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The Bowl Games have always been glorified exhibitions, and most of them didn't even exist until cable TV took off.

This is true, but bowl committees have a seat at the table, so to speak, a voice.  We'd all agree an 8 gamer would generate more revenue, and usually that is the Trump Card, so why do we not have one by now?

What's rigid about reality?

Under the current format, the have-nots aren't getting into the playoff.  Whether you go back 4 years or 40 years, they're simply not invited to the party.  But they could be.  All they have to do is keep winning and keep winning and get into the playoff and win some more. 
No, it's absoutely not fair to each individual team-season of that program, but it's the reality of the situation. 

And yes, any playoff should be exclusive. 

I mean, reality isn't that rigid. We'll soon enough have a larger playoff.

But your outlook is rigid. I don't really think that's arguable. And it's particular, right down to this silly hero's journey, if small team X just puts in the work and hits every arbitrary signpost for a skeptic's approval, only then does the magic happen. 

What's interesting about an exclusive playoff is even back to the BCS, the exclusivity was always somewhat mixed. It never excluded teams that couldn't win their division or conference. I suppose it did once exclude all but one conference, which led to the playoff we have now. Could just exclude teams that don't win conference titles, and we'll be nice and exclusive with a 10-team format. And the wrong loss can still deny you a spot. 

There are plenty of fans of Purdue and Kansas State and Ole Miss, et al.  They enjoy the sport, they aspire for a 9-4 season and a bowl game, and have fun, perhaps more fun than Bama fans.  (I would assert this is true for Ole Miss fans.)

Even Rutgers has some fans, I imagine.  South Carolina has some rabid fans, with no realistic chance of making any playoff.  (They have had some good teams in the past.)

The sport should be about the fans I think, who pay the money and watch TV.  All of them.

Hell, these days you can be under .500 and still make it to a bowl game under certain circumstances. The minor bowls aren't going anywhere. Nothing changes for a 9-4 middle of the road team, at all.

I don't really get behind this goal. Pro sports are at least in theory much more even, so if that's what you are looking for, there ya go. But they also tend to be a lot less interesting. College sports have real upsets that people remember forever. I like the idea of everyone being allowed to participate and compete for a title - that doesn't exist now. But competitive imbalance is also a lot of fun.

This is just tone-deaf.  
It's not much fun if you're playing for a shitty team for 4 years.  Where your only real chances for success are against FCS schools...or you're lining up against some All-American who kicks your ass around for 3 hours.  The only times you do well are the plays he takes off or against his backup.  That's not very fun.  
Football is fun when you play well.  Football is fun when you win.  Football is fun when you have the chance to say "we're the best" of a district or division or conference or country.  
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With that phrase in bold, I have to ask if you ever played football?  And who is your team/school/program?

I had fun playing sports even when we didn't do that well.  We won our region in baseball when I was a soph, that was cool of course.

Our Cincy baseball team would go to tournaments at times, once in Columbus, OH we played a team that was sponsored by a radio station and they were all a year or two out of the high minors.  The obliterated us, but it was a lot of fun, they were really nice guys.  They threw a pitcher at us we could sort of hit.  We played on astroturf in the minor league stadium and it was 440 to center field.  I thought walking out "Well no HRs here today."

They hit several monster shots.  We used a pitcher on our side who threw 55 mph junk and they had trouble with him relatively.

If the other team purposely started a pitcher you could 'sort of hit',
a - you two shouldn't have been playing in the first place, and
b - if I knew that to be true, I'd probably sit out or quit....that's disrespectful

It was a double elimination tournament.  We didn't choose our opponent.  I'm sure their top two pitchers could have whiffed most of us, boring, and they got to save them for other top teams in the tourney.  I personally had a lot of fun.  We went 0-2, and then played two more consolation games, I think we won one of them.

We went to the Men's Senior World Series in Phoenix the next year and went 0-6, though we had a couple close losses, and had a blast.  There were 360 teams there, divided into A, B, and C, we played "C".  

One funny thing, I found a "reasonably priced motel" for us that advertised it had beer and snacks as happy hour, "free".  It was a Best Western, usually OK.  We went to the small room to find the beer sitting out at room temperature and two bags of nasty chips.  Then they cut the hot water off two mornings in a row.

I volunteered to complain and the manager agreed to give us one night free, but we had paid cash for the rooms for a week, so she had to hit the ATM but we each got $90 back.  The cold showers were not fun.  Of course,  this is an over 30 league "for fun".  One pitcher on an opposing team pitched for the Reds, he was probably 50 but could still gun it, probably 85 mph.  He threw every pitch down the middle of the plate, he was very hittable.  He told me he had no interest in throwing anything else as it would be boring.  Strikes outs are boring.

Football is fun when you play well.  Football is fun when you win.  Football is fun when you have the chance to say "we're the best" of a district or division or conference or country.  

Yes - I agree. That's why I like the idea of everyone getting a chance to play their way in. That's what makes it fun. Excluding teams basically because they have bad recruiting rankings is the opposite of fun. 

With that phrase in bold, I have to ask if you ever played football? 

I played high school football. Sure, winning is great and losing sucks, that's the nature of competition. 

The NFL sucks because everyone's socks have to be the same and 9-7 teams are crowned the champions..

But that goes with the territory. Every team is more or less about as talented as another, so upsets aren't particularly memorable or impactful. Not a formula college football really needs. I say - make the midmajor games more important, not less. Make the regular season meaningful again.