Another year, another debut of the College Football Playoff weekly rankings

The College Football Playoff announces its first rankings five days before a slate of games that could reshape the season.

Episode 20 of “The Dog and Pony Show” debuts Season Five when the College Football Playoff rankings are revealed Tuesday night.

Week One of this unnecessary exercise is well-timed as Saturday’s schedule has five games that will enhance or eliminate the participants. Week Two’s rankings are likely to be significantly different from Week One’s rankings.

But college football is a talkin’-arguin’-debatin’ sport and when the contracts were signed birthing the CFP and its 12-year agreement with ESPN, the fine print included more white noise. Networks love their reality shows and ESPN is all-in with its version of “The Voice/Dancing With The Stars/American Idol.” It gives the network an hour of programming (and 12 minutes of prime-time commercials) to breathlessly announce and analyze rankings that are meaningful only for this week.

There’s only one ranking that matters and that’s the listing the committee decides and announces the day after Championship Saturday. But to throw a bone to the company paying $5.6 billion to televise the CFP, the Power Five commissioners agreed to do weekly rankings starting with the second half of the season. And its empty calories content is clear because the weekly show airs each Tuesday – two days after the games have been played. Because ESPN has Monday Night Football.

The CFP committee, chaired by Oregon athletic director Ron Mullens meets in Grapevine, Texas for two days (Sunday and Monday) and then Mullens goes on ESPN’s show to explain the thought processes of the 13 members. Presenting one voice based on 13 opinions is a near-impossible task plus it’s difficult for the chairman to not let his own opinions leak out. But it all helps create fodder for ESPN’s various opinion shows plus the dozens of other outlets/digital platforms, etc.

The best guess here is that the top four will start with Alabama – Clemson, with a stronger schedule, might sneak in at No. 1 – then probably Notre Dame and either LSU or Michigan. The Tigers and the Wolverines each have one loss; there have been six one-loss teams ranked in the first week in previous CFP rankings.

Notre Dame, with one loss, was No. 3 in last season’s Week One ranking. The Irish are 8-0 and in position to finish undefeated. That factor, plus the possibility of the SEC again placing two teams in the final four, raises the possibility that there won’t be enough room at the inn from the champions of either the Big Ten or the Atlantic Coast conferences. That could touch off enough yelling and screaming to melt Twitter.

"Saturday’s Games Worth WatchingNo. 1 Alabama at No. 4 LSUNo. 6 Georgia at No. 11 KentuckyNo. 12 West Virginia at No. 16 TexasNo. 3 Notre Dame at NorthwesternNo. 14 Penn State at No. 5 MichiganNo. 7 Oklahoma at Texas Tech"

But with a Week Nine of significant games looming, let’s also deal with the reality that college football – especially this season – is as volatile as a case of nitroglycerin and as balanced as Red Panda.

Consider defending national champion Alabama. The Crimson Tide have eviscerated eight opponents. Heisman Trophy candidate Tua Tagovailoa has yet to play in the fourth quarter. Saturday night, Alabama takes on LSU, a team that has defeated four ranked foes. Death Valley will be rocking – get the Richter Scale ready.

Both teams were idle last Saturday so should be rested. But what if Bama is rusty? What if Tagovailoa, in his first truly challenging road game, has some jitters. And there’s this: The toughest defense in terms of allowing yards per play that Alabama has faced is Missouri (4-4 overall and ranked 90th in YPP) and five of their foes are ranked 100th or worse. LSU is 24th in YPP.

The unpredictability of the sport is difficult to quantify. There’s an old saying about baseball that when you go to a game you’re likely to see something you’ve never seen. That was proven with Friday night’s 18-inning World Series contest. College football provides the unlikely on a weekly basis. Predicting is fool’s errand (and Your Humble Correspondent is nothing if not foolish).

• In terms of the first week of the CFP rankings, half of the 16 teams that have been ranked in Week One didn’t make the final four.
• One predictable outcome each season is at least one team ranked in the preseason top 10 finishing unranked. This season, there’s a chance that four teams that started in the top 10 could finish outside the top 25 – Auburn, Miami, Washington and Wisconsin.
• Week Eight provided churn and turmoil, resulting in some unprecedented changes in this week’s Associated Press poll. A season-high 11 ranked teams lost and eight lost to unranked teams – the most since 1989 when the poll expanded from 20 to 25 teams. Seven new teams are ranked, also a record for the top 25 era.
• There’s a chance that Championship Saturday (Dec. 1) could be a dud. But there are 17 teams that control their destinies of reaching their conference title games. And if there are a few double-digit underdogs (Virginia, Virginia Tech, Northwestern, Utah, Kentucky) playing for a trophy, the more chances are one might pull off a headline-making upset.

Realizing and understanding that the crystal ball is as opaque as a bowling ball, at this point and looking forward, here are two scenarios worth considering.

One: Alabama (13-0), Clemson (ACC champ, either 13-0 or 12-1), Notre Dame (12-0 or 11-1), Big Ten champion (Ohio State or Michigan, each 12-1), Oklahoma 12-1), Washington State (12-1).

Two: Georgia (12-1, SEC champ), Alabama 11-1), Clemson (ACC champ, either 13-0 or 12-1), Notre Dame (12-0 or 11-1), Big Ten champion (Ohio State or Michigan, each 12-1), Oklahoma 12-1), Washington State (12-1).