesting? Find a way to have the FCS champ in a play-in game for the CFB.

(11-07-2018 10:16 AM)Lord Stanley Wrote:  Why is everything so damn complicated? 10 conferences, 10 teams + two wildcards in the CFB playoff. Everyone will sleep on mattresses full of $100 bills.

I'm don't think there would be much interest in that. Way too many G5 teams. Nobody wants to see an e.g. North Texas and Eastern Michigan in the playoffs and a #6 Ohio State and #8 Georgia out because the latter didn't win the B1G and SEC.

The only reason all the conferences have their champ in March Madness is because there is enough space in the 68 team event for the big conferences to get 6-8 teams in anyway. Hoops moved away from the kind of tournament you envision for FBS almost a half-century ago.

No. I prefer the scheduling format that Clemson currently employs. South Carolina & another desirable P5 OOC game, a FBS and FCS buy game OOC and seven home games overall.

No to 9 conference games.

No to random OOC games assigned to us without concern of desirability. Regardless of how they may be doing in a single year Clemson fans and boosters would prefer a game against Ole Miss before they would a game against Indiana.

We would prefer a game against SC State than a game against UL-Lafayette because SC State is going to sell out their ticket allotment.

The only thing I would change would be the ACC schedule because as it stands it's currently unbalanced even years vs odd years for us. Even years we have no highly desirable ACC games on the home slate unless VT or Miami is the non-permanent crossover, making South Carolina the only home game those years considered desirable. Odd years we get FSU, GT, and the P5 OOC opponent at home giving us three.

To deal with the "losers" pool stigma, I'd suggest that you create four POST-SEASON pool destinations. Something like this:

1) 16-Team College Football Playoff pool - flows into the CFP, with consolation bowls in the other NY6 plus Las Vegas and New York.
The 16-team Pool 1 (CFP pool) consists of the 16 teams that will play for the national championship. This can be the straight top-16 ranked teams, or can include autobids for certain conference champions or whatever. The 16 participants are broken down into four 4-team groups that play 3 games against each other, with Teams #1 and #2 hosting two games and Teams #3 and #4 hosting one game. 2 teams from each group advance to the 8-team CFP tournament, that spills into the current CFP semifinals structure.

2) 16-Team National Invitational Tournament pool - flows into 8 bowl games, including the NIT championship, perhaps the Outback, Citrus, Gator, Camping World, Alamo, Holiday, and Texas bowls. The 16-team Pool 2 (NIT pool) follows the same format as the CFP pool, but the teams advance to a separate NIT tournament that flows into another marquee bowl structure. You can go with the straight #17-32 teams, or can include autobids for certain conference champions or runners up or whatever.

3) 32-team National Bowl Selection pool - flows into perhaps 12-16 of the bigger remaining bowl games. The 32-team Pool 3 (National Bowl pool), is broken down into eight 4-team groups, with the group standings used to fill certain pre-determined national bowl games....and perhaps no bowl for the lowest teams. Again, you can invite the straight #33-64 teams, or can include autobids for certain conferences.

4) 66-team Regional Bowl Selection pool - flows into perhaps 10-12 of the lesser remaining bowl games. The final 66-team Pool 4 (Regional Bowl pool), is broken down into 14 pools of 4 and 2 pools of 5. Group standings used to fill certain pre-determined regional bowl and no bowl for the lower teams.

Under this structure, every team would still play for something (at least a bowl game), even if they are relegated to the 4th tier Regional Bowl Selection pool.

Also, I'd suggest a 10-game regular season, with 8 conference games and 2 OOC games...PLUS 1 payday home game (pre-season or exhibition).

Everyone gets 3 post-season pool games and at least 6 home games (4 conference home games, 1 OOC home game, at least 1 post-season home game) plus the 1 payday home game, if they want it...

No seeding game before the post-season. Conference standings (and autobids?) and rankings (polls or selection committee?) determine to which post-season pool your team is invited. Everyone in FBS college football plays 13 games. Those that reach the CFP and NIT finals play 16 games. Everyone else plays 14-15 games.

Everyone still gets at least 6 home games and the top Teams still get 7-8 home games....

First, I appreciate the time taken to think through this and give a reaction to it.

