Andy

Frankly, until last week, I'm not sure how much of a downgrade Derek Anderson would've been. Cam was having a horrible season. Panthers play Tampa this week, maybe they can get by without him. They did once.

Totally an agree to disagree type thing. I don't mind your arguments, I just feel different. Also CFB would still be a sport where one game can change the season, its just different teams that one game can change everything for. Well, not really. With 8 everyone has a mulligan. With 4 you probably have a mulligan, but you'd better play a really good team out of conference (Oregon), dramatically improve following the loss (Oregon and Ohio St) or play in a great conference where you can rack up quality wins (Alabama).

I said winning the conference guarantees nothing, not that it means nothing. The rest is pretty much an 'agree to disagree' type situation. I like having one sport where one week/game/whatever can change the whole season, which the rest of the sports simply don't have (same with getting the best team, and I still haven't figured out why 'everyone else is doing it' is being used as a reason to expand). Like I've said before, I'm in the minority and they're going to go to 8 and I'm just going to have to deal with it.

The same people that call ND greedy for being independent love to get all snarky about their beloved conference championship games, the most shameless money grab in all of college sports. Take off the ND blinders for a second and understand how absurd it is for Kelly to offer up conference championship games in order to get the 8 team playoff. I've never heard of this, but it's not like he's negotiating. He's probably making a suggestion. And frankly, they SHOULD get rid of conference title games if they expand the playoff to eight teams. If adding NFL games to the season is sacrilegious, then why isn't adding more games to the seasons of underpaid college kids?

The same people that call ND greedy for being independent love to get all snarky about their beloved conference championship games, the most shameless money grab in all of college sports.

It's not like anyone forced the MAC/Sun Belt teams to play FBS football (and I'm an alum of one of them). They do it for whatever other reasons they have. Why is the onus on the rest of CFB to make it easier for them to win a championship? 4 is better than 2. Thought that before they went to 4, and it's exceeded my expectations. But beyond 4, the chance you've missed the best team is essentially zero (TCU this year is probably as close as you can get to a team with a claim to it). I love the fact that winning the conference doesn't guarantee anything. Why should it? I love the fact that fans of TCU/Baylor/Ohio St were watching and rooting hard for upsets last week to boost their chances. There's essentially 0 reason for any of them to care about other games last week if we're at 8, because they're all win-and-in games. The one thing the BCS did right (uninentionally I imagine, but still) was it made CFB a national sport because fans of the top teams in one league now had a real reason to care about games in the other leagues. I don't want to toss that out so we can get Boise State into the playoff.

You just put a team that played one Power 5 school (and got bludgeoned by them) into a playoff, then called the regular season 'more important' under such a scenario. Auto-bids for conferences is a fantastic way to remove any real incentive to schedule up during the regular season you just claimed would be more important. Why risk removing yourself from wild-card contention with a loss when the only games that really matter are in conference?

The only new one they picked up was the Cotton. They've owned the bowls for a while.

I always loved the "Zambrano giving Milton Bradley a black guy" thing and wish it would've lasted longer. Javy not bothering to know people's names is great too. But the obvious answer here is MFer Windermere and the various other Bum specials.

If he's anywhere close to what he was last spring and early summer, this is fantastic.

Between the tie-in situations improving across most of the leagues and the committee setting New Year's 6 matchups rather than the ridiculous selection order/conference tie-in situation of the BCS, I think I like the improved bowl situation even more than the 4-team playoff.

Carolina, which just won its first game in two months, will be half a game out of first place if (when) Green Bay embarrasses Atlanta tomorrow.

