ESPN announcers Joe Buck and Troy Aikman aren’t fans of the way some people have been talking about the new 12-team College Football Playoff.
Notre Dame, Penn State, Texas and Ohio State all won their opening-round matchups with relative ease, leaving some to complain about the way the new format has shaken out.
Fellow ESPNer Kirk Herbstreit at one point said that Indiana “was not a team that should’ve been on that field” after they were soundly beaten by the Fighting Irish.
But Buck and Aikman did not feel the same and the pair defended the way things have gone this year in the CFP during a break in the action between the Packers and Saints on “Monday Night Football.”
“I think the disappointment is for those that want to question whether those teams belonged in the playoff,” Aikman said. “I think to make those comments after the fact and after they had devastating losses by the amount that they did — I don’t know that that’s fair to anybody. We see teams in the Super Bowl that lose by large margins. And they were worthy. So, hat’s off to those winners and really all those teams — whether they lost last week or not.”
Buck, who is an Indiana alum, chimed in on the topic as well and said the negative chatter didn’t diminish how “awfully proud” alumni of Indiana are after the year they’ve had.
“And I think what it does is it diminishes the job that the teams that won did,” Buck said. “Like in the case of Notre Dame or Penn State and the job that they did in winning those games. I mean, it’s sports. And not everybody shows up with their A-game every night. But it’s been a fun collegiate season.
Buck compared the conversation to the one that fans have during March Madness each year and the complaints some fans end up having about who made it and who did not.
“I guess, you know, you can put 100 teams in there and there will still be someone upset about it,” Buck added.
The College Football Playoff resumes on New Year’s Eve when No. 6 Penn State battles No. 3 Boise State.
