Participating in mock CFP selection, 2011 Oregon 'screwed' like 2014 TCU
CBS Sports senior columnist Dennis Dodd got the unique opportunity to participate in a mock College Football Playoff selection process. He learned, as they say, how the sausage was made.
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Dennis Dodd
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5 min read
GRAPEVINE, Texas -- It is not a conspiracy, this College Football Playoff selection process.
It is long, with not enough potty breaks, but that’s beside the point. We were here Thursday -- 13 media members -- for the total experience, serving as committee members in a mock selection process.
For ourselves. For the public. For the future.
“It is the biggest chance in the history of college football,” CFP executive director Bill Hancock said of the playoff, which is in its second season.
We got to see how the sausage is made or, if you prefer, how TCU was screwed last year.
Remember? There was outrage in some quarters that the Horned Frogs slipped from No. 3 (in the playoff) to No. 6 (well out of it) on pick ‘em day despite winning their final game by 52 points.
So going in, there was skepticism -- at least from this mock member of the mock committee. Coming out? We were enlightened.
“You guys see the process now,” (real) committee chair Jeff Long said at the conclusion of the six-hour process. “You know there aren’t any favors.”
There certainly weren’t any for Oregon. It was a really bad day in 2015 for the Ducks of 2011. That’s the season from the past we used to assemble our (a) playoff bracket, (b) New Year’s Six bowls and (c) top 25.
Process
At one point, Oregon -- like TCU -- was in the playoff (at No. 4). Then they were out (at No. 5) after careful contemplation and a revote. Wisconsin moved up from No. 6 to No. 4 and stayed there.
Had this been the real world, there may have been a riot in Eugene.
But that’s the charm/secret of the process. Layers were pulled back on Thursday. We considered a revote at the top because Paul Myerberg of USA Today successfully lobbied for Wisconsin’s superior season.
“Being Badgered,” someone called it.
Considerations
Wisconsin, 11-2 during that 2011 season, suffered two narrow losses on the road to Michigan State and Ohio State. Oregon, also 11-2, got blown out by LSU in the opener and lost at home to a USC squad sporting only 51 scholarship players.
The Ducks were hurt by not only losing to the Trojans in the 2011 regular season but not meeting them again in the Pac-12 title game. USC (10-2) was banned from postseason that year because of the Reggie Bush penalties.
Oregon then “padded” its record, beating a 6-6 UCLA for the league championship.
Results
Those differences are why the sport has trusted this process to 12 wise men (and a woman) to make these hard decisions.
They begin meeting for real next month, releasing rankings for the season’s final six weeks. They meet each time for about 20 total hours over two days. We met for part of one day and came up with this final top six from 2011:
1. LSU
2. Oklahoma State
3. Alabama
4. Wisconsin
5. Oregon
6. Boise State
Here’s how the BCS had it four years ago:
1. LSU
2. Alabama
3. Oklahoma State
4. Stanford
5. Oregon
6. Arkansas
Long described it as a “razor-close” margin that allowed Ohio State to jump TCU in 2014. On Thursday, we experienced the knife with Wisconsin and Oregon.
Explanations / Observations
On any vote involving his team, Badgers athletic director Barry Alvarez would have to leave the room. In our little stage play Thursday, Ron Higgins of the New Orleans Times-Picayune was representing Alvarez.
“Don’t I end up coaching this team?” Higgins said.
As a matter of fact, the real Alvarez did step into a coaching role for the 2012 Rose and 2014 Outback Bowls after losing his coaches.
In 2011, an LSU-Alabama rematch in the championship game basically blew up the BCS. The Crimson Tide didn’t even win their division. No. 3 Oklahoma State, the Big 12 champion, finished third out of the running by a hair -- .0086 of a point. Wisconsin was No. 8 in AP Top 25 that year and a distant 10th in the BCS.
But choosing the 2011 season opened our eyes to another sort of potential repeat down the road. Using Alabama as the example, it’s still possible that a team that fails to even win its division could wind up in the top four of the CFP.
We’ll deal with that when it comes.
What the (real) committee continues to reveal to us is a new way to view the game. Late in the 2014 season, Florida State -- the only undefeated team -- was only No. 4. Ohio State elbowed its way into the field by blowing out Wisconsin in the Big Ten title game.
On Thursday, it was a bit of back to the future. We had the advantage of knowing that the Russell Wilson of today made his biggest college impact with the Badgers in 2011. We elevated No. 6 Boise State over No. 8 TCU, that year’s Mountain West champions, basically because the Broncos beat the Frogs head-to-head.
Some margins were "razor-close," as Long described in 2014. Others? Not so much.
Conclusions
The revote thing is underrated. At any point, committee members are able to consider the teams on the board and vote at least a portion of them all over again. Real committee members have the luxury of sleeping on some of it over the two-day period.
Conference championships matter, until they don’t. The ACC (Clemson) and Pac-12 (Oregon) would have been the Power Five leagues left out in 2011. That would have been a big deal. The Big 12 turned on its ear when its co-champs were left out last year.
Don’t be surprised if everything changes again on pick ‘em day. For all the work put into this process, the weekly rankings seem to be more television programming then benchmarks. The committee reserves the right to scramble the rankings on the final day to get it right.
This CFP thing just might work. I just wish you could have been there to see the sausage.
Mock committee members: Dennis Dodd (CBS Sports), Bonnie Bernstein (Campus Insiders), Bruce Feldman (Fox Sports), Paul Myerberg (USA Today), Ron Higgins (New Orleans Times-Picayune), Chuck Carlton (Dallas Morning News), Carlos Gomez (Fort Worth Star-Telegram), Brian Hamilton (Sports Illustrated), Bill Bender (Sporting News), Mark Packer (Sirius XM), Berry Trammel (The Oklahoman), John Hoover (Tulsa World), Ralph Russo (Associated Press)
