Mandel's argument why UM's schedule has been tougher than Wash or TAMU's
Hey Stewart: What in the world is going on with your Top 10 rankings? Michigan goes from No. 7 to No. 3 on a bye week, jumping both Washington and Texas A&M who also had byes? Did the change of heart come from (a) Hate mail flowing in from the Michigan faithful, (b) Wisconsin looking pretty awesome despite losing to Ohio State or (c) A belief that A&M will get dismantled by the Tide and Washington will come down to earth eventually?-- Carter Bayne, St. Paul, MinnesotaIt came from the fact I blew up the previous week’s rankings and started from scratch (which I should really do every week), and in doing that reevaluated every team’s resume based on what we know now. Given that, Michigan’s 45-28 win over Colorado back in Week 3 that I mostly dismissed at the time is now a 45-28 win over a 5-2, fringe Top 25 opponent. Penn State, who was 2-2 at the time Michigan smashed it 49-10, is now 4-2. And Wisconsin, whom the Wolverines beat 14-7, gave Ohio State an even tougher game.So while Washington has been dominant, Michigan has the same record against a much tougher schedule. Texas A&M’s has been arguably tougher than the Wolverines’, but its big win over Tennessee a week earlier lost some value when the Vols turned around and lost 49-10 to Alabama. And UCLA, which was ranked when the Aggies beat them in overtime in Week 1, is now 3-4. Throw in Clemson’s struggles at home against NC State, and that’s how Michigan “jumped” four spots on a bye week.
October 19th, 2016 at 12:39 PM ^
be damned, but I agree with Michigan at 3 for those very reasons. Furthermore, Defense.
October 19th, 2016 at 1:03 PM ^
October 19th, 2016 at 2:53 PM ^
Let the rankings be anathema.
October 19th, 2016 at 5:02 PM ^
Jerry: How long have you been waiting to squeeze that into a conversation.
Sent from MGoBlog HD for iPhone & iPad
October 19th, 2016 at 1:05 PM ^
From the East to the West.
October 19th, 2016 at 2:35 PM ^
October 19th, 2016 at 12:43 PM ^
Colorado has a big game @ Stanford this weekend. Go Buffs.
October 19th, 2016 at 12:53 PM ^
October 19th, 2016 at 2:16 PM ^
Yeah but that Wazzu team can beat anybody or lose to anybody depending on which way the sword swings.
October 19th, 2016 at 2:26 PM ^
We would have lost to Colorado had Sefo not gotten hurt. He just spewed that nonsense on Sirius XM The Playbook.
October 19th, 2016 at 2:37 PM ^
Aside from the fact that Michigan had essentially taken over the game in the second quarter - before Sefo got hurt? Whatever, Eddie...
October 19th, 2016 at 2:44 PM ^
Confession: You had the Eddie George piece in the subject header, so when I read the body of your text I read the first sentence and gave you a hairtrigger downvote.
Then I actually read your post carefully, as I occasionally encourage people to do, and realized I was being a doofus. So I flipped it to an upvote since it was my fault.
October 19th, 2016 at 2:58 PM ^
Its all good, i'm guilty of doing the same all the time.
October 19th, 2016 at 5:45 PM ^
Eddie George, didn't colorado have the lead in the 3rd qtr?
October 20th, 2016 at 7:15 AM ^
I know we came back like they weren't there to take the lead going into the half. So if they were leading in the third quarter we scored 21 in the second half, I honestly don't see that team (even with Dan Marino in his prime at QB) scoring more than 21 points on that defense in the second half. Eddie, Eddie, Eddie, Thats exactly the mindset we want OSU to come into The Game with. "Awe shucks they aint that good" just keep telling yourselves that. This is the year Michigan needs to use their youth against them just like they did against us last year.
October 19th, 2016 at 3:01 PM ^
for Sefo...ALL that he got after the first quarter was that 70-yard TD bomb.
October 19th, 2016 at 4:58 PM ^
The 'terrible, useless' backup that we killed (Montez?), has been lighting people up game in and game out since then.
Rob
October 19th, 2016 at 7:00 PM ^
I caught the end of his show today with Robert Smith on there. Both dogged Jabril at being #2 or #3 in the heisman race at the moment because "he doesn't have the numbers". What the fuck does that mean Robert? I know you watch the games and can clearly see that Jabril is the best football player in all of CFB.
Instead of calling a spade a spade, they referenced a LB at Vandy that has 100 tackles on the season as more worthy on the defensive side. It was sickening to listen to. Screw you Robert Smith, Eddie George and might as well throw Joey Galloway in there too. You're all a bunch of homers.
Someone should play it back for Jabril - let him meditate on that over the next month.
October 19th, 2016 at 7:19 PM ^
not playing including the best defensive back. He needs to start thinking of his excuses for when we kick OSU's ass.
October 19th, 2016 at 3:48 PM ^
Besides our own team, I think Colorado is the team Michigan fans should be rooting for more than any other.
If Colorado were to win the PAC-12 conference or even its division, that would be huge for Michigan's out of conference schedule; which in turn would help make the case for Michigan in the playoffs if we were to lose to OSU (god forbid).
October 20th, 2016 at 12:23 PM ^
Home schedule than was first thought...Sounds about right.
October 19th, 2016 at 12:43 PM ^
October 19th, 2016 at 1:29 PM ^
Although, to be fair to Mandel a bit, it would be interesting if more writers took that approach he mentioned, blowing up their rankings each week and reconstructing it based on what is now known about those schedules. I think that actually is a more fair way to do rankings, especially as the interconnections between teams and schedules grows throughout the season.
