Mike Elko met with the media briefly earlier today as part of the SEC Spring Meetings in Destin, Florida. Though it was a very brief window of time that Elko got to speak to the assembled reporters, any and every Elko presser is a must-watch.
In this availability, Elko was asked about many topics surrounding the changing sport of college football, and he handled all the questions with aplomb, as you'd expect. One answer, though, is getting a lot of attention already.
Elko was asked about the extremely hot topic of College Football Playoff expansion, something that has been in the news a lot lately. His answer was perfectly him and perfectly expressed— and completely honest, to boot.
Texas A&M coach Mike Elko hilariously skewers expanded playoff idea
Here's what the head man had to say:
"I don't know why you ask us. It doesn't matter what we think. I don't know why we're trying to become a trophy sport. What does Mike Elko want? 40. Then I won't get fired. It's OK to make it hard to get to the playoff... None of us are answering for the good of the sport. We're answering for the good of ourselves."Mike Elko
That's some brutal and unflinching honesty from the head man, to be sure. His trademark dry humor being sprinkled in there is a great touch, as well, and shows why this man is quickly becoming one of the most popular coaches in the sport.
Elko has the right idea, of course. Though it feels inevitable, expanding the playoff over and over simply won't do anything for the health of the sport. It may boost TV revenues, of course, but it will also ruin key regular season games.
This ever-expanding field also runs counter to the idea of having a playoff in the first place. If you're going to have a field that competes for the national championship at the end of the season, it needs to be a selective one: though this is a sport with many, many teams, it's still kind of absurd to have a bigger playoff field than the NFL, NBA, NHL, or MLB.
This all seems like it's worthless to talk about in one way, at this point. The slowly-moving tide of public opinion continues to inch towards the expanded playoff one way or another. The first year of expansion was a lot of fun for fans (with the exception of games like Oregon-JMU), but that will be quickly diluted as the field gets bigger and bigger.
This is simply a sport where Cinderalla runs don't happen. You may have a lower-level team win a game every once in a while, like Boise State over Oklahoma in the Fiesta Bowl, but stringing together wins of that kind is extremely demanding, and most teams can't do it.
Mike Elko recognizes the changing nature of the sport and what's needed to address it, and he's not only doing that in College Station, he's using his platform and influence to do so more broadly. Kudos to Elko for concisely expressing what so many already feel about this idea.
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