I may have exaggerated the bit where teams may lock down earlier once they feel safely in the playoffs but you see it in other sports where coaches limit the use of key players and the playbook
The team and fanbase? No, we won't lose interest. Your average national neutral fan? Idk. Exhibition game as in something like your College Basketball Champions Classic with Duke, Kansas, MSU and UK where win/lose both teams walk away nothing to lose or gain. Atleast right now we can still hype up the CU-UGA or ORE-OSU games as playoff type games
Personal preference, I find CFB holds my interest throughout the entire season better than other sports where besides my main teams, I'm not interested in other games until playoffs. I credit the small number of playoff teams in giving regular season games more substance. I fear expanding will make the big regular season matchups less interesting because winning or losing doesn't greatly impact your playoff standings. Why fix what is not broken?
Can't compare CBB to CFB ... there are so many CBB games. But, the big CFB games are awesome. I mainly go to the big away UGA games as they are so damn much fun. I can't wait to go to neutral or away at Clemson, Oregon, tOSU, UT, FSO, UCLA, and Oklahoma over the next decade. I went to Notre Dame away and home, and those were two unreal weekends.
I don't think you are a typical CFB fan. Typical fans like the good cross conference rivalry games more than something like CU v. BC or Wake. And you aren't a rabid CFB because we watch other games all Saturday long. You are homer - don't meant that pejoratively - fan that just likes his own team until playoffs.
If you think it through, far more regular season games will matter with expanded playoffs because way more teams have a shot. If you expand by 8 teams to 12, that probably means 25 more teams are fighting for those spots at some point in the year.
You keep saying that winning and losing doesn't greatly impact the standings ... it does. No one wants to get in 12th. You want in at 1 so you play 12.
You can do things to make something better even if it isn't broken, and there is a good argument there is something broken. It's funny, on one hand my desire for expansion isn't driven by my being a Dawg fan. I think we are on the cusp of getting into the 4 CFP in the near future, and we've been there 3 years ago, and close 2 years ago. My luck is we start getting in as a top 4, but get beat by a 5-12 team each year. But, on the other hand, I know what it is like to have to go through Bama/LSU just to get there every year. Your team on the other hand doesn't break a sweat each year to get in, and you only have to worry about Bama and LSU once you get there. tOSU is the same way. I think that might be influencing your thought here.