I think the arbitrary nature of the selection process has harmed the game. Wins and losses are a decisive measure. Conference championships are a decisive measure. Instead of measuring a teams performance over the course of the season, the committee is attempting to pick the best teams at the end of the season. This is the purpose of the tournament. Let teams earn their way into the tournament and then let head to head competition prove who is best at the end of the season.

I'm so sick of seeing people "make the case" with a bunch of bullshit. Undefeated beats 1 loss. Conference champion beats not conference champion. A direct loss beats any other bullshit you make up (I'm looking at you TCU). I've seen people comparing stats. That's meaningless unless you've played the same teams. I see all this talk about strength of schedule. There is no objective way to measure this, so you just pretend your conference is better than another team's conference.

I want to see people stop running up the score and I want to see people stop acting like a win isn't really a win because the score was too close or a team had to come from behind or it was a home game. Fuck this politics bullshit. Let's decide the best team on the field and not in the board room.

12/31/2014 8:53:45 PM

This 4 team playoff decided by a committee is still better than a single game decided by computers. But overall I agree with what you're saying. In a way, with the BCS rankings you could just kinda throw up your hands say "well, what do you expect...it's computers making the rankings" but now with a committee every single thing has the justified and scrutinized and fans are left trying to determine exactly what the committee's line of thinking was.

[Edited on December 31, 2014 at 9:03 PM. Reason : f]

12/31/2014 9:01:32 PM

holy crap what a huge break Mississippi State just got with that blown call by the refs

12/31/2014 9:04:06 PM

^yeah that was bad. GT's defense has impressed me so far.

12/31/2014 9:06:27 PM

Quote :

"This 4 team playoff decided by a committee is still better than a single game decided by computers. But overall I agree with what you're saying. In a way, with the BCS rankings you could just kinda throw up your hands say "well, what do you expect...it's computers making the rankings" but now with a committee every single thing has the justified and scrutinized and fans are left trying to determine exactly what the committee's line of thinking was. "

No doubt, but the campaigning is unsportsmanlike. I think an 8 team playoff would reduce the vitriol a bit. Barring that, they should at least whittle things down by only considering conference champs (and make every conference name a champ).

I think the committee made the right decision though. When the Big12 declined to name a champion, that took Baylor out of consideration and Ohio State was the only logical choice. TCU fans need to aim their frustration at the right place: The Big12. If the Big12 had 12 teams, they'd have a championship game and TCU would have had the opportunity to prove they were the best. TCU can either fix the Big12 or join a real conference.

12/31/2014 9:14:52 PM

Quote :

"And FSU really didn't have that impressive of an ooc schedule. 2 easy teams, 1 mid level at a neutral site, and an ND at home. Hardly noteworthy. "

FSU was the only team of the final four to schedule 3 of their 4 out of conference games with BCS teams

12/31/2014 9:15:35 PM

no matter how many teams there are, the first team left out is still gonna be extremely pissed off. Look at the NCAA Tourney last year and how pissed off SMU fans were to be nearly the 70th damn team. If you go to 8 teams, the 9th team will complain....16 teams, the 17th will complain, etc etc.

I do agree that it should be atleast the Top 8 teams however.

12/31/2014 9:26:50 PM

Yea, but the farther you get from #1, the less credible the whining is. #6 TCU could be the best team, but #9 Ole Miss surely is not.

12/31/2014 9:33:06 PM

^ Yep. I'd rather leave out #17 than #5

12/31/2014 9:39:10 PM

I whole heartedly agree. Just think theres gonna be whining no matter how many teams you have.

12/31/2014 9:40:22 PM

^that's definitely true...you're always gonna have somebody get snubbed. but yeah - it's better to "snub" an insignificant team than a team with a legitimate chance to win it like tcu or baylor

12/31/2014 9:47:04 PM

12/31/2014 10:13:23 PM

Is that New Orleans?

12/31/2014 10:39:06 PM

outside Sugar Bowl ESPN setup I think

12/31/2014 10:44:05 PM

Tuscaloosa Two Step

12/31/2014 10:45:40 PM

hahahah

12/31/2014 10:49:34 PM

we just gonna ignore that the acc's second best team is trucking the sec's second best team? or is the acc still a shitty conference in which fsu plays nobody?

