With the field expanding from four teams to 12 this fall and a new television contract set to begin for the 2026 season, myself and many others believed it was the utmost importance for the future health of the sport that the College Football Playoff air on multiple television networks.
The Powers That Be that run the Playoff disagreed.
On Tuesday, The Athletic reported that ESPN and CFP are in agreement on a 6-year, $7.8 billion contract that will keep future editions of the Playoff on the Worldwide Leader through 2031-32.
As of this writing, there is no format in place for the Playoff beyond the 2025 season. The original 12-year contract expires after 2025, at which point the CFP could, in theory, revert back to four or even two teams, or expand to 16, 32 or even 134 teams. In theory.
However, having the framework of a new TV deal in place all but secures the field will remain at 12 teams through the 2031 season. With the financial terms laid out and agreed upon, expansion to 16 teams wouldn't make financial sense and contraction to eight teams would leave money on the table.
And while I and others remain of the opinion that it's good for College Football, Inc., to get games on multiple networks, it must be noted that the CFP exited its exclusive negotiating window with ESPN -- meaning other networks had the opportunity to bid on a package of games or even to take the entire contract from ESPN. Fox wrestled the rights to the Bowl Championship Series (save for the Rose Bowl) from 2006-07 to 2009-10, but the BCS and its successor the CFP have exclusively aired on ESPN ever since.
Last month, ESPN and the NCAA announced an 8-year, $920 million contract to make ESPN the exclusive home of essentially every NCAA-owned championship other than the men's basketball tournament. Now, ESPN will keep the FBS championship as well.
Clearly, maintaining its status as the default home of college sports is a major institutional priority in Bristol.
ESPN currently pays $608 million to air the two CFP semifinals, the national championship and the four additional New Year's Six games. The new contract will pay the CFP and its member conferences $1.3 billion per year -- a 113 percent increase in gross dollars, and a jump from roughly $87 million per game to $118 million.
And though ESPN is paying the CFP for the right to own the postseason tournament, there is a possibility games could appear on other networks or streamers. The Athletic notes that ESPN could sublicense games to competitors at Fox, NBC or CBS, or to Amazon Prime, Apple TV+ or others.
With a TV deal in place, the next order of business for the CFP management committee is to settle on a format. It's expected the CFP will adopt a 5+7 model, where five spots will be reserved for the five highest-rated conference champions and seven to at-larges (who are ineligible for first-round byes), but that part of the contract remains unwritten.
As always, stay tuned to The Scoop for the latest.