The Joel Klatt Show: A College Football Podcast - College Football Playoff Rankings Reaction

Episode Date: November 20, 2024

FOX Sports’ lead College Football analyst Joel Klatt discusses the latest set of College Football Rankings and gives his biggest takeaways. He wonders if Kirby Smart and Georgia are being trolled by the Committee after landing in the 10th spot despite their win over Tennessee on Saturday. Klatt breaks down why the Dawgs are being set up for a very tough path in the Playoff and why a 10-2 SEC team is going to be left out this year. He considers what Indiana needs to do vs Ohio State to prove they belong in the Playoff field and also points out there are several other programs in the Top 10 with questionable resumes. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You look at their schedule, and it did not look easy. They had Ohio State, Michigan, and Washington on their schedule. College football has never been better. Interest has never been higher. Believe that we are at the dawn of the golden age of college football. It was an epic day of college football. It was one of those days where you fall in love with the sport all over again. Hey, what's up everybody?

Welcome into the Joel Klatt show. I am Joel Klat. This show, as always, is brought to you by Hampton by Hilton. and we have got a great episode here. College football playoff rankings reaction coming at you straight away. Hey, remember to follow us and rate and review us wherever you're listening to this podcast. Go ahead and subscribe on YouTube. The YouTube channel is awesome.

We've got a lot of cool stuff on there. So subscribe to the YouTube channel. And then make sure to hit the notification button as well so you can see when all of our content drops. And then wherever you like to social media, we are there. That's right. at Joel Clatch Show, you can catch all of our content, interact with us in those spots. Let's get into it, shall we? We've got another playoff ranking to react to.

And this one was interesting. I know that I will say it's a little anticlimactic because it's not a four-team playoff, which is good, right? So is there a lot to scoff at? No, not a ton, but there are some things that I think stand out in the top 25. So let's take a look at what the committee gave to us here with the top 25. And Illinois jumps in there at 25. I thought that was interesting and certainly helps Penn State. But the one for me is Missouri staying at there at 23. I'm just going to, I'm just going to laugh.

They didn't move after a loss. So that's awesome. Hey, Eli, you still playing play in playoff games? Oh, man, I shouldn't. Army and Tulane sitting there out of the American in 19 and 20. Colorado is at 16, fascinating, A&M at 15. And then you've got kind of this BYU, BYU, 12 to 14. And now you get into the nitty gritty. And this is where everyone's going to be commenting. This is where everyone's going to be interested in terms of what's happening from 12, obviously, and inside. So Tennessee at 11, Georgia at 10. Fascinating. Ole Miss at 9, Miami at 8,

Bama 7, Notre Dame at 6, Indiana's 5, Penn State 4, Texas 3, Ohio State, and Oregon rounded out there at 2 and 1. Okay, what do we think? Well, first and foremost, I know that all the talking heads, I guess I'm a talking head.

Interesting. Everybody commenting on this that I've heard immediately goes to Indiana, and I can understand, understand that. Indiana's strength of schedule to this point has not been great. Where I went immediately is Miami because I look at this and my eyes just immediately thought, in what world is Miami better than Ole Miss in Georgia and even Tennessee to that extent? I just don't agree. I just do not agree. This team has been living on the edge.

they've got a great quarterback and an offense that has to go outscore you. And that's it. Their defense, not solid. They lost to Georgia Tech. They probably should have lost to Cal. Probably should have lost to Virginia Tech. And they're sitting there and you're telling me that they're better than Ole Miss who's beaten Georgia. They're better than Georgia who's beaten Texas and Tennessee.

Like, come on. And again, like I'm not trying to take off on Miami. I like Miami. I think that the playoff would be great with Miami in it. and Miami is going to have their opportunity to play themselves into this space. But having them at eight over Ole Miss and Georgia, I'm like, wait, are you trolling Kirby? Because maybe the committee has had enough of comments like this after Georgia won last weekend over Tennessee. This is Kirby Smart.

