Let Me Be Loud Wrong Early...

The final College Football Playoff rankings will be revealed on Sunday night, and I am positive that I will be really wrong about what I think should and will happen. Why do I say this? Well, because I believe that there should not be a path for Ohio State to be in the final four.

I said Ohio State has to be left out!

If everything stays status quo, I think that the final four should be:

1. Alabama
2. Clemson
3. Washington
4. Penn State/Wisconsin winner

Okay, let me defend this since every expert says that Ohio State is clearly the second best team in the country. Why shouldn't I believe this?

I hate the eye test. They just look like the second best team. Or, the conference is the best this year, it deserves to have two teams. To me, this is the classic old school thinking that got us to a need for playoff committee and process to begin with. If this were just about an eye test, then yes, Ohio State looks great. Unfortunately, we have conferences. We have 12 game schedules. We have conference championship games. We can ACTUALLY determine the best teams in each conference.

How you ask?

WIN. YOUR. FREAKING. CONFERENCE.

The College Football Playoff Committee was established to find the best four teams at the end of the year. If you go to their website, you will find the following regarding the selection of the teams:

The selection committee ranks the teams based on conference championships won, strength of schedule, head-to-head results, comparison of results against common opponents and other factors.

Ohio State will not play for its conference championship, because it lost to Penn State. If you aren't eligible to play for your conference championship, how can you be considered the best team in that conference? It invalidates the season and renders having a clear conference champion useless.

Look, this is going to be a very hard decision for the committee. The case for Ohio State and/or Michigan appears really strong:

• The Big 10 Champion is going to be a 2-loss team, and everybody really wants to see Urban Meyer and Jim Harbaugh in the playoffs. College football is a coaches game, and they are the stars
• The Big 10 Champion will have a head to head loss to Michigan
• Wisconsin lost to both Michigan and Ohio State
• The popular vote (polls) have had both Ohio State and Michigan highly ranked the entire year

But again, neither team figured out how to get enough wins to win their division, and there cannot be a reward for not playing in the conference championship.

Again, I am going to be loud wrong. While I truly hope for it, I don't believe that the committee will leave Ohio State out of the playoff. If the Big 12 Champion, and either the Big 10 or Pac 12 Champion is left out, there should be an investigation. Otherwise, there isn't really a need to play the regular season. Want to know who the playoff will be next year? Because I already know. It will be Alabama, Ohio State, Michigan, and USC. Boom. Now you can all spend your Saturdays next fall playing golf and completing honey-do lists.