It’s not realistic to say “they need to play every Playoff game on college campuses.” Bowl partners have far too much investment to allow that to happen, so let’s not pretend like that’s a realistic tweak that can be made to the College Football Playoff. It’s more fantasy than reality.

But there are, however, a few things that can be changed that would be much more realistic.

And for what it’s worth, tweaking the format isn’t saying “they should never allow Team (X) in the field ever again.” That’s just arguing about a narrative. Tweaks should be about improving the overall Playoff while still maintaining the integrity of the sport and acknowledging the financial ramifications of every decision.

So these are the 3 tweaks I’d like to see as soon as next year:

Don’t give byes to 4 highest-ranked conference champs

It can still be incentivized to have auto-bids go to the 5 highest-ranked conference champs, but as we’ve seen with Year 1, it didn’t make sense to have Boise State and Arizona State earn first-round byes. Both were double-digit underdogs in their first Playoff games, and while both impressively held their own, it didn’t reward the regular season in the way it should have.

The problem was actually what played out with Oregon. Instead of Oregon getting an advantageous first Playoff matchup, it was tasked with facing an Ohio State team that got the 8-seed as a result of Boise State and Arizona State leap-frogging the Buckeyes with their byes from being 1 of the 4 highest-ranked conference champs. Oregon refused to let that be an excuse for getting blown out by the Buckeyes — give Dan Lanning a ton of credit for that — but there’s no way that the No. 1 seed got a better path than the No. 5 seed.

If we had just seeded the same teams 1-12, here’s what the format would’ve looked like in Round 1:

    • Byes: No. 1 Oregon, No. 2 Georgia, No. 3 Texas, No. 4 Penn State
    • First-round matchups:
        • No. 12 Clemson at No. 5 Notre Dame
        • No. 11 Arizona State at No. 6 Ohio State
        • No. 10 Boise State at No. 7 Tennessee
        • No. 9 SMU at No. 8 Indiana

Yes, we have hindsight to say those would have been better matchups. And then even if we would have had chalk with all the home teams in the first round, the quarterfinal matchups would have been:

    • No. 1 Oregon vs. No. 8 Indiana
    • No. 2 Georgia vs. No. 7 Tennessee
    • No. 3 Texas vs. No. 6 Ohio State
    • No. 4 Penn State vs. No. 5 Notre Dame

That would’ve made more sense than having better-seeded teams be double-digit underdogs in quarterfinal matchups. It also would have benefited Oregon, which should have a more favorable draw as the 1-seed instead of facing an at-large team that got bumped back because of auto-bids for conference champs.

For what it’s worth, Brett McMurphy reported that this tweak is already being discussed “in-depth.”

https://twitter.com/Brett_McMurphy/status/1873733071012557118

That brings me to tweak No. 2.

Let teams with a bye pick bowl venue, starting with the 1-seed

I admittedly overlooked this when the final bracket came out. I assumed that Georgia would play in the Peach Bowl quarterfinal game as the No. 2 seed. Instead, it got matched up in the Sugar Bowl because that’s the SEC champion bowl tie-in. That makes no sense when you consider that Texas lost to Georgia in the SEC Championship, yet it ended up getting to play in the Peach Bowl instead of Georgia.

We already let the higher-seeded teams pick their venue for the semifinal matchups, so why can’t we do this for the quarterfinals?

And to be clear, I’m still keeping the bowl venues locked in for the quarterfinals, so it’s not a total free-for-all. Oregon, as the 1-seed, should be able to pick if it wanted to play in the Rose Bowl, the Peach Bowl, the Fiesta Bowl or the Sugar Bowl. Even though the Ducks likely would have chosen the Rose Bowl, you would still make sure that you’re rewarding those top-4 seeds. Georgia would have picked the Peach Bowl and Texas probably would have gone with the Sugar Bowl, where it played each of the past 2 seasons.

If the goal is to reward seeding and not just make it to that all things are equal among those 12 teams, that’s an easy way to do that without any sort of logistical nightmare (the first-round bye teams can make their quarterfinal decisions within 24 hours of Selection Sunday).

While we’re at it, let’s crank it up a notch and get a little spice into the first 2 rounds.

Let teams with a bye pick who they play after the first-round matchups, starting with the 1-seed

Now we’re cookin’.

If this is really an entertainment product, this is the way to do it. Let the first round play out, and then on that Sunday at noon, have a draft. The 1-seed gets the first pick of who it wants to play in the quarterfinal round. Then the 2-seed would pick, and so on.

Can you imagine how electric that would be? You could have a 1-hour broadcast on ESPN at noon ET, with cameras and reporters set up at each of the 8 remaining schools. Then you’d have Rece Davis tee up each coach with a bye in order, and treat it like the NFL Draft. Put them on the clock for 10 minutes, then have Lanning say “we’ll be facing Team (X).”

That would set the stage for juicy storylines galore. Teams that get picked first or second would have 10 days of talking about being disrespected, while the teams with a bye would get the advantage of deciding which team would be the best matchup for them. Well, the 1-seed would get that total advantage, while the 2-seed would get the choice of 3 opponents, the 3-seed would get the choice of 2 opponents, etc.

By doing this, conference commissioners would win because getting that 1- or 2-seed is still a huge benefit, and the most likely path to getting that is a 0/1-loss team that earns a conference title. It’s a more creative but practical way to re-seed after the first round. You also take some power away from the selection committee, who can do something like accidentally give the 1-seed a gauntlet path to a national title while giving at-large teams the more favorable paths.

As McMurphy mentioned, any tweaks to the system would require unanimous approval by all parties. It’s not a given that happens. We know change takes a bit of time in college football.

But these changes could be made overnight and they would instantly improve the 12-team Playoff.