Sallee: College Football Playoff Committee Values Brand Over Performance

Barrett, how are you?

Oh, I'm great. Just, you know, Tuesday night, college football rankings night. Everyone hates everyone and there's rage all over the place. And it's a great time of year, man. It's a great time of year. Hey, Barrett, I was going to say for the first edition, especially with the newly extended playoff, we got 12 teams getting in. We had a ranking of 25.

Everybody's up in arms and it's just the first edition. What stood out to you? Was it Indiana BYU? What are your thoughts on this? Yeah, I mean, the overall, the overarching thought, and I said this in my podcast today, is that name brand matters. And they'll never tell you. They'll tell you the opposite.

I've talked to people at the college football playoff office and Rich Clark and all of them. Bill Hancock said it, too, that the brand doesn't matter. And yet we've got Indiana, which has beaten everybody by 14 or more points, for any day. I don't care if I say it's a straight discussion. Everybody has flaws.

Everybody stumbled. Everybody has that issue where they look beatable, except Indiana, and they're not getting any credit for it because wins and losses should matter. You have a Texas, which, strength of schedule wise, is fine. Doesn't have really any quality wins.

BYU has two. SMU at 13, significantly better than Texas or Miami in terms of overall resume. And, you know, it's one of those things that move the move to goalposts, right? One day they say it's wins and losses that matter. The next day, the strength of schedule.

The next day they say gain control or whatever. It goes to show you that name brand matters because there's no way Texas would be number five if they didn't have that Longhorn on their helmet. I'd say there's no way Miami would be ahead of BYU or SMU if it didn't have that U on its helmet. So, you know, name brand matters and that's it.

But like I said, it'll change because every single year they do it, right? The conference call comes out afterwards or, you know, the spokesman comes out on the TV show and is like saying they're focusing on gain control this week. And it's just like you're scratching your head going, what the heck are you guys doing?

And then comes the realization. It's all the program, the sport. It's all for us to yell at each other and be angry.

And because that's a feature of the sport, not a bug. It's awesome. I love it.

If people get so mad, it's the same thing, right? AP preseason rankings, right? Everybody's up in our jobs. Cancel preseason rankings. They're dumb. And yet everybody loves to talk about it.

Because in secret, everybody likes them all. And college football expert Barrett Salih is joining us here on the J.R. sport re-show. So Barrett, you mean to tell me this is all a business?

Is this what this is? I didn't believe it. Shocking, right?

Shocking. No, but, you know, I think in reality though, this year it's interesting. And look, I'm not a 12-team playoff guy. I didn't like the 14. I wish we could go back to the BCS.

Wait, wait, wait, wait. Before you move forward, why would you want to go back to the BCS? Because it only had one thing wrong, and that was in 2004. And I would argue, even as an Auburn alum, that Auburn probably didn't deserve to be in that BCS championship game either. I'm all about rewarding excellence, not granting access.

And we've got a system now that rewards access over excellence. And it takes away from the regular season. And it's proven to do that already this year. And on top of that, there are teams that are going to make the playoffs this year that have no business act being called national champions.

They just don't. I like that college football is unique. I don't like the NFL-ization of the college football world. It shouldn't be.

It can't be. And the landscape of it should prevent it from looking like the NFL. But like you mentioned, money's off.

Business, right? Well, we are in a 12-team playoff. The field is wider, on paper at least. We know some of these teams are going to get smacked around when the playoff actually starts. Who should we actually pay attention to to kind of hoist that trophy come January?

Okay, so this is so interesting, too. Because you're going to have the four automatic qualifiers, right? They're probably going to be the powerful teams. They might not be. But the third and fourth team might not actually be capable of winning a national championship. But five, six and seven might.

So that to me is fascinating. So I'm looking at a team, maybe like Tennessee, that if they win out, they're going to get in. Obviously, they'll probably make the SEC championship game if they do that as well.