Like I said after the game, I don't know what they're looking for. I really don't. I wish they could really define the criteria. I wish they could do the eyeball test where they come down. here and look at the people we're playing against and look at them. But they're not in that environment. They're not at Ole Miss in that environment playing against that defense, which is top five in the country with one of the best pass rushers in the country, and they're fired up, they got a two-score lead, and they're coming every play. They don't know, they don't understand

that. So they'll probably look at this week and say, well, we just played against one of the best defenses in the country, and we went for 453 on them, you know, and could have been more. So, it's just the tale of each week. So, Since Ohio State's defense is top five, and they've got two of the premier pass rushers in the country and great safety, does that mean that the committee should go take a look at where Indiana is playing and, like, really look at the team that they're playing and, like, you know, understand the environment that they're playing in and give them a pass for a loss? Is that what I'm hearing? Kind of sounds like what I'm hearing. Maybe the committee is just trolling Kirby Smart. Like, could it be?

And if they are, does anyone blame him? Kirby is a great coach. I think in a lot of cases, I would consider him one of if not the best coach in college football. This is the Kirby that I least like. I really love almost everything that he does until we get into this mode. I cannot stand the politicking. It happens down there incessantly. and they just, they rant and rave about like, well, you don't know what these schedules are like.

Like, I'm sorry, I just can't. Georgia should be rated higher than Miami. Maybe the committee is just tired of you whining after the games. That could be it. That could be it. Because Georgia's resume is outstanding. If there's anybody that has a gripe, and this is where I would agree with Kirby, Kirby, let me do it for you.

Let me do it for you. Georgia has a gripe right now, okay? And the gripe is, is like, I understand that they're 8 and 2, and they've lost two games, but they've got probably the best win in the country at Texas. They just beat up Tennessee badly. Their strength of schedules, the toughest in the country.

They're 3 and 2 against the top 25. I mean, certainly a better resume than, let's say, Texas, certainly a better resume than Penn State or Indiana or Notre Dame or like a lot of teams, okay? So let me argue for you, Kirby, because Georgia is right now in a kind of a precarious spot, not in terms of making the playoff and not making the playoff, but their path in the playoff. And I'll get to that in a little bit.

I'll get to that in a little bit. But the ire that everyone is zeroing in on is not Miami. Like that's the one that jumped out to me. Everybody else is zeroing in on Indiana, the undefeated Hoosiers. And they're starting to throw out this conversation about, like, like, well, what does Miami have to do? Or excuse me, what is Indiana? See, that was kind of like Elko, Mike Elko when he's talking about Auburn, then he dropped Texas. So then I dropped Miami. What happens in Columbus, Indiana plays Ohio State. We'll be there. Gus, Ginny and I. Can't wait.

Can't wait. Top five matchup, another one this season, which has been filled with them, more top five matchups than we've had a long time. And now the conversation is about like, well, what is the What are the Hoosiers need to do in order to retain their spot within the playoff? And let me just start with this. Like, I do not think Indiana is going to get blown out. I think that they're much better than people realize. Everybody is focused on their strength of schedule. And yet, and listen, it's not great.

I'm not here to defend their schedule. But what I am going to defend are two things. One is that if you looked at that schedule in August, it looked very, vastly different, or even if you go back to minutes after the national championship game, the day Kurt Signetti has hired any of these moments back in the offseason, you look at their schedule and it did not look easy. They had Ohio State, Michigan, and Washington on their schedule. That was three of the top seven teams in the country from the end of last year, right before the bowl games. Right. And then nobody thought that Nick Saban was going to leave,

which was going to prompt Kaelin DeBoer to leave Washington and go down to Alabama, and Jim Harbaugh gets the Chargers job, and then all of a sudden the transfer portal is crazy, and all the teams change. But when we were sitting here back then, no one was complaining about Indiana's schedule. They're complaining about it now. And that's fair. I'm not here to tell you that that is not a fair argument. I get it.

I get it. So what should a good team do against, let's call it, a bad schedule, an easy schedule. They should be dominant. They should be dominant. They shouldn't be eking out wins by three. They shouldn't be going to overtime with teams that they have no business being in overtime with. They should be dominant in those games.

