$325 million before ever playing in MLB? Why international stars are getting huge free agent contracts
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Jesse Rogers, ESPN Staff Writer
Though MLB free agency has moved at a snail’s pace for many this winter, there was one group of players who cashed in early: free agents coming to the majors from Asia’s two largest professional leagues, Japan’s Nippon Professional Baseball Organization and the Korea Baseball Organization.
Led by Japanese pitcher Yoshinobu Yamamoto, who signed with the Los Angeles Dodgers for a package worth $325 million, teams have spent over $530 million on players who, in most cases, have never played an inning in the big leagues.
That kind of guaranteed payday was unheard of even just a few offseasons ago. In 2001, Ichiro Suzuki became the first Japanese-born position player to join MLB, signing a three-year, $14 million contract with the Seattle Mariners as the first Japanese-born position player to join MLB. Adjusted for inflation, that deal would be worth just $24 million today — for a player who’s a lock to make the Hall of Fame next year.
“If he was coming over today, he’d sign for at least $150 million,” one agent said. “Probably more.”
So what has changed? Why are teams willing to give out that kind of sum to players who have never hit or thrown a major league pitch — or to those returning from Japan or Korea after struggling in MLB?
According to front office executives and agents involved in many of these deals, the market for these players this winter was years in the making.
Improved technology
The biggest change in talent evaluation since Ichiro signed his deal is simple: the ease of finding information on players in leagues across the world has improved.
Previously viewed as around the equivalent of the high minor leagues, the competition in the Japanese and Korean leagues — and more importantly how teams track performance — has grown exponentially. It has provided more certainty than ever about players.
“The world has shrunk,” said Rod Blunck, senior adviser of contracts for the Octagon Agency. “Even 10 years ago, streaming wasn’t available. Now you can watch everything.”
Though pitchers and hitters in Japan and Korea aren’t facing major-league-caliber counterparts in their respective leagues, a spin rate or release point there is the same spin rate or release point here. Teams don’t just have to rely on potentially flawed surface-level stats anymore.
“The advancements in scouting, especially the technology, have increased the ability for teams to dig into the talent and skill of those players like never before,” said Joel Wolfe, who represents Yamamoto. “Of the twelve teams in the NPB, eight have Trackman or Hawk-Eye.
“Every front office can see the analysis of every pitch thrown, every start, immediately after the data comes in as if, for example, Yamamoto or whoever pitched against the Reds yesterday.”
More data means more certainty in decision-making.
Octagon represents left-hander Shota Imanaga, who signed a four-year, $53 million contract with the Chicago Cubs last month. Blunck might have overprepared in advance of talks with the team.
“All the information on Imanaga I had that I thought was so important, they had also,” he said. ” All the same metrics that we have here [at the agency], they have there. They can compare apples to apples now.”
Cubs general manager Carter Hawkins summed it up this way: “More things can be measured now. The more we can, we can use that data to test hypotheses. The more we can test hypotheses, the more we can remove some doubt. Then we’re more willing to take on some more risk.”
Wolfe, who also represents outfielder Seiya Suzuki and pitchers Kodai Senga and Yu Darvish, was asked what’s changed just in the time since Darvish came to MLB from the NPB, signing a six-year, $60 million deal with the Texas Rangers in 2012.
“A lot has changed over the last decade and some has stayed the same,” Wolfe said. “The thing that has stayed the same is the way teams value the history, training methods, diligence and discipline of Japanese players, culturally. These players are known to be religious about baseball. That hasn’t changed. What has changed is the technology. We can measure everything now.”
The WBC effect
This offseason, the World Baseball Classic — which began in 2006, and is played once every three or four years — played a part, too. The 2023 tournament provided major league front offices with a look at international players that they normally don’t get leading up to their respective seasons overseas, in a high-pressure environment that gave a small taste of what players can expect in MLB. And executives were watching closely as some of the world’s best players shined.
“It just gave us a more fully formed objective opinion to layer on with the data,” Dodgers general manager Brandon Gomes said. “Having both of those things helps increase conviction level in how someone is going to perform back here in the big leagues. The WBC helped with that.”
It was only 7.1 innings across two games, but Yamamoto’s participation at the WBC last spring gave teams a baseline to work with as he approached his platform season in the NPB. He wasn’t the only one getting exposure: Imanaga and lefty Yuki Matsui both appeared in games for Team Japan while outfielder Jung Hoo Lee wowed scouts and executives in the tournament, going 6-for-14 with a .500 on-base percentage for Korea. All signed major league deals this offseason.
