HornetFan

As is the case with almost all classes, it will always be the usual suspects.  It will be one of the  Columbus/Apopka/Seminole/West Orange powerhouses.  I was pulling hard for Ocoee to crash the party and they nearly did but came up just short against Columbus.  As always, certain teams will look a lot stronger next fall than they do on paper now after they raid their neighbors, er, I mean after a couple of lucky transfers in.

As for playoffs/seedings for 7A, 6A, and 1A/R, I am fine with the previous RPI (which was transparent) or even the current MaxPreps rankings (they are not transparent, but have a level of trust, and are what we are basing promotions/relegations on). I know that means different ways for getting into playoffs, but I think that is responding to the needs of the system.
Cycles would be 2 years for football (and 1 year for non-football team sports as turnover happens quicker in those sports).
For rural, I think the biggest success has been from the communities themselves and not just in football, but all team sports. In 2009, Franklin County Boys Basketball had a once in a lifetime team and ran into the buzzsaw known as Arlington Country Day. I like to think that the rural classification would benefited a team like that instead of the Madison County's of the world.
But to go with your point based on same thing that classified other programs:
Madison County would be in 7A (just barely)
Hawthorne and Pahokee in 5A,
Chiefland and Blountstown in 4A
12 teams would be in 3A
19 teams would be in 2A
And probably a lot of these rural schools would be willing to play other schools like themselves in ability rather than just common community characteristics. If I was FHSAA, I would probably want to hear that the majority of the rural schools wanted it, before I disbanded it.
The reason why I didn't do geography based for 7A and 6A was because we want the best 2 to be in the finals. If those two are Miami Northwestern (All Bout 'Da West) and Miami Central, so be it. I would also assume if you are making into 7A or 6A, that your school and community have invested into your program for a couple of games. I would also think the gates would be bigger with quality opponents.
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As for promotion/relegation itself, this would be based on the 4 year averages of MaxPreps
7A: send 4 down to 6A
6A: send 4 down to 5A, send 4 up to 7A
5A: send 8 down to 4A, send 4 up to 6A
4A: send 8 down to 3A, send 8 up to 5A
3A: send 16 down to 2A, send 8 up to 4A
2A: send 16 up to 3A
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That wouldn't be fair to smaller schools, especially those that don't "cater" to elite athletes. If those kids at non-recruiting" schools win a state championship game, they probably deserve the designation more than the "bought" teams.

What about kids whose families actually move into the school district in question and may just be "average" high school players? If they are counted as a part of the 5 transfers, some coaches that routinely recruit top players may not allow these average players to "make" the varsity. I agree your concept is good if it includes only those transfers whose immediate families continue to reside outside the boundaries of the new school.

By the way. I know Lakeland and Benice can play with anyone.  All the other suburban state champs get slaughtered by metro equivalent 

The plan did not work at all. You had the same teams as always in the finals and the only new champion was lake wales who made the semis recently. It will be the same group of teams in the finals just like the past decade.  No real difference. So all the games were not blow out. Same teams and you got a million blowouts during regular season so no state powers got crushed by plan. 

Stop scheduling games with 70+ point spreads.
 
Florida needs better matchmaking.

Proud of my heritage, but more proud to have earned my citizenship and get to call myself an American.   The red, white and blue is what I choose to fly in my front yard. 

Equal Opportunity is there, what you're premise really is all about is that it isn't always fair.  That is correct and that is life. I respect your opinion, mine comes from a different angle, view, maybe even upbringing.  This view was engrained in my consciousness by my mother at an early age.  We moved to central FL in 1959 from my native Panama at the age of 11 with good English skills though not my first language.  The only teams sports I was famliar with were baseball and soccer, no football or basketball.  OHS was a small HS when I started attending there and because I was a pretty good athlete and not a lot of bodies to choose from coaches convinced me to come out for these other 2 sports.  My initial tryouts for basketball did not go well as the 20 odd students trying to make the team were going to be cut to 10.  I was cut on the final day and went home distraught explaining to my Mom that what was most upsetting was the fact they kept 3 kids that belonged to prominent ranching families that were lousy.  She proceeded to use the belt on me for excusing failure for this perceived "Unfairness".  She told me that life would always have situations like this and I needed to focus on beating out the other 7 as that problem would persist.  I had not experience this in other sports I had participated in so I decided to focus more on basketball. By my senior year I was selected by my teammates as team captain and earned MVP for the season eventually attending college on a scholarship. The successes I have enjoyed were triggered by that lesson that you can look at setbacks due to "Unfairness" as a curse or as a blessing.  Hope you understand what I chose.  This story isn't about me, but the hundreds of thousands that have reached the top despite roadblocks, impediments, unfairness or any other excuse that could be used.  That's what made America great, my sister and I being the only Hispanics in the entire school system had the "Opportunity" to succeed.  I am afraid we are losing that.  Just to be clear I was then and am now a huge Gator fan as that was my college of choice but wasn't good enough to be accepted at the time.  That is how it works. 

Zay has been a welcome addition and a tremendous asset on the Winter Park Wildcats. He is their leading receiver, has great hands and very good speed and is a deep threat. He's also very good after the catch. All that, and he's a great kid. He's far from a "complementary piece, and upon arrival at WP, he quickly became one of Aidan Warner's favorite go-to targets. 

