The Big Ten's defense of College Football Playoff auto bids should be enough to bury that plan

New York Times

3 days ago

Good for Big Ten commissioner Tony Petitti — going beyond a friendly podcast, proclaiming his support for a rigged College Football Playoff expansion at his league's media days and unwittingly helping to explain why it's such a terrible idea.
Petitti was so careful, so deft with his spin Tuesday. Stick to the talking points. Take it out of the selection committee's hands. Results on the field should matter more. Let's 'better connect the regular season and the postseason.' Never actually address why the SEC and Big Ten should get four automatic bids while the ACC and Big 12 each get half of that.
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Problem is, at some point you have to get into the specifics of the accompanying 'play-in weekend,' and last season tells us exactly why it's so ill-conceived. The Big Ten had four Playoff teams in 2024, and all were deserving. That won't always be the case, which is part of why this plan appeals to the Big Ten — while the SEC has thankfully realized five auto bids for league champs and 11 at-large selections would serve it better over time.
Petitti's 16-team plan, if activated last season, would have forced two of those four teams to win another game to guarantee spots in the Playoff. Eventual national champion Ohio State, the No. 4 seed, would have played No. 5 seed Illinois. No. 3 seed Indiana, the surprise story of the entire season, would have drawn No. 6 seed Iowa.
That's 8-4 Iowa, 6-3 in the Big Ten, with a nonleague loss to rival Iowa State, with a 12-point loss to a bad Michigan State team, with a loss to a bad UCLA team, with a 28-point defeat at the hands of the Buckeyes, with a 13-10 win over 7-6 Nebraska as the prevailing achievement of the entire season. That Iowa team. Needing one win against the upstart Hoosiers to make the College Football Playoff.
Unfortunately for Petitti, he had an exchange with a reporter in Las Vegas — Big Ten country! — in which he had to answer for that cringe-worthy scenario.
Unfortunately for anyone who actually likes his plan, he could only say this: 'If you're 6-3 in the Big Ten, I would argue that's a great record, and if you stumbled in a nonconference game, I don't know why that disqualifies you.'
He then went on to talk about how 8-4 as a winning percentage in most professional leagues gets you into the postseason and blah, blah, blah, but the damage was done.
How could anyone listening to that, and considering what cringe-worthy scenarios may lie ahead if the Big Ten gets its way, have any interest in the '4-4-2-2-1' plan?
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It rewards status over achievement.
It should offend anyone who actually believes in competition.
And in a given year, it could give us a sub-mediocre Big Ten team in the field as opposed to … pick your team from the ACC or Big 12.
I can see Clemson, Miami, Florida State, SMU and let's say Bill Belichick's North Carolina all being good in the same season. You? How about Arizona State, BYU, Iowa State and big-spendin' Texas Tech all at once? Throw in a good Notre Dame season and the expected haul from the SEC.
That leaves two at-large bids after four from the Big Ten, four from the SEC, two from the ACC, two from the Big 12, a Group of 5 team and Notre Dame join the field. That means serious quality from both the ACC and Big 12 likely watching from home.
But hey, Iowa upset Indiana so … shrug?
Imagine the fallout if an excess of auto bids forced a Playoff field to shake out that way, as opposed to the imperfect-yet-far-superior way of letting 13 human beings study data, watch teams, speak with each other and apply common sense to their selections. They will always be scrutinized and criticized — it's a ton of fun each Tuesday night in the fall — but I bet they wouldn't put 8-4 Iowa in over 10-2 BYU.
Oh, and imagine the impact on nonleague scheduling/nonleague participation, once coaches realize the standings in their ridiculously oversized leagues are all that matters.
The good news here is that the SEC is publicly opposed to Petitti's plan, so the worst-case scenario is a stalemate resulting in a continuation of the 12-team Playoff from 2026 to 2032. And that doesn't sound like a bad scenario at all.
So thank you, Tony Petitti. If anyone was on the fence about '4-4-2-2-1,' you've made it clear why they should jump right off and run toward common sense. Credit's due for being willing to show up in front of a bunch of reporters and try to spin it into existence. The best move now is to return to Joel Klatt's podcast and gently take it all back.
(Photo of Tony Petitti: Lucas Peltier / Imagn Images)