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

That should cover the football team's toilet paper costs.

If you have a curtious coach who is worried about saving his school money, maybe even double ply


https://twitter.com/davidubben/status/1770540623101075852?s=20

The biggest, positive difference college football has (had?) vs the NFL is the importance of every regular season game.  That's the key, and it's slipping away.

We're speeding towards the regular season games meaning less and less with an expnded playoff - more specifically, more and more at-large playoff births.  The 4 P5 champs + 1 G5 + 7 at-large is the model for the next 2 years, and then going the wrong way to 4+1+9 at-large after that (14 teams).

The possible (stupidly optimistic) saving grace is continued B1G and SEC expansion, at the expense of the XII and ACC.  I wish they'd stop picking them apart 1-2-3 schools at a time and just skip to the inevitable end.  Many think we'll get to 24 in both the B1G and SEC, but that lends itself to an AFC/NFC NFL model no "real" fans want. 
Optimistically, the 2 big boys could go past 24 apiece, and go a little radical in order to go back to the good old days.  With 30 teams each, that could be divided into 3 divisions of 10 teams each.  With 10 teams in each division, teams could play everyone else within their own division, plus 3 OOC games. 
In terms of a playoff, that'd be 6 division winners and you could include a G5 champ (which would include a few additional have-nots) if that's important.  So that's 7 teams, each representative of a certain population (division).  ONE at-large big is given to the biggest-boy non-division winner. 
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"But what does it all mean, Basil?"
Win your division.  Divisions are based on tradition, not necessarily geography (original big ten teams make up one division, 10 'other' eastern teams in another, 10 'other' western teams in the other, etc.
Everyone plays everyone in their division.  Division winners make the playoff.  Only 1 at-large bid (or 2, if you stop the charade with G5).  You're playing the teams you want to play and still have room for OOC rivalries.

Basically, it's going way forward, to go back.  Everybody happy.  More teams (60 instead of 48), so more overall $$$.  A move back to traditional conferences (now divisions, but who cares what you call it?).  And a massive, RENEWED emphasis on theh sanctity of the regular season. 

The XII and ACC dying, an even more-bloated B1G & SEC, and restricted at-large births i an 8-team playoff can be the perfect storm for the revitalization and useful nostalgia to keep college football healthy going forward.
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What's it look like?
B1G: 
Big Ten Division:  traditional 10 members
Pac Division:  UNL, Wash, Ore, USC, UCLA, Cal, Stan, SMU, TCU, CU
Lambert Division:  Penn St, UMd, Rut, FSU, Miami, GT, Pitt, SU, BC, ND
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SEC:
Original Tasty Crispy Division:  founding members
SWC Division:  Texas, OU, Mizzou, KU, A&M, Arky, KSU, UofA, ASU, OKSt
ACC Division:  SCarolina, UNC, NCST, Duke, WF, Clemson, WV, UL, UVa, VT
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Kicked to the curb (shed a tear):
Utah, BYU, UCF, Baylor, Texas Tech, Iowa St (joins with WSU and OrSt to form newfangled Big-8, and are given 12 cents/year)
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How much does czar of college football play?  I'll get my resume ready.

Na he prolly paling around & fishing with Jimmy Johnson

The biggest, positive difference college football has (had?) vs the NFL is the importance of every regular season game.  That's the key, and it's slipping away.

You and I (among plenty of others here) have been pointing this out for years so it is nothing new but the loss of the "Do or die" feeling around individual regular season games is the thing that I'm the saddest about.  

As an Ohio State fan, at times it has sucked.  A couple that jump immediately to mind:

• 2023:  Ohio State's only regular season loss was to Michigan and the Buckeyes missed the CFP
• 2018:  Ohio State's only regular season loss was to Purdue and the Buckeyes missed the CFP
• 2015:  Ohio State's only regular season loss was to MSU and the Buckeyes missed the CFP
• 2013:  Ohio State's only regular season loss was to MSU in the B1GCG (attended with my dad) and the Buckeyes missed the BCS
• 2010:  Ohio State's only regular season loss was to Wisconsin and the Buckeyes missed the BCS

The 2023 Michigan game was obviously a high-end match-up of two very highly rated teams and games like that will always feel "big" I guess.  The same applies to the 2013 and 2015 MSU games and the 2010 Wisconsin game but that 2018 Purdue loss, frustrating as it was, illustrates the thing that gave CFB the greatest regular season in sports.  Purdue had no business winning that game.  They finished below .500 with losses to Northwestern, Directional Michigan, Mizzou, MSU, Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Auburn.  They were not a good team, that wasn't a "big" game but it ended up dramatically impacting the NC race because it took out Ohio State which opened up a spot for 12-1 Oklahoma who lost to Bama in the semi-final.  If Ohio State had beaten Purdue they'd have likely finished that season #3 knocking ND down to #4 and Oklahoma down to #5 and out of the playoff altogether.  Thus, that single random mid-season regular season game that wasn't a "big" game between ranked teams ended up changing both CFP semi-finals and who knows what the ultimate impact would have been if it had been Bama/ND and Clemson/tOSU instead of Bama/OU and Clemson/ND.  Maybe Clemson still would have beaten Bama in the NC . . . Maybe not.  