(11-07-2018 09:44 AM)SkullyMaroo Wrote:  Power 5 Team A normally gets 6-7 home games. Those season tickets get sold in advance (you can’t pick and choose which games you go to) and they get money on concessions and merchandise and all. In the new system, in games 1-7 they could conceivably only get 3 home games (some teams will get 3 and some will get 4). Let’s say this team is Mississippi State or Auburn and they’ve had a disappointing year. In Game 8 this team is seeded 6th in the SEC West. Now they’re looking at a situation where they’re probably not hosting that 8th game because they’d be playing the #2 team in the East.

If I understand your model and this team keeps playing, despite not being in the championship tournament, how are home games determined and sold in short order in a way that makes this team the money it currently gets when all home games are known in advanced and pre-sold?

How many of those tickets would even sell if fans are unhappy they didn’t make it into the tourney? What does this do for G5 teams that would most likely be forced to travel those last 4 weeks? They lose money from lack of home game too. What happens to tournament teams that lose in round 1 or 2? Is their season done at 9-10 games or do they fall back into the pool of non-championship teams?

1. Some schools will get 7 home games, typically primarily as a result of contracting with an FCS school for their first game of the season. Indeed, I hadn't spoken yet to the home/away piece, but you're correct to have inferred that everything would be geared toward an equitable number of home games for all teams. It won't end up being perfect, but that will be the intention/expectation.

In the NC Pool brackets, each game's location would be determined first by which school, if either, is down 1 home game or up one home game on the other, and if they're dead-even, then it's a simple coin flip. As fair as we can make it.

So, schools generally will be able to anticipate 2 home, 2 away in November, though there will inherently be some limited variance in that.

2. Now, having said that, there is an important caveat to be introduced since we're examining now some of the details, and it is this:

Schools will have a brief time window--maybe 24 hours--following either setting the balance of their regular season schedule (after having lost a game on Consequence Saturday or later) or the determination of the next week's opponent (having won a game on Consequence Saturday or later) to negotiate a buy-out for home field rights.

That is, after all, the essence of what happens anyhow when Mississippi State and Southern Miss agree to play a game in the current context... there's a financial benefit conveyed to Southern Miss to persuade them to come to Starkville rather than to play in Hattiesburg, or the opposite happens.

One might respond, "That's not much time to negotiate a contract."

Game contracts, to my understanding, are mostly standardized and are primarily going to vary according to the cash being paid to the visitor, and how many tickets the visiting team will be allotted to sell for themselves. It's not at all uncommon, of course, to see athletic departments negotiate bowl game contracts fairly quickly for themselves; and probably even more applicable is that FCS schools progressing from week to week in their tournament obviously iron out contracts pretty efficiently (... or at least, that is, back when Marshall was playing at that level, arrangements for the next week's playoff game were negotiated within hours).

3. It's a free market, of course, and perhaps athletic departments would differ somewhat in how each chooses to approach their season ticket marketing in the new environment--one in which the first 7 games are locked-in with, ostensibly, 3 or 4 home games, and then, depending on the results of those, having home field rights to either 3 (if they end up with home field for Consequence Saturday) or 2 (if they don't).

My own conventional thought is that an athletic department with an opening home game would tend to sell a 7 game package as normal.

And while we can't guarantee which dates in the final five weeks would be home games, the trade-off when I'm selling this preseason is, you don't want to be missing out if our team wins on Consequence Saturday and is actually and officially in the legitimate chase for a national championship... so pay us for 7 games up front, and let's see how it goes.

Worst case, if we (speaking as-if I'm the AD) don't get that 7th game (vis-a-vis, don't get home field for Consequence Saturday... or, we don't buy-out another team for rights for home field), then it will be credited to your account for buying tickets next season.

And of course, even if we don't, there will be some income coming to the athletic department from that Consequence Saturday opponent's proceeds, so it's not like it generates nothing for us.

4. Couple of those questions ask about something evidently not made clear in the graphic, but I addressed them in a follow-up post to Wolfman...



That's about all the time I have today to engage this... back to "real" work. But I'll find time later to address other follow-ups from others.

