The College Football Playoff committee blatantly exposes its bias and proves Lane Kiffin correct
On Sunday afternoon, a couple of days before the penultimate College Football Playoff rankings reveal show, Ole Miss Rebels head coach Lane Kiffin sent a tweet with a list of reasons why his team should be included in the 12-team playoff. Kiffin's tweet focused on the resumés of Ole Miss, Alabama, and South Carolina. The […]
On Sunday afternoon, a couple of days before the penultimate College Football Playoff rankings reveal show, Ole Miss Rebels head coach Lane Kiffin sent a tweet with a list of reasons why his team should be included in the 12-team playoff.
Kiffin's tweet focused on the resumés of Ole Miss, Alabama, and South Carolina.
The tweet laid out a solid argument for why Ole Miss deserves a playoff spot over Alabama and South Carolina. Even if you don't agree that Ole Miss should get the nod, the argument at least shows that the three three-loss teams have resumés that are very close. Each fan base can present a reasonable case.
"Clearly Ole Miss should be in the playoff over Alabama, but Bama is the bigger brand and more than likely will get in over Ole Miss," read the end of Kiffin's note.
On Tuesday night, Kiffin's argument was proven correct.
And not only was Kiffin's argument validated, the College Football Playoff committee made a decision that left absolutely no doubt that Alabama is benefiting from brand bias.
Alabama is No. 11 in the latest playoff rankings, which means they'd be the last team in the tournament if postseason play started today.
Ole Miss, meanwhile, is at No. 13 in the rankings, one spot behind Miami.
Alabama jumped Miami on Tuesday night due to the Hurricanes' road loss last weekend to No. 22 Syracuse.
(There's an argument to be had that Miami should be above both teams because the Hurricanes' two losses — on the road to Georgia Tech and Syracuse — aren't as bad as the worst losses by Alabama and Ole Miss.)
Ole Miss, despite having a resumé that many folks think is better than Alabama's, didn't jump Miami along with the Crimson Tide.
And that's where it's clear that the playoff committee is blatantly biased toward Alabama.
If the resumés of Alabama and Ole Miss are that close, then how does Alabama jump Miami but Ole Miss doesn't?
The committee really didn't think that one through.
I can see both sides of the argument for Alabama and Ole Miss. I don't think there's a clear and obvious answer either way (and that's one of the many problems with these rankings — sometimes there isn't a clear answer and the committee has to make a choice….the big brand is probably going to win in most of those scenarios).
But what’s clear is that the gap between Ole Miss and Alabama isn’t wide enough to justify squeezing another team in between them, as the committee did on Tuesday night.
Alabama is the only program in the nation that's leapfrogging Miami on its own the way it did on Tuesday night. They can thank the logo that Nick Saban gave power to for the way these rankings are playing out — it certainly isn't because Alabama went out and earned it. If that was the case, Bama wouldn't have been blown out by a mediocre Oklahoma team with just a week to go in the regular season.
