Alabama Crimson Tide

Bye Tide: The Case For No. 1 To Go Straight To CFP Final

Published Jun. 30, 2017 6:28 p.m. ET

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Alabama is No. 1 in the country, which isn’t a surprise. But the Crimson Tide is SO far ahead of the rest, it is time to consider a bye straight into the final.

Saying the Alabama Crimson Tide is the No. 1 team in the country isn’t exactly a news flash.

There are Aleutians who know the Crimson Tide as well as the actual tides.

Kim Jong-un allows Alabama football scores to be broadcast freely in North Korea.

If we ever discover intelligent life on other planets, odds are they’ll know about Nick Saban.

Alabama is No. 1 about like how the sun rises in the East and sets in the West. It is doubling down on 11 in blackjack and putting $2 on Secretariat to win in 1973.

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OK, we know what you’re thinking. This is the online version of the Sports Illustrated Jinx. No one talks about the no-hitter while it is in progress. Thing is, Alabama football has a recent way of convincing even the most cynical among us that the Crimson Tide might well never lose again.

Alabama is such a consensus No. 1 that if it wasn’t for the pesky games getting in the way, AD Bill Battle might as well have the granite engravers and flag company on speed-dial to prepare for yet another national championship.

Which is why we propose a radical idea: One team each season should get a “bye” straight to the College Football Championship national title game.

Plus-One Turbo

Call it the Plus-One Turbo model, or simply the Saban System. Every year, without fail, there is an overwhelming No. 1 team that far and away stands above the rest. That team gets a pass straight to the national title game.

The CFP committee then decides which teams are ranked Nos. 2-5 and pits them into the usual four-team playoff semifinals. The emerging winner gets the No. 1 team for it all.

The benefits of this are numerous. Most obviously, instituting the Saban System injects one more game into the system – which also means MORE television revenue into the mix.

The Plus-One Turbo also solves the recurring problem presented when there is either an undefeated Group Of 5 team or a superpower team from the same conference as one of the other four teams.

And the incentive of earning the No. 1 seed in the Plus-One Turbo is obvious – rest and scouting while the other four battle it out. Striving to be No 1 means EVERY game really matters (not that Alabama or other mega-conference teams are exactly coasting into the existing system) and means that “how” you win your games mean more than just winning them.

Putting the Saban System into effect would take some work, of course, as the NFL Playoffs would need to be navigated around. National Signing Day would need to be pushed back a week or two, to give Alabama (and, we suppose, whomever might make the game along with the Tide) that extra time to finalize another stellar class. And there might be the stray academic out there who would bray against putting ONE more game into the mix.

But really, it makes sense. Alabama likely WON’T lose another game (there might even be a proposition wager on that somewhere in the desert …) again, so there surely should be some benefit to the kind of dominance we are seeing – dominance that might never be duplicated.

It’s time for the Saban System. And to order more Walk of Champions granite and championship flags.

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