The one thing that made college football so unique was that winning a national title required consistent excellence throughout the entire season. Champions usually went undefeated or had only one loss. The ideas was to reward the team who had the overall best season. It made every game meaningful. It made every loss crushing.

If the playoff expands and includes conference champs, then you might have an 9-4 team in the playoff. There's an upside and a downside to that.

The upside is that it makes the regular season more interesting for more teams for a longer period of time. Until a team is mathematically eliminated from winning their conference, they have a shot at a NC!

The downside is that it makes a magical regular season far less meaningful. There is no need to be perfect. Those games decided by a great play or a fortuitous bounce are no longer part of the magic of a championship run. Bama would likely get in every year, even with two losses.

So we either need to move it forward or return to what made it unique and special (that'll never happen and this post is not about what is practical or realistic -- but rather just a perspective on what made college football different).