CFB Playoff: Auto Bids or 12 Best Teams?

By Brett Daniels

At SEC Media Days earlier in the week, former Alabama coach Nick Saban made waves when he suggested that the College Football Playoff in the current and future iterations should not have any sort of automatic bids for conference champions. For 2024 and 2025, the format is set as a 5+7, 12-team model , which grants automatic qualifying spots to the five highest-ranked champions and seven at-large spots to the next highest-ranked teams.

Using the rankings of the College Football Playoff committee, here is how the last five seasons using the current criteria and teams ranked 1-12 regardless of conference affiliation or championship.

2023 (current format)

· 1 ^st round byes: #1 Michigan (Big Ten Champion), #2 Washington (Pac-12 Champion), #3 Texas (Big 12 Champion), #4 Alabama (SEC Champion)

· #5 Florida State vs #12 Liberty (ranked #23)

· #6 Georgia vs #11 Ole Miss (rematch of regular-season game UGA won 52-17)

· #7 Ohio State vs # 10 Penn State (rematch of regular-season game OSU won 20-12)

· #8 Oregon vs #9 Missouri (this could be a good game)

Florida State would get a favorable matchup with Liberty in the first round where the Seminoles would prevail even without Jordan Travis. Georgia beat Ole Miss a few weeks earlier as did Ohio State with Penn State. Oregon vs. Missouri would have been a good game, but for the purpose of this exercise Oregon moves on.

Second Round: Michigan vs. Oregon, Washington vs. Ohio State, Texas vs. Georgia and Alabama vs. Florida State. Michigan gets by Oregon; Washington and Ohio State would be a low-scoring affair with the Huskies coming out on top; Georgia gets by Texas and Alabama is too much for Florida State.

Semifinals: Michigan vs Alabama; Washington vs Georgia. Michigan beat Alabama in the Rose Bowl and Georgia would stifle the Huskies and put up a lot of points on that 99 ^th ranked defense. Michigan vs Georgia for the National Championship.

2023 (best 12 teams)

· 1 ^st round bye-Same as above

· #5 Florida State vs #12 Oklahoma (better game than FSU v Liberty)

· Remaining games would be the same

2022 (current format)

· 1 ^st round byes: #1 Georgia (SEC Champion), #2 Michigan (Big Ten Champion), #3 Clemson (ACC Champion), #4 Utah (Pac-12 Champion)

· #5 TCU vs #12 Tulane

· #6 Ohio State vs #11 Penn State

· #7 Alabama vs #10 USC

· #8 Tennessee vs #9 Kansas State (Big 12 Champion)

Under this format, Clemson (#6) and Utah (#11) would receive unearned 1 ^st round byes and Tulane would knock Washington out of the field. Tulane was ranked #16, so it wouldn't be that egregious to have them replace Washington. Using actual results and educated guesses, the second round would see #1 UGA v #5 TCU, #2 Michigan v #6 Ohio State, #3 Clemson v #7 Alabama, #4 Utah v #8 Tennessee. UGA thrashed TCU in real life, so they go on to the semifinals to face #8 Tennessee. Michigan would get the better of Ohio State again and meet up with Alabama. This sets up a UGA vs Michigan final, which would have been a much better game than the actual UGA vs TCU game.

2022 (best 12 teams)

· 1 ^st round byes: #1 Georgia, #2 Michigan, #3 TCU, #4 Ohio State

· #5 Alabama vs #12 Washington

· #6 Tennessee vs #11 Penn State

· #7 Clemson vs #10 USC

· #8 Utah vs #9 Kansas State

In this scenario, we see Alabama, Tennessee, Clemson and Utah advancing to the next round. UGA vs Utah - UGA advances; Michigan vs Clemson - Michigan advances; TCU vs Tennessee - Tennessee advances; Ohio State vs Alabama - this would be the best out of the four games and honestly a coin flip. The Ohio State that played UGA in the Peach Bowl probably beats Alabama. The Ohio State that played Michigan loses by 10-14 points. Semifinals: UGA vs Ohio State; Michigan vs Tennessee. UGA vs Michigan final.

2021 (current format)

· 1 ^st round byes: #1 Alabama (SEC Champion), #2 Michigan (Big Ten Champion), #3 Cincinnati (Group of 5), #4 Baylor (Big 12 Champion)

· #5 Georgia vs #12 Pittsburgh

· #6 Notre Dame vs #11 Utah

· #7 Ohio State vs #10 Michigan State

· #8 Ole Miss vs #9 Oklahoma State

Baylor moves up to #4 as a conference champion and pushes Georgia from #3 to #5. Going chalk, the second round would be Alabama vs Ole Miss; Michigan vs Ohio State; Cincinnati vs Notre Dame; Baylor vs Georgia. Three out the four second-round matchups would be rematches from the regular season. Using those results, the semifinals would be: Alabama vs Georgia; Michigan vs Cincinnati. Georgia won the rematch in 2021 and Michigan would probably have enough offense to beat Desmond Ridder and Cincinnati. UGA vs Michigan Championship Game