“Once the WBC happened, the whole world realized the value of Japanese pitchers,” Wolfe said. “Then executives see it more and more when they go over there and experience it firsthand.”
The returning player
One of the deals out of the KBO this year came from a player who has played in MLB — just not successfully.
“It was a great place for me to go and get a ton of innings and work on my stuff,” said new White Sox pitcher Erick Fedde, who signed a 2-year, $15 million deal in December. “The goal going over there was of course to come back to the big leagues.”
Fedde was a first-round pick of the Washington Nationals in 2014 but in 102 career games, including 88 starts, he compiled a 5.41 ERA before being non-tendered after the 2022 season. He made $2.15 million that final year in Washington before signing with the NC Dinos in the KBO last year.
He added a sweeper to his repertoire just in time for his 2023 season, when he went 20-6 with a 2.00 ERA over 30 starts in Korea. In the span of 12 months, Fedde won the MVP and the Korean league equivalent of the Cy Young before signing with the White Sox.
Whether it be current pitchers such as Fedde, Merrill Kelly and Miles Mikolas, or past hitters including Cecil Fielder and Gabe Kapler, excelling in Japan or Korea has long been a path to reviving a struggling career. Kelly helped the Arizona Diamondbacks to the World Series in his fifth season after returning from four seasons in the KBO.
“I think teams started to see tangible impact before Merrill, but it certainly is another point along the spectrum of, there is real value in players gaining experiences over there and it translates,” Diamondbacks GM Mike Hazen said.
White Sox GM Chris Getz said Kelly was indeed a data point for him in his pursuit of Fedde, but he didn’t commit based solely on players who came before him. Getz was asked if it was Fedde’s pitch arsenal or simply his numbers that convinced the team he could have success this time around in MLB.
“The combination of both,” Getz answered. “When you look at the projection system and have the ability to get a better understanding, is it going to translate? Should it translate? There was enough support there to feel like we should go and get Erick Fedde.
“He was the most feared pitcher in that league, and the numbers show it.”
What’s next?
Through technology, improved scouting and simply a better-played game in the NPB and KBO, MLB teams are bringing those players to their own organizations at a successful rate.
Many believe questions about how to best adjust to MLB and life in the United States have now surpassed those about whether a player coming over from those leagues can play in the majors.
Analytics don’t show if an American diet or playing across multiple time zones for the first time or simply living in a foreign country will have an adverse impact on a player. Now, MLB organizations are looking inward to make that transition comfortable.
Suzuki’s first season with the Cubs in 2022 is a good example. His performance was sporadic, and his adjustment to the big leagues came slowly. The team, player and his agent identified his new diet as a concern. He wasn’t the best version of himself in that first year so they attacked a solvable problem.
In 2023, it wasn’t an issue.
“Team infrastructures have gotten better at helping players from different cultures assimilate to cities and teams and the MLB style of play,” Hawkins said. “We’ve been doing it here [in Chicago].”
But, undoubtedly, the Cubs and other teams would like to eliminate that transition period as much as possible. Why take a year to figure things out?
Wolfe thinks Senga’s first season with the Mets will be a template for those that come after him. He didn’t need much time to get acclimated, compiling a 2.98 ERA in 29 starts in 2023. How the Mets handled his transition is another data point.
“Players there [in Japan or Korea] are used to a seven-man rotation and one time zone,” Wolfe said. “That adjustment might be the bigger question. But it can be solved with money, effort and communication.”
The Dodgers, while signing Yamamoto to that massive deal, addressed those questions as well, and came away satisfied.
“We don’t have concerns that he’s not going to make the transition effectively,” Gomes said. “And getting to know the person and who he surrounds himself with, on top of what he brings on the mound, is a lot where that comfortable level comes from. Of course, you can’t know everything.”
And that’s true on the field, too. If it was truly apples to apples, Fedde’s season (20-6, 2.00, 209 K’s) in the KBO would have translated to a bigger contract. While spin rates and velo translate, that’s not necessarily the case for the caliber of player faced.
“The competition isn’t quite the major leagues, but each team had a couple of major league hitters,” Fedde said. “Not quite as much power, but they work in different ways.”
While the margin for error in assessing players has been greatly reduced, it will never be an exact science.
