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Have you seen those Dr Pepper ads tied to the College Football Playoff?

If you've watched ESPN for more than five minutes ilately, you could hardly have missed them. They run ad nauseum.

"This year, we crown the first true, undisputed No. 1," says the actor in the Dr Pepper ads. "All those other seasons, they don't count."

It's supposed to be funny. But it is what ESPN has been selling fans for the past year.

Chris Fowler, who will call the Ohio State-Oregon championship game on Monday, didn't altogether agree.

"I don't know about that," he said in a conference call with reporters. "You play the game that the system puts in front of you. And I wouldn't diminish what all the teams that won championships in the BCS era did."

"I know it's not necessarily a perfect system," said Kirk Herbstreit, who will be in the broadcast booth with Fowler on Monday. He pointed to TCU and Baylor as teams left out, but added that no matter how many teams are in the playoff, "You're always going to have teams that are left out and frustrated."

And, whatever criticism the four-team playoff is a huge step in the right direction. And, in Year 1, it has already proved that the abandoned BCS system was hugely flawed.

The BCS would have given us Alabama vs Florida State for the national championship. And, as we learned when Ohio State beat Alabama and Oregon crushed FSU 1, those were not the two best teams.

"And that's what's cool about this playoff," Fowler said. "You've got, in Year 1, a true example of why this system is an improvement."

Fowler and Herbstreit both said they are more than pleased with how the first year of the playoff system has worked out. And they're not pushing for the playoff to be expanded to eight teams.

"I'd like to see how four teams works," Fowler said. "I have been a longtime playoff proponent. I think eight teams makes sense, but in a sport that moves glacially and is extremely conservative, this is pretty revolutionary."

"This year with four, it played out very, very nicely," Herbstreit added. "I think four is a good place to start. I think it's natural for people to jump to conclusions that it will eventually go to eight."

He said he could see, at some point, an eight-team playoff that would include the champions of the Power Five conferences (ACC, Big Ten, Big 12, Pac-12 and SEC); the highest-ranked team from the so-called group of five (American Athletic, Conference USA, Mid-America, Mountain West, Sun Belt); and two at-large teams.

But, at the same time, he said that getting to eight teams this year would have been difficult. There were calls for Baylor and TCU to be included, but "it would've been hard to find the seventh and eighth teams," Herbstreit said. "I think six [teams], everybody was excited about. But you didn't hear a lot of people arguing about that seventh and eighth team."

Clearly, ESPN is invested in the current system — more heavily invested in the college football bowl/playoff system than anyone. Not only does the worldwide leader in sports telecast 37 of 38 bowl games plus the championship, but it owns 11 of those bowls.

So, yes, ESPN is going to be the drum for the legitimacy of the system that will produce a champion on Monday.

But if — when — the playoff expands to eight teams or more, you can bet that ESPN will be telling viewers that that's the best system ever. Just like they're telling us that this is the best system ever.

Scott D. Pierce covers television for The Salt Lake Tribune. Email him at spierce@sltrib.com; follow him on Twitter @ScottDPierce.