TheIcon34

September 27th, 2009 at 12:15 PM ^

The teams that lost yesterday/Thursday are still ranked ahead of Michigan.

Penn St is 13th.
Ole Miss is 18th.
Cal is 19th.

Miami is tied for 21st, 6 pts behind Michigan.

Mgoscottie

September 27th, 2009 at 12:32 PM ^

I personally think that's bullshit that they're still ranked that high. They have beaten no one and lost at home. They didn't return much from last year and should have dropped until they beat somebody of note.

Jinxed

September 27th, 2009 at 12:41 PM ^

The media and the SEC coaches rank SEC teams up so that when they inevitably beat up on each other they don't drop as far as they would otherwise. As of right now, I wish we had Alabama's remaining schedule.. seems easier than what we got left.. and it's the "OMG SEC!!"

Plegerize

September 27th, 2009 at 1:00 PM ^

This whole era in college football where the SEC is hyped up is really killing me.

I mean I respect what the teams in the conference have been able to do and being able to sell a product that appears to be the best in the nation, but I just wonder how it's going to end and when.

I mean has there ever been another conference in the history of college football that has been talked up and considered the best in the NCAA before?

CrankThatDonovan

September 27th, 2009 at 12:20 PM ^

Penn State loses to Iowa at home in a game that totally exposed their weaknesses on the offensive line, yet they still remain four spots ahead of Iowa, who has not lost a game? Fail poll is full of fail

CrankThatDonovan

September 27th, 2009 at 12:33 PM ^

Agreed. I also think that all of the 3-1 teams in this poll should show Michigan fans that we are, in fact, a pretty good team. Every team outside of maybe the top 3 has weaknesses, some of them glaring, and those weaknesses have already cost those teams games while Michigan had been able to pull out victories. I know that we are going to lose games, it is silly to think that we won't, but I don't think that Michigan's defense is any worse than it was expected to be, and I think our offense is much better than we expected. I think there are quite a few wins left on the schedule

quakk

September 27th, 2009 at 1:57 PM ^

let's get rid of the polls altogether. an opinion poll to determine the national champion? absurd.

humans are inherently flawed (yeah, really). i've wondered for years what it would look like to take the ncaa hockey rating krach and apply it to football - but i've been too lazy, er, busy to do it.

M-Go-Bleu

September 27th, 2009 at 12:46 PM ^

How can you explain having Cal in front of Oregon. Oregon's loss came against #5 Boise and destroyed Cal...

These are the worst rankings I've ever seen, just a big popularity contest.

Brodie

September 27th, 2009 at 2:02 PM ^

It's only one third of the BCS calculations. They AP isn't involved any more because they wanted to be able to give their national title out just in case the shit hit the fan.

TheIcon34

September 27th, 2009 at 12:50 PM ^

Iowa is 13th, while PSU is 15th.

Don't think I have seen a huge jump for an unranked Big 10 team. Wisconsin is undefeated but not in the top 25. I think the only other unranked teams are Texas A&M, South Florida (who beat FSU), UCLA and Auburn.

exmtroj

September 27th, 2009 at 12:58 PM ^

How in the world is Houston at #12, or Boise at #5, or USC at #7? These rankings are ridiculous, and looking at FSU's overall performance, BYU doesn't belong anywhere in the top 25.

Seth9

September 27th, 2009 at 1:07 PM ^

My weekly complaints about the Coaches' Poll:

First of all, there is a comparison so bad that it would be laughable if this didn't actually come in a poll that helps determine the National Championship: #19 Cal vs. #25 Oregon. HOW IS IT THAT CAL IS HIGHER THAN OREGON AFTER GETTING BEAT 42-3?! THIS DOESN'T EVEN TAKE MUCH RESEARCH. JUST LOOK AT THE SCOREBOARD FROM YESTERDAY AFTERNOON.

Now to look at another idiotic comparison: #13 Penn State vs. #17 Iowa. Iowa just won a primetime road game at Penn State. Iowa is undefeated, Penn State is 3-1, and the Coaches' Poll is an idiotic exercise.

And the final piece of stupidity: #12 Oklahoma St vs. #15 Houston. Seriously.

Overall conclusion: The Coaches' Poll is an embarrassment to everyone's intelligence.

jmblue

September 27th, 2009 at 1:43 PM ^

The fundamental problem with the Coaches' Poll is this: the coaches don't have the time to watch the games. How was RichRod supposed to follow all the other noon games when he had his own game to coach? And then after the game, when he was talking to the press, meeting with recruits and so on, was he supposed to be keeping an eye on the 3:30 games? And then he's got to vote before 1:00 a.m. or whatever - before he has any reasonable amount of time to digest everything else that was going on around the country while he was coaching his team. It's ridiculous.

chally

September 27th, 2009 at 1:40 PM ^

If your primary criteria for a poll is head-to-head wins, you'll never be able to create a poll (there will be too many circular sets of losses).

I'm not suggesting that the Coaches poll is a good poll with a coherent philosophy, but there are plenty of valid approaches to rankings that would allow for those results.

