College Football Playoff Preview
This is the 10th year of the College Football Playoff and it is shaping up to be the most interesting selection debate yet. It’s been an unusually chalky year at the top of the sport- this is the first time in several decades that we’ve gotten past Thanksgiving with 4 undefeated major conference teams, and that means that some resumes that would ordinarily make the playoff will be left out this year.
There are a lot of people who have delved into the various scenarios for this weekend’s games and tried to prognosticate what will happen in each of them. I decided to take a slightly different approach and utilized the betting odds to make the playoff to try to derive what the market is implying might happen in various scenarios. Here are some interesting things I found:
Michigan, Georgia, Washington and Florida State are in with a win. Oregon almost surely is as well.
No one will dispute that Michigan and Georgia are in the playoff with wins this weekend. There has been some buzz about the possibility that a 13-0 Florida State could be left out, but I find this quite unlikely. The Seminoles are both -140 to beat Louisville and to make the playoff. If you assume they have no chance with a loss, this implies to me that they’re a lock with a win.
Before going through with this exercise, I wasn’t certain that Oregon was a lock with a win over Washington. However, the Ducks are -355 to beat Washington and -340 to make the playoff, implying around a 97% chance that they make the field with a win on Friday.
Alabama and Texas both need help- Texas moreso.
Each column in the above table can be read as follows:
Win % - Market implied chance of winning this weekend
P(playoff with win) - Market implied chance of making the playoffs given that the team wins this weekend
P(playoff with loss) - Market implied chance of making the playoffs given that the team loses this weekend
P(playoff) - Market implied chance of making the playoff
Two things to note here- Alabama has an 88% chance of making the playoff if they beat Georgia, and Texas has a 42% chance of making the playoff if they beat Oklahoma State.
Texas has one very clear path to the playoff. If they beat Oklahoma State, Georgia beats Alabama and Louisville beats Florida State, the field will clearly be Georgia, Michigan, Texas and the Pac-12 champion. This scenario happens about 25% of the time. All of their other paths to the playoff are murky and involve either getting in over 12-1 Alabama or a Michigan loss.
Alabama is also in with a win and a Florida State loss. A Crimson Tide win and a Florida State win complicates things, as I’ll get into below.
Georgia and Michigan both have a chance with a loss.
Georgia is pretty much a coinflip to make the playoff with a loss this weekend- obviously their case would be greatly helped by a Florida State loss. Michigan is a massive favorite over Iowa, but I estimate they have around a 1 in 3 chance at making it if they lose.
If it comes down to Texas, Alabama and Georgia, the Crimson Tide are in better shape than the Longhorns and Bulldogs.
As I mentioned above, the easiest scenario for Texas is a win, a Georgia win and a Florida State loss. If Texas and Alabama both win, things get much trickier. If Texas, Alabama and Florida State win, there is 1 spot for Texas/Alabama/Georgia. If Texas, Alabama and Louisville win, there are 2 spots for Texas/Alabama/Georgia (all of this assumes Michigan beats Iowa).
In the scenario where there’s 1 spot for Texas/Alabama/Georgia, I estimate there’s about a 60% chance Alabama gets it, a 30% chance Texas gets it and a 10% chance Georgia gets it. If there’s 2 spots for Texas/Alabama/Georgia, I estimate there’s a 90% chance Alabama is in, a 60% chance Texas is in and a 50% chance that Georgia is in.
Ohio State is on life support, but not completely dead.
The best chance for the Buckeyes is for Michigan, Georgia, Louisville and Oklahoma State to win. This would pit the Buckeyes against the Pac-12 loser for the last spot, an argument I think they should win (especially if it’s a 2 loss Oregon). The Buckeyes have around a 3% chance at the field.
All of this analysis is only as good as the betting odds I’m using to make them, but the betting markets are reasonably tight and liquid so I think they form a good foundation for analysis. The markets are a bit higher on Alabama and Georgia’s chances and a bit lower on Texas’ than I would’ve guessed. Regardless, it is shaping up to be the most interesting conference championship weekend we’ve had since Auburn vaulted into the BCS title game in 2013.