Introduction
Friday 9th October was a pretty interesting day. South Alabama beat Alabama State in the highest scoring FBS game of the year, UTSA won over South Florida, and a deadline expired in terms of the College Football Playoff (CFP), and a move to 24 teams.
To say we know a 24 team playoff is coming is pretty obvious. The conference championship games as we know it will be eliminated, and replaced with a new 1st Round of Playoff games. For ESPN, this will help them financialy in terms of any negotiations, as outside of the B1G Championship game which is owned by the B1G Network then licensed to FOX, CBS or NBC (Who sold it back to FOX this year for somewhere in the region of $55 Million), ESPN / ABC own all of the other conference championship games in the FBS.
The deadline wasn’t for ESPN and the CFP to jump further into bed with each other, but more of a case of either to agree outright terms, OR for the CFP to submit it’s final proposals to ESPN, who will then have until roughly Monday October 19th to respond in kind. After October 19th, in theory, the rights will go to the open market and other networks will have the option to bid for the CFP contract directly, part of it, or come to an agreement with ESPN the same way TNT currently do for a couple of Quarter Final games.
The CFP have released an update through that wonderful medium known as X, which we still call Twitter to reminisce about the ‘Good ol’ Days’. This is from Chris Vannini, who is a senior writer at the Athletic:
“While Friday, October 9 marked the end of the exclusive 30-day negotiating period with ESPN, we continue to have ongoing discussions with ESPN regarding media rights connected to potential Playoff expansion to 24 teams. The dialogue throughout the window has been constructive, and we will carry these conversations forward with ESPN as we determine the path ahead. Given the confidential nature of these discussions, there isn’t more to share at this time. We will provide additional updates when appropriate.”
With this still up in the air somewhat, and based again on silly questions and predictions on Social Media, this is as concise a primer I can produce on the matter.
Will There Be A 24 Team Playoff?
Yes. The B1G and SEC both support it, which in the world of the Power 4 Conferences being a not so secret Power 2, means it has enough traction. There was a possibility that it could have happened for this year, but time expired on the clock the same way it did on the Washington Commanders in OT over the weekend.
The other conferences are onboard in a sense that they hope there will be more eyeballs on the product. Outside of the P4 Conferences, the most intriguing part of the other conference championship games is the Dr Pepper ‘throwing’ contest, which has actually become a game of chest pushing a football towards a bucket. Hopefully these will disappear altogether or become a kicking shootout or something.
In some ways it fixes some of the discussion I wanted to have about the PAC-12 & MW, then C-USA & SBC and the AAC & MAC having combined ‘champion showdown’ games in order to improve their draft stock. This is nestled in the detail of another article I’m in the process of writing around W1 – W4 scheduling (Remember, W0 is gone), and how the Go6 teams need to schedule amongst themselves to build up some form of credibility and decent games early in the season.
Will ESPN Keep All the Games?
In short… Maybe, but even if they take ‘control’ of the entire package, expect there to be a sub-license of sort to FOX, CBS/TNT, but likely not NBC who feel at this point they’re too deep into hot water with their B1G contract and ND Football.
I would expect something similar to the Quarter Finals in the current CFP format, where TNT/CBS (As they are now essentially one), or FOX would be interested in part of the package, and frankly ESPN has too much going on in it’s own yard. Aside from the FCS. DII and DIII playoffs, ESPN controls half of ‘Bowl Mania’, and whilst there was a time to just have football on TV for the sake of it, this was at a time when ESPN was making more money than anything else in Disney’s portfolio from carriage fees. Things have changed. At the same time, ESPN will want to keep the FCS / DII / DIII rights as proof of depth, as College Football is essentially the network’s bread and butter still in 2026.
Who Else May Get Involved, And How?
My mind first goes to FOX. Of course, FOX have had the BCS National Championship game and it’s accompanying accouchements, but this was a time when FOX barely had any other CFB rights, and were just moving people around from other assignments in what will go down as one of the worst rights sales in history. That was the mid – 2000s though.
Since then, FOX / FS1 have tried twice to launch a College Football pregame show, essentially settling with BIG NOON KICKOFF being at the site of a game that will be shown in the noon window on FOX (Or if it’s the case of the Union Jack Classic, FS1). So they have the first part nailed down, as even though they don’t beat ESPN in a straight ratings fight, this is not the same numbers that the ‘as good’ FOX Sports Live had against Sportscenter, which was painful for anyone to read. BIG NOON KICKOFF can hang.
Then you have the actual games they may bid for themselves. People either love or hate Gus Johnson, but with the right inventory, they would use much of the crew they use on Saturdays anyway. Remember, FOX owns at least some rights to the BIG, XII, and MW. You turn on FOX, FS1 or B1G Network (Which remember they own 61% of), at any point on a Saturday in the fall these days, each network (And maybe even FS2) will have games. That’s a massive difference from before. I’d argue that they actually have better graphics than ESPN, but that’s both a taste issue and something that will need to be tested in a Playoff format (Just NOT the [CENSORED] graphics; please!)
