Clemson appears on outside-looking in on first ESPN Playoff 'bubble watch'

ESPN is doing a 'bubble watch' for the Playoff this year in an expanded field to 12 teams. They have Clemson in the 'first four out' in preseason projections.

Brandon Rink - Assoc. Editor / Staff Writer - Tuesday, August 20 2024

Clemson football appeared on the outside-looking in with the first edition of a College Football Playoff 'bubble watch' for ESPN in the new 12-team era.

Clemson is in the 'Next Four Out' for the exercise, listed behind LSU, Missouri, Tennessee, Oklahoma, Michigan, Kansas State and Oklahoma State among bubble-out teams.

"The Tigers will go as quarterback Cade Klubnik goes, and he needs to improve if Clemson is going to return to postseason relevancy," Dinich said. "Klubnik ranked 11th out of 12 ACC quarterbacks last year with a 55.0 Total QBR. He'll get some help from running back Phil Mafah, who led the ACC in rushing touchdowns and ranked third in rushing yards per game after taking over for Will Shipley against NC State."

Dinich does have the ACC getting multiple bids in the first expanded Playoff, with Florida State winning the league and Miami getting an at-large as a 10-seed, heading to Notre Dame in the first round.

"FSU is a little different, though, because in this prediction, it would be No. 5 in the committee's final ranking on Selection Day -- behind SEC runner-up Texas and Big Ten runner-up Oregon," Dinich said on an ESPN morning show. "As long as FSU finishes as one of the four highest-ranked conference champs, though, it will earn a first-round bye -- even if it's not in the committee's top four on ranking day. Florida State answered the committee's top question from last season when it added transfer quarterback DJ Uiagalelei to the lineup.

"Miami is predicted to finish as the ACC runner-up. There are no rematches here [in her predicted quarterfinals], but there could be if the ranking fell differently. Miami and FSU play each other on Oct. 26. They could play each other again in the ACC title game -- and a third time in the CFP bracket. It would be an unusual circumstance, but not impossible."

Dinich was recently called out by fellow ESPN analyst, and also Clemson alum, Eric Mac Lain for saying that Clemson is the most overrated team in the AP Top 25, at No. 14.

"Why so much love for the Clemson Tigers?” Dinich said. “They had four conference losses last year, which is as many as they’ve had combined in the past six seasons. People keep telling me their defense is going to be great, their defense is always pretty good.

"But they’ve got to get a quarterback. Cade Klubnik is back, until we see offensive improvement, I don’t see why there should be so much love for the Clemson Tigers."

Mac Lain offered a rebuttal on local radio.

"What is 'pretty good'? What does that mean? Is that Top 50? Is pretty good Top 20? What is pretty good? Because since I strapped the helmet on and played for the Clemson Tigers, Clemson has been Top 7 every single year in Power 5 outside of one where they lost arguably the best defensive coordinator the game has ever seen, and they were Top 15 I think that year," he said. "So pretty good seems like quite the understatement. They're one of the best. But they've got to get a quarterback. Cade Klubnik was the No. 1 quarterback in his class so I guess that's not good enough...The deal with it all is, one, it's such an unnecessary random shot. I don't understand it.

"You're talking about a Top 14 team. You're not talking about a Top 5 preseason team. So the left hook out of nowhere is crazy, but it's something that for whatever reason some people want to do. Take shots at this conference. Take shots at Florida State. Take shots at Clemson. Things of that nature. And it's remarkable to me, at the end of the day. Quite frankly, if you look at the Clemson offense... I think you see improvement. I think you see a quarterback going into Year 2 as a starter. We are so quick as a society (to declare) this guy is an all-world competitor right away. Easy, right? That's why everybody that's a 5-star quarterback comes in and does these things. No man, there's not a lot of those guys. There's very few, and it's extremely hard to do.

"For me, just the randomness of it, but it worked. It got our attention. I'm doing a radio show right now about it."