Fanbogs - College Football Weblogs

September 14, 2004

Fanblogs XIV: Week 4

Poll of the Fanblogs.com authors & contributors for games played through September 13, 2004:


1. Southern California (10) 166
2. Oklahoma (2) 151
3. Georgia 137
4. LSU 126
5. Miami (Fla.) 124
6. Texas 99
7. Ohio St. 75
8. Florida St. 61
9. Iowa 59
10. West Virginia 48
11. Florida 36
12. Tennessee 29
13. Auburn 27
14. California 24

First place votes in parenthesis. Weighted ballot points appear beside team name.


Others Receiving Votes:
Maryland 14, Utah 13, Purdue 12, Boise St. 10, Fresno St. 9, Indiana 8, Kansas St. 8, Michigan 6, Virginia 6, Troy St. 3, Memphis 2, Oklahoma St. 2, Oregon 2, North Carolina St. 1, Southern Miss. 1, Virginia Tech 1


Author Voting:
Kevin Donahue: 1) Southern California, 2) Oklahoma, 3) LSU, 4) Miami (Fla.), 5) Texas, 6) Georgia, 7) Auburn, 8) Florida St., 9) Iowa, 10) Ohio St., 11) Purdue, 12) Florida, 13) Virginia, 14) Tennessee

Pete Holiday: 1) Southern California, 2) Oklahoma, 3) LSU, 4) Miami (Fla.), 5) Georgia, 6) Texas, 7) Florida, 8) Florida St., 9) Ohio St., 10) Tennessee, 11) Iowa, 12) West Virginia, 13) Auburn, 14) Maryland

Derek Willis: 1) Southern California, 2) Oklahoma, 3) Georgia, 4) LSU, 5) Miami (Fla.), 6) Texas, 7) Ohio St., 8) Iowa, 9) Florida St., 10) West Virginia, 11) Auburn, 12) Tennessee, 13) California, 14) Purdue

Dave Frey: 1) Oklahoma, 2) Southern California, 3) Miami (Fla.), 4) Georgia, 5) LSU, 6) Ohio St., 7) West Virginia, 8) Texas, 9) Florida, 10) Florida St., 11) Iowa, 12) California, 13) Michigan, 14) Tennessee

Jeff Quinton: 1) Southern California, 2) Miami (Fla.), 3) Oklahoma, 4) Georgia, 5) Texas, 6) LSU, 7) Iowa, 8) Florida St., 9) Ohio St., 10) Florida, 11) West Virginia, 12) Utah, 13) Oregon, 14) Virginia

Josh Crockett: 1) Oklahoma, 2) Southern California, 3) LSU, 4) Georgia, 5) Miami (Fla.), 6) Texas, 7) Ohio St., 8) Iowa, 9) Tennessee, 10) Florida St., 11) California, 12) Michigan, 13) West Virginia, 14) Virginia Tech

John Ludwig: 1) Southern California, 2) Oklahoma, 3) Georgia, 4) LSU, 5) Miami (Fla.), 6) Texas, 7) Ohio St., 8) California, 9) Iowa, 10) Tennessee, 11) Purdue, 12) Florida St., 13) Auburn, 14) Michigan

Mike Boone: 1) Southern California, 2) Oklahoma, 3) Georgia, 4) Miami (Fla.), 5) LSU, 6) Texas, 7) Florida St., 8) California, 9) West Virginia, 10) Ohio St., 11) Florida, 12) Virginia, 13) Tennessee, 14) Iowa

Josh McClain: 1) Southern California, 2) Oklahoma, 3) Georgia, 4) Iowa, 5) LSU, 6) West Virginia, 7) Maryland, 8) Florida, 9) Texas, 10) Utah, 11) Miami (Fla.), 12) Boise St., 13) Purdue, 14) North Carolina St.