12/31/2014 11:16:53 PM

Imma go ahead and say that 3-8 of the SEC would demolish 3-8 of the ACC.

12/31/2014 11:18:49 PM

Yeah the sec is really good. I'm not arguing the ACC is better. i think it's entirely true that the SEC is both really good and really overhyped. Mizzou, perennial middle tier Big XII team has won two SEC East titles in two years. If the SEC was as mighty as its hyped up to be, how would a relatively average newcomer pull off such a feat?

But the talk about FSU not playing anybody? Best team FSU beat is destroying the best team Bama beat right now.

Although i don't completely agree that 3-8 of the SEC would "demolish" 3-8 of the ACC. they are better. I'm not convinced they'd "demolish" them though.

[Edited on December 31, 2014 at 11:32 PM. Reason : d]

[Edited on December 31, 2014 at 11:32 PM. Reason : ddd]

12/31/2014 11:28:27 PM

This WolfPack2017 fool has to be an alias. No way someone is this dumb.

FSU beat 9 bowl teams, 4-0 against ranked teams, and has won 29 games in a row. But they are not top 4?

12/31/2014 11:34:13 PM

Nah... FSU is clearly crap. They are only undefeated

12/31/2014 11:40:46 PM

^^I would say that we were all probably dumb at 19 years old.

12/31/2014 11:48:05 PM

also, that mighty SEC West, amirite???

12/31/2014 11:50:34 PM

happy fuckin new year

1/1/2015 12:01:35 AM

I must say...outside of UNC, the ACC has handled themselves pretty decently in the bowl games this year.

NC State dominates UCF and staves off a comeback for the win.
Clemson clowns Oklahoma.
GT clowns Miss. State.
Miami hangs tough with South Carolina.
BC should have prolly beaten Penn State.
ND(i'll give the ACC half credit here) beats LSU with their backup QB.
VT wallops cincinatti.
Duke hangs tough with 17th ranked ASU and screws up royally at the end.

No embarassing losses outside of the UNC one with some pretty good wins in there. I'll take that every year.

1/1/2015 3:20:25 AM

Quote :

"FSU beat 9 bowl teams, 4-0 against ranked teams, and has won 29 games in a row. But they are not top 4?"

So beating cupcakes that only got bowl berths because they play fcs teams is suddenly an achievement? Also, you can't judge a team on what it did last year. They have 13 wins this season with only one of them being against a good team (GT). FSU has a conference schedule that is not as tough add anyone else in the top 6. The fact that they almost lost to middle of the road teams is ridiculous. It's not fair to just say that a team that wins all their games is the champion, because those wins can be cheap and easy.


However I will say again. I am not arguing that FSU should not be in the top four. I agree completely with the cfb committees rankings. The whole point of this, and you would have seen that if you would have read it, personally I don't think FSU deserves to be in the top 4 because of who they plaited and how small the margin of victory was. I understand this is not a professional way or whatever to rank them, but to me they haven't proven that they are top 4 material.


Tl; dr. FSU is good and I do not object to them being in the top 4 rankings, but I also think they haven't proven that they are top 4 yet.

Happy new year!

1/1/2015 8:22:37 AM

This guy...

1/1/2015 9:01:02 AM

^^ If FSU doesn't deserve top 4, let's analyze the other 2 teams in the top 4 (I'm excluding OSU b/c I think TCU should have been in over them)

Alabama: 3 of their wins were against Southern Miss, Western Carolina, and Florida Atlantic.
They barely beat Arkansas, beat LSU in overtime, and barely beat Miss St, a team that just got run over by GT (who FSU Beat)
Oh yeah, and Bama LOST to Ole Miss, who got embarrassed by TCU.

Oregon: 6 of their wins were against South Dakota, Wyoming, Washington State, Washington, Utah, and Colorado. Very middle of the road, if you ask me.
They also LOST to Arizona

There is no dominant team in college football this year. I agree with that. But FSU deserves to be in the playoff just as much as those other 2 teams.

We should just go to a 8 team playoff. 1 team from each Power 5 conference and 3 at-large.

1/1/2015 9:15:35 AM

Of all the "meh" teams FSU played, they didn't once slip up and lose. You can't say that about Baylor, who was #5. And you can't say it about Ohio State who was #4. For that reason alone FSU is a top 4 team without question.

