The highly anticipated release of the first College Football Playoff rankings arrives tomorrow night, but it’s already stirring up controversy.
With the playoff field finally expanding to 12 teams this season – eight more than in previous years – one might expect less debate over who qualifies.
Yet at least one respected college football commentator is warning of potential bias.
Former quarterback-turned-analyst Danny Kanell expressed concerns that the CFP selection committee might “manipulate who gets in and who’s left out,” calling attention to what he sees as unfair “power rankings” favoring certain teams.
“In a season where we’ve seen more parity than ever before, we’ve seen teams fall well short of expectations that had ‘loaded rosters’ with high expectations. We’ve seen them fall apart,” Kanell said.
“We’ve seen Alabama lose to Vanderbilt. We saw a very average Florida team go toe-to-toe with Georgia. We’ve seen it across college football, and yet, we see power rankings show up that still give credit to those teams that came into the season with high expectations and doesn’t give teams that didn’t the recognition they deserve.”
Kanell has been a longtime critic of what he views as a pro-SEC bias in college football, and in his latest video, he specifically highlighted Indiana, a Big Ten team that’s made headlines with its surprising success this year.
Indiana, now ranked No. 8 in the AP poll, crushed Michigan State 47-10 last weekend and holds a 9-0 record.
Kanell is concerned that despite the Hoosiers’ dominance, they may be undervalued in the CFP rankings.
“Don’t let them disrespect a team like Indiana and try to keep them down in the rankings and say they haven’t played everybody,” Kanell said.
“They are 9-0, nine games into the season, have not lost and have won every game by two touchdowns or more. If they were the Buckeyes or they wore the Maize and Blue, Indiana would be ranked 1, 2, or 3,” he added.
Kanell also warned fans to “watch the narrative” as discussions unfold, suggesting that teams from conferences like the ACC or Big 12 might be unfairly downplayed in favor of teams from the SEC as well as traditional powerhouses.
Of course, this line of thinking is nothing new. However, it’s interesting to see how a “non-traditional” program from the Big Ten (Indiana) is being overlooked in the scheme of things.
Where do you stand on the whole issue?
Do you agree with Kanell that tomorrow’s playoff reveal will reflect a clear bias towards the SEC in particular???
Either way, we’ll soon find out. The first CFB Playoff rankings will be unveiled tomorrow at 7pm EST on what should otherwise be a pretty quiet day.