R&L Carriers New Orleans Bowl in New Orleans, LA – 12/20, 11 am (ESPN) UL Lafayette vs Nevada Gildan New Mexico Bowl in Albuquerque, NM – 12/20, 2:20 pm (ESPN) Utah State vs UTEP Royal Purple Las Vegas Bowl in Las Vegas, NV – 12/20, 3:30 pm (ABC) (22) Utah vs Colorado State Famous Idaho Potato Bowl in Boise, ID – 12/20, 5:45 pm (ESPN) Air Force vs Western Michigan Raycom Media Camellia Bowl in Montgomery, AL – 12/20, 9:15 pm (ESPN) South Alabama vs Bowling Green Miami Beach Bowl in Miami, FL – 12/22, 2 pm (ESPN) Memphis vs BYU Boca Raton Bowl in Boca Raton, FL – 12/23, 6 pm (ESPN) Northern Illinois vs Marshall San Diego County Credit Union Poinsettia Bowl in San Diego, CA – 12/23, 9:30 pm (ESPN) Navy vs San Diego State Popeye’s Bahamas Bowl in Nassau, BS – 12/24, 12 pm (ESPN) Western Kentucky vs Central Michigan Sheraton Hawaii Bowl in Honolulu, HI – 12/24, 8 pm (ESPN) Fresno State vs Rice Zaxby’s Heart of Dallas Bowl in Dallas, TX – 12/26, 1 pm (ESPN) Louisiana Tech vs Illinois Quick Lane Bowl in Detroit, MI – 12/26, 4:30 pm (ESPN) Rutgers vs North Carolina Bitcoin St. Petersburg Bowl in St. Petersburg, FL – 12/26, 8 pm (ESPN) NC State vs UCF Military Bowl in Annapolis, MD – 12/27, 1 pm (ESPN) Cincinnati vs Virginia Tech Hyundai Sun Bowl in El Paso, TX – 12/27, 2 pm (CBS) (15) Arizona State vs Duke Duck Commander Independence Bowl in Shreveport, LA – 12/27, 3:30 pm (ABC) Miami vs South Carolina New Era Pinstripe Bowl in New York, NY – 12/27, 4:30 pm (ESPN) Boston College vs Penn State National University Holiday Bowl in San Diego, CA – 12/27, 8 pm (ESPN) Nebraska vs USC AutoZone Liberty Bowl in Memphis, TN – 12/29, 2 pm (ESPN) Texas A&M vs West Virginia Russell Athletic Bowl in Orlando, FL – 12/29, 5:30 pm (ESPN) (17) Clemson vs Oklahoma AdvoCare Texas Bowl in Houston, TX – 12/29, 9 pm (ESPN) Texas vs Arkansas Franklin American Mortgage Company Music City Bowl in Nashville, TN – 12/30, 3 pm (ESPN) (23) LSU vs Notre Dame Belk Bowl in Charlotte, NC – 12/30, 6:45 pm (ESPN) (13) Georgia vs (21) Louisville Foster Farms Bowl in Santa Clara, CA – 12/30, 10 pm (ESPN) Stanford vs Maryland Outback Bowl in Tampa, FL – 1/1, 12 pm (ESPN2) (19) Auburn vs (18) Wisconsin Buffalo Wild Wings Citrus Bowl in Orlando, FL – 1/1, 1 pm (ABC) (16) Missouri vs (25) Minnesota Lockheed Martin Armed Forces Bowl in Fort Worth, TX – 1/2, 12 pm (ESPN) Houston vs Pittsburgh TaxSlayer Bowl in Jacksonville, FL – 1/2, 3:20 pm (ESPN) Iowa vs Tennessee Valero Alamo Bowl in San Antonio, TX – 1/2, 6:45 pm (ESPN) (14) UCLA vs (11) Kansas State TicketCity Cactus Bowl in Tempe, AZ – 1/2, 10:15 pm (ESPN) Washington vs Oklahoma State Birmingham Bowl in Birmingham, AL – 1/3, 12 pm (ESPN) Florida vs East Carolina GoDaddy Bowl in Mobile, AL – 1/4, 9 pm (ESPN) Toledo vs Arkansas State “New Year’s 6” Games: Chick-fil-A Peach Bowl in Atlanta, GA – 12/31, 12:30 pm (ESPN) (9) Ole Miss vs (6) TCU Vizio Fiesta Bowl in Glendale, AZ – 12/31, 4 pm (ESPN) (20) Boise State vs (10) Arizona Capital One Orange Bowl in Miami, FL – 12/31, 8 pm (ESPN) (7) Mississippi State vs (12) Georgia Tech Goodyear Cotton Bowl in Arlington, TX – 1/1, 12:30 pm (ESPN) (8) Michigan State vs (5) Baylor Playoff Games: Rose Bowl in Pasadena, CA – 1/1, 5 pm (ESPN) (3) Florida State vs (2) Oregon Allstate Sugar Bowl in New Orleans, LA – 1/1, 8:30 pm (ESPN) (4) Ohio State vs (1) Alabama College Football Championship Game in Arlington, TX – 1/12, 8:30 pm (ESPN) Semifinal Winners

