CFP Discussion

[RamblinRed]

We shall see. I think both FSU and Bama will win. The question is Texas. If Uga wins or Texas loses, it makes the decision easy. But if FSU, Bama and Texas all win, then the committee either leaves the SEC out of the playoffs, which I do not see happening, or they drop FSU. I would bet on the latter. Six pack, winner's choice.

By the way, th Colley Bias Free rankings has FSU below two one loss teams, Texas and Ohio State. I am just saying.

Until about 12 hours ago I was where you are.
But after looking more into each teams performances, how the committee has ranked through the season, there is a scenario where the SEC gets left out. It's not the most likely scenario, but it is not a 0 chance scenario either.

If Mich, FSU and Wash all win as do TX and AL, then I think SEC gets left out. The Washington win may not be necessary either, but it makes it easier. 24 hours ago I didn't think this, but I do now.

Committee has been pretty consistent all year in how they ranked teams. They also are less likely to be SEC homers than say the AP and Coaches polls (which are not allowed to be used by the committee - nothing with a pre-season poll is allowed to be used by the committee).

You can put me in the camp that the committee is not leaving out an undefeated conference champ. The committee is most concerned about the teams and FSU's record overall would be strong enough that the committee would not put a 1 loss team ahead of it. We've seen this with the NCAA basketball committee's, we've even seen it once with the CFP committee, the bids are based on body of work - not necessarily whether you think they are the '4 best teams right now' or whether their starting QB is available.

If FSU had say one Top 25 CFP win, that would be one thing, but if they win Saturday they will have 3 road/neutral CFP Top 25 wins, the most of any team in the country. If FSU wins I don't think the decision is going to be the least bit hard for them to put FSU in.

Right now there are 4 undefeated teams. All of them are simply win and you are in. Depending upon how many of the undefeated teams lose will determine how many spots are available for 1 loss teams.

 

[FredJacket]

please tell me this is your oversight…. The only thing worse than the committee leaving out a 13-0 FSU because of a player injury would be a committee doing that when they don’t even know the name of said player!

I’m in total agreement with the rest of this post by the way…

yes.. totally on me.. sorry. He had it right and even named the backup. My bad.

 

[stinger78]

If OR wins, Washington is the top 1-loss, non-conf champ, followed UGA (if they lose to Bama).

Oregon is the top 1 loss conference champion, followed by Tx and Bama in that order if all win.

What it will be or what I would do? I would have to include head-to-head information. That would place UTA ahead of Bama and Bama ahead of UGA. If Oregon beats Washington, then they are essentially tied. Where do we place them relative to UTA/Bama/UGAg? I don't know. If UoM and FSU win, then they are in plus two of the five above. In my thinking, UTA is above BAMA/mutts, but they lost to OU, now a 2-loss team. So, probably the Oregon/Washington winner gets 3rd. After that, it's some ranking of the rest:
Oregon - lost to current #3 (if they lose)
Washington - lost to current #5 (if they lose)
Texas - lost to current #12
Bama - lost to current #7
UGAg - lost to current #8 (if they lose)

Using that metric alone, it's Oregon and Washington, but if you include conference camp as a metric and take Oregon plus the best remaining conference champ, so it's then between Texas and Bama for the last spot and UTA beat them head-to-head, so UTA gets the nod. However, all could make the case, and whoever gets left out will gripe about FSU getting in.

 

[CEB]

yes.. totally on me.. sorry. He had it right and even named the backup. My bad.

No worries… if you had pasted a real quote, that dude was going to be in deep doodie…. They would have to put FSU in just to avoid the backlash!

 

[CEB]

What it will be or what I would do? I would have to include head-to-head information. That would place UTA ahead of Bama and Bama ahead of UGA. If Oregon beats Washington, then they are essentially tied. Where do we place them relative to UTA/Bama/UGAg? I don't know. If UoM and FSU win, then they are in plus two of the five above. In my thinking, UTA is above BAMA/mutts, but they lost to OU, now a 2-loss team. So, probably the Oregon/Washington winner gets 3rd. After that, it's some ranking of the rest:
Oregon - lost to current #3 (if they lose)
Washington - lost to current #5 (if they lose)
Texas - lost to current #12
Bama - lost to current #7
UGAg - lost to current #8 (if they lose)

Using that metric alone, it's Oregon and Washington, but if you include conference camp as a metric and take Oregon plus the best remaining conference champ, so it's then between Texas and Bama for the last spot and UTA beat them head-to-head, so UTA gets the nod. However, all could make the case, and whoever gets left out will gripe about FSU getting in.

It’s hard to say what metric the committee puts first. The only thing I know is that the current top five are all in with a win. Beyond that, you’re at the will of the committee… so the moral of the story is don’t lose…

I don’t think anyone can gripe about an undefeated P5 conference champ getting in…. Well, they can, but its not much of a gripe.

 

[Northeast Stinger]

It’s hard to say what metric the committee puts first. The only thing I know is that the current top five are all in with a win. Beyond that, you’re at the will of the committee… so the moral of the story is don’t lose…

As to what metric they use….good question. They are trying to be objective, and will explain their choices based on some formula, but usually after the fact once they’ve already decided. The reason is that, ultimately, there is no objective way to choose given all the unknowns and variables. There are simply some choices that will be less controversial than others.