But following the money has been a good indication where the sport is going, and teams from the A’s to the Dodgers are investing in players who have played in the NPB and KBO. The world took notice when Los Angeles committed more than $1 billion on players this winter who grew up in the game overseas — the best indication yet of how the market is growing.
“We have more coverage from scouting to information and technology than ever before,” Gomes said. “Being able to break down players that are performing well wherever in the world they are. There’s just a greater level of comfort in making investments in players coming over here or coming back here. We’re glad we did.”
Miami is inching closer but still needs some help.
With the Hurricanes creeping up to No. 12 on Tuesday night in the College Football Playoff selection committee’s fourth of six rankings, the ACC’s hope of having two teams qualify for the 12-team field is still alive. Time is running out, though, to convince the selection committee they’re better than Notre Dame — and right now a gap remains in spite of the head-to-head win. The ACC champion — even if it’s No. 18 Virginia — is almost certainly guaranteed a spot as one of the five-highest ranked conference champions. That’s evidenced by the fact that five ACC teams are still ranked above No. 24 Tulane, the only representative from a Group of 5 conference. The question is whether Miami can do enough to join the ACC champion as an at-large team with one game remaining, on Saturday at No. 22 Pitt.
Though the Canes have no margin for error and could still use some help above them, they might get it if Ole Miss doesn’t win the Egg Bowl against Mississippi State. No. 6 Oregon jumped one spot above No. 7 Ole Miss, indicating that the Rebels might not recover from a second stumble.
With Rivalry Week on the horizon, there are still plenty of scenarios that can unfold — and hope is still oozing from the bubble.
Bubble Watch accounts for what we have learned from the committee so far — and historical knowledge of what it means for teams clinging to hope. Teams with Would be in status below are in this week’s bracket based on the committee’s fourth ranking. For each Power 4 conference, we’ve also listed Last team in and First team out. These are the true bubble teams hovering around inclusion. Teams labeled Still in the mix haven’t been eliminated but have work to do or need help. A team that is Out will have to wait until next year.
The conferences below are listed in order of the number of bids they would receive, ranked from the most to least, based on the committee’s fourth ranking.
Jump to a conference:
ACC | Big 12 | Big Ten
SEC | Independent | Group of 5
Bracket
SEC
Would be in: Alabama, Georgia, Oklahoma, Ole Miss, Texas A&M
Last team in: Alabama. The Tide can either lock up a spot in the SEC championship game with a win against Auburn in the Iron Bowl — or can miss the playoff entirely with a loss to its rival. The debate will come if Alabama finishes as a three-loss SEC runner-up. The Tide have played the ninth-hardest schedule in the country, according to ESPN Analytics, and their résumé would only be enhanced by facing a top-five opponent in the SEC championship game. A third loss, though, even in a close game to a top-five team, could drop Alabama into a dangerous spot in the top 12 where it might face elimination to make room for a guaranteed conference champion — or a second Big 12 team.
First team out: Vanderbilt. The Commodores could stay status quo this week, which means at No. 14 they remain a long shot for an at-large bid. Punctuating their résumé with a win against a ranked Tennessee would be the first step, but they’d also need multiple upsets ahead of them to get serious consideration. It’s conceivable, as Miami can lose at Pitt, Oklahoma can suffer a third loss to LSU, and Alabama can lose the Iron Bowl. None of that would matter, though, without a win in Knoxville.
Still in the mix: None.
Out: Arkansas, Auburn, Florida, Kentucky, LSU, Mississippi State, Missouri, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas
Big Ten
Would be in: Indiana, Ohio State, Oregon
Last team in: Oregon. With the win against USC, Oregon eliminated the biggest threat to its playoff spot in the Big Ten and further solidified its place in the top 10. The win against USC boosted the Ducks’ résumé enough to jump Ole Miss, and the complete performance against another ranked contender answered some questions in the committee meeting room. Oregon now has a 16.5% chance to reach the Big Ten title game, according to ESPN Analytics, but it must beat Washington and it needs Michigan to defeat Ohio State.
First team out: Michigan. The No. 15 Wolverines are here because they can reach the Big Ten championship game with a win against Ohio State and a loss by Indiana or Oregon. Michigan no longer has to worry about the head-to-head defeat to USC because the Trojans have three losses and dropped behind the Wolverines to No. 17 in the latest ranking. The loss to No. 8 Oklahoma, though, will probably keep them behind the Sooners for an at-large bid if they both finish with the same record. Nobody in the country, though, will have a better win than Michigan if it beats the Buckeyes for a fifth straight season.
