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It would never be cool to have mediocre participants in an event ostensibly organized to identify the college football national champion. 

But you are ok w/ the way the NCAA Basketball tournament is run?

It would never be cool to have mediocre participants in an event ostensibly organized to identify the college football national champion. 

2014, Florida State was mediocre but at 13-0 couldn't be excluded due to resume. They had squeaked through wins all season, and could as easily have been 9-4 as 13-0.

2015, Michigan State had nowhere near the overall talent level of the other CFP participants. They managed to also squeak through the conference season with only one loss, beating OSU/M/Iowa by a combined 10 points, and with one-score games against Purdue and Rutgers, who were terrible. 

Now that's not exactly the same as a 9-4 Northwestern, but it's not like they haven't put in teams that they "had to" because of resume that really had zero chance of winning it all.

Yeah, I don't see the CCG upsets as a deterrent at all.  It's kind of like NCAAB where a team goes on a run and then makes the tourney.  It would be cool to see Northwestern, Wake Forest or whoever in the playoff if they have a magical run.  They're not likely to win again, but maybe 1 in 5 times they actually win the first round.

Wisconsin instead of Ohio St, Baylor instead of Oklahoma, Virginia instead of Clemson, Georgia instead of LSU

that would look and feel different

seeded
#1 Georgia
#2 Wisconsin
#3 Baylor
#4 Virginia
A couple more upsets later, Virginia is the champ!!!

See my above note.  Why do we need playoffs or 8 teams? 

As I said a few pages ago...

I see two options.

• Go back to the old way, in which there is no clear champion, and it's all a beauty pageant. 
• Go forward to establish clear objective criteria for a playoff (P5 conference champs), such that we don't have to make it a beauty pageant for anything more than 2-3 at-large bids. At that point the teams that are excluded from at-large berths have little to complain about, because they didn't even manage to win their own conference. 

I'd be fine with #1, honestly. I don't think we can put that genie back in the bottle, though, so I continue to argue for #2.

The world seems to demand a clear champion, and neither the Bowl Coalition, the 2-team BCS, or the 4-team CFP do a very good or fair job of deciding one.

If you can convince the world that we don't need a clear champion, let's go back to the old way. If we're not going to do that, let's at least implement a playoff system that does it right.

Well first-off, I think college football players want to beat the other team no matter what.  And the bigger and badder the opponent, the more they want to win.  So I don't think there's much risk of those becoming exhibition games.

And second, I think the seeding will matter a GREAT deal because I think the first round is going to end up being played on the home team's campus.  So seeding will be based on W/L as well as SOS, which will also encourage teams to schedule TOUGH OOC matchups rather than layups. 

On the first paragraph I meant from the perspective of the fans, not the players.  As a fan, I see tOSU football games as basically "can't miss" events.  I'm not that way with BB at all until the NCAA tournament.  Everything prior to that is "just a game" and doesn't really alter the course of the season.  Ie, Ohio State got upset in BB not long ago by Minnesota but it just doesn't matter because there are 31 games plus a league tournament then the NCAA so one loss doesn't change things much.  However, when tOSU got upset by Purdue in football last year it was a REALLY big deal and completely altered the course of the season because that loss, alone, kept tOSU out of the CFP.  

I agree on seeding and that is one of the reasons I would want the first round games hosted by the top four league champions.  I think seeding at every level would matter:

• Being the #1 seed would be HUGE because it would probably mean being a double-digit favorite at home against a team like Memphis (this year).  
• Being #2 instead of #3 would be important because it is likely that #6 would be substantially better than #7.  
• Being 2-3 instead of 4 would also be huge because in most years #5 would probably be a REALLY good at-large that either missed their CG (like Bama in 2017 or tOSU in 2015).  Avoiding #5 would be important. 
• Being a top-4 Champ would be important for the home game.  
• Being #5 instead of #6 or #6 instead of #7 would matter because, depending on the year, there might be a MAJOR drop-off between #2 and #3 or #3 and #4.  
• #8 would almost always be the G5 Champion so that isn't really relevant for P5 teams.  

On top of that, once in a while you would have a CG upset such that, as discussed above, you would end up with something like a 9-4 Northwestern as the #7 seed.  Consider a year like that also with a relatively weak G5 Champion:

• The #1 seed gets a home game against a Memphis.  
• The #2 seed gets a home game against a 9-4 Northwestern.  
• The #3 seed gets a home game against at-large #2.  
• The #4 seed gets a home game against at-large #1.  

There are big gaps at each step there.  

On the first paragraph I meant from the perspective of the fans, not the players.  As a fan, I see tOSU football games as basically "can't miss" events.  I'm not that way with BB at all until the NCAA tournament.  Everything prior to that is "just a game" and doesn't really alter the course of the season.  Ie, Ohio State got upset in BB not long ago by Minnesota but it just doesn't matter because there are 31 games plus a league tournament then the NCAA so one loss doesn't change things much.  However, when tOSU got upset by Purdue in football last year it was a REALLY big deal and completely altered the course of the season because that loss, alone, kept tOSU out of the CFP. 

I 

Agree 100% with everything you said on seeding.

But on your statement here, I mean, I get it, I certainly care less about regular season college basketball games than I do the postseason.  But I also care less basketball in general,than I do football.  And it seems like you do, too?

You state that tOSU football games are "can't miss" events for you, and although I didn't attend the 2005 UT-tOSU game in Columbus, from what my friends who did tell me, it's an enormous gameday even for folks that don't have a prayer of getting into the stadium.  Do you really think that would change all that much simply knowing that a loss doesn't kill your season?  I mean, to be honest, it's ALREADY that way for tOSU and Alabama and Oklahoma.  All three of those teams have been admitted to the CFP having already lost a regular season game.  And that's WITHOUT an auto-bid for P5 champs.  I don't think it would change the scenario much at all, to be honest.

Contrast that with my perspective, where Texas has not once-- EVER-- been allowed to play for the national championship without having a perfect undefeated season.  I sure would have loved to receive a tOSU/OU/Alabama -style mulligan in that 2008 season when I think Texas was the best team in the country but got caught out by the B12 tiebreaker rules.

And also, as you point out a couple posts later, there are just SO MANY MORE basketball games, that comparing the relative meaning of one game in a season isn't really appropriate.  I just don't think it'll EVER feel like basketball and I don't think the "safety net" of an auto-bid is enough to make ANY fanbase feel relaxed about losing a regular season game.

As far as I know the AP poll is still free to vote for whomever they like as the #1 team.  And I don't consider it any more or less valid than it ever was, nor do I consider the CFP's trophy any more valid than the AP's trophy,

So yeah, we could still get a split.  It'd be fun to see it happen.