No matter what format, arguing is the rule in CFP

The CFP categorizes the main college football conferences as the “Power Four” group, which includes the likes of the ACC, Big Ten, Big 12 and SEC. The next level down is the “Group of Five” conferences, which are the next five conferences after the power conferences. Those include Conference USA and Mountain West conferences. Tulane was the winner of the American Athletic Conference (AAC) and James Madison won the Sun Belt Conference championship.

Both earned spots in the CFP and both were bounced — emphatically — this weekend. Tulane, the 11th of 12 seeds, was smoked by No. 6 University of Mississippi (Ole Miss), 41-10. James Madison, the last seed in the bracket, put up points against Oregon, but were beaten handily, 51-34.

I get what the CFP organizers are trying to do. The committee is trying to be as equitable as possible in giving some of the smaller guys a shot. But the simple fact of the matter is there is a quite a dropoff from Power Four conferences and Group of Five. There is something to be said about the transfer portal gutting teams from Group of Five teams who level up and transfer to a school in the big boy conferences, but I don’t think the scores would have been much different. Tulane and James Madison went a combined 23-5 this season. Both had really good seasons that will be marred by blowout playoff losses.

I don’t know what else the CFP can do. This year’s version gave first-round byes to the top four seeds — Indiana, Ohio State, Georgia and Texas Tech — in the hopes that the lower seeds might have a chance.

And it did work when you had power conference teams facing each other. The other two games in the first round were actually upsets, according to the seedings. No. 10 Miami beat No. 7 Texas A&M 10-7, while No. 9 Alabama scored 27 unanswered points in overcoming a 17-0 deficit to beat No. 8 Oklahoma 34-24.

The whole point of creating a national championship college football tournament for the top teams in the nation was to create a definitive answer as to who was the true national champion. Before the CFP, we had the BCS (Bowl Championship Series) and before that, the national champion was simply anointed by voters.

It seems arguing about college football is the only thing college football fans can agree on.

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Hopefully the Jake Paul Boxing Era is coming to an end. After several years of hand-picking fights against retired MMA fighters or 58-year-old Mike Tyson and others not ready for the ring, Paul got his comeuppance when former Olympic and heavyweight champion of the world, Anthony Joshua, caved in the right side of Paul’s face in their Friday night fight that was streamed live on Netflix.

I got on the Netflix train ahead of a real fight — Canelo Alvarez against Terence Crawford — and because I was home sick Friday, decide to check out latest circus surrounding the YouTube star-turned-boxer.

To be honest, no athletic commission should have allowed this fight and it certainly makes sense that the Florida commission would, because, well, Florida.

Joshua has been in the ring with most of this generation’s heavyweight stars and champs, going against a guy who had eight fights under his belt, many against guys who are smaller and lighter than Paul, who weighed in at a cruiserweight of 217 pounds.

And originally, Paul was supposed to fight Geronta “Tank” Davis, who is about 6 inches shorter and about 70 pounds lighter. Again, a fight that never should have been made.

But when Paul canceled that fight because of Davis’ legal troubles, he went to the opposite direction.

This time, the shoe was on the other foot. Joshua was nearly 6 inches taller and had 30 pounds on Paul. Joshua is built like an Adonis and has one of the most powerful right hands in boxing.

It was only a matter of time before Joshua found the range. And he starched Paul, dropping him like a bag of cement in the corner of the ring, leaving Paul with two fractures in his jaw.

I don’t think the fight was fixed. There definitely wasn’t an agreement that Joshua had to take the loss. But there had to be some kind of agreement because Joshua carried Paul for the first five rounds. There were several times Joshua could have dropped the hammer that is his right hand, but it was clear he was pulling his punches.

The announcers on the fight and social media wondered why Joshua wasn’t cutting off the ring. He was, he just wasn’t letting his hands go when he did so. It didn’t help that Paul tried to turn the bout into some kind of wrestling match as he continuously dropped to the mat during clinches. It was obvious Paul was simply trying to get through all eight scheduled rounds of the fight, connect on a few punches and then have the judges railroad him into a win by decision.

Maybe this brutal loss will knock some sense into Paul.

Nathan Mollat has been covering high school sports in San Mateo County for the San Mateo Daily Journal. since 2001. He can be reached by email: nathan@smdailyjournal.com.