The risk of diminishing returns by expanding the College Football Playoff too far

IRVING, Texas — The College Football Playoff governance committee’s two-day meetings came and went here at the Ritz-Carlton in Las Colinas this week, where “healthy” and “robust” conversations about the future of the CFP took place.

When the meetings ended Wednesday afternoon, conference commissioners walked through the white double doors, exited the large conference room on the east side of the hotel, and darted toward the lobby. All of them had their roller bags, hoping to evade reporters waiting in the hallway. They had flights to catch, after all.

While there wasn’t a ton of insight into the year-long debate about a new CFP format — will it be 16 or 24 teams? — there’s a question nobody involved in these discussions can ignore as they make a critical decision that will greatly impact college football: Is there a tipping point when it comes to how many teams can be invited to the CFP before there’s diminishing returns on interest in the regular season?

The CFP is expanding. There’s no hiding it. And steam has picked up behind the scenes to at least consider the viability of a 24-team model, a concept that would have felt outrageous to many of us a year ago. Could the people who filled that Dallas conference room cause irreparable harm to college football’s greatest asset — its amazing regular season — by expanding too far out?

SEC Commissioner Greg Sankey, the only commissioner to stop outside of the double doors to visit with the media, was asked about a “Tipping Point.”

“The Malcolm Gladwell book?” he sarcastically asked back.

No, actually, the risk that including 24 teams in the CFP could diminish fan interest in regular-season games, particularly early-season matchups. What’s the point of getting locked in for big-time early-season matchups when you know the game doesn’t matter and both teams would have to lose three or even four more times to be excluded from the postseason tournament?

“It was in the room,” Sankey said. “We talked about it. I didn’t disagree.”

Here’s the thing about expanding a playoff format: once it’s expanded, you don’t go back. If college football goes to 24 teams and there is a negative reaction — lower television viewership and less fan interest — there is no reverting back to 12, which has arguably been a very good format for the two seasons we’ve had it. The ironic part? We’ve had the 12-team system for only two years, and only one season with the current (and functional) seeding model.

CFP director Rich Clark said the conversation about what’s too much has taken place, and experts have presented what a 24-team CFP could actually mean for the big picture.

“We have experts that we work with that can give us projections of what might be, and they have some ways to do it in a, I would say, a pretty scientific way,” Clark said. “So they help us to find those and to give us their best assessment of what it might look like from a viewership or a revenue standpoint.”

Here’s the reality: experts believe interest could wane somewhat, even though Americans have unequivocally proven they will watch football when it’s on TV. Yes, everyone loves watching football, but the idea that college football is an indestructible product — one that will keep putting up record numbers year over year despite any changes made to the system, format or rules – probably isn’t true. There is such a thing as expanding too much.

More coaches are now in favor of 24 than ever, which makes sense from a self-preservation standpoint. Most coaches, fighting for their jobs week to week in the fall, would love a get-out-of-jail-free card after losing regular-season games, which were once very punitive in this sport. Who wouldn’t want to go 7-5 and still make it to the Big Dance? Most people’s opinions are formed based on self-interest.

Here’s a question that mirrors any discussion about maintaining interest in the regular season: What do the fans want? Though polls on the social media platform X are far from scientific, in the On3 poll asking fans the simple question about what should be done about the future CFP format, expanding to 24 received less than nine percent of the more than 1,000 responses.

It’s not popular.

Texas A&M head coach Mike Elko made a statement to On3 that echoes fan sentiment regarding protecting the regular season.

“The importance of the regular season is still very much in line with what I believe it has always been,” Elko said. “Could that still be the case with a larger number? Potentially. But I think we need to create some data points to figure out where that balance is. We don’t need to be NCAA basketball. The beauty of our sport is that there are games at the end of the season that matter that people lose.”

Nobody wants college football to become college basketball.

Nobody.

The $1 billion dollar question is whether football can endure massive postseason expansion and remain unscathed. Yes, the college basketball season has become less and less compelling over the years as it continues to expand — the NCAA Tournament, funny enough, is reportedly in talks to expand from 68 to 76 teams — but is that also because it’s basketball?

Could college football have a similar fate if it goes to 24?

Clark said everyone in the room is open to discussing all angles.

“We don’t want to leave a stone unturned and make a decision that’s going to have second- or third-order effects that we didn’t consider,” he said.

Expanding too far is a big stone. No, it’s a boulder.

“The regular season is king, right?” Clark said. “We are a compliment to the regular season. So we have to consider how it would impact the regular season.”

The people in that room have to get this right.

Why?

Because once a decision is made to expand to 24, there’s no going back.