MAILBAG: Interesting College Football Playoff seeding hypothetical, is Sam Pittman off the hot seat, more

The Week 6 mailbag offered up a very interesting College Football Playoff seeding hypothetical, a look at an epic slate of Oct. 12 games and a Sam Pittman-Billy Napier hot seat question.

As always, you can hit me up on X with a DM or tweet @JesseReSimonton or you can email me at jesse.simonton@on3.com for all future questions.

William asks: What are the odds that a Group of 5 team leapfrogs the Big 12 champion for the fourth-seed?

You’re onto something, William!

Lost in the shuffle of all the early-season cannibalizing in the SEC, is that the Big 12 hasn’t quite been the conference of carnage just yet … but it’s coming.

That league is about to go through the wood-chipper over the next two months, and although there are currently five teams with zero Big 12 losses, it won’t be any surprise if the ultimate winner of the league — be it Iowa State , BYU , Kansas State or some out-of-nowhere contender — has a 10-3 record when the College Football Playoff field is released.

What could that mean?

A much different-looking bracket than many anticipated.

Since the College Football Playoff expansion was first revealed, everyone (myself included) just penciled in the highest-ranked Group of 5 team for the No. 12 seed.

In most seasons, that probably will be the case, but maybe not in 2024.

Folks spent months debating how the No. 5 seed could be sneaky advantageous because they’d get to play the G5 champ and then the Big 12 Champion. Well, the path to the quarterfinals might not be such a layup if it’s suddenly Clemson or Tennessee as the No. 12 seed.

Right now, Iowa State (No. 11) and BYU (No. 14) are ranked ahead of Boise State (No. 17). Kansas State is lurking in the 20s.

The Broncos have around a 40% chance to make the playoff as the highest-ranked Group of 5 team, per most models, and they have a 25% chance to win out, per ESPN FPI. A 12-1 Boise State team (with star running back Ashton Jeanty chasing history to boot) with a 3-point loss at Oregon is likely going to finish somewhere in the 8-12 range in the final rankings.

For historical purposes: UCF (12-0) was 12th in 2017 and then 8th in 2018. Cincy was 8th in 2020, and then obviously jumped into the Top 4 in 2021. Last season, a Liberty team that played no one never climbed higher than 23rd.

But if Boise State is in that range come the end of the season, that would mean the Broncos are likely to be ranked higher than whoever the Big 12 champion is with 2-3 losses — meaning they’d be the No. 4 seed with a bye in Round 1.

The Big 12 is about to start beating up on each other (like as soon as this weekend, see below with the next question), so this is definitely a storyline worth watching.

Ryan asks: Oct. 12 has been considered the best weekend of the season since schedules were released. Now that we’ve seen all these teams play is that still the case or has Week 7 lost some luster after last weekend’s epic slate of games?

Oct. 12 has been marked on CFB aficionados’ calendars all offseason, and a rollicking Week 6 (for CFB fans at least, just not for lots of Top 10 teams) doesn’t do anything to diminish this weekend’s games.

What happened last weekend ( five Top 11 teams losing to unranked teams ) was kind of like a solar eclipse. It happens more than you think, but it’s still just rare enough to be wild to witness.

So while Week 7 may not spawn the sheer number of upsets, it could still produce lots of incredible games — many with College Football Playoff stakes. But even games like Vandy at Kentucky or South Carolina at Alabama are now particularly interesting.

This wasn’t part of Ryan’s question, but to illustrate just how good the set of games are this weekend, here are my Top 10 games of Week 7.

10. Cal at No. 22 Pitt

9. Vanderbilt at Kentucky

8. No. 16 Utah at Arizona State

7. No. 11 Iowa State at West Virginia

6. Florida at No. 10 Tennessee

5. No. 4 Penn State at USC

4. No. 18 Kansas State at Colorado

3. No. 1 Texas vs. No. 18 Oklahoma (Red River Rivalry in Dallas)

2. No. 9 O le Miss at No. 13 LSU

1. No. 2 Ohio State at No. 3 Oregon

From Jake: Is Sam Pittman off the hot seat after beating Tennessee? Could the same be said for Billy Napier if he pulls off the upset against the Volunteers this weekend?

Sam Pittman is among the most beloved characters in all of college football, and he hasn’t shied away from the fact that his job is on the line this season.

At SEC Media Days, he joked that he was “popular now, just in the wrong way. I’m HOT!”

Well, Pittman’s seat certainly had gotten any cooler after the Hogs started the year 3-2 with another pair of frustrating, one-score losses (Oklahoma State and Texas A&M) where they led in the fourth quarter.

Before the Tennessee game, Pittman had become the Scott Frost of the SEC, going an astounding 2-11 in one-score games since 2022.

But then Arkansas upset the Vols 19-14, scoring a late touchdown with a backup quarterback and then getting a stop on the ensuing possession to give Pittman his most signature win to date.

Come Saturday night, the message boards and call-in shows weren’t calling for a new head coach, but Calling the Hogs and rallying around Mr. Yessssirrrr.

“Hey, they’re going to fire their coach. They’re going to do this. When the hell are we getting this guy out of here?” Pittman said Saturday.

“I think maybe it’ll unite the state a little bit in saying, Hey, this is our guys. Let’s go. Let’s go back them like they did tonight.”

For now, Pittman has re-endeared himself with a fan base that loved him on Day 1. Will the goodwill have staying power? TBD.

The Hogs should be 6-0 if not ranking in the 100s in turnovers. If they can avoid coughing up the football, they could win 7-8 games, which probably is enough for Pittman to remain the coach in 2025.

But even though four of their final six games are at home, they still have LSU, Ole Miss, Texas and Mizzou on the schedule, so the hot seat talk won’t totally die down until we see how the reset of the season plays out.

As for Billy Napier , Florida did upset Tennessee last season, and a win in Neyland Stadium would be a huge for a head coach who lost twice at home already this fall. But barring a turnaround so unforeseen, the hour-glass on Napier’s tenure continues to drip sand.

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