Perhaps the BEST B1G Forum anywhere, here at College Football Fan Site, CFB51!!!

If Michigan wins out could they opt to go to the Rose Bowl instead of the CFP?  That would be my imaginary preference.

If it were exclusively interpreted as a statement that playoffs are dumb, I'd enjoy that too. But it wouldn't be; it'd be interpreted as cowardly. And would trash a 5% chance at a NC. So not a good move.

Medina also stated that they don't knock for "bad losses". I agree with a caveat, I don't think they penalize a team for losing to a bad team, but I totally think they knock you down for losing badly to a team. Evidence: See OSU the last 2 years.

We can't really tell.  In 2016 Ohio State had a "good" loss (on the road by a FG to a team that finished as B1G Champion) while in 2017 both of their losses were "bad" (by 15 at home to a CFP team and by 31 on the road to a mediocre team).  I think the bigger difference was the quantity of losses (two vs one) rather than the quality of losses (good vs bad).  

Auburn was the path for a two loss team to get in:

1.  Two close losses to highly ranked teams.
2.  Win your conference.
3.  Three impressive wins over highly ranked teams at the end of the year.

There may yet be more in the future and we've gotten lucky?  We had a 2 loss team get in once when only 2 teams got in

Imagine THIS YEAR a scenario wherein Michigan loses to NW and Clemson loses to Pitt and ND loses to Syracuse and Wazzu loses to UDubb who drops their CG and WVU and OU beat each other.

What then?

I think LSU's ranking is the cut off line. In the CFP's "mind" there are only 7 teams in consideration right now. I'm not saying WSU or OSU can't rise above that threshold, but I don't think the committee is running scenarios that include Washington State or Ohio State.

I think LSU is the cut off line in the sense that if you aren't ahead of LSU when the dust settles then you aren't in the conversation.  However, there are a lot of games left to be played and the three teams currently immediately behind LSU (WSU, WVU, tOSU) all will have opportunities to prove that they should be higher (or not) while LSU doesn't really have much left in terms of opportunities to move up.  
West Virginia, Ohio State and, to a lesser extent, Washington State have a much better chance to improve their situation.  LSU's only remaining games are against a cream-puff Rice team and a barely over .500 aTm.  
West Virginia has .500 OkSU, #6 Oklahoma, and (if they win that and possibly even if not) the B12CG against #6 OU, #15 TX, or #16 ISU.  
The Buckeyes have .500 Maryland, #4 Michigan, and (if they win those) #22 Northwestern.  
Washington State's situation is not as good as Ohio State's and West Virginia's because the Cougars can't knock out anyone ahead of them but their last three games will be .500 Zona, #18 Washington, and the winner of the messy Pac-S race between #19 Utah, ASU, and Zona.  One thing that helps the Cougars is that the PAC-S winner is likely to be a team that wins their last two regular season games and finishes ranked.  

As for the premise of nine teams for four spots, that can be reduced if we deal with the obvious paired teams for four spots:

Bama-UGA*
Clemson
ND
OU-WVU
Michigan-OSU
Wazzu

*Bama - most think - has a shot with a loss, depending.