BlogPoll Week 3
First of all, for those unfamiliar, I use a “resume” system that ranks the quality of opponent in 3 tiers, details found here.
Example of tiers are –
Top Tier Teams – the high quality and elite teams in BCS conferences. Examples include USC, Oklahoma, Ohio State and Georgia.
Mid Tier Teams – Most of the remaining BCS conference teams, and some of the better non-BCS conference teams, like Utah.
Low Tier Teams – The worst of the BCS teams (like Duke), and the rest of the non-BCS teams.
USC’s convincing win over Ohio State is the sole example of a win in the top tier, landing them number one in our poll.
The rest (with my assessments of their win qualities) –
1. USC – 1 top, 1 mid
2. ECU – 2 mid (WVU & VT), 1 low
3. Oklahoma – 2 mid (Cincy and Washington), 1 low
4. BYU – 2 mid (Wash, UCLA), 1 low
5. Florida – 1 mid (UM), 1 low
6. USF – 1 mid (Kansas), 2 low (EDITED 2:11 PM)
7. Alabama – 1 mid (Clemson), 2 low
8. Wisconsin – 1 mid (Fresno), 2 low
9. Missouri – 1 mid (Ill), 2 low
10. Penn State – 1 mid (Oregon St), 2 low
11. Vanderbilt – 1 mid (South Car), 2 low
12. Georgia – 1 mid (South Car), 2 low
13. Oregon – 1 mid (Purdue), 2 low
14. Kentucky – 1 mid (Louisville), 2 low
15. North Carolina – 1 mid (Rutgers), 1 low
16. Wake Forest – 1 mid (Ole Miss), 1 low
17. Auburn – 1 mid (Miss. St), 2 low
18. Utah – 1 mid (Mich), 2 low
19. Notre Dame – 1 mid (Mich), 1 low
20. U Conn – 1 mid (Virginia), 2 low
21. Oklahoma State – 1 mid (Wash St), 2 low
22. Texas Tech – 3 low
23. LSU – 2 low
24. Texas – 2 low
25. Nebraska – 3 low
My comments –
What I do is compare the quality of teams defeated when all else is equal. For example, I rank Florida ahead of South Florida on my belief Miami is better than Kansas. And so on.
In the case of Vanderbilt and Georgia, having defeated the identical mid-tier in South Carolina, I rank the team with the better win first.
Finally, my current “Top Tier” teams are thus –
ACC – None
Big Ten – Ohio State (Wisconsin and Penn State in waiting)
Big 12 – Oklahoma, Missouri
Big East – None
Pac Ten – USC
SEC – Florida, Georgia, LSU
As always, comments solicited.
Mentioned in Austin Murphy's book 
11 comments:
Virginia and Washington St. are mid-tier teams?
Virginia is the worst team in a very bad ACC and Wazzou just made Baylor look like an NFL team.
You give your own team credit for 2 wins when there are other teams on the board lower than UF with 3 wins? It will be alright after you'll beat up Tenn this weekend, but a last second field goal to beat the spread (in home night game) against a less than stellar Miami team does not keep UF at #5 based on your criteria....
3 wins should trump 2 wins this early in the season, unless you are USC and destroy the #5 team in the country.
Follow Blutarsky and not start this until week 5 (or 5 in his case).
leakbrewergator - Both of those were tough calls I agree. UVA is awful this year, yet they were a 9 win team last year. I would say they are ripe for downgrade.
Washington State probably deserves to fall into "low". I'll consider it.
ugaflyfisherman - If 3 wins always trump 2, than USC along with Florida must be unrated to. That simply won't work.
The point is certain TYPES of wins trump others. When a team's 3 wins are against "low" tier teams, ANY win against a mid or top tier team is better by definition. Hence USC, with the only top tier win, is number 1.
I also don't think Miami is less than stellar. I think we will see them more competitive than anyone thinks this year - they are the fastest team I have seen UF play in several years. If I'm wrong, I'll state it then.
Lastly I agree 100% with Blutarsky - but I am a BlogPoll voter, so I HAVE to rank. I don't get a choice not to.
Flyfisherman,
I agree with your first point but we are part of the blogpoll so we submit a ballot every week. The good news is that we aren't locked into the AP/Coaches system of musical chairs. Our poll in week five will reflect the reality in week five and not be a product of remnants of week three's poll.
South Florida has played 3 games so far, not two. [Kansas, Central Florida, and an FCS team). Unless you're not counting their FCS game. [But then you'd have to not count Georgia's, and OU's, and so on).
That gives them either 2 mids and a low, or 1 mid and two lows. Not sure if that's enough to squeak by your Gators.
Right you are dethwing. When culling through a mass of info something is bound to get lost.
I would put them 1 mid, 2 low. UCF just isn't quite a mid-tier team in my estimation. So they would stay put.
If tOSU is not even good enough to be ranked, how are they still a top tier team?
I know you are using a strict resume system, but it seems that a loss to The Greatest Team Ever (tm) should be no shame. (Not yet, but you can be sure that some talking head will describe Southern Cal that way after another win or two).
Reinforces the oddities of early season resume polling - no sane person can really believe that Vandy and Kentucky are better than LSU and Texas.
Methinks you get a perverse pleasure out of these early ballots.
Keep up the good work.
mhoram - All my pleasures are perverse.
That said, it will all shake out in the end. One of two things will happen -
1. OSU will prove their worth as a top tier team, meriting USC's win as such. In doing so OSU will inevitably climb back into my poll.
2. OSU will prove a bust, in which case I will demote them to mid-tier. In that case they won't be of so much value to USC.
Once again, patience. This is early stuff.
Moreover I don't *believe* that Vandy and Kentucky are better than Texas or LSU. I don't *believe* they are better than anyone in fact. I just looking at what they have done.
Resume ranking doesn't rely on belief of one team being better than another. In fact it is irrelevant. If a team is "better" it will prove so eventually. However, I vastly prefer it to the "usual" ranking method that is based almost entirely on belief, at this point.
I think this poll is acceptable, but maybe you'll should take into consideration the number of wins somehow. I don't know how to do that, but as college football fans, sports fans, etc you have learned that anyone can be beaten on any day by any team....
Mergz: Less than stellar might have been harsh on Miami as they are extremely fast, but I don't know if I would consider them a mid-tier team yet. Being it was a rivalry game I think it bumps them up a little into that grey zone (your call).
So Miami is faster that the UGA team of 2007? Not that I'm a homer or anything. Curran running down your fastest player in the flat was special... I do agree though that they are the fastest team in the ACC.
I enjoy viewing this poll much more than the AP. At least you'll can make valid arguments about why you picked one team over the other. Everyone should be accountable when voting when these polls have so much weight associated with them.
I think you can drop ECU down now. After last night, WVU doesn't even look like a mid-tier team. It just looks like ECU beat a dud.
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