1/1/2015 9:37:29 AM

All this talk of team A beat these teams and Team B's wins don't really count because they were against these teams makes my head explode. Let's first limit the pack to conference champions. Then let's look at their # of losses. After that, pick numbers to break ties. Let the tournament results figure out who is the best.

FSU is undefeated and should have the #1 seed. I'd pick Alabama, Oregon, and OSU for the remaining spots. Baylor is left out because of the lack of a undisputed conference title and TCU is behind Baylor by direct competition. The point of this is it shouldn't matter whether your think FSU or Bama, or TCU is the best team. If Bama or Oregon are better than FSU, they will prove it by beating them. If TCU were the best, they would have won their conference outright. But FSU deserves the #1 seed until then.

The best solution going forward is to institute a conference championship game in all conferences and expand the playoffs to 6 or 8 teams. Playoff berths should be assigned in a deterministic way, not based on campaigning, "making the case", "statements" or "resumes". Let's keep the drama on the field where it belongs.

Hell, if they are only going to pick 4 teams, they should probably just decide the match-ups at random.

What pisses me off about all this is somehow this process has opened the door to fans claiming their teams is the best without having to actually win football games. How the fuck is TCU the best team when it lost to Baylor. By any objective standard, TCU is the second best team in the Big 12 (and in Texas). That's not enough to earn your way into a tournament of 4 teams.

[Edited on January 1, 2015 at 11:39 AM. Reason : ?]

1/1/2015 11:27:06 AM

I do agree that the CFP should be 8 teams. But the seedings at this point kinda don't matter. IMO, they did get the 4 teams right. My personal ranking would've been a little different, but like you said - whoever the best team is, they will have the chance to prove it regardless of where they were actually seeded.

1/1/2015 11:36:21 AM

I just think it demeans the game to rank the only undefeated team 3rd. If you were a disinterested observer and I told you there was 1 undefeated team from the 5 major conferences, you would be incredulous that they'd be ranked behind two other teams.

To me it is just common sense. Seed the teams based on the on the field results and let the tournament decide who is best. FSU has earned the #1 seed. Even if Bama turns out to be best, its loss to Ole Miss should have the consequence of giving it a tougher road to #1.

1/1/2015 11:43:41 AM

I do feel like all season people have looked for reasons not to rank FSU #1. More than they would for any other defending national champion who went defended again the following season. For whatever reason - maybe people hate Winston, or just hate FSU, or maybe because this the first year of the payoff - FSU has faced far more scrutiny than any other team in a similar situation that I can remember. I can't think of anything close to a defending national champion who returns most of their talent, runs the table all season, and is put under a microscope more then FSU has been this year and is never given the benefit of the doubt. The excuse Ohio State's loss to Va Tech as just being an early season slip up while Ohio St broke in a new QB. But FSU doesn't get the same benefit of the doubt for avoiding an early season slip up vs Clemson when Winston was suspended. (Not to mention Clemson is way better than Va Tech)

[Edited on January 1, 2015 at 11:50 AM. Reason : l]

1/1/2015 11:47:59 AM

can't believe Oregon are favored by more than a touchdown against FSU

1/1/2015 12:22:30 PM

After Clemson, GT, and NCSU's performances, you have to be optimistic for FSU.

1/1/2015 12:33:38 PM

Big Ten once again proving they are the best conference in 2014

1/1/2015 1:10:31 PM

Quote :

"I do feel like all season people have looked for reasons not to rank FSU #1. More than they would for any other defending national champion who went defended again the following season. For whatever reason - maybe people hate Winston, or just hate FSU, or maybe because this the first year of the payoff - FSU has faced far more scrutiny than any other team in a similar situation that I can remember. I can't think of anything close to a defending national champion who returns most of their talent, runs the table all season, and is put under a microscope more then FSU has been this year and is never given the benefit of the doubt. The excuse Ohio State's loss to Va Tech as just being an early season slip up while Ohio St broke in a new QB. But FSU doesn't get the same benefit of the doubt for avoiding an early season slip up vs Clemson when Winston was suspended. (Not to mention Clemson is way better than Va Tech)"

This is the only reason I am cheering for FSU to win it all again, I really hate the college football pundits and that result would really piss them off. I also have an utter hatred for OSU but it would be hilarious if they embarrassed Alabama just because I am getting sick of the constant SEC cock gobbling.

