Mike Elko questions the College Football Playoff committee's vague tiebreaker rules and defends Texas A&M's strength of schedule with analytics, not noise.
The 12-team College Football Playoff was supposed to fix everything. More access, more chaos, more teams with a real shot at a national title.
In theory, it's awesome. In practice, Texas A&M head coach Mike Elko says it's still a mess ... and he's not wrong.
While the Aggies are poised to be in the field, Elko is openly questioning how the committee gets from "best 12 teams" to the actual rankings everyone sees on Tuesday nights. With so many teams bunched together, he says nobody outside that room really understands the tiebreakers.
"I've said this all the way through this season, of what exactly is the criteria that we're utilizing to break ties. I don’t know that anybody has a real firm understanding of what that actually is," Elko said during his Early National Signing Day press conference. "So, for us to have a higher strength of schedule and a higher strength of record than a lot of the teams that share the same record as us, I don't understand."
That confusion isn't new.
Earlier in the year, former CFP chair Mack Rhoades tried to justify ranking Indiana ahead of Texas A&M with the same record and instead delivered what Aggies fans quickly labeled a word salad. The explanation raised more questions than answers, and Elko clearly hasn't forgotten.
Online, critics have circulated a graphic suggesting A&M's schedule is soft because many of its SEC opponents finished in the bottom half of the league. Elko pushed back hard on that narrative.
"I know we can get on a mic and scream real loud that Texas A&M hasn't played a strong schedule, but if you dive into our schedule in any capacity, every analytic says we have," he said.
"Rather than yelling real loud about what we've done, I think let's look at the analytics and the numbers and use that to try to guide some more intelligent decision making."
For Elko, the seeding drama is secondary to one thing ... getting in and lining up.
"As a football coach, put a ball down," he said. "Let's go play. It doesn't matter. We'll play anyone, anywhere. It is what it is. We're going to be in the Playoff and we're gonna go compete for a national championship."
The CFP may be electric. It may also be flawed. Mike Elko just isn't afraid to say both can be true ... and that Texas A&M deserves clarity, not spin.