I'm not looking forward to the 2024 season the way I've looked forward to every season for the entire 35+ years that I've been following this sport.  I saw a headline somewhere on the web about important early-season OOC match-ups the other day and I didn't even bother to click.  For most of my 35+ years of following the sport I'd have read that with intense interest wanting to know where my Buckeyes or the other contenders might slip up.  Now I don't care because I know in advance that my team and their serious competitors get AT LEAST two mulligans each.  

I looked at Ohio State's schedule just now.  It is telling that the first time I bothered to look at it was for this post.  In past years I'd have been worried about Nebraska as a potential trap game because it is in between HUGE games at Oregon and at Penn State.  Purdue is a potential let-down coming right after the trip to Penn State.  In years past I'd have been analyzing this to death and discussing it here but now . . . I just don't care.  

Don't get me wrong, I still want my team to win the NC it is just that the individual games aren't as meaningful.  Unlike the five times in the last 14 years listed above when Ohio State missed a chance to play for the NC based on a single loss, this year I absolutely KNOW that will not happen.  If Ohio State has an off week at home against Nebraska and loses to the Cornhuskers because the game is between big match-ups against Oregon and Penn State, so what?  Unlike 2023, 2018, 2015, 2013, and 2010 a single loss isn't going to keep Ohio State out and I know it so I'm not worried about it.  Realistically, two losses will not be enough to keep Ohio State out either.  Recent years in which a 2-loss Ohio State team did not make the BCS/CFP:

• 2021:  Lost to Oregon and Michigan
• 2017:  Lost to Oklahoma and Iowa

Adding these to the five aforementioned years in which a one-loss tOSU missed the BCS/CFP and you get seven which is half.  In seven of the last 14 seasons my team has been deprived of a postseason opportunity to play for the NC on the basis of just one or two losses.  In the new structure that will not happen again.  

My team is one of the favorites to win the 2024 National Championship.  I should be super excited about that and honestly, I'm not.  My feeling on it is basically "wake me up when the playoffs start".  I mean, sure I want to beat TCUN and win the B1GCG but now those things are really just about positioning/seeding.  This is nothing like the last 35+ years where Ohio State's NC Chances were on the line every single week.  

That and the gap between the haves/have nots,the old on any given day is being put out to pasture

The gap has always been there.  The mitigating factor is what medina mentioned.  That you might get got on a rainy October afternoon in Columbia, Missouri, and that was it.  The more mulligans the top teams get, the more likely they are just going to wind up taking advantage.

Medina mentioned OSU examples, but even as a neutral fan, why get too invested in a random upset, when South Carolina upsetting Georgia, might just make Georgia a slightly worse seed in the tournament.

Yeah I'd vote for OAM for Czar of College Football.  He definitely cares a lot more about the sport than the yahoos actually running it right now.

Even if your team didn't win the NC or even if you believe as @betarhoalphadelta does that your team could never win an NC, your team and his did meaningfully impact the NC race with wins over Ohio State in recent years. 

And I've said this before, but I could give two shits about "impacting the NC race". The value of beating OSU in 2018 was getting a highly improbable, really fun win. I didn't worry at the time what it meant to the NC race, nor did I care or gloat at CFP selection time that we "ruined" your NC chances. College football as a Purdue fan isn't, and never really was, about winning the NC. 

My problem with these changes is that as a Purdue fan I have to ask "what are we playing for?" Winning the NC? Obviously nope. We'll never have the talent to survive a 4-game CFP gauntlet against the baddies of college football. B1G championship? Nope. Not in an 18-team (20? 22? Do I hear 24??) conference with "two best teams" CCG. Rose Bowl against the PAC champ? Nope, the Rose Bowl is now a CFP game and the PAC doesn't exist. A meaningful bowl game? Nope. There are no more meaningful bowl games because the CFP has sucked all oxygen out of the room. 

So, what's the point of even fielding a team?