In college sports, always follow the money …

My take-aways from the recent playoff decision: Just as in the Real World, observers should always identify "The Most Important Thing.”

College football fans have long wanted a larger playoff field - and for athletes to stop being “exploited” - so this Genie is out of the bottle and isn’t going back in.

Prologue Disclaimer: For now, reviews of the new playoff formula are, largely, glowing or positive.

For example, based on TV ratings and game attendance, college football is just as popular - maybe more popular - than ever.

Fans of teams like SMU, Indiana and Arizona State, which are in the playoffs, are ecstatic. Alabama can make a compelling case it should have been in the playoff field, but there’s no denying Alabama could have made this a moot point by not losing at Oklahoma and Vanderbilt.

However, the changes in college football - including those that have just started to exert themselves (like the economics of NIL) - will take years to fully manifest in a way that will probably qualify as a net detriment to college athletics.

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SMU is in and Alabama is out of the first 12-team college football playoff.

From this news/decision of the College Football Playoff Selection Committee, one can identify “the most important thing” for said Committee.

As we’ll see, this example confirms the wisdom of the journalism maxim “always follow the money.” If you follow the money, you’ll almost always know what will happen (or will NOT happen) in just about every real-world scenario.

In this example, we learned the Most Important Thing for this Committee was that it didn’t want to penalize or punish a team that lost in a conference championship game (as SMU did).

SMU, which was ranked No. 8 in the final regular season poll, would have been penalized if the Committee didn’t select this team.

Today, Alabama fans are depressed or irate because almost all of them believe the Crimson Tide is, in fact, a better team than SMU or the ACC champs, Clemson - and thus is more deserving of being considered one of the 12 “best” teams.

This proposition can be argued with numerous season metrics, one of which is the fact that “the best team in the ACC” (Clemson) had lost to the fifth or sixth best team in the SEC (South Carolina) a week ago - in a game played at Clemson’s home field.

That is, teams from inferior conferences shouldn’t be rewarded just because they win more games in said conference. Of course, they can win more games in an “easy conference.” A key question would be how many games would they have lost if they played in a much tougher conference?

I’m 99-percent sure on this prediction …

Every big or controversial decision has down-stream consequences. With the first 12-team playoff, one result is almost inevitable - the playoff field will be expanded (again) - probably from 12 to 16 teams.

This will happen because the best conference in college football the last 25 (or 100) years is the SEC, which had at least three teams (Alabama, Ole Miss and South Carolina) that were, in fact, punished because they play in the best/toughest conference.

The SEC was always the toughest conference and became even tougher when the league added perennial blue-blood powerhouses Texas and Oklahoma to its league roster last year.

What this means to SEC fans is several very good teams are almost certainly going to have two to three (or even four) losses in many years. (Just as in the NFL, we are seeing the real-world consequences of true “parity.”)

In the future, SEC teams will probably play a nine-game league schedule instead of the current 8 conference games.

This change will also be explained/justified by the maxim “follow the money” as network executives (read: ESPN/Disney) want to televise as many high-interest games as possible, which will produce higher TV ratings, which produce more money for this network, money that is shared by all league members.

Also, with an 8-game schedule (and 16 teams in the league), teams might go many years without playing every team in the new mega conferences. A nine-game schedule will allow more SEC teams to play other SEC “rivals” at least every few years.

Of course, a nine-game SEC schedule will produce even more losses for SEC teams. So, again, the solution to many “good” 9-3 or 8-4 teams not making the all-important playoffs is to … expand the playoff field to 16 teams.

The Playoffs always expand …

History also tells us that once a playoff system is enacted, the field of playoff qualifiers always expands.

We see this in the NFL and all pro sports (and even high school sports) and we’ve definitely seen this in college sports.

When I was a child, the NCAA “March Madness” basketball tournament only selected 16 teams. (I remember some fantastic C.M. Newton Alabama basketball teams of the mid-1970s that didn’t even get to play in the NCAA tournament).

Today, the NCAA basketball field is 68 (!) teams. This expansion occurred for one reason only - so more fans of college basketball wouldn’t suffer the disappointment that Alabama, Ole Miss and South Carolina are experiencing today … and to ensure the TV ratings for the college basketball tournament included many more eyeballs.

In NCAA Division II football, the field was once eight teams; today, it’s 24 teams. Many more teams now make the post-season baseball (and softball) playoffs as well.

Expansion of playoff fields is designed to keep as many fan bases as possible interested in these sports, where, increasingly, the only thing most fans care about is “did our team make the playoffs.”

Per the operative logic, the more people who get the proverbial “participation” trophy - and make the playoffs - the better.