Still in the mix: None.
Out: Illinois, Iowa, Maryland, Michigan State, Minnesota, Nebraska, Northwestern, Penn State, Purdue, Rutgers, UCLA, USC, Washington, Wisconsin
Big 12
Would be in: Texas Tech
Last team in: Texas Tech. The Red Raiders can clinch a spot in the Big 12 title game with a win at West Virginia. As long as Texas Tech does that, it should be a lock for the CFP — win or lose in the Big 12 championship. It would be both stunning and difficult for the committee to justify dropping Texas Tech if its second loss is to a top-11 BYU team that it beat handily during the regular season. The Red Raiders would be the only team that could claim a regular-season win over the eventual Big 12 champs in that scenario.
First team out: BYU. The Cougars can clinch a spot in the Big 12 title game with a home win against UCF on Saturday. They’d be a CFP lock with the Big 12 title, but a loss would likely knock them out of the bracket because they’re already in a precarious position and would have lost to the same team twice. They would need multiple upsets to happen above them to stay in consideration as the two-loss Big 12 runner-up.
Still in the mix: Arizona State, Utah. ASU can earn a spot in the Big 12 title game with a win against Arizona and a BYU loss or a win and losses by both Texas Tech and Utah. The Utes will reach the Big 12 title game if they beat Kansas and both BYU and Arizona State win and Texas Tech loses.
Out: Arizona, Baylor, Cincinnati, Colorado, Houston, Iowa State, Kansas, Kansas State, Oklahoma State, TCU, UCF, West Virginia
ACC
Would be in: Miami
Last team in: Miami. Miami’s chances of reaching the ACC title game are now 14.2% — third best in the league behind SMU and Virginia, which are both above 80%. That means their best chance to reach the CFP remains through an at-large bid. They must win at Pitt on Saturday, and it helped that the committee ranked the Panthers No. 22 on Tuesday night. Miami’s loss to SMU no longer looks as bad as it initially did after the Mustangs cracked the CFP top 25 at No. 21. Miami is getting some help, but it has also helped itself by winning three straight games by at least 17 points. Saturday at Virginia Tech brought Miami’s first road win outside of its home state, which is something the committee has been awaiting. Miami’s win against Notre Dame remains one of the best in the country, and the Canes are within range of the committee revisiting the head-to-head tiebreaker. They’re both in the same conversation as Alabama and BYU. If Miami can win at Pitt, the committee will certainly factor that into its discussion during the fifth ranking. It’s important to remember, though, that head-to-head isn’t the only factor in the room. The entire body of work is considered, and right now, the committee is more impressed by the Irish.
First team out: Virginia. Of all the convoluted scenarios still left in the ACC, this isn’t one of them: If Virginia beats rival Virginia Tech on Saturday, the Cavaliers will clinch a spot in the conference title game. And with No. 21 SMU now one of five ranked teams from the conference, the ACC title game is likely to feature two ranked opponents. The Mustangs have the best chance to reach the ACC championship game (86%) followed by Virginia (81%) after Week 13, but SMU lost to Baylor, TCU and Wake Forest — the latter two of which are above .500. If SMU wins at Cal on Saturday, the Mustangs will clinch a spot in the ACC title game. Virginia was the committee’s second-highest-ranked ACC team behind Miami in its fourth ranking, and the Cavaliers had a bye.
Still in the mix: Duke, Georgia Tech, Pitt, SMU. Here’s where you can find your convoluted scenarios. Pitt can get into the ACC championship game with a win and a loss by SMU or UVA. Duke can get in with a win plus losses by two of the following three teams: Pitt, SMU and Virginia. Georgia Tech needs so many things to happen it might want to find a church instead of playing Georgia.
Out: Boston College, Cal, Clemson, Florida State, Louisville, North Carolina, NC State, Stanford, Syracuse, Virginia Tech, Wake Forest
Independent
Would be in: Notre Dame. The Irish are doing everything right — they’re winning and looking good doing it. If they can seal the deal with what should be a relatively easy win against Stanford, Notre Dame will be in the familiar position of waiting and watching while the conference championship games unfold and possibly alter the picture. Notre Dame fans should be keeping a close eye on the SEC and Big 12 title games. If Miami beats Pitt, the committee will compare that common opponent with Notre Dame, which also beat Pitt. They would continue to talk about the head-to-head tiebreaker, but that’s not the final determinant. Both Miami and Notre Dame can earn at-large bids, but if there are two Big 12 teams in, someone currently in the top 10 will have to be excluded.
