Imagine this: The CFB powers decide that they need to appoint a commissioner. They conduct a survey among fans to deduce who will be the ideal candidate. The results are drawn and infer that you are the right guy. Now, you’re bestowed with the duties to run the sport. What changes would you bring about?

During the latest iteration of The Joel Klatt Show, the program’s namesake was asked this question. Sounds like a daunting task! So much power and so much to fix. The question reverberates even louder within the current dynamic of the sport, with a bunch of new facets being introduced in recent seasons. A CFB savant such as Joel Klatt was prepared with solutions to a multitude of issues. He discussed them in depth. Buckle up, because there is a lot to break down.

“It’s not just one thing that I would do. It’s a series of things to make the structure of the college football world work a lot better for 3 [factions]. The players, the coaches and the fans”, said Klatt before proceeding to his list. “Number one is I would organize the players. So there would be a players body or association”. “Once the players are [unionized] then you can start to collectively bargain with them”. He emphasized how this would avoid individuals going rogue in a sense and limit their ability to move around teams.

Klatt continued with his suggestions, saying “the second thing, which I think is vital, is [to] force agents to register. Once we have agents that are registered now we can control tampering. We know what’s being negotiated and where”. Both these changes would move college athletics closer to the linearity and efficiency of pro sports. 

“The third thing that I would do is that I would have the conferences hold the contracts for the players”, said Klatt. If conferences shared NIL revenue with players directly rather than going through the schools, there would be more transparency in how finances are allocated. Joel Klatt believes that these overarching changes will complement each other and improve the sport from the top down, all the way to the fans. Apart from this, he even had gripes with the current new CFP format.

Joel Klatt believes the 12-team CFP format is flawed

Klatt suggested that a 14-team playoff would serve better than a 12-team one. The notion has been floated extensively in the past. It may well be implemented from 2026 onwards when the next broadcasting deal kicks in.

Right one theme for this week in CFB, he then chimed in on discourse around strength of schedule. With so much talk about Indiana and their relatively easy path compared to teams like Georgia, Klatt had an answer. He suggested the league should make schedules for each team. These shall be based on how well they did in the previous season. The better the team, the more difficult their road next season and vice versa.

With so much to take in, one ponders whether CFB really does in fact need a commissioner. The sport is far from the finished product. Transformations are already ripe around the landscape. It will be interesting to see if any of Joel Klatt’s ideas are incorporated in the future.