You know, I think they've got a chance to to really get back into it. I'm still a fan of LSU. I think that they had their get the loss to USC is holding them back because that's a bad loss right now. But if they were to get into the SEC championship game, which I think is very possible, then winning it could provide a springboard or maybe even get a home field home game. So I think LSU is one to watch out for. They're down at 14.

I think they're underrated. And look, with Penn State, I know what happened last week is last week. I still believe that they can catch fire. I still think their offense is capable of doing more than it did last week.

I thought it was ultra conservative. And I trust James Franklin enough if they do get to that point to recognize the error of his ways in big games and to let it fly a little bit. So I do think Penn State is capable. It has the athletes to do it. But, man, I keep I keep an eye on Tennessee. If they can if they can get their passing game going. Oh, man, that seems going to be almost impossible to beat.

Barrett Salih is joining us here from Sirius XM and Outkick. You talk about potentially skipping over the ultimate third and fourth seeds. And we know that the top four seeds are going to be conference champs. Are you throwing an ACC team like, I don't know, some guys in Miami out the window here? So maybe here's the thing.

OK, let's let's just say Miami gets to Miami to me. Flawed defensively. Right. I think we've seen that, especially in big games. Their defense has not come to play. They've also I wouldn't say luck, but they've benefited from some some calls that might have been gone. They should have gone the other way. Right.

So they're living on the edge. That said, they've got a quarterback and a superstar who can take over every game. So they've got that working for them. But eventually, I think in big games against great teams, they can take Cam Ward away a little bit. Right. And that'll go a long way, because if the defense for Miami falters like it has in big games already. I don't even think Cam Ward can make up for for whatever call they dig themselves into.

Plus, on top of that. I don't know if they're going to win the ACC because I tell you what, man, SMU is legit. That is a really good football team. Right now, SMU sitting at number 13 of the college football rankings. When you take a look at what we have here in this this first week, what gets you going about SMU? Well, first of all, they've got one of the best coaches in the country. Red Lashley is going to get offered jobs across country like him and Kurt Cignetti are going to have they can do whatever they want.

They will be able to go wherever they want or stay where they are. Doesn't matter. Second of all, they caught lightning in a bottle with Kevin Jennings. He played great towards the end of last season when when Preston Stone went out.

Rhett made the proper call after a couple of games to bench Preston Stone. And Kevin Jennings has taken it from there. The Mustangs are relentless offensively and opportunistic defensively. And they're getting better and they're gaining confidence. And so I think to go to Pitt last week and do what they are to beat at home the way they did. That's a really good Pitt football team.

And they cut through them like a hot knife through butter. So I think we're talking about a team like right now, maybe they can't beat Miami like right this very instant. But the ACC Championship games in a month. And by that point, they might be as good, if not better than Miami. I truly believe in that team. I think that, you know, they're not capable of winning a college football playoff, but I don't think Miami is either. But I think that both of them will actually get to it.

Hey, listen, I think SMU, after being chopped to shreds with the death penalty about 40 years ago, I think, dammit, a lot of their. Well, everybody with the program old enough to remember is probably appreciative of what they're currently doing. I put it that way. Right.

Everybody who drives the Trans Am drives it because of Eric Dickerson. Oh, boy. Oh, boy. Barrett Salih is here with us.

I'm serious. XM and outkick as we look forward to this upcoming weekend. I know you mentioned LSU. They got a big game this Saturday as well against Alabama. Alabama not getting a whole lot of attention. We got Lane Kiffin trying to get over the hump again by taking on Georgia.

What are your thoughts on those matchups? Are there any other games that we should really pay attention to? Well, those are the big ones that the SEC week. Right.

Like that is they're taking center stage. I think for Alabama, LSU. The biggest thing to me is is Alabama and the lack of discipline.

Right. You look at what they've done in conference games. They're near the bottom and penalties. What they've done on the road, they're near the bottom of the SEC and penalties. It's just it's an undisciplined football team. And the last thing you want to have when you go to Death Valley is an issue with discipline. And we saw Alabama in a big game at Tennessee with 15 penalties.