Group of 5
Would be in: Tulane. This is where the committee will probably continue to differ from the computers, which say James Madison (57%) and North Texas (54.4%) have the best chances to reach the playoff. JMU’s schedule is currently ranked No. 123, while North Texas is No. 127, and that has held both of them back in the committee meeting room. Tulane is No. 73 with wins against Duke and Northwestern. The No. 24-ranked Green Wave maintained their spot this week as the committee’s highest-ranked Group of 5 team following the 37-13 win at Temple, their largest margin of victory this season.
Still in the mix: East Carolina, James Madison, Navy, North Texas, South Florida. JMU has clinched the East Division and a spot in the Sun Belt Conference championship game. It will face the winner of Southern Miss vs. Troy. Five teams from the American are still eligible to play in the conference title game, and multiple tiebreaker scenarios are still looming. Tulane has one of the most direct paths. It would clinch with a win if it is the highest-ranked team from the American in the CFP ranking. North Texas would clinch a spot with a win — because Navy was not ahead of Tulane and North Texas in the CFP ranking Tuesday. Navy could clinch a spot with a win and a loss by Tulane or North Texas.
Bracket
Based on the committee’s fourth ranking, the seeding would be:
First-round byes
No. 1 Ohio State (Big Ten champ)
No. 2 Indiana
No. 3 Texas A&M (SEC champ)
No. 4 Georgia
First-round games
On campus, Dec. 19 and 20
No. 12 Tulane (American champ) at No. 5 Texas Tech (Big 12 champ)
No. 11 Miami (ACC champ) at No. 6 Oregon
No. 10 Alabama at No. 7 Ole Miss
No. 9 Notre Dame at No. 8 Oklahoma
Quarterfinal games
At the Goodyear Cotton Bowl, Capital One Orange Bowl, Rose Bowl Presented by Prudential and Allstate Sugar Bowl on Dec. 31 and Jan. 1.
No. 12 Tulane/No. 5 Texas Tech winner vs. No. 4 Georgia
No. 11 Miami/No. 6 Oregon winner vs. No. 3 Texas A&M
No. 10 Alabama/No. 7 Ole Miss winner vs. No. 2 Indiana
No. 9 Notre Dame/No. 8 Oklahoma winner vs. No. 1 Ohio State
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David Hale
We don’t talk nearly enough about luck in sports.
It’s only reasonable to want to believe the best team always wins, that the outcome of a game is the reward for a better process, that, in the end, we all get what we deserve.
But then you watch 10 minutes of Florida State football and it’s impossible to deny that there are football gods at work and they can be awfully vengeful.
And so it is that, at this late point in the season, the College Football Playoff rankings still hinge, in no small part, on a botched extra point at the end of Notre Dame-Texas A&M.
We can look back at Miami‘s game against SMU on Nov. 1 — a game that, with 2 minutes to go the Canes had a 90% chance of winning, according to ESPN’s metrics — and consider it a bad loss, then a week later, see Oregon — with less than a 40% chance of beating Iowa with 2 minutes remaining — pull off a comeback and have it constitute a critical point on the Ducks’ résumé.
Alabama nearly doubled Oklahoma‘s yardage but lost, Ole Miss gave up 526 yards to Arkansas and won, Georgia has trailed in the second half five times this year but has just one loss to show for it.
These things happen, and while there’s clearly valuable data involved — Georgia wins those games, because the Dawgs are really good — any time we’re discussing a one-game sample size, there’s room for ample debate over what matters and what doesn’t.
The committee’s job is to counterbalance the fickleness of luck with a calculated, rational, repeatable process of evaluation that, if applied again and again by dozens of different people, would largely yield the same results; something akin to scientific testing, a way to filter out the noise and get to what matters most. “The process,” as everyone from Nick Saban to Michael Lombardi have called it.
And yet, it’s hard to say exactly what the committee’s process really is. Even when it’s explained — Miami isn’t in the same bucket as Notre Dame, so they can’t be compared directly, for example — the logic often crumbles under the slightest bit of scrutiny.
Instead, the committee has mostly relied on its own luck, and each year, by the time the final rankings are revealed, the 13 games played on the field provide enough clarity that most reasonable people will proclaim the committee got things right, save for the occasional reminder to Florida State that, yes, the football gods are not Seminoles fans.