*** (In sports commentary or in public health articles, I rarely write a piece that jibes with “conventional wisdom.” I’m always curious if a few other people think like I do. The share button often answers this question.) ***

Will conference football championship games continue to be played?

For monetary reasons, these game probably will, but whether they should be played is another question.

We’ve already seen that playing in these games, hypothetically, poses the risk of your team getting eliminated from the playoffs.

The conference championship games also create another risk of getting one or more key players hurt - right before the most important games of the season - the national championship playoff tournament.

As things stand today, the best teams in college football are already guaranteed of playing a 14-game schedule (12 regular season games + the conference title game + at least one playoff game).

To win the national championship in a 16-team field would mean that at least two teams play 17 games every season.

Question: Is this too many games for “student athletes,” who now have four to five extra chances to suffer a career-ending injury, which could cost these athletes tens of millions of dollars?

Why are the bowl games even still being played?

Another likely “unintended consequence” of an expanded playoff field is this will, probably, kill off the post-season bowl games.

While these bowls are still being played today, most of the bowl teams’ best players are (perhaps smartly) deciding to sit out these (“unnecessary”) games so as not to risk an ACL injury that could harpoon their draft prospects.

Most college football fans probably won’t mourn the death of the bowls in a world where the playoffs are all that “matters.”

However, as a contrarian and traditionalist, this development made me sad as the bowls were once perceived as a reward for a good season, created life-long happy memories for participants and allowed half the teams to enter the off-season with a big victory - which kept the fan bases feeling better about the future of their programs and provided a warmer feeling about the just-completed season.

For smaller programs, a bowl bid (and maybe a victory) was once a big deal - and still would be for many of these programs, which probably won’t have this opportunity in the future, a result that might harm overall interest in the sport.

Making more money is more important than ever …

So, again, I return to the “most important thing.” It’s important to these behind-the-curtains decision makers to keep the conference championship game money coming into athletic-budget coffers.

This money is even more important now that every college that hopes to field a competitive team - one that can make the all-important playoffs - has to provide tens of millions of dollars - to create a fund to pay for the players who can get your team into the playoffs.

That is, the NIL “free market” has rapidly become one of the largest line items in the budget of any athletic director.

Money that used to be spent improving facilities or paying for girls volleyball scholarships now has to be spent paying football wide receivers, running backs, defensive backs and quarterbacks. (I think several college football players are already being paid $1 million, or six-figure stipends, to play college football).

Looking into my crystal ball …

Money - which is more important than ever in a world of accelerating inflation - will continue to be THE driver of college athletic trends.

In the future, I see a “Big Boy” League of four or five super conferences - where all games ESPN will telecast will draw impressive TV ratings.

The odd teams out will be the mid-Major programs (like my alma mater Troy), which will find it harder to schedule “money-making” games against the Big Boys (As ESPN doesn’t make enough money telecasting these “cup cake” games).

The likely bottom line is that the rich programs will get richer - which they have to do to pay six-figure incomes to these programs’ football and basketball players in their only two money-making sports).

Alas, the poor programs will get poorer as fan interest invariably dwindles. Many of these programs, which can’t compete in the NIL “market” - will continue to drop sports programs to save money and some might drop out of Division I athletics all together.

Who benefits? Who won’t benefit?

One might ask “who benefits” from this scenario? The blue-chip college football and basketball players will certainly start building their net worth a year or three earlier before hitting the draft lotteries.

But the average football player at “mid-Major” programs like Troy or the soccer or track athletes at the non-blue blood programs aren’t going to receive any life-changing NIL revenue (if they receive anything at all).

What’s more likely to happen is that many scholarships that were offered to student athletes in the past will be discontinued. Schools that once offered Division I-level sports experiences and memories, will not be able to continue to do this in the future.

That is, an alleged “much-needed reform” to “help exploited student athletes,” will actually end up harming more student athletes, who, in the future, won’t receive the same experience or might not be even able to play college sports at a high level.

Said differently, The Law of Opposite Effects will exert itself.

IMO, the reformers and the quest to generate ever-more money will (probably) gradually kill one of America’s favorite past times. I’m tempted to holler, “Stop!” … but I know the reform Genie has already escaped the bottle.

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(Columns on sports and college football trends usually don’t do well in “Substack ratings,” but, still, somewhere I know tens of millions of American are just as passionate about these topics as I am).

One-time Ko-Fi donations greatly appreciated!

P.S.

I added some bonus or “cutting room floor” paragraphs on this topic - changes/trends in college athletics - in today’s Reader Comment section.