If you went into the first round of the College Football Playoff expecting close games, then you were no doubt disappointed by the opening weekend. But if you went into the first round of the College Football Playoff expecting close games, Joel Klatt isn’t sure why.
Klatt, Fox’s lead college football analyst, has heard the discourse regarding the first round of the playoff, which not only featured the home favorites going 4-0 — but 4-0 with four double-digit wins. Klatt criticized those who are decrying the blowouts and echoed the sentiment shared by Wisconsin’s announcer Matt Lepay, that blowouts were commonplace in the four-team era of the College Football Playoff.
“These types of margins that we experienced in the first round of the College Football Playoff happen all the time,” Klatt said. “It’s been happening in the College Football Playoff in the four-team model forever. We’ve had some absolute duds for semifinals and in the Championship Game. I witnessed firsthand, Georgia score sixty — what was it — five points on TCU. So let’s not be revisionist in our history as if like, ‘Oh, everything else used to be incredible. Now this 12-team, this is just a bridge too far, ’cause look at these margins.’ That’s not a thing.”
I remain incredibly frustrated and disappointed in the commentary regarding the CFP from this past weekend…Games like that happen all the time…Even in the NFLpic.twitter.com/CMd5pf2nNT
— Joel Klatt (@joelklatt) December 23, 2024
Klatt also noted that the issue of postseason blowouts is not new — or even unique to college football, saying, “We’ve had large margins forever in our sport,” backing that argument up by citing last season’s Wild Card round.
“It wasn’t good. And yet, I didn’t hear anybody, anybody, start yelling and screaming about, ‘The Eagles don’t deserve to be in the playoffs playing the Bucs,’ as the Bucs are winning 32-9,” he said. “I didn’t hear anybody saying, ‘Why are the Dolphins in the playoffs? This is ridiculous,’ as they’re getting beat 26-7 by the Kansas City Chiefs.
“Did you know, that last year, in the 2023 NFL Wild Card round, the average margin of victory was in those six games was 17.5 points? Home teams went 5-1. Why? Because it’s tough to beat good teams in their home stadium in the NFL — just like in college football. The only one team that lost at home was the Dallas Cowboys. This happens. And this is no different than any other sport,” Klatt added.
That is all accurate. Of the six games played in last season’s Wild Card round, only one — the Detroit Lions’ 24-23 win over the Los Angeles Rams — was a one-score game. The other six games were all decided by at least 14 points.
Since Klatt didn’t identify anyone by name, we can’t say for sure if he was aiming his comments at anyone in particular. But ESPN’s Kirk Herbstreit and Nick Saban were both vocal in their belief that Indiana didn’t belong in the playoff after the Hoosiers fell to Notre Dame in Friday night’s opener. Scott Van Pelt also bemoaned the lack of competitive games while hosting SportsCenter immediately after Ohio State trounced Tennessee in the weekend’s final CFP game. Van Pelt was particularly vocal about Indiana and SMU, though conceded that both “had company” with Tennessee. He also conceded “I don’t think there’s any clear, perfect answer.”
Klatt continued his argument by pointing out that unlike College Football Playoff games in the past, these games were played in the home stadiums of the higher-seeded team, which only makes blowouts more likely. He noted that even on a neutral site, all four of the first-round’s winning teams would have been favored.
“So again, why was I taken aback by this reaction, that every one of these results was an indictment on the losing team? Because this shouldn’t be a thing,” Klatt said. “You know what is a thing? Home field advantage. It would have been, candidly shocking, for any one of these teams to walk into these buildings and beat one of these teams. So you have clearly superior teams — by the rankings themselves — who are getting to host football games. If we put them at a neutral site, we wouldn’t have expected upsets. And yet, now we put them at home, and we’re expecting upsets and we’re expecting great one-possession games? I just don’t agree.”
[Joel Klatt on X]