That's exactly what Indiana has done. So the team, the players, the coaches, they have this schedule put in front of them. They prepare themselves to go and be as dominant as they can against the schedule in front of them. They have no control over what's going to happen with those teams. They don't know that Michigan is going to have a terrible season by Michigan accounts. Okay, they don't realize that Washington's not going to be what we think and that the five and one Nebraska team is not quite the five and one Nebraska team that we thought that they were going to be. So they all they can do is go out there and be dominant against the team that's in front of them. And that's exactly what they've done.

Nobody has a better margin of victory than Indiana this year. Their average margin of victory is up there with the best in the country. So they have been dominant. That's why, like, I just totally disagree with this sentiment that Indiana has to somehow prove something against Ohio State. Like, if Indiana loses on Saturday, then Kurt Signetti should stand there in front of the podium and be like, I wish the committee would come up here and look at that team that we just played. they were a top five team. You know, like, so it's like,

is the Pollock ticking going to start there? Maybe it should. Maybe it should. I don't care how the game goes. I think Indiana has done enough to this point, where if they're an 11-1 team, they're probably going to be in the college football playoff and should be.

This notion that they have to somehow prove something just because their schedule is not great, I think is laughable. I really do. I think it's laughable. That is not their purpose. problem. It is not their problem. And again, they've been dominant against that schedule. If they've been beating this schedule by three every week, then it's a different conversation. But they haven't.

They have been a dominant team over their schedule. And by the way, you know, everyone's like, Indiana is drawing all the arrows. You know, all the arrows. Everybody wants to just pound on Indiana. Guess why? Because it's Indiana. If this was a different brand, we wouldn't be doing this. And do you know how I know that? Because there are bad resumes all around them, all around them, with teams that have lost football games, which Indiana has not done. Texas's resume, bad. They don't have a top 25 win.

They got beat at home, handily, by Georgia. Why are they third in the country? I don't know. Penn State. Their resume isn't great. They got a favorable schedule out of the Big Ten. They didn't have to play Michigan. You look up.

They didn't have to play Oregon. So their only tough game was Ohio State. They lost it at home. Their only top 25 win, Illinois, 25th. Two spots below Missouri. Sorry, I can't. I can't with the Missouri. It's ridiculous.

Notre Dame's resume is not great. They have a loss at home to Northern Illinois. Like, why aren't we directing our ire at teams that have equally bad resumes? With a loss, Miami, same thing, the exact same thing. They don't have many quality wins, and they lost to Georgia Tech. They should have gotten beat by Cal. They should have gotten beat by Virginia Tech. But they didn't.

I'll hand them that. Got a little bump from the officials in some of those games. All we're talking about is Indiana, and yet there are bad resumes all around them. So guess what the point is there? The point is that nobody can have a loss now. That's the point. Everyone's talking about like, is Indiana win with a loss? Well, guess what?

I'm not sure. Notre Dame can't lose to Army. Penn State can't lose to Minnesota this weekend. You know, like Texas can't lose to Texas A&M. That becomes a question. Where's Texas's quality win? Georgia can't lose another game. Alabama can't lose another game.

Miami can't lose another game. Nobody can lose another game. The only team that can really like lose another game and be fine, Oregon. Oregon. And not just because of the game. they're number one. They're number one, and they have an off week this week, so they're 11 and 0, not just 9 and 1 or 10 and 0. They've already qualified for the Big 10 championship game, which means they're in that game probably shouldn't be downgraded for the 13th data point.

The only team that can suffer a loss and probably 2 and still make the playoff is Oregon. I think Oregon has not only clinched a birth in the Big 10 championship game, but they've basically clinched a birth in the college football playoff. Now, they certainly want to go out and continue to win games. They want to win their rivalry game against Washington. They want to win the Big Ten championship game so that they can get a buy in the first round of the playoff. But this idea that Indiana specifically has something to prove, and even if they lose, it matters how they lose. I just, I don't agree with that sentiment. I just don't. Nobody in this situation,

Nobody. Ohio State can't stand to lose. The only team that is up there and kind of putting themselves in a position where they're kind of above the fray is Oregon right now. So this is why, like, I just, I don't love that everybody is focused on Oregon, or excuse me, Indiana. They're focused on Indiana only because of the brand, only because of the brand. You know, there's bad resumes all around them. Now, let me go back to Georgia, because I think this This Georgia point is interesting. Georgia at their best is one of the best teams in the country. If they play like they did against Tennessee,

they can and will win a national championship. They are that good at their top end. Now, if the offensive line doesn't play well, like they played against Ole Miss, then they can get beat. Okay, their wide receivers have to play well like they did against Tennessee. They play like they did against Ole Miss, then they're going to get beat. But Georgia, the reason why Kirby actually has a point about evaluating this team and trying to use an eye test is because Kirby sees what I see, which is the path in the playoff, gets pretty precarious if you get seated in the wrong spot. So now we take a look at the actual 12-team playoff.