2021 (best 12 teams)

· 1 ^st round byes: #1 Alabama, #2 Michigan, #3 Georgia, #4 Cincinnati

· #5 Notre Dame vs #12 Pittsburgh

· #6 Ohio State vs #11 Utah

· #7 Baylor vs #10 Michigan State

· #8 Ole Miss vs #9 Oklahoma State

Second-round games: Alabama vs Ole Miss; Michigan vs Baylor; Georgia vs Ohio State; Cincinnati vs Notre Dame. Alabama vs Cincinnati, Georgia vs Michigan were the actual semifinals that year, so we will use historical results. Alabama vs Georgia for the National Championship.

2020 was the COVID year and not everyone participated at the same level. For arguments sake, we will skip to the 2019 season.

2019 (current format)

· 1 ^st round byes: #1 LSU (SEC Champion), #2 Ohio State (Big Ten Champion), #3 Clemson (ACC Champion), #4 Oklahoma (Big 12 Champion)

· #5 Georgia vs #12 Memphis (G5 Highest Ranked)

· #6 Oregon vs #11 Utah

· #7 Baylor vs #10 Penn State

· #8 Wisconsin vs #9 Florida

Memphis (12-1) would be the Group of 5 representative and would replace Auburn (9-3) at #12. The second round would be LSU vs Wisconsin; Ohio State vs Baylor; Clemson vs Oregon; Oklahoma vs Georgia. This is probably the best set of second-round matchups with three out of the four games being competitive. LSU vs Oklahoma and Ohio State vs Clemson semifinals are the same as they were in 2019. LSU vs Clemson for the National Championship.

2019 (best 12 teams)

The only change would be Auburn replacing Memphis as the #12 seed and getting a rematch against Georgia in the first round. Georgia won the regular season game 21-14.

2018 (current format)

· 1 ^st round byes: #1 Alabama (SEC Champion), #2 Clemson (ACC Champion), #3 Oklahoma (Big 12 Champion), #4 Ohio State (Big Ten Champion)

· #5 Notre Dame vs #12 Penn State

· #6 Georgia vs #11 LSU

· #7 Michigan vs #10 Florida

· #8 UCF vs #9 Washington

Notre Dame was ranked #3 in the selection rankings, but per the current format is only eligible for the #5 seed. Oklahoma moves to #3 from #4 and Ohio State jumps up from #6 to get a first-round bye. Georgia drops from #5 to #6 and has a first-round rematch with LSU, which handed them one of their two losses on the season. Second round: Alabama vs UCF; Clemson vs Michigan; Oklahoma vs LSU; Ohio State vs Notre Dame. Semifinals: Alabama vs Notre Dame and Clemson vs Oklahoma. Alabama vs Clemson for the National Championship.

2018 (best 12 teams)

· 1 ^st round byes: #1 Alabama, #2 Clemson, #3 Notre Dame, #4 Oklahoma

· #5 Georgia vs #12 Penn State

· #6 Ohio State vs #11 LSU

· #7 Michigan vs #10 Florida

· #8 UCF vs #9 Washington

Notre Dame would get a first-round bye in this scenario along with Georgia not having to match up with LSU in the first round. UCF makes the field as a Group of 5 team by virtue of being ranked #8. Second round: Alabama vs UCF; Clemson vs Michigan; Notre Dame vs Ohio State; Oklahoma vs Georgia. Three out these four games would be very competitive, Clemson would beat Michigan, Notre Dame would edge out Ohio State, and Georgia would beat Oklahoma in another barn burner. Alabama vs Georgia and Clemson vs Notre Dame in the semifinals are games that were played in the regular season or conference championships. Alabama vs Clemson for the National Championship.

In most seasons the current format and best 12 teams format produce the same National Championship game. The best teams will always rise to the top. One thing that I did notice was that the 12-team format - regardless of how it is seeded -  produces a lot of rematches in the first and second rounds (which I am not a fan of in any way). There are scenarios where one team would have to play another team three times with the last game being the only one that truly “counts”. It will be extremely frustrating for a team like Oregon to go to Michigan and beat the Wolverines there, beat them again in the Big Ten Championship game, only to have to face them a third time in the second round of the Playoff and lose. There were also a few seasons where teams ranked in the 6-11 range would receive first-round byes due to being a conference champion. This completely skews the bracket on whatever side those teams are on, as the teams with a bye are supposed to be the best teams. In the 2022 season, #8 Tennessee would play a Utah team in the second round that was ranked lower (#11) than the Vols in the final poll. I also expected the Group of 5 team making the playoff to be more of a point of contention than it was. The 2023 Liberty team was the only instance where it was a reach to put them at #12 (Liberty was ranked #23 in the final 2023 rankings).