Chip Shots: Having My Cake. Eating My Cake.

A funny thing happened on the way to college football becoming a game for the highest bidder.

The rich got richer. And then they started losing anyway.

Last weekend, the experience was like having my cake and eating my cake.

Fore reference, “having your cake, and eating it, too” is not the proper original phrase.

Last Saturday, five of the top seven teams in the country went down in a single day all lost, producing one of the most chaotic weekends the sport has ever seen: 

Georgia (ranked #1), Notre Dame (2), Indiana (5), Alabama (6), and Texas (7)

When NIL and the transfer portal exploded onto the scene, many fans assumed college football would become even more predictable. The biggest brands would use their huge coffers to stockpile the best players while squeezing everyone else out.

There is some truth to this concern.

Programs like Texas, Ohio State, Georgia, and Notre Dame still enjoy enormous advantages. They have larger donor bases, deeper resources, stronger facilities, and national recruiting reach. Nobody should pretend the financial playing field is level.

But the results on the field suggest something more complicated is happening.

Rather than concentrating all talent in a handful of programs, NIL has also created opportunities for players who might have sat on the bench at a traditional powerhouse. Instead of waiting two or three years for playing time, athletes can transfer to a program where they can play immediately and still earn compensation. This talent redistribution has strengthened teams outside the traditional elite.

Look no further than this week's rankings. BYU sits at No. 2 after beating Notre Dame. Miami is No. 1. Programs such as Texas Tech, Utah, UCLA, and Tennessee have all climbed into prominent positions.

Twenty years ago, seeing this collection of schools near the top of the rankings would have been far less common.

The transfer portal has essentially created free agency. A backup quarterback, receiver, or defensive starter can now become a difference-maker somewhere else almost overnight. This mobility makes rosters more volatile, but it also makes more teams competitive.

The result is a paradox.

The wealthiest programs still have advantages, perhaps bigger ones than ever. Yet the weekly outcomes feel less predictable. The top teams may have more talent, but they no longer have a monopoly on it.

I did not see this part of college football’s new world order coming. Did any of you?

This is why we're seeing more upsets and fewer dominant dynasties.

The expanded playoff contributes to this trend as well. More teams believe they have a realistic path to the postseason, which keeps more programs investing, recruiting, and retaining talent. A loss once considered a season-ender now creates urgency instead.

Is pay-to-play making the rich richer?

Absolutely.

Is it also creating more parity?

Surprisingly, yes.

The biggest brands still occupy the penthouse, but the gap between the penthouse and the rest of the neighborhood appears smaller than many expected.

Last Saturday offered a pretty compelling piece of evidence. If money alone determines the outcomes in college football these days, how come five of the nation's top seven teams lost on the same day? 

College football might never be financially equal. But one of my favorite takeaways is looking at how many teams caught up to and surpassed the Southeast Conference (SEC) schools who were paying players before it was legal.

In the 2010s the worst thing that could happen to college football did happen.

Two Southern teams were featured in 7 of the 10 BCS/College Football Playoff (CFP) title games, turning college football’s biggest game into a battle of regional interest.

The SEC kept rolling from 2020-2022 with Southern schools matched against each other in two of those three title games.

Now, in recent years, the last three CFP champions are all Big 10 teams, institutions academically superior to most SEC schools, with larger alumni and greater institutional wealth. One could argue – since Washington joined the Big Ten the year following it’s CFP runner-up season – now it’s the Big Ten landing in each title game.

Even so, in the first two expanded CFPs, the featured teams have more relevance on a national platform: Ohio State and Notre Dame for all the marbles, followed by Indiana’s emergence from just being a basketball school defeating the Miami Hurricanes, a small-enrollment private school (like Notre Dame) but maintaining a national following.

With Ohio State and Indiana donning the two most recent crowns, and the topsy turvy top ten emerging this week, I am having my cake, and I’m eating my cake.