"We had large margins forever": Frustrated Joel Klatt gives haters reality check for criticizing 12-team CFP after first-round duds

By Krutik Jain

Modified Dec 24, 2024 12:30 GMT

NFL: Play Football Prospect Clinic with Special Olympic Athletes - Source: Imagn — Joel Klatt defends 12-team playoff format despite blowout results - Source: Imagn

The newly introduced 12-team College Football Playoff field has left analysts like Joel Klatt divided. Last week, all CFB first-round games were played, but none were even remotely close. These one-sided affairs have led analysts, including Paul Finebaum, to speak negatively about the format, which was supposed to add excitement among fans.

However, Joel Klatt feels such lopsided games happen all the time even in the NFL. The analyst isn't buying the 12-team playoff field being a "dud," citing examples of such one sided games both in college football and NFL.

"These types of margins that we experienced in the first round of the college football playoff happen all the time," Joel Klatt said. "It’s been happening in the college football playoff under the four-team model forever. We’ve had some absolute duds in the semifinals and even in the championship game.

"I witnessed firsthand Georgia score 60—what was it?—five points on TCU, okay? So let’s not be revisionist in our history, acting as if everything else used to be incredible. Now, this 12-team model, people are saying it’s a bridge too far because of these margins? That’s not a thing, okay? We’ve had large margins forever in our sport."

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Joel Klatt doubles down on his defense for 12-team CFP citing NFL examples

To bolster his point, Joel Klatt draws parallels with the NFL playoffs, where large margins of victory are common in the wildcard round.

"There are large margins in the NFL as well," Klatt added. "If you look at last year’s wildcard round of the NFL playoffs, it wasn’t good. It wasn’t good. And yet, I didn’t hear anybody yelling and screaming that the Eagles didn’t deserve to be in the playoffs when they played the Bucs and lost 32-9.

"I didn’t hear anybody saying, 'Why are the Dolphins in the playoffs? This is ridiculous,' when they got beat 26-7 by the Kansas City Chiefs. Did you know that in the 2023 NFL wildcard round, the average margin of victory in those six games was 17.5 points? Seventeen and a half. Home teams went 5-1."

Klatt points out that no one questions the legitimacy of the NFL playoffs despite these results. Instead, factors like home-field advantage heavily influence outcomes in both college football and the NFL.

Klatt even suggested putting such games on neutral venues and maybe then games could be closer. However, the criticism of the format is unwarranted.