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If the NCAA controls the system, big time college football AS IT STANDS NOW, is over.  Period.  The funding for 100,000+ seat stadiums, the amount of money that is derived from it, dries up pretty damn quick. NCAA basketball tournament on Line One. Bullshit.  Less than 5% of the NCAA basketball tournament's total revenue (ticket sales, TV money, etc.) goes to the schools that actually participate in it.  College football, even at badly supported IA programs, still effectively supports all the other athletic department programs at most universities (Duke would be an obvious exception). A team that GOES TO THE ELITE 8 in the NCAA basketball tournament will gross LESS money than either Memphis or North Texas will tonight in the horrible New Orleans Bowl.  That is DESPITE the ridiculously huge contract the NCAA basketball tournament yields each and every year.

To be honest, I'm in favor of any playoff over the current situation. Even the BCS+1 would be an improvement. I would take it. I would also be happy with an 8 or 16 team playoff, as long as both the OOC and CC games were still important. I would not want to drastically change the definition of Div 1-A (for example, by moving to an 8x8 setup and dropping all the mid-major schools). Actually I'm not all that far off from you - my standards are a shade higher than most, I'll admit that - but I'd be just fine with the best of the best playing it off - I want CCs who've played a tough sked - and I want both aspects to matter....... We here in the playoff camp will try our best to accommodate you!  Is an 8-team playoff best of the best enough, or do we need a smaller number?   Which both aspects do you mean in your last phrase? Strong conference and strong OOC schedules?

I'm not asking for a faith in any of those systems but only a noticing that EVEN THEY (all but one) choose one of the top three AP teams as their #1 pick.  Perhaps your mistrust is because most of them are  computer-_base_d? The nationally-sampled human polls don't disagree much with them; sure, the order of #1, #2, #3 varies, but the top eight of the AP poll   captures what IMO is all of the legitimate contenders. I distrust all ranking methods, computer or human pollsters. If we're going to have an 8 team playoff, make it the 8 conference champs. I think you meant make it some of the 11 conference champs or perhaps split Division I-A and take the conference champs from the new top division. But anyway, what's wrong with using a poll to SELECT teams for a playoff? Once the playoff is seeded, the teams settle things on the field; the real source of controversy is declaring a poll winner the outright champion without giving the other contenders a chance to prove themselves (via a playoff). Do you think there is a significant chance that taking the top 8 teams in a well-established poll will fail to select legitimate _title_ contenders? Polls/ranking systems (BCS, RPI) are already used to select at-large teams in the BCS/men's basketball tournament.  I'm saying let's just do this 100%, rather than awarding automatic CC bids. Dude, to get from 32 teams to the MNC would take at least 5 weeks and that would be way too much travelling for most fans over the course of that month. please have some consideration for the Alums and for the stadiums and for the teams... BBall can get away with it because they play 2-3 games a week, a logistical impossibility for a football team. education is the progressive discovery of our own ignorance

the past Plenty of good ideas.  Just a couple of points: First, is Division I-A really one division, or is it two?  Let's just end the b.s. and have the BCS conferences call themselves their own division.  Make a 16-team playoff, with each conference champ, each conference finalist in playoff conferences, plus 8 at-large teams.  If you really want to include all of Div. I-A, make those 8 at-large spots the results of a pre-playoff, say with the 5 other conference champs, and 11 at-large teams from whoever's left. A playoff with more than 16 teams, thus requiring more than four games (the pre-playoff you mention would require a fifth game), starts getting problematic.  16 slots is enough to waste a slot on every single Division I-A conference in the country and still have five slots left for the truly deserving at-large teams.  Of course, like you said, splitting up Division I-A is an option. The thing is, having a 16-team playoff without splitting I-A give you two huge problems.  First possibility, lower-ranked conference champs get left out to permit the 'stronger' teams from 'better' conferences to get in.  Second possibility, strong #10-#20 teams get left out to make room for #20-#30 'weaker' conference champs.  Either way, deserving teams get screwed. The BCS conferences might as well just call themselves a different division and be done with it.  Let the bottom half of I-A put a playoff together in time to send their top team to the 'BCS Division' thingy, perhaps. We'll work from the end back.  The semi-finals and final game would be a Final Four, just like basketball.  Cities/places would bid for it 2-3 years in advance.  The final could be the Saturday just before the NFL conference championships (this year, Jan. 17), You're going to catch hell from the anti-playoff camp for making the playoffs extend that far into the Spring semester. Hypocrisy really pisses me off.  The anti-playoff college presidents whine about 'the integrity of college academics' when they whine about playoffs extending into the January semester.  But they have no problem when only one-third of their football p_layer_s actually get around to graduating.  Horsecrap. Between the boring sameness of the NFL and the silly shenanigans of the NCAA, I've given up on them (even though I do think NCAA football is often by far the most entertaining of the bunch). I'll stick with CFL, Rugby, and Aussie Rules, thanks. Rugby has no blocking. Yahoo. NCAA football has more originality than the CFL, NFL, Arena FL or NFLE. The CFL has more originality? Tell me which is the one CFL that has a TE? Or do they all employ the basic run and shoot type biases that some teams in the NCAA employ. It does have more originality than the NFL though. It was certainly interesting seeing the Eskimos with 4 runningbacks in a formation.

Hey - btw Reed and Steve - this has been a great thread. Thanks!  And thank you (seriously) for participating!  Getting your opinions helps expose the holes and all that...