(11-07-2018 02:47 PM)YNot Wrote:  
To deal with the "losers" pool stigma, I'd suggest that you create four POST-SEASON pool destinations. Something like this:

1) 16-Team College Football Playoff pool - flows into the CFP, with consolation bowls in the other NY6 plus Las Vegas and New York.
The 16-team Pool 1 (CFP pool) consists of the 16 teams that will play for the national championship. This can be the straight top-16 ranked teams, or can include autobids for certain conference champions or whatever. The 16 participants are broken down into four 4-team groups that play 3 games against each other, with Teams #1 and #2 hosting two games and Teams #3 and #4 hosting one game. 2 teams from each group advance to the 8-team CFP tournament, that spills into the current CFP semifinals structure.

2) 16-Team National Invitational Tournament pool - flows into 8 bowl games, including the NIT championship, perhaps the Outback, Citrus, Gator, Camping World, Alamo, Holiday, and Texas bowls. The 16-team Pool 2 (NIT pool) follows the same format as the CFP pool, but the teams advance to a separate NIT tournament that flows into another marquee bowl structure. You can go with the straight #17-32 teams, or can include autobids for certain conference champions or runners up or whatever.

3) 32-team National Bowl Selection pool - flows into perhaps 12-16 of the bigger remaining bowl games. The 32-team Pool 3 (National Bowl pool), is broken down into eight 4-team groups, with the group standings used to fill certain pre-determined national bowl games....and perhaps no bowl for the lowest teams. Again, you can invite the straight #33-64 teams, or can include autobids for certain conferences.

4) 66-team Regional Bowl Selection pool - flows into perhaps 10-12 of the lesser remaining bowl games. The final 66-team Pool 4 (Regional Bowl pool), is broken down into 14 pools of 4 and 2 pools of 5. Group standings used to fill certain pre-determined regional bowl and no bowl for the lower teams.

Under this structure, every team would still play for something (at least a bowl game), even if they are relegated to the 4th tier Regional Bowl Selection pool.

Also, I'd suggest a 10-game regular season, with 8 conference games and 2 OOC games...PLUS 1 payday home game (pre-season or exhibition).

Everyone gets 3 post-season pool games and at least 6 home games (4 conference home games, 1 OOC home game, at least 1 post-season home game) plus the 1 payday home game, if they want it...

No seeding game before the post-season. Conference standings (and autobids?) and rankings (polls or selection committee?) determine to which post-season pool your team is invited. Everyone in FBS college football plays 13 games. Those that reach the CFP and NIT finals play 16 games. Everyone else plays 14-15 games.

Everyone still gets at least 6 home games and the top Teams still get 7-8 home games....

Not much time right now to do anything but scan this, but count me intrigued... i'm anxious to review and give this more thought. Thanks.

Too. Complicated.

No football pools. No NITs.

Play the games on the field between conference champions.

(11-07-2018 09:56 AM)quo vadis Wrote:  IMO, some problems:

1) Don't like games 1-7 being about "seeding". That makes them a lot less meaningful, because a team could theoretically go 0-7, but then win on week 8 and voila, into the National Title pool, while a 7-0 team gets upset and they are out. Why not just get rid of week 8 and choose the national title pool based on record during weeks 1-7?

Entitled to your opinion, of course.

I see it differently (of course).

Theoretically, there could be a substantive argument that the 7-0 team in the example was the beneficiary of being in an incredibly weak division.

So, the 0-7 team from the opposite division who hypothetically went into the 7-0 team's home and beat them serves the purpose of testing that argument and finding it to be true on the basis of the empirical evidence.


Wife is yelling at me to take her to dinner... ... will hope to get the rest later this evening.

(11-07-2018 09:56 AM)quo vadis Wrote:  2) I agree with those who say weeks 9-12 in the non-title pool will suffer significantly attendance-wise. Everyone knows these are the "loser's bracket" games, a stigma that doesn't apply right now even to games between teams that are obviously out of title contention. Plus, it will be difficult to rustle up attendance for games where nobody knows the opponent until a week or so before the game is played.

My honest gut reaction to the "loser's bracket" stigma... me being a fan of a non-autonomous conference school... is maybe tainted by that fact that I don't even seriously think of our team, even in our best years, as being a serious contender for the NC. Suppose I have to grant the possibility that maybe qualifying for a bowl game is not all that motivating these days for some fans to show up. I honestly don't know what compels fans at schools obviously out of title contention late in a season to show up... I'd just assumed they all thought like I do, that qualifying for the best possible bowl game was/is important.