This year though, it’s increasingly likely the committee’s luck could run out.
We have one full weekend of games left. There are reasonably 16 teams who’ll make a case as to why they should earn one of the seven coveted at-large spots. Without a little luck in Week 14, the committee’s going to have some incredibly hard choices to make.
And that means we’ve got plenty of outrage left to send the committee’s way.
This past week seemed to be the apex of the biggest rankings debate: Notre Dame or Miami?
The argument here is easy to understand. The committee has consistently had the Irish well ahead of the Hurricanes, despite both teams having the same record and Miami holding a head-to-head win.
But you know what’s even easier to understand? BYU has a better record than both.
In fact, let’s look at some résumés.
Team A: Best win vs. SP+ No. 19, next best vs. No. 21. Loss to SP+ No. 2. Two wins vs. teams 7-4 or better. No. 5 strength of record.
Team B: Best win vs. SP+ No. 9, next best vs. No. 25. Loss to SP+ No. 3. Six wins vs. teams 7-4 or better. No. 6 strength of record.
Both look like pretty obvious playoff teams, right?
Well Team A just moved up a spot in the rankings, seems assured not just of making the playoff, but of hosting a home game, and no one seems to be arguing about its spot in the rankings. That’s Oregon at No. 6.
Team B would currently be our first team out, a team with a résumé that shows equally impressive wins, an equally understandable loss and a far more impressive breadth of quality opponents. And yet, no one seems to be arguing much about BYU’s spot in the rankings either.
Why is it that the Cougars — the forgotten one-loss team with a higher ranked win than Oregon or Notre Dame and a better loss than Alabama or Oklahoma — sit at No. 11 and no one seems to care?
We get the frustration over Miami’s placement. There’s plenty of anger to go around. But don’t let BYU get lost in the shuffle. The Cougars’ résumé holds up against all the two-loss teams and is on par with Oregon and Ole Miss. Somehow, the committee — and nearly everyone else outside of Provo — seems to be ignoring it.
Wait, are we really defending Notre Dame here? Hey, somebody’s got to do it.
Let’s take a closer look at the Irish, who’ve become the punching bag for every fan frustrated with the committee’s rankings.
Right now, Notre Dame is effectively the golfer who wrapped up his round early and is waiting in the clubhouse, hoping no one else makes too many birdies. The Irish are safely in the field, and only a road trip to lowly Stanford is left on the docket.
But as the committee’s rankings hold steady week after week, there has been more and more time to debate the merits of Notre Dame’s résumé, and when we reach the end of championship week, it’s hard to ignore that one team aiming for a playoff bid doesn’t actually play in a conference.
So, does Notre Dame really deserve the benefit of the doubt?
In short: Heck yeah.
The Irish have five wins against bowl-eligible opponents — more than Georgia, Ole Miss, Vanderbilt or Texas Tech.
Both of Notre Dame’s losses were one-possession affairs against top-12 opponents. The loss to Texas A&M came down to a fluke occurrence, as the Irish flubbed a point after try.
Notre Dame’s game control — about as good an estimation as we have for the eye test — puts the Irish ahead of everyone but Ohio State, Indiana, Texas Tech and Oregon.
In four games since Nov. 1, Notre Dame has beaten its opposition by a combined score of 181-42, lambasting Syracuse so badly in Week 13 that Fran Brown might not shower for a month.
Look at any of the underlying metrics — explosive play rates, defensive stop rates, Jeremiyah Love being awesome rates — and Notre Dame is as good as anyone in the country.
So yes, we get the more logical debates about Miami’s Week 1 win or Alabama’s superior schedule, but the bottom line is, outside of Ohio State, there’s probably no team in the country playing better, more balanced football than the Irish. That probably shouldn’t be the only consideration, but as we debate which teams ought to be docked a few points in the rankings, Notre Dame probably shouldn’t be at the front of the line either.
Yes, Miami has a good argument against the committee’s treatment of the Hurricanes. The committee, too, seems to acknowledge under-appreciating Miami early on, and is adjusting by slowly moving the Canes up one spot each week, hoping that’ll be enough to appease the masses.
But here’s a question: What if Miami’s real beef should be with the ACC, not with the committee?
For each of the past two years, there has been widespread consensus that the ACC’s best team is Miami. But, barring some truly high-level chaos in Week 14 — something the ACC is apt to provide — the Canes won’t be playing for a conference championship again.