If not FOX, then it’s realistically only going to be CBS / TNT Sports, which at some point will become one entity or at worst two, loosely tied together. Outside of the [CENSORTED] rights they now have to re-negotiate early due to the network ownership change, the message seems to be consolidate, and be intelligent. We all remember what happened with NBA rights on TNT, and whilst not having them is a bit more cash in the back pocket, the entire NBA / Inside the NBA / Kevin Harlan’s ad reads were just printing money.
At the very least, I would expect CBS / TNT to continue the same sub-licensing agreement as they currently have, because it’ll work cheaper overall, and it’s actually less work. From what I understand, it’s essentially and ESPN production, just with TNT mouthpieces, so it’s not a full outlay as bidding directly would be. And that could be the important point overall.
In all honesty, outside of a couple of 1st round and Quarter Final games, I don’t see much movement here. CBS likely wouldn’t be able to ‘sell’ the games as a full on CBS production unless they took the direct bidding route, and the name of the game at CBS / TNT sports is being both prudent and strategic with investments in what is a slightly bloated combined sports network with lots of ‘filler’, but not much in the way of headlines.
I don’t see NBC getting involved at all. They, like CBS know that [CENSORED] rights are coming up in the next few years due to the shield wanting to jump the gun and go in early, and with streamers likely chomping at the bit when it comes to Sunday Night Football. This I believe is NBC’s number 1 priority.
There is a strong part of me that feels that NBC are also still bitter with the way that their B1G Saturday Night broadcasts have panned out. In theory they should have offered a decent alternative to ABC’s SEC filled Saturday Night Football, and whatever is replicated on ESPN, ESPN2, ACC Network and SEC Network. But it never did, not because of B1G and FOX entirely, but because of the contracts the schools started to pull out once they tried scheduling them into primetime, Michigan and Ohio State being the biggest names.
People actually forget that there were games airing on CBS and NBC in 2024 without a contract actually being signed. That is how messed up the B1G conference rights became. And NBC wouldn’t want any more of that. In direct comparison to CBS / TNT, I think that NBC would rather BID for part of the rights, knowing exactly what they would receive, rather than play the sub-license game and end up with blowout games.
I don’t see a world where they could use the Notre Dame concept of showing any game they are in because it’s both too disjointed, and also Notre Dame games in playoffs just print money. Simple as that.
Conclusions: So, Then, What?
There are, in my mind two realistic options:
ESPN and the CFP agree something before rights go to market, where ESPN will pay the CFP the money they need, indirectly paying off the cost of Conference Championship games, as teams represented will still get a payout.
From here, ESPN will licence two tranches of the playoff, one to FOX, and one to TNT sports (Or whatever they will be called down the line). These will be for parts of the rights up to the Quarter Finals, with ESPN / ABC keeping the Semi Finals & Finals to themselves.
The rights go out to the open market, and both FOX and NBC make partial bids. FOX will want to alternate the Championship game with ESPN every other year (Like what used to be the case with CBS / TNT sports before they became one in NCAABM), and have about half of the rights across the entire playoff picture.
NBC’s bid will in effect be for some early games, as they don’t have the money / capacity to compete with FOX / ESPN. Whilst welcomed, the bid is shrugged off by the CFP. CBS / TNT sports won’t bid, as they don’t want any other ‘firm’ contracts where they are responsible for everything on their docket until they’ve cleaned their house up. They hope that they can sublicense games down the road.
At the end of it all, it will come down to how much FOX are prepared to bid. After all their divestments over the last 10 years or so, they will likely have the cash, and also a way to sell their product as a football ‘synergy’ the way that is harder for ESPN to do with only 1 NFL game a week. I expect that FOX will bid high, especially as ESPN have recently tried to ‘devalue’ part of the playoff and payoff by removing conference championship games. FOX owning in effect 61% of the B1G Championship Game may be a factor in the end. An investment that could pay over the top when the dust settles.
If ESPN end up walking away with everything, expect sublicensing galore, especially in the early inventory. ESPN have enough to focus on that they can lose a few games and make some money in doing so. If it becomes a FOX / ESPN project, there will be no 3rd / 4th broadcaster in my mind. The networks will be looking to promote what they have as best they can.
Next week will be interesting in a broadcast perspective for sure. I wrote this on Tuesday 13th October 2026. If I’m right, just take it as a point that I know my stuff in this area. If I’m completely wrong, then I apologise for you reading this article, but I won’t take it down. I’ll own my mistakes instead!
Peace, Rage & Love
