





Many contributors to Hefty Headlines were invited to participate in our poll before the bowls. Every member of the crew participated.
Our groups seems to agree with the CFP committee with our top four teams. We have them in the same order too. The Oregon Ducks jumped up to #5 after an impressive win over Utah. Wisconsin and Auburn were able to return to our top 10.
Our top three remains untouched, however, Oklahoma now slides in tied with Georgia at #4. Michigan and Minnesota fall out of the top ten this week, they are replaced by the Oregon Ducks and Baylor Bears.
Voting Trends
As it stands – Tommy Nuggets is in the lead. Things can change vastly during bowl season, the majority of our pollsters voted to continue to pick for every bowl game. Those picks will come later this week.
Can Tommy Nuggets be caught by Stormin’ Mormon or Chamby during bowl season?
– Buzz
The College Football Playoff Committee had a pretty easy job when they announced the top four teams. It was obvious to everyone that LSU, Clemson, Ohio State and Oklahoma would be involved in some way. The only argument was – who gets the #1 seed. I believe they got the order right. Some – Tommy Nuggets – may cry about this for a while. However, LSU was the clear #1 team in the nation.
Obviously, everyone would love a much larger playoff picture. I decided to take a look at what games we could have if the playoff field were to expand.
To keep things consistent, I used the latest CFP rankings to determine seeding:
A six team playoff looks pretty nice. The top two seeds are rewarded with a bye in the opening round. Every Power 5 conference champion gets in, plus one at large team – Georgia. The one thing I do not like about this is that we could see another LSU-Georgia game.
If Georgia and Oregon were to swap places – this would be the ultimate playoff bracket for me. We would avoid another SEC rematch possibility until the championship game.
As it stands with the current format, teams can play an additional two games. This bracket sets up the possibility of a team playing three postseason games.
I like the opening round games we get in this bracket. Wisconsin comes in as a solid #8 seed, we would see if LSU is the real deal or if the Big 10 is legit. Clemson would get their first true test of the season against #6 Oregon. Ohio State would likely steamroll #7 Baylor to show how weak the Big 12 was this year.
This is where things start to look messy. You have the possibility of teams playing an additional four postseason games with this bracket. We are also looking at a number of possible rematches – with Oregon and Utah immediately playing back-to-back games in the opening round. Georgia would play Auburn for a second time this season. Penn State would set up to play Ohio State again with a win – Florida would have a rematch against LSU with a win.
I would LOVE to watch a playoff like this, but many of the games are looking redundant.
For this to work they would need to have the ability to flex the seeding to avoid conference rematches in the opening round. If we swapped Auburn and Utah – we could get a rematch between Oregon and Auburn, along with an interesting Georgia and Utah game.
We get all of the same opening round games that we would get from the twelve team playoff. Rather than awarding a first round bye to the top four seeds, they would play against the 13th-16th ranked teams in the opening round.
This would buy us an interesting game with #13 Alabama against #4 Oklahoma – a game the Crimson Tide would likely win. #15 Notre Dame at #2 Ohio State would give us a classing matchup in the opening round.
The nice thing about this is, if you focus in on Oklahoma – they would have to prove they are for real against SEC competition before making it to the semifinal.
This is ridiculous. The two teams in the national championship would play five postseason games.
As it stands this season – I think the best playoff format would be a six team playoff. You include all of the Power 5 conference champions and one at large team. You also have an opportunity to reward the two best teams with a first round bye.
As we expand the playoff the games get a little redundant – the regular season would lose too much meaning if you make this thing too big.
What do you think the playoff should look like? Are you happy with the four team format, or would you prefer to expand this thing?
– Buzz
The current rankings lead me to believe that we will have a couple CFP firsts:
That’s all for now. Let’s see how things play out this weekend before we get too far ahead of ourselves.
Some of us need to get back to our day job.
– Buzz
Many contributors to Hefty Headlines were invited to participate in our Week 14 poll. Five members of the crew participated, Stormin’ Mormon half-assed it and only submitted his picks.
Our top three remains untouched, however, Oklahoma now slides in tied with Georgia at #4. Michigan and Minnesota fall out of the top ten this week, they are replaced by the Oregon Ducks and Baylor Bears.
The race for the best winning percentage is heating up – it is down to three real contenders. Tommy Nuggets is in the lead, but Stormin’ Mormon and Chamby are right on his tail. Bix and Klyde Frog are in the back of the pack, and I have all but eliminated myself.
Root for chaos. Let’s see what happens if we get wins from Oregon, Georgia, Wisconsin, Virginia, and Baylor!
– Buzz
Many contributors to Hefty Headlines were invited to participate in our Week 13 poll. Five members of the crew participated:
Our top four remains untouched. The Oregon Ducks and Penn State fall out of our top ten – they are replaced by Florida and Michigan.
Rivalry week. Let’s hope for some big upsets to shake up this playoff picture.
– Buzz
Down go the Golden Gophers! Down go the Baylor Bears! We lost two more undefeated teams this week.
Many contributors to Hefty Headlines were invited to participate in our Week 12 poll. Five members of the crew participated:
Our top three remains untouched – it is hard to imagine a playoff scenario without LSU, Ohio State and Clemson. The Georgia Bulldogs jump up to #4, leapfrogging Oregon and Alabama.
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This is honestly bullshit. I went all out last week and picked against the grain – only to go 0-5.
We have one great game this weekend, Penn State @ Ohio State. The rest of the weekend looks pretty “meh”. Hopefully the Nittany Lions can shake things up in the Big 10 and take down The Buckeyes.
– Buzz
Down go the Nittany Lions! Down go the Crimson Tide! We lost two more undefeated teams this week.
Many contributors to Hefty Headlines were invited to participate in our Week 11 poll. EVERYONE participated:
Alabama falls out of our top four this week after losing to the clear #1 team in the country LSU. The Oregon Ducks somehow snake their way into a playoff spot this week. Finally, the Golden Gophers get some respect after defeating former #4 Penn State.
This weekend we have an elimination game in the Big 12 – the loser likely out of playoff contention. The Baylor Bears could prove to be a real contender with a win over Oklahoma.
Minnesota gets a chance to prove they are for-real for-real with a game on the road at Iowa.
– Buzz
We lost another undefeated team for the fourth week in a row – the SMU Mustangs fell to the Memphis Tigers on Saturday night.
Many contributors to Hefty Headlines were invited to participate in our Week 9 poll. EVERYONE (except for Chamby) participated:
Our top three teams remained unchanged this week. Georgia and Oregon each found themselves tied for #4 after their big wins this weekend. There is some clear voting bias in our poll – Clemson and Penn State only showed up in 4/5 top tens – greatly impacting their rankings.
Penn State @ Minnesota and LSU @ Alabama. Do I need to say more than that to get you excited for this weekend?
– Buzz
The Oklahoma Sooner football team fell this week to unranked Kansas State. In three consecutive weeks we have had an undefeated team lose to an unranked team.
Many contributors to Hefty Headlines were invited to participate in our Week 9 poll. EVERYONE participated:
The LSU Tigers remain our number 1 team in the nation. Ohio State jumped Alabama. Penn State and Florida round out our top five. Our biggest drop went to #10 Oklahoma, who fell six spots after their loss to unranked Kansas State.
Due to consistent bitching from our pollsters – we now will produce a weekly top ten, rather than a weekly top 25.
This weekend is decent – but I am looking forward to the following weekend. On November 9th we have Penn State @ Minnesota and LSU @ Alabama.
– Buzz