​ATLANTA, GEORGIA – JANUARY 20: Head coach Ryan Day and JT Tuimoloau #44 of the Ohio State Buckeyes hoist the trophy after beating the Notre Dame Fighting Irish 34-23 in the 2025 CFP National Championship at the Mercedes-Benz Stadium on January 20, 2025 in Atlanta, Georgia. (Photo by Carmen Mandato/Getty Images)Getty ImagesI’ve been previewing plenty of football betting odds the last few weeks, but in college football, there is one big question looming over the entire sport.How many teams should the playoff have?College football has always struggled to do something that every other sport figured out eons ago. That is figuring out the champion is. You might be old enough to remember – like me – when the whole thing was decided by (gasp) media polls at the end of the season. Before that, bowl games were showcases and the champion was picked before the bowls.Now, almost every bowl game is irrelevant, but that’s a different issue spelled “transfer portal.”Think of college football today as fractured fiefdoms where geography used to matter. The Big 8 used to matter. Heck, there used to be a Big 8. The SEC used to matter. The Big 10 definitely mattered. Heck, there was even a brief period of time when the Big East had football and they mattered too. Now all those fiefdoms have cracked or merged or disappeared completely like the Pac-12. There is no one single person in charge of college football. We have no czar, no commissioner. What we do have is plenty of people competing for their own interests and piece of the pie (read: money….it’s always about money).But now we do have playoffs. Last year it was 12 teams. There’s talk among those fiefdom rulers that it should be more teams.Traditionalists for the sport say that more is bad and we can’t have the Michigan/Ohio State regular season game not mean anything anymore!! (Or whatever rivalry game you love).I have bad news for you. Expanding the playoff is coming. And expanding the playoff is also correct.Do The Playoff MathLast year there were 138 FBS teams (Football Bowl Subdivision – one bad thing about not having one person in charge is that you get these terrible, clunky names) and 12 made the playoffs. That’s 8.7 percent of the teams.In the FCS division (Football Championship Subdivision – again, horrible name) there are 128 teams and the NCAA has a very credible 24-team playoff. That’s 18.75 percent of the teams who get in.SPARTANBURG, SC – DECEMBER 02: Brandon Goodson (14) quarterback Wofford College Terriers hands off the football against the Furman University Paladins in the FCS playoff game, Saturday, December 2, 2017, at Gibbs Stadium in Spartanburg, South Carolina. (Photo by David Allio/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)Icon Sportswire via Getty ImagesNCAA Basketball has 365 Division 1 teams. The tournament is 68 teams. That’s 18 percent of the schools make it.Since college football has now become NFLite, let’s look at how the professional guys do their playoffs.