USA Today Sagarin Ratings
Don't want to get ahead of myself here, and I appologize if this has been discussed already, but I was looking at the Jeff Sagarin computer rankings (part of bcs formula) and note that Michigan is in at number 20.
http://www.usatoday.com/sports/sagarin/fbt09.htm
This is significant because this early in the season both formulas used are Bayesian (meaning there is an element of expectation from previous season and previous games that factors in). Eventually, all teams will be connected by playing (not sure which week), but that should give Michigan an automatic bump in computers if we keep winning because we had to have low expectations coming into the season (currently draggin us down now - i.e. Oklahoma State is still ahead of us).
Also a drag is that ND is ranked 33 in Sagarin, which means that we need them to beat the Spartans so that we can get an increase in points for beating a top 30. (Sparties are a long way from breaking into the top 30).
September 17th, 2009 at 4:34 PM ^
Let's just aim for a nice record and a decent bowl game in a warm place. A place that doesn't involve playing, say, Texas, Alabama, or USC. The defensive UFR doesn't lie - this can be a fun team to root for without getting too caught up in whether they are in the top 5 or 8 or what have you.
September 17th, 2009 at 4:47 PM ^
Sagarin isn't a very good indicator until after the 5th or 6th game when they remove their preseason rankings from the formula they use.
September 17th, 2009 at 7:18 PM ^
the Sagarin formula that would be used by the BCS has Michigan at 24.