Paul Finebaum on CFP committee: 'Warde Manuel completely blew it'

Paul Finebaum didn’t hold back about Warde Manuel and the College Football Playoff committee Monday morning.

Following the release of the final rankings and bracket, Finebaum couldn’t believe Manuel and crew showed their hand. It could set a bad precedent regarding the rankings moving forward.

Get your team’s official College Football Playoff watch from AXIA by CLICKING HERE: “Watches that tell so much more than time”

For Manuel, at least he was transparent. But Finebaum thought the chair was a little too honest.

“The biggest problem this committee had is that Warde Manuel, the athletic director at Michigan, got up on Tuesday night and completely blew it,” Finebaum said on Get Up. “He said things that committee chairman never say. And by the way, I appreciate him being transparent, but he put a roadblock up, and he essentially said, what you what you alluded to. And the reason why that committee went the direction there are people that represent college football and to make it easy for the audience, the college championship games bring in 10s, if not hundreds of millions of dollars, and they would have in essence, issued a Supreme Court ruling saying they are null and void. 

“So Alabama got jobbed. But again, Alabama did it to themselves. So they preserved the conference championship games at least for another year. They’re not going to be around long. You and I both know that.”

Paul Finebaum rips CFP chair Warde Manuel

Based on Manuel’s thoughts, it seemed like it was a foregone conclusion Alabama would be left out of the College Football Playoff if Clemson beat SMU. When the latter happened, the Crimson Tide were left at home.

“I also don’t want to waste the audience’s time with a lot of fake outrage, because SMU has a very good record,” Finebaum said. “They don’t have a very good resume. Alabama has a good resume and record, but they also have so many bad moments that I think they cost themselves. Had Alabama not gotten blown out by Oklahoma 24 to three two weeks ago, I think they would be in but they made that committee’s choice easier, and they did it to themselves. 

“And while we could spend the rest of the hour talking about where the committee missed on seeding, where they missed on team selection, ultimately, they didn’t have a lot to work with. So while I’m not thrilled with it, I’m also not going to waste too much more time on it.”