Ben Prather: 1) Southern California, 2) Miami (Fla.), 3) Georgia, 4) Oklahoma, 5) Ohio St., 6) Fresno St., 7) Indiana, 8) Boise St., 9) LSU, 10) Utah, 11) Florida St., 12) Troy St., 13) Oklahoma St., 14) Southern Miss.

Robert Knodell: 1) Southern California, 2) Georgia, 3) LSU, 4) Texas, 5) Miami (Fla.), 6) Oklahoma, 7) Ohio St., 8) West Virginia, 9) Florida St., 10) Iowa, 11) Auburn, 12) Florida, 13) Memphis, 14) Purdue

Michael Hickerson: 1) Southern California, 2) Oklahoma, 3) Georgia, 4) LSU, 5) Texas, 6) Miami (Fla.), 7) Kansas St., 8) Auburn, 9) Tennessee, 10) Maryland, 11) West Virginia, 12) Florida St., 13) Ohio St., 14) California

Posted by Kevin Donahue

 

Comments:

  1. Fanblogs Author Josh McClain said:

    posted on September 14, 2004 3:59 PM — 198.207.0.5 — link — abuse?



    I couldn't ever vote in the top 14 a team who has one loss this early in the season. Fifth, sixth week That's ok, but this early?

    Michigan, Va Tech, Oregon & Florida State - win a few more first.

  2. Jeff said:

    posted on September 14, 2004 4:28 PM — 24.197.122.162 — link — abuse?



    So a loss to Miami by FSU is that much worse than a 3 pt. win over N. Ill. by Maryland or LSU going to OT against Oregon State?

  3. Fanblogs Author Josh McClain said:

    posted on September 14, 2004 4:31 PM — 198.207.0.5 — link — abuse?



    A win is a win.

    Being close only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades.

  4. Fanblogs Author Derek Willis said:

    posted on September 14, 2004 4:39 PM — 63.72.70.149 — link — abuse?



    Maybe so, Josh, but I look at the teams outside the top 14 and I think almost all of them would have great difficulty in beating Florida State (as long as Rix didn't just hand them the ball, that is). Michigan and Va Tech I agree with - they haven't shown me much to deserve the reputation. But FSU did show me something Friday night to warrant its inclusion.

  5. Jeff said:

    posted on September 14, 2004 5:17 PM — 24.197.122.162 — link — abuse?



    A win is a win.

    That's the same sort of ill-formed logic that took Strength of Schedule and Margin of Victory out of the BCS formula.

  6. Fanblogs Author Josh McClain said:

    posted on September 14, 2004 6:13 PM — 198.207.0.5 — link — abuse?



    That's not what I'm saying at all. Since College Football is the only major sport where polls determine who gets to play for the title, you use the ultimate stat - wins and losses.

    Sorry, moral victories or "we had 'em" doesn't mean you won the game. You didn't win. I don't care how many you were winning by, or what happened, at the end of the day, your team lost. That's why they play the game in the first place.

    That rationale, and your anger, along with the ranking of FSU in the top 10 in the poll, is why polls should NOT be taken until the sixth week of the season. They are worthless until then. By then, things have shaken out.

    Every season, half a dozen teams ranked in the top half of the polls fall off the face of the earth. And they are ranked for weeks as they pile up the losses(See Auburn, ASU circa 2003). So how is that fair to the Purdue's of the world who've gone out and dominated their games? I'll answer that for you, it's not.

    And MOV is the most worthless college football comparison out there. Oklahoma gets brownie points for putting up a 60 spot on Houston while Texas gets nothing for grinding out a 22-20 win over a tough UA team? That makes a ton of sense.

    Strength of schedule is a different monster. I was upset at it's removal. If we're going to use flawed and partial voters to determine the winner than we had better balance it with some logic like quality wins and SoS.

    Polls irritate me to no end.

    I saw that Arizona recieved a top 25 vote in the AP poll. That was the 2-10 in 2003 Arizona, one of the worst football teams in the nation. Does that make sense? Absolutely not.