October 19th, 2016 at 2:29 PM ^
And to piggyback off of your thought....I have yet to hear a compelling reason why the teams aren't ranked until after say the first four weeks of the season. Or rank the teams before conference starts. Yes that would mean that some teams can't start the season off against conference opponents.
October 19th, 2016 at 3:10 PM ^
The committee hasn't done a single poll yet. Their rankings don't come out until at least next week.
AP, Coaches, etc. don't really mean anything anymore.
October 19th, 2016 at 3:11 PM ^
October 19th, 2016 at 4:07 PM ^
Isn't that basically what the CFP committee does? I thought they re-ranked every week which is why their process is better than the polls.
October 20th, 2016 at 12:24 AM ^
actually do that though. The fact that he didn't take into account actual results yet, and still had us #7 when we were ranked #4 overall basically means everyone else, or at least most other voters were taking all this new information into account as it happened. He basically just said, yeah my rankings the past few weeks were bad so I decided to catch up on the teams I'm ranking.
October 19th, 2016 at 12:45 PM ^
The buffs have a good chance of winning their division. That would be great for us.
October 19th, 2016 at 5:33 PM ^
to the finale against Utah and that's in Boulder, so that's probably why the fancystats have them as 60% chance to win the division.
October 19th, 2016 at 12:46 PM ^
Used to follow him regularly during his SI days (and Dr. Z). He is more objective than most CFB columnist.
October 19th, 2016 at 12:51 PM ^
October 19th, 2016 at 5:48 PM ^
bama will roll TAMU
October 20th, 2016 at 7:48 AM ^
Nuff said!
October 19th, 2016 at 5:54 PM ^
though. If you're arguing about recalibrating your views about teams that were overrated you have to do the same about teams that were underrated. @Auburn and Arkansas are probably more difficult games than home Tennessee and obviously UCLA.
Hawaii is ranked 107th in F/+ and 120th in Sagarin. They are awful and we played them under circumstances that were ridiculous for them. UCF is better than we thought but still bad. Rutgers, yikes. TA&M has played a pretty tough schedule - definitely far more difficult than ours and it's ranked far more difficult in every ranking system of SOS.
We've blown everyone out (except Wisconsin which wasn't as close as the score), so we do deserve to be ranked higher and we are the better team so far, but I always laugh about definitive statements like "we would crush them!" We'd be slightly favored. We'd probably win 6 or 7 times in 10 against them. But they deserve to be ranked right behind us.
October 19th, 2016 at 12:52 PM ^
October 19th, 2016 at 1:18 PM ^
FEI doesn't like Michigan's schedule so far. FEI has UM with the 77th hardest schedule played so far (Rutgers and Hawaii are massive hits).
FEI has Bama with the 30th hardest schedule, Clemson 27, A&M 37, OSU 59 and Washington 122.
October 19th, 2016 at 2:29 PM ^
Well, Michigan is penalized for a matchup with conference foe Rutgers (#120!! FEI), while Texas A&M is not for their meeting with Prairie View A&M as FEI doesn't count games against FCS competition. Obviously that's not the entirety of the difference, but this affects SOS and also contributes to some stark contrasts between the FEI and S&P+. This is most apparent for teams that lost to FCS foes:
- Northwestern lost to Illinois State (FEI #20, S&P #60)
- Iowa lost to ND State (FEI #25, S&P #36)
- Wazzu lost to Eastern Wash (FEI #8, S&P #42)
October 19th, 2016 at 3:18 PM ^
Good stuff.
October 19th, 2016 at 6:01 PM ^
ranks FCS teams along with FBS and he has Michigan's SOS at #48 which sounds about right. It's tougher than expected but it's still been pretty easy so far. TA&M is ranked #16 with that Prairie View game being the only cupcake. They've had a pretty tough schedule.
October 19th, 2016 at 3:20 PM ^
At this point we're really not focusing on the schedule overall but the games we've that were opportunities for losses, and we've won every one. Our schedule is top-heavy with WI, CO and maybe PSU. Who cares if the others are the 110th or 70th best teams.
October 19th, 2016 at 4:11 PM ^
That tends to be how the committee has thought, too. The last two years have featured lots of discussion of "quality wins."
October 19th, 2016 at 12:58 PM ^
Like the OP, I appreciate that Mandel is willing to stretch his view back across the season. For CFB in particular, the early season sample size and comparison points are so few that it makes perfect sense to recalculate the whole mess periodically.
No need for a foolish consistency if new data renders prior judgments faulty. Fix it and move on.
October 19th, 2016 at 1:00 PM ^
I like Mandel, generally, and it's hard to dispute what he wrote. Washington looks impressive, but they have not played anyone at all yet -- no one as good as Colorado, let alone Wisconsin; their non-conf was Rutgers, Idaho and Portland State, for pete's sake.
That said, if someone ranks UM 4th or 5th, I don't really care. UM wins the rest of their games, they'll be in the CFP -- one game at a time, blah blah.
October 19th, 2016 at 1:11 PM ^
October 19th, 2016 at 2:01 PM ^
It would be the two best DLs in the country on display, IMO.
October 19th, 2016 at 2:56 PM ^
Alabama?
October 19th, 2016 at 6:04 PM ^
It's Bama and us at 1a and 1b and a sizable margin for whomever is #3.
October 20th, 2016 at 2:11 PM ^
Clemson's is in competition with Michigan's for best DL in the country. Alabama probably has the best pass rush, but probably the #3 DL overall, IMHO.
October 19th, 2016 at 1:09 PM ^
Credit to Clemson, I guess. They found a way to win that NC State game. I watched most of that Clemson/Troy game too, and it's not like Clemson every really had that game in the bag either - not unti late in the game.