And listen, are these going to hold? Probably not. What jumps out? Boise State in there with a buy. That would obviously be great for Boise State because I don't think Boise State is going to get into the top eight, which would mean that they would host a game. I don't think that that's going to happen.

So Boise now is just praying that all hell breaks loose in the Big 12 so that they can be the fourth best champion in the country and get a buy because they don't want to go on the road as a, you know, 10 seed, 11 seed and have to play like at Penn State at, you know, whatever, someplace like this. That would not be a solid spot. And then the other thing is this Georgia. And I don't think they're going to land at 11.

All right. So where is Georgia likely to land? I think Georgia is likely to land somewhere between 7 and 10. They don't have much left on their schedule. So I firmly believe that they'll handle their schedule. But I don't think that there's enough on their schedule to leap them all the way up to like the 5. So they're probably going to sit at that 7 to 10. The 5 and 6 spots will probably be reserved for the loser of the SEC and Big 10 championship game.

And so then Georgia sits there between 7 and 10. And if they continue to get this type of look from the committee, and this is what Kirby's upset about, then they probably are going to fall in like the 9 seed. I see a very strong possibility that Georgia lands at the nine. And here's why the nine I think is going to be rough. Is because the nine seed has to go on the road in the first playoff game. And going on the road to any of the teams that can land in the eight seed is bad. Right now it's Notre Dame, but it could be Alabama.

It could be, you know, It could be Tennessee, however things pan out. Like, this is not a spot that you would want to land in. Maybe, I mean, it could be Ohio State. You might have to land. Going on the road is not a fun proposition at that point. You don't want to do it. The worst part about the nine seed isn't necessarily going on the road

because even a team like Georgia could feel like, yeah, we could probably go on the road and win that game. But then you have to play the one seed. So you're going to play the winner of either of the big, or the SEC, whoever that is, that champion. So it could be Oregon, could be Ohio State, could be Texas. That's going to be a very difficult game. And then you're going to have to play in the semi, likely the five seed.

Because remember, the four seed is going to be just the fourth best conference champion we have in the country. It could be Boise State. It could be Colorado, which means that the five seed hosts the 12, then plays some conference champion there, Colorado, Boise State, BYU, Y, Arizona State. And the five seed is likely to be a really,

really strong team. Probably the loser of that Big Ten game, which is Ohio State at this point, could be Oregon. So not only would you have to go on the road in the first round, you'd have to play the one seed in the second round, and then the semi, you would have to play the five seed, then you'd just have to play the championship game.

So the hardest road of the playoff is the nine seed, and that's kind of where Georgia is pointed. I see a path where Georgia's going to wind up in the nine seed. And that's going to be like really tough. And I think that's what Kirby sees. He sees that he doesn't feel like they're getting the respect that they deserve for their resume. And he might be right. He might be right.

Having Miami two spots ahead is somewhat laughable. And again, I ranked them at six in my poll. And the reason I put them at six and people will. out of their minds. Well, Bama has beaten them and Ole Miss has beaten them. Yes, but at their best, what are they doing at their best? And again, at their best, Georgia has a win over Texas on the road. They've got a win over Tennessee. Their losses are on the road to Bama and Ole Miss. Like those are very tough losses. Just got to say it that way. And then you look up and it's like, Ole Miss lost to Kentucky. Bama lost to Vanderbilt. I haven't seen that from Georgia.

