CLEMSON -- In 2014, the first year of the College Football Playoff, Clemson was largely known for that noxious term with the "-ing" at the end of it (and no, we're not talking about "winning.")

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Back then, the Tigers' reputation was for inflating hopes one week and then spectacularly deflating them the next.

The knock on them then was unpredictability, and seven years later the knock is the total predictability of them landing in the playoff and playing for national championships.

Supposedly people across the nation are bored with the same old, same old. And it's totally natural in these parts for Clemson fans to say cry me a Reedy River.

But the inexorable push to a 12-team playoff, and the logic behind it, brings exasperation even to a detached observer who doesn't really have a dog in the fight.