With push for 24-team CFP field ramping up, Greg Sankey and SEC holding fast against it

IRVING, Texas — After a 90-minute session over the future of the College Football Playoff format here at the Ritz-Carlton, one power conference commissioner exited a meeting room followed closely by one of the organization’s media consultants.

The two held a quiet but spirited discussion, presumably about what was just discussed within the room: Should the playoff expand to 16 teams or 24?

The conversation between the two lasted a few more seconds before they disappeared down a hallway with no real resolution to the argument — much like these meetings.

The CFP’s annual two-day spring meetings here this week produced, as expected, no decision on a future format.

But, perhaps for the first time, the gathering paved the way for a more intense holistic examination and financial evaluation of a 24-team postseason — support for which emerged last week during a presidential committee call that involved several high-profile CFP decision-makers.

However, there is one person who continues to support a 16-team field: SEC commissioner Greg Sankey, who as meetings wrapped up here Wednesday re-emphasized his past comments about expansion and outlined potential issues with any 24-team format.

Those include negatively impacting the regular season, athlete health and welfare considerations in playing more games, and the financial loss of eliminating his conference championship game (he declined to specifically speak on the latter).

One thing, perhaps above the rest, seems paramount in determining future expansion: Will a 24-team playoff really produce that much more revenue than the annual $1.3 billion from a 12-team field?

“It’s absolutely important,” Pac-12 commissioner Teresa Gould said.

“Is it worth it?” asked one CFP stakeholder here Wednesday

It depends on who you ask.

Yahoo Sports spoke to three former or current television executives as well as several media consultants to ascertain the truth. The result: No one really knows until a bidding process unfolds.

But before we get to the financials, let’s boil things down.

The 24-team format, championed by the Big Ten, includes several variations (some with automatic qualifiers, some with no byes at all). The one under the most consideration (but not the only one!) is an all at-large field where the top 24 teams in the CFP rankings advance to the field (maybe with an automatic spot for a Group of Six team).

Big Ten commissioner Tony Petitti and SEC commissioner Greg Sankey hold the keys to any future CFP format changes. (Kirby Lee-USA TODAY Sports)

(USA TODAY Sports via Reuters Connect / REUTERS)

The top eight teams would receive a first-round bye, and the first two rounds of games would be played on the campuses of the higher-ranked teams.

This would add 12 games — more than doubling the current 11-game CFP.

How much are these additional 12 games worth? After all, eight of them are first-round games pitting Nos. 9-24, plus four additional second-round games.

First, you should know that it is believed that ESPN owns up to 13 games (the current 11 games plus two more additional games). If that’s true, that may only leave 10 games up for bid — most of them first-round affairs pitting plenty of three- and four-loss programs.

From a television perspective, the worth of each of those games may be as little as $10 million, according to some experts, and as much as $25 million. Add in a few dollars ($50-75 million) in on-campus game revenue and you are left with a wide range.

Some say as little as $300 million and others say as much as $700 million. The key amount to keep in mind is $250 million — the estimated value of the 10 FBS conference championship games, which, in a 24-team format, would need to be eliminated and their amounts recuperated from an expanded postseason.

“You might not even make enough to recoup the conference championship game revenue,” said one person here.

The SEC title game is valued at least $80 million and as high as $100 million, according to those with knowledge of the projections. The Big Ten isn’t much lower. Can the leagues fill that budgetary hole?

Many of Sankey’s own members have publicly called for the elimination of a championship game that they believe has been devalued with a playoff expansion to 12 teams. There is one problem with that: The SEC is contractually obligated, through ESPN, to play the game.

“We have contracts,” Sankey said. “Opinions are expressed, but we have a contract, so we have a championship game.”

There are plenty of other variables here to consider in a potential bidding process for a 24-team CFP. The NFL may go to market earlier than expected, potentially “sucking a whole lot of money out of the ecosystem,” said one stakeholder.

Could that be made up by billion-dollar streaming companies wanting a piece of an expanded CFP pie? One commissioner cautions that line of thinking with a reminder of the CFP’s bidding process two years ago, when the organization moved from four teams to 12.

Only one legitimate bidder came to the table back then (ESPN).

But perhaps this isn’t all about the money.

“It’s an access thing,” said one commissioner.

Though a majority of fans seem to be against such an expansion — many of them traditionalists who wish to preserve the sanctity of the regular season — their teams, some spending $30-plus million on their rosters, would have a chance at a national championship despite two or three or even four losses.

Four-loss Iowa, for instance, would have made the field last year.

Would that be a good thing? Even CFP executive director Rich Clark, unprompted, mentioned Wednesday the impact on the regular season.

“The regular season is king,” he said. “We are a complement to the regular season.”

Clark described CFP expansion discussions today as “healthy,” but he’s uncertain an agreement will be reached by Dec. 1 — the deadline for a change to be implemented for 2027. The goal now for the CFP is to complete any research and work on the 24-team concept by the time decision-makers next meet in person in June.

“There’s a lot of data we want to drill into a little bit more,” Clark said.

As meetings ended here Wednesday, the commissioners all went their separate ways, most of them leaving the Ritz-Carlton for the airport or their nearby homes.

But meanwhile, off in a corner of the hotel lobby, the SEC commissioner gathered with the CFP’s media consultants.

Perhaps the additional work has already begun.

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