Scoggins: First playoff bracket brings controversy, as expected

This outcome was inevitable and so completely predictable. The anxiety, the anger, the politicking. Every bit of it.

It's simple math. Four teams received invitations to the inaugural College Football Playoff. College football has five power conferences.

Five leagues for four spots equals hurt feelings. Are we surprised that somebody feels slighted?

Remember the old system, that dastardly BCS? Only the methodology for determining a champion got detonated. Controversy remains woven in the process because of its exclusive nature.

They need to take the four-team format and multiply it by two. That next step feels inevitable, too.

"Any event that's worth its salt brings contention with it," said Bill Hancock, executive director of the College Football Playoff. "That's because it's an event that people want to participate in. And so those that just barely don't make it are very disappointed."

Hancock made that statement over the summer. He envisioned this perfect storm swirling many months ago.

Ohio State, Baylor and TCU went to bed Saturday night with visions of being awarded that final spot in the playoff. Alabama, Oregon and Florida State were locks. They didn't need to fret about anything. They knew they were safe.

But not those last three. They had to sweat it out and tout their résumés and hope that the selection committee found their one loss more forgiving than the other two teams' one loss.

Heck, Baylor even hired a PR firm recently to state its case about why it deserved a spot in the playoff. Maybe the school should ask for a refund.

All three teams were worthy of the playoff and could sell their case with conviction, but three teams for one spot means two of them would be left spitting mad.

Ultimately, the committee chose Ohio State, which won the Big Ten Championship and did so by dismantling Wisconsin 59-0 in what counted as a luminous last impression. A final push, if you will.

Conspiracy theorists will suggest that the committee picked Ohio State because of its national appeal and brand. An Alabama-Ohio State semifinal certainly won't lack in viewership numbers and breathless hype.

But that conveniently ignores an obvious strike against the other two teams: Baylor and TCU were hurt by the Big 12's lack of a conference championship game. The fact that Ohio State won a championship game and won it so convincingly clearly swayed committee members in their final vote.

Unlike the BCS, which relied on computer algorithms, the selection committee made a judgment call based on evaluating those three teams' full body of work. The Buckeyes pulled ahead in their 13th game.

We could argue the merits of all three teams until next fall, but a disputed conclusion was unavoidable in a four-team format, which is why the playoff can't expand fast enough.

Four is the perfect number to make people scream and hyperventilate. Eight is the perfect number for a real playoff.

Four is a good start. Eight is enough.

Hancock said this summer that decision makers vowed to keep the playoff at four teams for the life of its 12-year contract. That might be their intention, but the outcry for expansion will become too loud to ignore.

College presidents capped the playoff at four teams because they feared anything larger in scope would diminish the significance of the regular season. That's a reasonable argument because the passion and intensity of college football's regular season makes for compelling theater that few sports can match. The jockeying by teams the past month created a mini-playoff atmosphere.

Would an eight-team playoff strip some of that high-stakes drama from the regular season? Maybe just a little, because fewer teams (and fan bases) would be on pins and needles coming down the stretch.

But eight teams wouldn't dilute the product so much that the regular season is rendered insignificant. Good teams would still get left out. That drama wouldn't disappear. And imagine a playoff that also included Baylor, TCU, Mississippi State and Michigan State.

Teams ranked 9 through 11 would still complain, of course. That's just the nature of sports.

More than eight teams, no thanks. That would go too far.

A four-team playoff still trumps the BCS because more teams have a chance to win the championship, and give me a selection committee over a computer any day. Those two semifinals look like doozies on paper.

Baylor and TCU probably disagree, but frustration was inevitable. Four spots always guaranteed that somebody would get left out in the cold.

Chip Scoggins • 612-673-4484