Why would the other conferences continue to play in these nothing games? Face it bro, you are stacking the deck and trying to make a shaky point the hard way. Try this "reasonable" football senario on for size.
The SEC title game is a nothing game. Not even close to the truth. It's the one game that the entire committee watches together. That's the same for all conferences. As I've mentioned when referring to that additional data point...when that one game is the game that propels a team to get a spot in the playoffs it's an everything game.
A 15 million dollar payout to the conference is a "shaky point." Again, not even close to be the truth.
Between the money and the additional resume building points there's nothing there that says this game is a bad idea or needs to be changed. The argument that the title games aren't equal are true. The notion the committee members don't realize this? Short sighted, at best.
#1 Alabama vs #8 UCF
#2 Clemson vs #7 Michigan
#3 Notre Dame vs #6 Ohio State
#4 Georgia vs #5 Oklahoma
Nobody sits at home in this real world and watches others beat each others brains out. Not even Notre Dame.
Now we're having fun!!!
Two of these games "might" be fun. Three, if you consider a Bama team rolling over a UCF team to be fun—and that would only be true for Bama fans.
It's touched on earlier in this thread and bears repeating.
What has Michigan done to deserve being included? What has UCF done?
Out of the eight you've listed, three deserve it at this point: Clemson, Notre Dame, and Alabama. Three still have something to prove and their respective conference championship games will do just that.