1/1/2015 1:10:34 PM

I would take FSU to win by double digits against Oregon. They have time to prep and they'll handle their business.

1/1/2015 1:20:08 PM

what's gonna be really dumb is if FSU does lose to a great Oregon team tonight, people are gonna be like "told y'all fsu was overrated!!!!" when tonight's results really have no bearing on what FSU did the first 13 games of this season and whether or not they deserve to be in the playoff.

1/1/2015 2:19:49 PM

Quote :

"But the talk about FSU not playing anybody? Best team FSU beat is destroying the best team Bama beat right now."

Quote :

"when tonight's results really have no bearing on what FSU did the first 13 games of this season and whether or not they deserve to be in the playoff."

So which is it, the bowl games prove something or they are just a single sample that conclusions shouldn't be drawn from? You seem to be contradicting yourself a bit...

1/1/2015 2:32:25 PM

A loss tonight still leaves fsu as the 2nd or 3rd best 1 loss teams imo

1/1/2015 2:57:47 PM

I agree that FSU has gotten a lot of hate.

Most of it stems from the common argument, "They haven't played anybody!"

They can't choose their own schedule. It isn't like they can call up the top 10 teams and arrange a matchup from week-to-week.

Anytime a team from a power 5 conference goes undefeated, that's a big deal. and I'm sick of people saying the ACC is weak. The ACC has held its own this year. You line up the ACC teams with SEC teams in RANDOM match ups (draw from a hat) and I think you get a .500 record. Mark it.

1/1/2015 2:58:57 PM

Quote :

"So which is it, the bowl games prove something or they are just a single sample that conclusions shouldn't be drawn from? You seem to be contradicting yourself a bit..."

That's not what I'm saying really.

You can believe that 1) FSU is a great team this year. 2) Oregon is also a great team this year and they might be better than FSU and 3) win or lose tonight, FSU is still a top 4 team. Doesn't mean FSU didn't deserve to be there does it? Just like if Bama or Oregon loses, do you think people are gonna argue that they didn't deserve to be there? Of course not. What they've done this season in the first 13 games proves they belong in the playoff, and tonight's result won't change that. They may or may not win the whole thing. But they deserve to be there regardless.

I just meant the knee jerk reaction if FSU loses is gonna be "OMG FINALLY EXPOSED FIRST DECENT TEAM THEY PLAYED BEAT EM!" when that really isn't the case at all. They're still a top 4 team. Just like Mississippi State getting stomped by GT doesn't negate that Miss St had a really good season.

My post about Miss St getting beat by GT wasn't to say that Miss St lost, therefore they didn't deserve to be in that game. It was saying that GT is a really good team that IMO was underrated for a lot of the year.


[Edited on January 1, 2015 at 3:07 PM. Reason : f]

1/1/2015 3:04:30 PM

this is an excellent game. Melvin Gordon needs overtime to break Barry's record. He's 43 yards short

1/1/2015 3:21:08 PM

You are using a bowl game to justify GT's strength but then saying that if FSU gets blown out tonight people can't use that as an example of FSU weakness and should consider all 13 games. You say use the body of work for FSU, yet ignore that GT lost to Duke and UNC? Just asking which is it, a body of work or value on the bowl game. You are arguing both about 2 different teams, at least be consistent.

1/1/2015 3:23:52 PM

Yeah this has been a really fun game.

1/1/2015 3:24:06 PM

Remember that time everyone thought ohio state and oregon were awesome for beating michigan state? Well baylor is crushing them and already beat tcu. Obviously the playoff winner will have 2 awesome wins vecause someone has to win but there will be no true champion unless fsu wins

[Edited on January 1, 2015 at 3:24 PM. Reason : fsu]

1/1/2015 3:24:10 PM

This Brazilian kicker for Wisky is a fatass, lol.

1/1/2015 3:27:18 PM

Think Wisconsin's kicker needs a tighter jersey.

1/1/2015 3:27:36 PM

onions

1/1/2015 3:27:51 PM