Seth9

September 27th, 2009 at 3:24 PM ^

In a situation where there is no circular set of losses, which is the case in my three examples, and the winning team has an equal or better record than the losing team, also the case in my three examples, and the winning team has played at least a comparable schedule to the losing team with the same number of quality wins, also the case in my three examples, then there is no reason whatsoever that the losing team should be ranked above the winning team.

@Oregon 42, Cal 3:
Oregon is 3-1 with a road loss to #5 Boise State, a weak win over Purdue, a good win over then #18 Utah, and a blowout of Cal. Cal's best win came at Minnesota.

Iowa 21, @Penn State 10:
Iowa has two quality wins, one at home against Arizona, the other at Penn State. Penn State has none. Iowa is 4-0. Penn State is 3-1.

Houston 45, @Oklahoma State 35:
Houston is 3-0 with two quality wins, one at home against Texas Tech, the other at Oklahoma State. Oklahoma State is 3-1 with a quality home win over Georgia. The Georgia win is better than Texas Tech, but that doesn't change the fact that Houston beat Oklahoma State at Oklahoma State.

In all of the above cases, the losing team is currently ranked higher than the winning team in the Coaches' Poll. I defy you to come up with a credible reason in any of these situations to explain why the loser should be ranked above the winner.

The reason for the coaches' inability to put together a credible poll is irrelevant. The fact that they cannot should preclude the poll from having any part in determining the National Championship game, or for that matter any BCS game.

chally

September 27th, 2009 at 4:29 PM ^

You're supposing that the point of the poll is to rank teams based on what they have accomplished so far. Not all pollsters believe that.

One entirely defensible approach to polling is to simply rank the teams based on perceived team strength. If you asked me whether I would rather have Michigan play all of the winning teams you have listed - Houston, Oregon, Iowa - or all of the losing teams - Cal, Texas Tech, Penn State - I would pick the winners pretty easily. That's telling, and it would inform my poll if I were basing it on perceived team strength.

Noah

September 27th, 2009 at 5:17 PM ^

That's only legitimate for a preseason poll. Ranking on perceived strength when games have already been played is just ridiculous, and ignores a good portion of what's happening on the field.

chally

September 27th, 2009 at 7:00 PM ^

There is nothing ridiculous about it.

First of all, we're talking about a week 4 poll with zero consequences for anyone involved. There is no difference between this poll and a pre-season poll. It's the best guess of some people about who are the "Top" 25 teams. I offer that a power ranking is much more consistent with the goal of ranking the "top" 25 teams than a resume ranking 4 weeks into the season.

Second of all, and most importantly, Wins and Losses aren't the only things that happen on the field.

We've all had the experience of watching the better team lose. For example, most of us felt that way after the 2008 Notre Dame game. Based on what we saw (i.e., the play on the field), I would have ranked us ahead of the team that just beat us by quite a few points.

Sometimes a team struggles against a particular style of offense or defense. Under Carr we couldn't stop the spread. Sometimes a team loses a trap game, or loses because they were looking ahead, or looses because they're playing a former coach who knows the system. USC's loss to Washington is infinitely more understandable than, say, Ole Miss' loss to South Carolina, despite the fact that South Carolina is probably a better team than Washington.

What happens on the field, including the wins and losses, is evidence of which teams are good, but if the goal is to rank the best teams then a complaint based solely in wins and losses just doesn't have much critical power.

Even if you strongly believe in resume voting, then you shouldn't be tied to head-to-head records, since resume voting requires evaluating the whole record. For example, take Iowa and Penn State. Iowa's worst game (near loss to Northern Iowa) doesn't look that much better than Penn State's worst game (loss to Iowa). If Penn State's other three wins are more impressive than Iowa's other three wins, Penn State could still end up having accomplished more at the end of the day. It's like the difference between a student who gets 4 straight Bs and a student who gets 3 As and a D. That D sure looks ugly, but it's the second student who has the higher GPA. You may not believe that to be true in this case, but (1) it's debatable, and (2) the point is not that the coaches got it right, but that your use of head-to-head results simply isn't a meaningful critique.

Wolverine In Exile

September 27th, 2009 at 1:53 PM ^

If Tebow is out more than 2 games, and Florida loses 1 or more of the games he's out, then Florida will drop big (lower than 15??), but as soon as Tebow comes back and Florida starts winning again, Gators will jump back up faster than a Russian hooker at a vodka convention mainlining crystal meth. You might be looking at (begin dramatic voice by announcer guy) "the greatest poll recovery in the history of college football led by the greatest player in college football history" (end dramatic voice by announcer guy)

Brodie

September 27th, 2009 at 2:05 PM ^

I'm not sure I have too many problems with these polls. Specifically our rankings in them, do people really think we belong somewhere in the top 20?

Happyshooter

September 27th, 2009 at 2:07 PM ^

Michigan is ranked still, which helps us fans feel good and I am sure makes the players and students (and RichRod) happy, but without the national fuss that being a top team would bring.

That leaves the State game as the in state contest is always is, a match-up of two University groups, and not a major national game that could distract the M players from trying their best to win for bragging rights.