Rich Finds a Silver Lining in the College Football Playoff Officially Expanding to 24 Teams

The College Football Playoff is going to 24 teams. Rich isn't throwing a parade, but he did find a silver lining, and it has less to do with the bracket than with who might finally be in charge.

The deal is official. ESPN and the College Football Playoff have signed a $1.7 billion agreement to expand the field to 24 teams in 2027. The playoffs will begin the second weekend in December, and Power Four conference championship games will be eliminated. The reaction on set: "Huzzah. Huzzah on that front."

But the good thing Rich really wants to come out of this is structural. A 24-team playoff creates a power structure of schools that share the same questions about scheduling, NIL deals and finances. If that leads to everybody playing by the same rules, Rich has a list.

Start with coaches. "You can't just have some energy or chicken mogul buying you out. You can't just walk. There's no such thing as a buyout. Your contract is your contract," Rich said. "In the same way that you want to have stricter rules about player movement, we need to restrict the movement of coaches, too."

He made the point with NFL comparisons that sound absurd on purpose. You can't go to Sean McVay and say, "Hey, what's your buyout?" so he can coach the Jets because Woody bought him out. You can't pay the Steelers an extra million dollars to fill a Week 2 hole in your schedule. You can't have a drafted player threaten to leave for a rival over playing time, only for the rival to pull the deal once a better player turns up in free agency. "It sounds absurd, but this the stuff that's happening, right?"

"There's a lot of garbage and crap that's going on right now that everybody's hoping Capitol Hill will fix," Rich said. "Guess who's not coming to the rescue?"

So who should step in? Rich would welcome the people writing the checks, whether that's the show's partners or his bosses, getting together to do it better than what's happening now. As for who runs it, Sankey doesn't want to do it, and neither does Petitti, but "someone's gonna do it. Let's get it done." It will take a while.

There is another bonus, too. From what Rich read during a commercial break, with a lot more games coming, some might wind up on NFL Network.

The crew also looked at what 24 teams would have changed about the past weekend. BYU and Utah was intense. The Notre Dame and Miami game felt like a must-win for the Irish, based on the College Football Playoff Committee's November 1 rankings. With 24 teams, they wouldn't have needed it.

That game ended in a disputed touchdown call, right in front of Michael Irvin, who was yelling at the refs. The receiver landed with both feet in and the ball in his hands, then took another step out of bounds as the ball moved slightly and was knocked out. Was that a catch? The difference between college and pro catch rules only muddied it. It was also noted on set that Mario Cristobal said after the game he wasn't given an explanation, which everyone agreed was absurd. "It's very simple to do that," one voice said. "Communication."

Scheduling guidelines are expected as part of the new deal, and Rich said there has to be a reconfiguration, since Notre Dame "gets dinged" for not scheduling anybody.

Rich knows how strange it sounds to talk about narrowing the field the moment it doubled. But if this is a pie being split among member schools, those schools should figure it out together with the people handing out the money. "I'd rather have like TV people who love the sport," Rich said. "I'd rather have that happen than whatever the hell's happening right now, which is some group in Indianapolis that doesn't appear to have much of a clue."

He admitted a personal grievance, too. His school is so bad right now "we wouldn't even make it." Josh Pate is on the next day's show to talk more about it.

The real test, the crew agreed, is competition. Three-loss teams are in, and maybe a four-loss team makes it. If those mid-December playoff games are non-competitive, "then it'll be a problem." As one voice on set put it, "It feels like they barely gave 12 a chance before being like, 'Oh, let's just double it.'"