Monday, January 10, 2022

#242 Selection Problems

I'm here on the night of the College Football Playoff National Championship to complain about the selection committee and their process. Alabama and Georgia, after defeating Cincinnati and Michigan, respectively, are playing for this year's championship. Here's the problem: we've already seen this matchup. Alabama trounced Georgia for the SEC championship. But since both teams were selected to make the four-team playoff, Georgia gets another chance. Now it's very possible that these two teams are the best teams in the country this year. But I don't want to see a game that I've seen before. I think that if we're going to have four teams make the playoffs in a system with five major conferences plus a whole host of other potentially deserving schools, such as this year's Cincinnati squad, then each conference should get AT MOST one entrant. Unless you're an independent team (Sidebar: I've had enough of that nonsense, too. Notre Dame and whoever else, just join a conference already and make everyone's lives easier. It's 2022.), if you don't win your conference, you don't make the College Football Playoff. Period. End of discussion. What's the point of having conference championship games if you don't need to win them to represent your conference on college football's biggest stage?

But, but, you might protest, what if the best team in a conference or even the best team in the nation gets upset? Good. Upsets are a huge part of the reason we watch sports in the first place. Let's truly treat the conference championships like the beginning of the postseason. From here on, it's win or go home. Look, with all due respect to my pal Austin Warner, I'm sick of Alabama. I don't want to watch Alabama anymore. But they won their conference, fair and square. Georgia had their shot. Let's see somebody else play. A system that doesn't even require teams to win their own conference is not a good system. Be better, selection committee.

Grace and peace,
BMH

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