How do we know the 12-team CFP is perfect? Because it feels too small

It's an odd-but-true paradox of life: You know you have the right amount of something when you feel like you don't have enough of it.

Ever been on vacation two days too short? A dream. You're already dying to go back. Ever been on a vacation two days too long? You might as well be in prison. 

"You go see a comedian, at an hour and 10 minutes, you love the guy. At an hour and 30 it's like, 'Eh. I thought he was never going to finish,'" Jerry Seinfeld once said. "It's a small amount of too much -- too much cake, too much anything, and it changes the whole feeling." 

So it is with vacations, with entertainment, with dessert, as it is with the College Football Playoff. 

For starters, let's state the obvious: this year, the 12-team CFP is really a 10-team bracket. The fourth- and fifth-ranked conference champions, no matter who they end up being, will not have gotten into this field without guaranteed slots. That doesn't mean whichever teams wind up filling those slots have anything to apologize for, but it's upped the ante on the seven remaining at-large slots. And everyone on the wrong side of the bubble feels it.

Texas and Miami are chirping at each other. BYU is chirping at Texas. The ACC is sniping Notre Dame (which is ironic, because no one has done more to prop Notre Dame into its cushy spot than the ACC). 

All of those teams have points for and against them, but that's not the point.

The 12-team Playoff has hit the sweet spot of expanding access while also not suffocating the unique flair that makes college football's regular season the best in American sports. That's a difficult see-saw to balance. The Big Ten's 4+ model would kill that, by the way. 

Notre Dame, Miami, Texas and BYU (not necessarily in that order) all have strong arguments to make the CFP, both in a vacuum -- all are above where SMU, the last team in last year's field, finished in 2024; Notre Dame is the No. 3 team team in the country in that metric -- and against teams currently in the field. Personally, I think the Irish would have a puncher's chance to win the dang thing if they make it in. 

But all of those teams have left the door to their exclusion open. If deserving teams are left out, that means no undeserving teams made it in. The vacation is too short, not too long. 

BCS-style politicking is not proof that the College Football Playoff is too small. In fact, we'll know the Playoff has become too large when the politicking goes away.