Your 2022 National Champion is almost certainly going to be one of the following teams:
Alabama
Ohio State
Georgia
Clemson
There's almost no chance any of the following teams will win the national championship, but they're worthy of discussion and could slip into the playoff:
Southern Cal (big transition year)
Michigan (last year was a fluke and they got exposed in the CFP semis)
NC State (would have to run the table including winning at Clemson)
Texas A&M (New QB)
Notre Dame (1st year coach and a tough schedule)
Biff's Surprise Teams (Last Year's Michigan State):
Texas
Baylor
Tennessee
Pitt (surprise, they're back)
No chance USC slips into the playoff. Their line play would have to improve leaps and bounds, which it isn't going to do under their strength coach, and Williams would have to take a huge step forward in the offseason in reading defenses, and I think he has been too distracted.
Michigan slips back to normalcy this year, I think.
NCSU isn't running the table
aTm is going to return to normal. They had one big upset, at home, last year. And other than that, they were their usual selves.
ND is always unpredictable.
Texas and Baylor are breaking in new QBs, and they're actually new. Not sure why people want to ignore Oklahoma. They lost Williams and Rattler to the portal, but replaced them with somebody better-- or at least somebody who was better than their play was at QB the last two years. Williams may be a superstar, and Rattler may excel at the other SC, but Gabriel is already pretty proven and is familiar with the offense. Other than that, they lost a lot of guys who weren't producing at expected levels. The OU O is going to be better than it was the last two years (unless Gabriel gets hurt, then all bets are off), and the D you know will take a step forward. They should be the obvious favorites to win the conference. Texas is all hype until they can prove otherwise. Sark hasn't done shit in his head coaching career, and there is no reason to expect him to change that at Texas. I could bore you with other stuff, but the buzz and excitement in Norman is real. Nobody is expecting a natty level team this year, but the future is bright, especially considering where the program was when FULR left.
Will see if Tennessee can retain some of that momentum from last year.