Zay has been a welcome addition and a tremendous asset on the Winter Park Wildcats. He is their leading receiver, has great hands and very good speed and is a deep threat. He's also very good after the catch. All that, and he's a great kid. He's far from a "complementary piece, and upon arrival at WP, he quickly became one of Aidan Warner's favorite go-to targets. 

No, the Eagles need to be realistic and focus on what they want to accomplish for this particular season to instill  confidence and pride in their kids.  As coach seems to think, playing someone they know they have no chance against isn't STEPPING OUT OF THEIR COMFORT ZONE but rather just plain dumb.

Something is very fishy about such large differentials even if point margins are ignored. Several teams are going to feel like they got hosed when the final rankings shake out. Go back to RPI or go back to district champ and runner up with 6 team or greater districts. 

Toho HS is only about 5 years old and up until this season, their football team has not been competitive against established teams. They hired a new coach and found a freshman QB that has potential. The early half of their schedule was against extremely weak teams and they ran up the scores, while bragging that their QB was the "next coming". They finally started playing teams that were capable of winning at the varsity level and Toho and their QB are failing miserably. One can only imagine what Osceola will put up on the scoreboard against Toho in their next game. Hard to feel sorry for Toho after they ran up scores in their first five games.

SOS means nothing if you lose all the games. You shouldn’t get unlimited credit just for scheduling the games. Anyone can do that 

Toho HS is only about 5 years old and up until this season, their football team has not been competitive against established teams. They hired a new coach and found a freshman QB that has potential. The early half of their schedule was against extremely weak teams and they ran up the scores, while bragging that their QB was the "next coming". They finally started playing teams that were capable of winning at the varsity level and Toho and their QB are failing miserably. One can only imagine what Osceola will put up on the scoreboard against Toho in their next game. Hard to feel sorry for Toho after they ran up scores in their first five games.

It was a 0-0 game at halftime and eventually lost 21-7 not necessarily a route.  Despite their record, they are extremely good. 
I wasn't aware that the W-L-T columns made a distinction between "good losses", "routs", and just "losses". I've only seen them listed as losses. 
Also, if this tough schedule prepares them and propels them thru the playoffs those seniors can hang their hat on that. 
We're all entitled to our opinions. I would think that the kids would rather have a winning record against teams with which they are competitive rather than "hanging their hat on" continually getting beaten by teams that are better than them.  
 

No it isn't.  What you are implying is that the classifications (2 or 3 of them) in the bottom half of that proposed system could beat even the 1A champ currently much less the 2A thru 8A.  I think both you and I know the answer to that.  In the system from the 60's we have been awarding a state championship to the best team based on enrollment numbers.  That seemed to be a fair way of doing it and the winner regardless of class was in the top 10% of teams in the entire state.  Now you also want to pretend this is the same thing when you are awarding a championship to the top shitty team, teams that aren't even in the top 70% in the entire state.   Get real.   As I previously stated , give them a trophy but call it something other than a state champ.  You may want to keep arguing this point, I have no interest in that as no matter how you want to justify it I will never think it is a good thing to reward poor performance.

Not a thing.  At present the only viable solution I see is for HC to be realistic in where their team is competitively among the 570-580 so schools under the FHSAA umbrella.  You don't have control of the district you will be placed in, but you do have control in scheduling the remaining 5, 6 or 7 games.  Are you in the top third, the middle third or the bottom third whereby you choose opponents in your "Classification" for lack of a better term.  You will win some and lose some, but most importantly your kids can compete with teams at the same level.  Most scheduling requires a two-year commitment (home and away), so re-evaluate every couple of years to determine whether to increase/decrease the level of difficulty.   Yes, I know this formula can go completely out the window when someone poaches several of your players.

This trend will continue or even worsen as time goes on, so yes it should be concerning to everyone.  Unfortunately some don't see it as a problem and without strong support for change it will persist.  Your stats basically reflect a running clock in a third of those games reported.  That ain't good for anyone, but I am all ears if you have some solutions in bringing this ship back to shore.  Thanks for the research and your effort in presenting a factual analysis. 

Death of a program...

But here's the rub . . . you lose most of your games (or finish under .500) and kids today say "dang, I don't want to be part of a losing team," so several of them decide to transfer and then, as a result, they're not very good next year and their record reflects it. 

I don't think that I ever dressed that nicely Perspective. The bow-tie is definitely too big for me. The black horn-rim would not be my choice for frames either. Those frames would be too much attention-grabbing for me. 

Well HornetFan, it started many years ago, for a few of us, on the FlaVarsity message board. It's a part of the "Rivals" family of high school football websites. Whenever a homer fan like myself (Mainland High) or others claimed we were unfairly shafted by the Refs our resident long time Florida Official "Janbun82" would interject and want the particulars of the egregious act against our teams. In all the years I never remember him siding with any of us "poor losers." Not saying it didn't happen, I just can't remember it. He couldn't go against his brothers, his family of officials. Even when I would point out every profession has good and bad, competent and incompetent he never budged an inch. So after all these years St Frances at Venice comes along and WE GOT THE GOODS ON VIDEO !  Will he, or won't he side with his family ? That's the question   

I don't know if I have ever had the chance to state how much that I enjoy your posts and contributions to this message board HornetFan, but I am stating it now.