What's with ND vs LSU in bowls? 3rd time in 17 years. Hopefully this one isn't as terrible as the last two.

OSU would default to the Rose Bowl right? or is the Rose one of the playoff sites? Normally OSU would default to the Rose in this scenario, but the Rose is a semifinal game. OSU would get an auto bid to one of the other NY6 games. Same applies to the Big 12. If the committee picked OSU, whoever the B12 decided was the champ (they'll pick someone if neither TCU or Baylor make it) would normally default to the Sugar, but since that's the other semifinal they'd get an auto bid somewhere else. In this case, of course, both would get NY6 games anyway by virtue of their ranking. It's a little complicated. I've read that if neither Big 12 team gets picked for the playoff, Baylor would go to Cotton by virtue of head to head win and TCU to the Holiday Bowl. What a potential fall from 3rd playoff spot to Holiday bowl after winning a game against a conference opponent by 52 points. No way that's correct. Both teams will be ranked high enough to get a New Year's 6 spot. All the Top 10 teams get one automatically. Whoever gets 'picked' as Big 12 champ probably does go to the Cotton, though.

OSU would default to the Rose Bowl right? or is the Rose one of the playoff sites? Normally OSU would default to the Rose in this scenario, but the Rose is a semifinal game. OSU would get an auto bid to one of the other NY6 games. Same applies to the Big 12. If the committee picked OSU, whoever the B12 decided was the champ (they'll pick someone if neither TCU or Baylor make it) would normally default to the Sugar, but since that's the other semifinal they'd get an auto bid somewhere else. In this case, of course, both would get NY6 games anyway by virtue of their ranking. It's a little complicated.

There are arguments for all 3 of Ohio State, TCU and Baylor. I'd pick Baylor because OSU has the worst loss by far and I think head to head needs to matter. But I don't think any of the 3 would be wrong picks.

Apropos of nothing, I have a feeling Michigan's next coach will not be someone that's already being heavily discussed. My gut says Narduzzi (although I know his name has been floated a bit), but I wouldn't be shocked if they go off the board entirely.

I go by avatar for like 80% of posters here.

Really? Their fanbase has a largely impeccable reputation. Every time they're mentioned on ND boards, someone posts about how great their fans were when they visited South Bend in 2000, and my cousin, a Sparty alum, passed along similar sentiments when he visited Nebraska for their game there in (I believe) 2011.

I don't think that's the worst hire in the world for Nebraska, but it is curious. That said, if you can win 6-7 games a year at a place with literally no history, in a better conference, than you can probably do well at Nebraska. Better than 9 wins a year? Doubt it. But I never figured the Pelini firing was only based on record.

Grantland's Andrew Sharp wrote a great article about how great the 4-team playoff is and why going bigger would be a mistake.

He's the Vegas favorite. Makes all the sense in the world if he wants to go to make the jump now.

To answer your second question, I believe Michigan has to pay him $1M less in buyout if they fire him after Jan. 1 - not that they will wait that long.

I'm never going to forgive Andrew Luck for not declaring for the 2011 draft, no matter how smart it was to avoid Carolina.