  7. Fanblogs Author Pete Holiday said:

    posted on September 14, 2004 6:34 PM — 68.62.114.241 — link — abuse?



    Here's what it comes down to for me... do I think that Team A would usually beat Team B? If so, Team A gets a higher rank. That's it.

    Do I think West Virginia or Maryland could beat Miami? Not even if they combined teams. So they fall below. It's really very simple.

    What I find interesting, Josh, is that on the one hand you say that since CF uses polls, the pollsters should go by "the ultimate stat -- wins" which is so contrary as to almost be silly.

    If the intention was to go by "the ultimate stat", then we wouldn't even have polls. Period. The fact that we have polls insists that we use something OTHER or MORE than the number of wins to figure it out. Any 1st grader can compare two teams and see who has more wins... yet, no first graders are voting in polls. Amazing, that.

    As for MOV... MOV is essential. Maybe not to the BCS, but to polls in general. Now, you also have to consider who was played, but at the end of the day, beating Arkansas 22-20 is probably better than scoring 70+ on some DIAA school... but it's NOT better than beating Arkansas 48-20, is it?

    But hey... nevermind all that logic and stuff... a win is a win.


    One thing, though... where are UConn, BC, Indiana, Minnesota, and the hordes of other teams that are undefeated with TWO wins? I mean... NC State only has ONE win... don't you think someone with a higher number in the "ultimate stat" category and the same number of losses should be higher ranked?

  8. Jeff said:

    posted on September 14, 2004 6:57 PM — 24.197.122.162 — link — abuse?



    That rationale, and your anger, along with the ranking of FSU in the top 10 in the poll, is why polls should NOT be taken until the sixth week of the season. They are worthless until then. By then, things have shaken out.

    Who's angry? Not me.

    I do agree totally about polls being worthless until later in the season - that's why I think it really doesn't matter much now whether every team ranked is unbeaten or not.

  9. Fanblogs Author Josh McClain said:

    posted on September 14, 2004 7:11 PM — 198.207.0.5 — link — abuse?



    I meant the anger by everyone over the polls.

    Every week you see people in this thread screaming and hollering about how you can rate one team over another.

    I typed your and meant the.

  10. Fanblogs Author Josh McClain said:

    posted on September 14, 2004 7:23 PM — 198.207.0.5 — link — abuse?



    We don't need to resort to being a smartass about how everyone picks their polls. Everyone has their own method. That's mine, you have yours.

  11. Jeff said:

    posted on September 14, 2004 7:30 PM — 24.197.122.162 — link — abuse?



    For awhile it was any poll thread posted, especially the preseason ones. Those arguments have replaced the rehash of USC-LSU apparently.

  12. Fanblogs Author Robert Knodell said:

    posted on September 14, 2004 7:48 PM — 12.215.229.182 — link — abuse?



    The problem with the whole "ultimate stat" rationale is the wide disparity between the quality of opponents that teams will play. By following that theory, Tulane should have been ranked number one and should've played for the national title two years ago.

    Josh, last season should TCU with only one loss have been ranked higher and gotten an at-large BCS berth over two-loss Ohio State? I think this is an interesting debate.

    If each team played each other in a round-robin schedule (impossible, given that there are 117 D-1A teams), then wins and losses could determine the rankings by simply having W/L standings as Pete said. I'm not sure I can buy into the premise that no team can be ranked higher than another one with fewer losses.

  13. Fanblogs Author Kevin Donahue said:

    posted on September 14, 2004 7:51 PM — link — abuse?



    The greatness of polls, IMHO, is that it's an aggregate of opinion. (Maybe schmed could stop by and share a simile for opinions & body parts.) But, the best part of polls is that you can take all these divergent thoughts and blend them into one easy to read list. Sure, everybody's got a different take, but --as a group-- we pretty much think this is the list (well, at this single moment in time, anyway!)

    Besides, y'all are all wrong & I'm right! ;)

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