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The original was posted on /r/cfb by /u/BehringPoint on 2023-11-15 20:06:48.
Browsing the annual Michigan Defeats Penn State postgame thread, I came across a comment that perfectly encapsulates what has become widely accepted r/CFB conventional wisdom since the 12-team playoff was announced.
The playoff expansion is basically the “James Franklin Job Security” expansion
The theory here is simple: the expanded playoff field will act as a sort of pressure relief valve for fans and boosters at the 15-20 schools which are seriously committed to football and are usually mentioned as fringe contenders in the first half of the season, but perpetually seem to be stuck outside the tiny group of elite programs that dominates the four-team playoff in any given year. These are schools like Penn State, Auburn, Florida, LSU (minus 2019), USC, Ole Miss, Tennessee, Notre Dame…teams with coaches who can win 10 games a season but never quite break through to the next level.
It’s about to get worse for them.
Because what currently defines success for coaches in one of these high-pressure jobs? It’s nebulous: some combination of double-digit wins, beating your rival(s), making a NY6 bowl, playing in the conference championship game. But starting in 2024, there will be a new, single standard for success for coaches at these schools: making the playoff. The playoff will become the floor for coaches like Franklin or Heupel or Napier, not the ceiling. “Missing the playoff” will become accepted grounds for hot seat talk. And the unforgiving math of there being fewer playoff spots than programs that expect to get one will remain, just on a much bigger scale.