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No. $ drives everything in college football, the 'narrative' exists to gin up interest in what would provide the most $. After a few years of having a 4 team playoff consisting of teams entirely from the old confederacy, national interest in the playoff would die off. In order to maximize revenue from a play off, interest in the play off would almost have to be national in scope. You need to have Pac 12 and Big 10 fans tuning in to watch at least the first round. The 'narrative' would come in to rationalize leaving out what some might consider play off worthy teams.

Nobody said anything about 4 teams from the confederacy (although we all know which team from a Confederate state would get the biggest benefit of doubt.) My point is that as long as it's possible to included non-champions at the expense of champions, then the sticker on the side of the helmet matters more than it should. And in any case of an argument, the standard to judge against will be the AP poll, because it's a manifestation of the echo chamber.

I think it's hard to deny that under that situation, Alabama, Oklahoma, Texas, Notre Dame, Michigan, Ohio State, Nebraska and Southern Cal would get undue consideration compared to Oklahoma State, Baylor, South Carolina, Michigan State, Stanford, Mizzou, and Arizona State, all of whom are in the current top 13. It has already happened in 2011, when an Oklahoma State team who had won their conference and beaten more top-25 teams was left out for Alabama.

And yes, dollars are part of why the media echo chamber creates a narrative.

Even so, I thought it was irresponsible journalism for ESPN to run the "LSU & Alabama" crawl for a game they would end up televising during a game that included a team that still had an argument on a network they are affiliated with. "Pay no attention to this game, because the team that is smacking down their top rival (who is in the top-10) still has no chance no matter how many points they score. Their game can't match the effort shown in the greatest loss ever." I guess that's the privilege of being the "Worldwide Leader".

GEAUX TIGERS

This post was edited on 12/16/13 at 4:50 pm