College Football Playoff expansion isn’t about double the teams, it’s about double the money.
We’re going about this the wrong way, staring at the glam instead of the guts.
College football doesn’t have a playoff problem. College football has a player movement problem.
Yet the solution from all involved is as daring as it is dumb: Throw more money at it.
The Big Ten wants a 24-team College Football Playoff format, and the SEC, Big 12 and ACC want 16. The CFP officially stayed at 12 teams for 2026 Friday because the SEC and Big Ten, at this point, can’t agree the sun sets in the West.
The idea of CFP change didn’t quickly evolve because university presidents decided they like the new postseason, and want more teams to experience the sheer magnitude of it all. It’s because their athletic departments are desperate for money in the new player empowerment era.
These movers and shakers of higher education took nearly 150 years to agree on a four-team playoff, and 12 years later, are already debating moving to 24. Not because it works, but because of necessity.
A 12-team playoff earns an estimated $1.5 billion annually in media rights from ESPN. Double the teams, and you’ll more than likely double the price.
Player salaries have not only taken $23 million annually in media rights money from a university’s bottom line, they’re on the verge of taking much more. Apparently, only the Big Ten sees this.
There’s no other reason the Big Ten, which had to be dragged kicking and screaming into the original four-team CFP, is digging in on 24 teams. Who would take a playoff that already has obvious growth flaws just two years into moving to 12 teams, and want to double the entries?
Buy IU championship books, prints
The same person who tried to sell 10% of the Big Ten’s media rights to capital investors for $2.4 billion. You may not like Big Ten commissioner Tony Petitti’s business chops, but at least he’s stepping into the box and taking swings.
At least he sees the employee train barreling down the track, and knows it’s time to do something. Because once players become employees — once the only salve to free player movement is enacted and players begin working off multi-year, unbreakable contracts — universities will be sharing much more than $23 million annually.
Call it what you want. You say 1099 individual contractors, I say collective bargaining. No matter how you swing it, you’re still negotiating with players for a significantly larger piece of the media rights pie in exchange for multi-year deals.
The Big Ten presidents understand this, and have given Petitti leeway to find new revenue streams. So he’s taking Ruthian swings.
Do you really think Petitti believes the sixth or seventh (or more) Big Ten or SEC team in a 24-team playoff is good for the health of the game? Of course not.
It is, however, good for the financial bottom line of every university in the Big Ten. He’s gambling — to a larger extent than the SEC, Big 12 and ACC — that college football is bulletproof.
No matter how you change, reformat or tweak it, fans can’t get enough. More to the point: Media companies (legacy and streaming) can’t pay enough.
Indiana and Miami just played a national championship game that drew an average of 30.1 million viewers. At one point in the game, the high-water mark was 33 million.
College football is second only to the NFL in live television viewership numbers, and is wildly undervalued. The NBA in 2024 signed an 11-year deal worth $76 billion from ESPN/ABC, NBC and Amazon Prime, and its television numbers pale in comparison to college football.
The Big Ten presidents and Petitti see the fatted calf, and want it. That doesn’t mean the SEC, Big 12 and ACC don’t also, it just means they haven’t reached that point of desperation.
Because if the Big 12 and ACC were to agree with the Big Ten and want a move to 24 teams in the playoff, the SEC would go along. The presidents of the SEC and commissioner Greg Sankey can threaten to have their own playoff, but they won’t be the single reason college football isn’t whole.
Now, the rub: The CFP actually feels right at 12 teams. But get rid of the freebies for the Group of Six, and give them the same access as Notre Dame. If you’re ranked in the top 12, you’re in.
Moving to 16 teams eliminates the reward of a first-round bye, further diminishing the regular season. Moving to 24 teams likely means a clunky first round of eight byes, presumably the top eight teams.
It also includes four automatic bids for each of the Power conferences. In 2025, that would’ve moved USC, Virginia, SMU, Pittsburgh, BYU, Utah and Houston to the CFP.
Woof.
Hey, somebody has to take big swings to fix the looming player movement problem.
Even if it’s as daring as it is dumb.