If you think that group is not being influenced, you are mistaken
I didn’t make an argument one way or another as to whether or not they were influenced, or by whom.
My whole point is that those complaining about “arbitrariness” in college football rankings are incredibly late to the party, which is why I don’t get bent out of shape about who does or doesn’t make it in.
People forget that any sort of playoff system was opposed for the longest time for numerous reasons: length of schedule; the sheer logistical difficulties of having a national playoff when you have 100+ teams with only 12 games in the season (not counting conference titles); and (most importantly from my recollection, as it’s been many years) the protests of those who believed a playoff would devalue traditional contests like the Rose Bowl, the Orange Bowl, and so on. That’s why whoever the ‘consensus #1’ pick was, in effect, subject to some level of arbitrariness whenever you had years with matching records, and it became a popularity contest (so to speak).
The general move since the BCS and CFP were introduced (from a 2-team playoff, to a 4-team playoff, and finally to a 12-team playoff) has been gradually reducing this sort of arbitrariness inherent to the sport, especially given that the conferences have been shifting and realigning in that timeframe (I mean, after this year, who thinks the Pac-12 is going to remain a Power Five conference?).
This has naturally come at the expense of making the Bowl games less relevant in the grand scheme of things, but I think that was inevitable once the clamor for an expanded playoff became too loud to ignore.