Bottom line? Biases will be the deciding factor. We are simply speculating on what these biases are.

 

[Oldgoldandwhite]

One more thing to keep in mind is that the committee does not care about the history of these programs or their conferences in this event.

I hope you’re right

 

[GoJacketsInRaleigh]

There has been some discussion about whether FSU will get the Orange Bowl bid if they win the ACC and are not included in the CFP. The Orange Bowl, according to my famility in Florida, gets the ACC champ if they are not in the CFP (this is the contractural ACC tie-in). I doubt UL gets a NY6 invite if they are not the champs and FSU gets the Orange Bowl.

So, my question for family was, why would CFP bypass undefeated FSU. The answer I got was for FSU to win an ugly game by a close margin (emphasizing their loss of Travis) and Alabama to beat uga. Their thinking is the CFP is going to have uga in the top four win or lose. Michigan and either Washington or Oregon will get a spot. The 4th spot will then go to Alabama or Texas (if they are the B12 champs) or Washington (if Oregon is the PAC champ).

FSU isn't going to drop in the playoff rankings from #4 to #5+ if they win Saturday.

 

[BleedGoldNWhite21]

The only people who think the SEC will get left out are fans from other conferences who hate the SEC.

I am actively rooting for Alabama to win the national championship thanks to a large bet I made in August. That doesn’t change the fact that it’s not going to happen without a lot of help.

 

[CEB]

As to what metric they use….good question. They are trying to be objective, and will explain their choices based on some formula, but usually after the fact once they’ve already decided. The reason is that, ultimately, there is no objective way to choose given all the unknowns and variables. There are simply some choices that will be less controversial than others.

Bottom line? Biases will be the deciding factor. We are simply speculating on what these biases are.

Biases will be the deciding factor for one-loss and / or “at large” teams.
For the first time that I can remember, there are four (likely five) teams for which bias should not come into play… until they lose.

 

[Northeast Stinger]

Biases will be the deciding factor for one-loss and / or “at large” teams.
For the first time that I can remember, there are four (likely five) teams for which bias should not come into play… until they lose.

I certainly prefer it to be cut and dried.

 

[CEB]

I certainly prefer it to be cut and dried.

Won’t it be great to decide it on the field?
Think that’ll ever happen?

 

[forensicbuzz]

If Alabama beats uga, uga will not be playing for the Championship if there are 3 P5 undefeated championships. That would blow everything up. there’s no way a 12-1 uga team goes in over 12-1 Alabama after just losing to them, and there’s no way a 1-loss team goes in over an undefeated P5 team. Won’t happen. Especially with uga’s strength of schedule.

 

[stech81]

If Alabama beats uga, uga will not be playing for the Championship if there are 3 P5 undefeated championships. That would blow everything up. there’s no way a 12-1 uga team goes in over 12-1 Alabama after just losing to them, and there’s no way a 1-loss team goes in over an undefeated P5 team. Won’t happen. Especially with uga’s strength of schedule.

I think the word strength used in uga’s Schedule is a joke.

 

[orientalnc]

I think the word strength used in uga’s Schedule is a joke.

It is easy to debate the quality of uga's schedule, but they finished with three straight ranked teams ahead of us. I learned years ago, as a competive athlete, never downplay the quality of your opponents. Saying uga didn't deserve to be #1 deflates the quality of our competition and I oppose that strongly. They were #1 when we played them and have won 29 staight games. I would gladly swap resumes.

 

[Northeast Stinger]

It is easy to debate the quality of uga's schedule, but they finished with three straight ranked teams ahead of us. I learned years ago, as a competive athlete, never downplay the quality of your opponents. Saying uga didn't deserve to be #1 deflates the quality of our competition and I oppose that strongly. They were #1 when we played them and have won 29 staight games. I would gladly swap resumes.

Good point but, from an objective measure, uga’s schedule was not even ranked a top 50 schedule. Now, to be fair, they probably could have played a top 20 schedule and still been undefeated.

 

[GoJacketsInRaleigh]

If Alabama beats uga, uga will not be playing for the Championship if there are 3 P5 undefeated championships. That would blow everything up. there’s no way a 12-1 uga team goes in over 12-1 Alabama after just losing to them, and there’s no way a 1-loss team goes in over an undefeated P5 team. Won’t happen. Especially with uga’s strength of schedule.

Texas deserves to go in before Alabama.

 

[FredJacket]

I think the word strength used in uga’s Schedule is a joke.

Too bad Ga Tech is so improved... we could have done more to hurt their SoS.

[I kid]

 

[HouseDivided]

The committee keeping Ugag at #1 was thr worst case scenario for everyone else. They're setting it up to let them on regardless of the Bama outcome. The committee chair even said Ugag has "separated" itself from the pack the last few weeks and that they took into account the starters they rested against us. Keeping them at #2 when Michigan beat Ohio State is pretty telling. It will be hard for them to drop them to #5 win or lose now. Also, no #1 CFP ranked team this late in the process has been left out.

We need Bama to beat then badly and the other team to win convincingly, I'm afraid, to keep those dip****s out.

 

[Oldgoldandwhite]

If Ugag loses, it blows up everything. The committee will be second guessed no matter what.