So, that's why I'm intrigued by the input Ynot gave... generally, to maybe develop some specific better-bowl carrots that automatically get conveyed to the best teams emerging from the Regular Pool


I would qualify one point here, too... just because a team loses on Consequence Saturday and fails to get to the NC Pool doesn't necessarily mean they fall out of conference title contention... so there's also that.



As to attendance, I feel you can't be talking about the NC Pool games (right?)... if anything, those games are going to be tickets difficult to get if you don't have season tickets or if you aren't willing to pay premium price. Regarding the other games, I'm not one of those fans inclined to think that most people need a lot of lead time... if there's a game, and if my team is playing, just tell me what day and what time the gates are opening. Who the opponent is is almost trivial... but then, if you tell me that it's typically a regional opponent (thus, a school I'm at least familiar with) that has a record on-par with my team's, that says to me that it is more likely to be a game worth the price of admission.




By the way, one point that may have been misunderstood, for lack of good communication on my part...

The only occasion when teams won't know precisely who their next week's opponent will be before a given game are those in the NC Pool... but even they have a bracket and can narrow it down to one of two teams, depending on if they win or if they lose.

Everyone else is in the regular pool, and gets a slate of games determined for them on Consequence Sunday, with a bye week the following weekend--so two weeks before they have their next opponent.

(11-07-2018 09:56 AM)quo vadis Wrote:  3) How can conference CCG games be held with some conference teams, and the best ones, in the national title pool?

Okay, in terms of the essentials, it's actually not unlike the situation as it already is: Which ever two teams from opposing divisions finish the regular season with the best W/L%, those are the teams invited to play for the conference championship.

But yes, there are a couple of important caveats worth noting... (1) unavoidably, not every conference team will play the exact same number of games, which is why best W/L% is specified... and (2) teams competing for the NC can decline to accept the conference championship invitation, and probably normally would, preferring the safer route to contend for the national title--i.e., avoiding the opportunity for injuries to occur that might make it more difficult to win the national championship, and at least as important, avoiding the opportunity to suffer a loss.

To be clear, if a team accepts the invitation to play in their conference championship, then just as it is now, they also accept the risk that a loss in that game would put their claim to one of the four finalist slots for the national championship in jeopardy. A loss would force a set of predetermined tiebreaker criteria to be applied in order to determine which of three teams--themselves, the team they defeated in their previous game, or the new conference champion--would occupy the semi-final slot they would have had for themselves. That, because all three would have some potentially reasonable claim to that slot.

(So, yes, there is that "backdoor" through which a Regular Pool team could theoretically still get into the NC chase, but that situation would not seem likely to develop very often, given the unnecessary risk.)

Throw-in point, fwiw...

The first tiebreaker criterion I would argue for employing would be a statistic that represents not only margin of victory at the end of games played, but three more data points for every game--margin of lead after each quarter, and weighted to assign more value to greater leads earlier in games. So, margin of lead after the 1st quarter is multiplied by 4, after the 2nd is multiplied by 3, after the 3rd multiplied by 2, and lastly, the final margin of final score is added. This effectively would offer a measure of how soundly Team X defeated the teams they defeated--i.e., greatest credit for winning big earlier and maintaining the margin of the lead throughout the game.

(11-07-2018 10:16 AM)Lord Stanley Wrote:  Why is everything so damn complicated? 10 conferences, 10 teams + two wildcards in the CFB playoff. Everyone will sleep on mattresses full of $100 bills.

From where I sit, if someone described what we have now to an alien visiting earth, I believe his first response would be "why do you have such a damn complicated system?"

It's what we're used to, of course, so what we have now doesn't seem so convoluted and inefficient. But it is.

The concept proposed here is built around the goals indicated, one of which is to remove the subjectivity from the process, and just put into place a tangible, reasonable process that explicitly and undeniably allows every school a path to a championship and that fits into the currently-prescribed calendar.

And because this framework rationally ought to generate more games that are competitive, and fewer blow-outs, and because the tournament element extends over the course of six stages of elimination... I think everyone will sleep on mattresses full of Berkshire Hathaway stock certificates. :)