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Now, let's tie it to the actual process of getting picked for the college football playoff because this was a big point of consternation among the coaches. Like I said earlier, they want to make sure that the committee rewards an SEC schedule. As we all know, they're not supposed to be looking at conference affiliation. That's not supposed to matter. This is a sport that does not have very many crossover games and they're going to have even fewer of them now that the ACC and the SEC are going to a nine-game conference schedule. So, you have not enough data points to have like true strength of schedule metrics like you do in basketball where there's hundreds of games and you have plenty of points
to do it. They are very worried though like they are convinced that this is going to come down to a bunch of nine and three SEC teams and you know 10 and2 teams in the Big 12 or you know the Big 10 or whatever are going to get in above them without having the rigors right like we and we acknowledge it the SEC is deeper the top isn't as strong as the Big 10 has been but they're arguing that what they saw in the metrics and what is concerning to them is that you're better off being dominant in a bad league than being, you know, towards the top of a more competitive league. And I'll read you this quote from um Georgia athletic director Josh Brooks. Actually, this was to in response to one of my questions
because I said, you know, like, hey, the human element, like how do you guys feel about that in this world where, you know, everyone's a little bit worried about how the teams are selected? He says, quote, look, I'm biased. I spent a lot of time in the SEC. I was part of a mock exercise a number of years ago. One of the things that took me back is when people would say things like that was a bad loss or that wasn't a great win. To me, that's hard to say when you go to some of these venues, especially at night. When you judge Texas on the loss at Florida last year and say that's going to be a massive hit to their resume. Well, Florida is a really tough team and that's a really tough place to play.
That was also a team that fired their coach. Yeah, it was not like what did they finish? Four and eight. I know this is my issue with this conversation in particular. I think it is both true that the SEC is deeper, but we cannot make excuses for losing to that Florida team. We cannot make excuses for getting taken down to the wire against Mississippi State. We cannot make excuses for Arkansas hanging around with you when you're supposed to be one of the best teams. I watched what Notre Dame did going to play Arkansas. That game was not close, right? So, like to me, I think we have to be able to put those two things in the proper context of certainly on a week-to-eek basis, the competition's going to be
harder down there. We're not going to make these excuses. Oh, Florida's a tough team and what? Okay. There. I mean, if they're a football team, they're supposed to be tough. Like, I'm really not trying to hear that as an excuse for why somebody could lose to a team like that. I mean, their excuses that like they had to play Florida and um Indiana played Purdue, right? Or something, right? Like that. I mean, Purdue's tough, right? Like, like Barry ODM's a tough coach. They got tough players. I mean, what are we talking about?
I'm saying that's their argument. So, like this I feel like we've been in this perpetually for years. And you know, part of the reason that like the only reason that you know, Alabama made the playoff a couple years ago is because they were in the SEC. Yes. They sometimes it's like how does that come into play? I think they want it to be like a true metric where they rank the conferences and they say like this nine and three is better than that nine and three. And that's never going to happen. you're never gonna have what they want unless a committee comes out here and just says it. And they're putting in teams that have more losses over teams that have fewer losses. And that's just not what this committee has ever done.
They could at any point they could totally change the way that people scheduled, but they have not done it because every year we go down the list and it's zero losses, one loss teams, two loss teams, three loss teams. Maybe there's a couple where there's like one ahead of the other, right? But they could have made this point about Texas last year. They could have said, "We're going to treat them like a two- loss team because we're not going to penalize them for going and playing and losing to Ohio State." They did not do that. They didn't have them close to the playoff. Again, we did talk about the Florida loss as a bad one, but that you could have gotten rid of that whole talking point and just said, "We're not going to
penalize him for the Ohio State game." Freshman or well, not freshman, but rookie quarterback making a first start. So close. One of the closest teams to play Ohio State. Oh, you could have done all of that and they don't do that. So, to me, like it's less of an issue about like, oh, the metrics and we're worried we're not getting enough credit and it's just saying like, hey, be a selection committee that wants to make a point about scheduling and then people will stop cancing these home and home games, you know? No, I mean, it's that to me is the simplest part of it. And I think it's it's really disheartening, too, because one of the things that we were supposed to get out of the expanded playoff was
some of these matchups, right? like we're just supposed to get better matchups because you had that leeway. And the Texas example I think is a great one because after seeing that I think a lot of people were like why would I do that? Like why would I do that? Take my team on the road. Didn't say that. He was like I got to get out of this game next year. You know like what was the point? Don't blame them. I don't blame him. And so to your point like it's a direct feedback loop of what the committee does in terms of how they rank teams um particular teams that have some of these losses against great teams. um that they
went out and scheduled and they didn't have to versus other schools and I'll pick on Indiana here where and I'll give the excuse that they were trying to build themselves back as a program, right? But like they have basically committed Penn State, same thing. They have committed to this philosophy of we're not going to play anybody with the pulse first three games of the year. We're going to be chilling and then we'll see what happens in conference. And I think more teams are going to do that. It never hurt them. Michigan had that as well, right? Like it the committee never made a point about these things in
basketball. When the committee makes a point, people change the way they schedule. Joshua, I just pulled up the CFP rankings going into the playoffs. Zero losses. Then we got all the one loss teams. Then we got a two loss team. Then there's a three loss team, but it's Alabama. And remember, they count the conference championship loss. So that was really a two loss team in their mind. They didn't get dinged for doing another. So two twos. Oh, nine and three Texas. uh two three loss and now we're in the three loss world. So there we go man.
Like if you're not going to evaluate these teams separately without being obsessed with the loss column, you're never going to fix this problem. Yeah, it's rough. and for the SEC like this argument that the committee is not supposed to look at conference affiliation like at a certain point I'm not saying we should wait it but we should also acknowledge that 12-0 in a certain conference versus a 10-2 potentially down there depending on what the schedule pool is like could be completely 10 and two might be a little bit better than the 12 and0.
Well, and think like think about the years where it was Clemson and everybody else in the ACC, right? That's basically what you're saying, right? And then we got to test those out in the playoff, right? In some years that Clemson team was better than the best in the SEC. Sometimes it wasn't, but you're right. It is calculated differently. It is going to look different and you're just not getting enough crossover games. I actually love Jed Fish went on SiriusXM. Yeah. And he made this pitch for this like crossover. The way that you start the season each year is like Big 10 versus SEC one weekend as the same time the ACC plays the Big 12 and it's a challenge and then you flip it the next week and
then you flip it and get all these crossover games and you can actually determine conference strength and you could actually get strength of schedule metrics. That would be enough games. Yeah, the metrics deal to me is such a copout. Like I it's it's funny because they have the ability to just stand on business and do the eye testing, right? Part of the reason we wanted a committee in the first place was for them to just be like, "Yeah, I we just we see what we see from this team and it's better than team whatever." But I feel like the metrics are always used to try to back door and like justify. Um and they don't even do a good job of
that. and I don't think the metrics are great in the first place. So, it's it's just a very frustrating process.
