Greg McElroy College Football Playoff rankings Screengrab via ESPN
By Matt Yoder on

Nothing tends to create more debate and drama in sports than the weekly rankings of the College Football Playoff. But with the first rankings released for the 2025 season on Tuesday night, ESPN college football analyst Greg McElroy was struggling to find a bone to pick.

As the first CFP rankings were released, Big Ten powerhouses Ohio State and Indiana led the way at #1 and #2 respectively. They were followed by Texas A&M, Alabama, Georgia, and Ole Miss from the SEC. BYU, Texas Tech, Notre Dame, Virginia, and Memphis rounded out the rest of the field. Red River rivals Texas and Oklahoma were the first two schools on the outside looking in this week.

The CFP rankings closely followed the AP Poll rankings with the lone exception Oregon being ranked a few spots lower.

So when it came time to debate the rankings and sink some teeth into the favored college football pastime of debating hypotheticals, eye tests, who looks better getting off the bus, and conference superiority narratives, McElroy was left with not much to work with.

“I’m like baffled right now,” McElroy said. “Because I really agree with the rankings. I don’t have like a huge issue outside of maybe a team or two that might be slightly too high, too low, this ranking makes sense. This is the first time I feel like in an initial ranking where it’s like, I understand why they did that. That makes sense to me. They’re putting premiums on how a team has looked, how consistent they have played. They’re penalizing teams that haven’t played anybody just yet or don’t have a great win a la Oregon, who by the way looks great, but they haven’t played enough people yet to warrant a higher ranking… I just think they did a great job this week and I’m like flabbergasted by it. Tip of the cap to the committee.”

The weekly College Football Playoff rankings show has been a hot mess ever since it started. It typically brings out the worst in college football fandom and media as tribalization goes to the extremes. Kirk Herbstreit even washed his hands of the entire exercise after having to be subjected to so much stress from trying to analyze it week after week.

But if this is what we get on a weekly basis in 2025, maybe it will be a kinder and gentler season for the college football universe. LSU and Penn State have a better chance of playing for the national championship this year, but it’s nice to dream.

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