College Football and the Polls question.

[Deity Dude]

Today's rankings is a great example of why there needs to be a playoff system in college football. If it goes by ranking (which is the basis for the BCS formula), the "pet teams" have an unfair advantage.

Example:

Team A (3-0) beat Team B (2-1) at its home field. Team B (2-1) beat Team C (2-1) on its home field. Other than the games played against each other thier schedules have been similiar.

Common sense tells you A should be ranked higher than B and B should be ranked higher than C. But, it is the exact opposite.

BTW the 3 teams are

A = Michigan State: 3-0 and beat Notre Dame at Notre Dame

B = Notre Dame: 2-1 lost to Michigan State and Beat Michigan at Michigan

C= Michigan: 2-1 lost to Notre Dame.

Poll results:

..................................AP.............. USA
Michigan.......................14...............13
Notre Dame..................16...............18
Michigan State..............17...............22

What is that based on? A love of Michigan and Notre Dame? I don't know, it just doesn't make sense.

OK I am a Spartan fan, and I will admit the they get over ranked in basketball sometimes. The difference is, in basketball the tournament determines your final ranking.

Another interesting way to look at it is this. If Michigan did what Michigan State did (3-0 and had beat Notre Dame) they would be ranked #2 or #3.

If Michigan State did what Michigan did (2-1 and lost to Notre Dame) they would be unranked.

So that amounts to a 20+ position premium in the rankings for being a "pet team"

BTW - the unbiased computer ranking (I know these are flawed but they aren't biased for any certain team) has it as follows

Michigan State.....12
Notre Dame..........17
Michigan...............31

Edited because I dont know how to do table so I added periods

[Guynemer]

May I direct you to:

http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?s=&postid=4017713#post4017713

And for what it is worth, I'm a Michigan fan who agrees with you 100%.

[Deity Dude]

Michigan's my 2nd favorite team.

[Sikander]

I agree as well, and I'm also a Spartan who likes Michigan too.

[Drake Tungsten]

The problem has much more to do with preseason polls that are based on nothing than it does with pollsters having "pet teams". Michigan was absurdly overrated at the start of the season, Notre Dame got an excessive bounce in the polls for beating them and Michigan State had the bad luck of beating Notre Dame after it had sunk in that Michigan (and therefore Notre Dame) probably weren't as good as people had thought. Throw in the reluctance of pollsters to drop teams too far in the polls after a loss and you end up with a situation like this.

[DanS]

I don't agree. The polls don't mean anything this early in the season, so why focus on them now?

The pollsters want to see big matchups and will weight their votes slightly to help create them. They want to have something fun and interesting to write about. For instance, I was surprised that Michigan State wasn't ranked last week, if only because they were 2-0 and playing Notre Dame at the weekend on national TV.

[Deity Dude]

The rankings do matter early because its like a ladder system. It's easier to get to the top if you start out closer. Especially if 2 teams each have a loss.

If you start out #3. Then lose a game and drop to #14. If you win the rest of your games you will be in the top 4.

If you start unranked. Climb to #15. Then lose a game you probably go unranked again. Then if u win the rest of your games you might get top 10.

Top 4 plays in the National Championship game or runner-up game. 10th plays anywhere from 2nd tier BCS to not even on New Year's Day.

[DanS]

It's not quite like a ladder system, in that all sorts of factors come into play once you get down to the end of the season. For instance, strength of schedule and head-to-heads will make more of a difference near the end of the season. If Michigan wins the rest of its games and Notre Dame wins the rest of its games, and there's one slot left for the title game, I fully expect Notre Dame to get the slot, even though Michigan is ranked higher right now. If Michigan State is the other undefeated, I would expect Notre Dame to get the slot because of strength of schedule.

Of course, Notre Dame's probably not going to have near that record at the time, so don't get your panties in a twist.

[Deity Dude]

Actually the only thing that comes into play is who the voters vote for. Each one of them has thier own reasons and decision making processes. Thats the problem.

If a voter can write Michigan's name ahead of Notre Dame now when common sense says to do the opposite, there is no reason why they won't later. Same goes for writing Michigan and Notre Dame's name ahead of Michigan State's. Thank God this is the only organized sport at any level, that I know of, that uses such a crazy system to determine its champion.

[Ming]

Originally posted by Deity Dude
Thank God this is the only organized sport at any level, that I know of, that uses such a crazy system to determine its champion.

Yep... REAL sports have a playoff system

[Imran Siddiqui]

Also my analogy in the other thread is important (IMO, of course ). San Francisco beat St. Louis in the NFL Week 1 matchup. Would you say that San Fran is the better team overall? I'd hope not. I think voters are voting on the fact that even though X team lost to Y, the X team is better overall and their final record (as the pollster sees it) will be better.

[Deity Dude]

In your analogy, I would rank SF higher than St. Louis until St.Louis either beat them or obtained a better record, otherwise its a popularity contest. There has to be a consequence to losing a game. (Even if you are the "better" team). Otherwise, why even play them. But in the NFL it doesn't matter because there is a playoff system based on predetermined rules, not popularity of team name.

I wonder how many different NFL Champions we would have, if we only played a regular season and then voted.

[Guynemer]

Of course, this specific example will work itself out a week from Saturday when Michigan plays at MSU. But other similar circumstances don't have such a neat resolution.

[Deity Dude]

What if Michigan wins. Then all 3 teams are 1-1 against each other and undefeated against everyone else. Then you would have 3 teams that should be ranked very close to each other, but I can guarantee you they wouldn't be. Michigan will be in the top 10 and MSU will be struggling to stay in the top 25. If state wins they'll probably be around 10 and michigan will still be in the top 25. So basically State is at a little more than a 1 game disadvantage to UM.

I'm know these things happen all over the country. I was just using this example because I am familiar with it and the 3 teams happen to all play each other early.

[Guynemer]

Originally posted by Deity Dude
What if Michigan wins...

Something tells me that this is highly unlikely.