On the "top 6 conference champions" note...could this provide a potential entry to a dominant MAC team if the power conferences consolidate down to 4 mega conferences and/or there are lots of conference championship upsets.
Could be, but I'm still not impressed. Any system that does not reward all conference champions with a seat at the table is insufficient
Football is a fundamentally different sport than all the others. And how many games you want these kids to play?
If you want to win the high school state championship in Ohio, you have to play 16 games. If you want to win the FCS championship, you have to play 15 or 16 games. If you want to win the Super Bowl, you have to play 20 or 21 games.
My ideal playoffs would be 12 teams, top four seed byes, with all conference champions represented and two at-large bids. That's four rounds. Throw that on top of a 12 game regular season and a conference championship game, that's 17 games max and would only be accomplished by a bottom eight seed that played in its conference championship game advancing to the national title game. That doesn't sound like a far reach to me.