When leagues were smaller and had two divisions, the idea of pitting one division champ against the other made intuitive sense. But with expansion and the end of division play, what we’ve gotten is wildly diverse scheduling and the potential for confounding tiebreakers to ultimately decide which two teams get to play for a conference title.
In the Big Ten and SEC, where winning the league isn’t a do-or-die proposition, that’s fine. In the ACC, where only the champion might get a playoff bid and there’s a real chance that six different teams will tie atop the conference with a 6-2 league record — well, that’s a big issue.
So, why not just tweak the rules of how a conference championship game is seeded? What if one spot goes to the team with the best conference record and the other spot goes to the next highest ranked team? Doing so would ensure both the most deserving team (best record) and best team (highest ranked) got a shot, and it would’ve ended any concerns about the ACC being passed by multiple Group of 5 leagues, because a mediocre team like Duke would’ve had no shot at winning the league.
The ACC has bent over backward to try to find unique solutions to potentially existential problems in recent years. This is a change that would be forward thinking, easy and beneficial to the league’s playoff prospects.
It just won’t come in time to save Miami in 2025.
Remember last week when Tulane was also No. 24, just ahead of Arizona State, and behind Illinois, Houston and Missouri, who all lost? It might seem reasonable, given that precondition, that Tulane would then move up, say, three spots or so, while remaining a tick ahead of Arizona State.
But no, a week later, the Green Wave still check in at No. 24, a spot the committee seems to have set aside as “Where we put a Group of 5 team,” like the junk drawer in your kitchen that holds packing tape and birthday candles and those weird scented oils your mother-in-law ordered for you off TV — a placeholder for all the stuff you don’t know what else to do with.
In the big picture, it probably doesn’t matter. As long as Tulane stays ahead of its compatriots in the Group of 5 — winning the American, out-ranking James Madison — the Green Wave will make the playoff. And perhaps that’s all that matters.
But of the teams that jumped Tulane in the rankings this week are Arizona State — still with a chance to win the Big 12 — and Pitt and SMU, who have decent odds of making the ACC title game. Georgia Tech, despite a miserable loss to Pitt, also held firm ahead of the Green Wave.
A year ago, the ACC’s championship game implosion earned Clemson a bid into the playoff, but also shifted the ACC behind Boise State, the best Group of 5 champion, allowing the Broncos to land a bye. The stakes have changed for 2025-26 — the top four conference champs are no longer guaranteed an off week — but that doesn’t mean Tulane should be fine settling for the 12-seed either.
Tulane’s strength of record is ahead of Georgia Tech, Virginia and Pitt. If one of those teams claims the ACC’s playoff berth, what’s the rationale for putting them ahead of the Green Wave? And the difference between the No. 11 seed and the No. 12 seed might be about traveling to the SEC or the Big 12 for a playoff game.
The Group of 5 has largely been set to the side by this committee all year, so none of this comes as a surprise. But Tulane — or JMU or Navy or North Texas or San Diego State — all deserve to be judged on the merits of their résumés, not by which conference they’re affiliated with.
The bottom of the top 25 seems to be prime real estate for the ACC, but the one ACC team who might most deserve one of those coveted spots between 20 and 25 is nowhere to be found.
Wake Forest has the same record as SMU, and it beat the Mustangs head-to-head.
Wake Forest has a better overall résumé than Georgia Tech, and it only lost to the Yellow Jackets (in overtime) as a result of an officiating call the ACC later apologized for.
Wake Forest is a game behind Virginia in the standings, and the Deacons have a head-to-head win over the No. 18 Cavaliers, too.
Look, Wake Forest doesn’t ask for much. The Deacons are like the friend who’s always willing to pick you up from the airport, only better because they’ll probably bring along a box of Krispy Kreme. So if some ACC team that no one respects is going to be ranked 23rd regardless, why not Wake? Because the next time a committee member’s connection gets delayed out of CLT, it won’t be Pitt offering to pick them up and give them an air mattress to crash on. That’s strictly a Wake Forest thing.
Also angry this week: James Madison Dukes (10-1, unranked), North Texas Mean Green (10-1, unranked and now losing their coach), Navy Midshipmen (8-2, unranked), Utah Utes (9-2, No. 13 after being this week’s team that somehow isn’t as good as Miami anymore), Alabama Crimson Tide (9-2, No. 10 and far too close to the edge of the playoff for comfort)
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