I think they had three more that were declined. That's not good. And I think that's a trend that's been in Alabama all year. And I think it is really concern me when Kalen divorce said a couple of weeks ago that they have to go back and work on the little things like getting to meetings on time. And I'm sitting there thinking if that was Nick Saban, like he might actually kill somebody for being late to a meeting. Right. That's not that is not supposed to happen.

So that worries me a lot. And I tell you what, with Auburn, with Ole Miss and Georgia. If Lane Kiffin can get Georgia into a shootout, Georgia's in massive trouble.

Carson Pick with 11 interceptions over the last five games. They haven't been able to run the football effectively, even against Texas. They were bad, like not not just they were horrible offensively against Texas.

And the only reason they won was because of that front seven, which is just unbelievable. So, you know, I think to me, and I never thought I'd say this before the season, but Georgia getting into a shootout is is a bad, bad problem for Kirby Smart. And I think Ole Miss more than really any other team on Georgia's schedule is capable of doing that. Oh, yeah, absolutely. Carson Beck is going to throw the ball around to the wrong team. Unfortunately, you don't want any any piece of that.

Yeah, he does. Unfortunately, you talk about LSU. Let's talk about USC. What the hell is going on out there like this? They're going through multiple quarterbacks now. Do we got people trying to save their asses from being fired? It's getting there, man. It is getting there.

Like I said, all of these in the Lincoln rallies abroad. I think he only cares about himself and his philosophy and is very reluctant to move off of it no matter what. And that includes in the quarterback department. Look, to me, Miller Moss is this year's version of Joe Milton last year. And Joe Milton, remember, had a great bowl game. Everybody thought that he was going to come in and be a superstar and he tanked for Tennessee last year. I think Moss kind of has that same sort of Joe Milton thing going on. And look, I think Lincoln with the defense regressing a little bit than it was before the season. OK, so way better than it has been under Lincoln Riley for the first two seasons.

But I think that he just really didn't want to admit that he's wrong and he has a hard time doing that. With that said, Jayden is a really good quarterback. You know, he held Barry Odom. He was the driving force of UNLV coming back into the national team with Barry Odom last year. And I mean, they were they were mad that he left.

They really liked them. I mean, the dude threw for over three thousand yards last year. So, you know, is it going to change USC all that much that that Miller Moss is on the bench and Jayden is in the game? I don't think it will in terms of the offense. I think if anything, they're going to let Jayden kind of loose more so than maybe they were with Miller Moss trying to hide his deficiencies a little bit. I don't think they're going to do that now after making a quarterback change. So this might help them a lot, but it goes back to, you know, they shouldn't be in this position and they're in this position because Lincoln Riley is extremely stubborn. And well, we know it looks like he's getting closer to the the end. So we'll see what he does.

Thrown out a new quarterback to try to save his ass. Where can people follow you and all of your work on Sirius, your podcast outkick? You're right. Your podcast, your radio. Where can we follow you? Pretty much everywhere. College football, Smothering Cupboard, YouTube, Apple, Spotify, all those places. You can find it there daily.

And then Sirius XM on Sunday mornings on Channel 84 and throughout the week, wherever, on their college channels and then columns every day on Outkicks. So we'll be at Ole Miss Georgia this weekend. Oxford's always a great time, always a great town, and it should be to be really excited about this one.

I've already talked to folks down there. This is a this is a bucket list game for a lot of people that are Ole Miss fans. Yeah. Hopefully it's a bucket list game for people traveling from Athens and Georgia. Hopefully Georgia doesn't know hurricane. We know hurricane.

No, I hope not. I had to deal with that. We've had we've had enough.

We don't we don't need any more of them things. Hey, Barrett, thank you so much for the time. Appreciate you. My pleasure. Thanks for having me.