So that's where Kirby has a bit of a point. They have a bit of a point. The last thing is when you start to play this thing out, and I'm hearing it from a lot of the SEC people, the SEC people are starting to get nervous. And that's why you see them politicking. When they get nervous, they start to gripe. And when they gripe, you know that they see the path of someone getting left out that is one of theirs. I've been saying this for a number of. of weeks, there is highly likely a 10 and 2 SEC team that is going to get left out of this playoff. The way that it's formatted now, to me, that is absolutely on the table. Now, you can say that it's not right. You can whine and cry about it. I'm just telling you, like, that's probably going to happen. Right now, it looks like Tennessee. And then the rest of the to the SEC has got to think to themselves, and this is where you start to play it forward. You see a couple of games on the schedule overall in college football that are really going to impact the SEC overall. One of them is an SEC game. One of them is not. So if I'm the SEC,

if I'm Tennessee, if I'm the conference office and I'm Greg Sankey, I am a huge, huge fan of Army this weekend because I want them to beat Notre Dame, and I really need Texas to win that game over A&M. And the reason is as follows. Number one is, if you can knock Notre Dame down or out, Notre Dame with two losses, one of them being to Northern Illinois, the other being to Army,

they would be out of the playoffs. So now all of a sudden that opens up a spot. And then the other thing that you have to avoid is just the sheer chaos of everybody in your conference being 10 and 2 before the conference championship game. So if A&M beats Texas, they add themselves to the fray, and now it just becomes an absolute mess, and there's absolutely going to be a team left out at 10 and 2. See, but if Army wins and Texas wins, now all of a sudden you're sneaking Tennessee in there.

Like there is a scenario where I'm looking at this and you can get Texas in the playoff. You can get Alabama in the playoff. You can get Ole Miss in the playoff. You can get Georgia in the playoff and you can get Tennessee in the playoff. There is a scenario where there's five SEC teams. I think the best most plausible way is that if Army wins and Texas wins in the next couple of weeks, that's what I would be rooting for if I was the SEC. Man, I tell you, there's always things to talk about.

You look at it and you think like, oh, Miami is interesting. And then you start digging through all this stuff. And to me, it's always just fascinating. And I'm just going to reiterate a point that I've been trying to make all season long. And that is, this is awesome. This is, I thought that I would really enjoy the playoff year and the expanded playoff. Truth be told, I thought the four-team playoff was bad. From like the very first moment that we got it.

I was like, I don't know about this. every week, I like the 12-team playoff more and more and more. I don't think it's a perfect model. We can get to that a later date. I do think it should be 14. But having the 12, like, think of all the teams. We are a week away from Thanksgiving right now. And we've got teams playing huge playoff implication games

all the way to like Boise, SMU, BYU, A&M, Colorado, Clemson, Army, Tulane, Arizona State, Iowa State. This is freaking awesome. All the fan bases that are all in on college football has grown,

has grown. And it's going to make the sport better. Every single year, this is going to get better. We've seen more parity because of the transfer portal and because of NIL. And now this is going to enhance parity. Why? Why? Because when you're in the transfer portal as a player

or when you're a high school recruit and you're a top-level high school recruit, you don't have to go to the same five and six places in order to say that I'm going to actually compete for a national championship. Now you can go to any number of 15 to 20 places. So the talent is going to disperse across the country more evenly because of NIL and then hopefully now revenue sharing

with the house settlement. And we've got the transit. Like all of this stuff leads to parity. We have seen it in the regular season this year. We are seeing what meaningful games look like as it pertains to the playoff across more teams than what we used to. And it's all been great. So when I say in the open that we are at the dawn of the golden age of college football,

this is what I mean. And we aren't even scratching the surface. We haven't even fixed the structure of what the players are going through. like I touched on in the last episode. And we're seeing like incredible November of college football. And I love it. I love it. I hope you love it as well.

And if you're listening to this, you probably do. Remember to rate and review us wherever you get your podcast. Remember to subscribe on the YouTube channel. Go ahead and hit the notifications down there. Leave a comment below. We'd love that if you did. And you can follow us on any of the social medias at Joel Clash show, wherever you like to social media.

We will be back tomorrow with picks and previews, and because there's more meaningful games, I've got more picks and more previews to give. Eight games we're going to go through tomorrow. Eight. Eight. That's right. Be there, and I will be there with you. Thank you so much, folks.

I'll see you tomorrow.