College football expansion debate re-ignited by Big 12 commissioner

Leave it to the ever-outspoken commissioner of the Big 12 Conference, Brett Yormark

to reignite the debate over the expansion of the college football playoff

Just a few minutes into his address at the Big 12's football media day

he was ready for battle with his fellow commissioners. 5-11 is fair. We want to earn it on the field

It might not be the best solution today for the Big 12, given your comments about AQs

But long-term, knowing the progress we're making, the investments we're making, it's the right format for us

And I'm doubling down today on 5-11. 5-11 refers to a format with five automatic bids for conference champions

and 11 at-large bids to fill out what would be a 16-team playoff field

starting with the 2026 season. The Big 12 and the ACC are the two conferences proposing this format

in an attempt to head off what the Big Ten and the SEC believe is the best solution

The Big Ten and SEC hold most of the sway in expansion talks

and they want to see four automatic qualifiers from each of their own leagues

along with two each from the Big 12 and ACC. Adding Notre Dame as an automatic in that scenario would then leave three at-large bids

Kansas State head coach Chris Kleeman doesn't have an opinion on how expansion is set up

but he does have another concern related to the added games The wear and tear on the athletes is real I don think we helped that at all by knocking the roster size down I don think that was a

good move at all, but that's control what you can control. So that's going to be a concern

when you have fewer players playing that amount of games. But I'm excited about what I was able

to watch last year of the playoff and the potential expansion here in another year

The Big 12 had only one representative, league champion Arizona State, in the inaugural 12-team college football playoff last year

The Sun Devils lost to Texas in the quarterfinals in double overtime

Jormark said getting to a point where there are several teams in the discussion each year

is how his conference can maximize whatever format the new playoff will take

You know, I think parity matters, and I think ultimately over time

and it's hopefully sooner than later, there will be a couple of our schools that will emerge as elite schools

that are always part of the conversations at the highest levels, and that's what we're working towards

But it starts with parity and being competitive top to bottom, and I think we're there

Yormark said that in addition to schedule strength, new metrics would be added to the selection process to ensure fairness

He also said he was confident conference commissioners will eventually settle on the 5-11 model

They have until December of this year to decide which 16-team format to adopt

For Straight Arrow News, I'm Chris Francis