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Preseason and Regular Season Polls (2016)

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Gcashwell said:
I never want to hear anybody talk about a "good SEC loss" again after Michigan lost to an unranked team and didn't fall in the polls.
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The "good SEC loss" cyclical nonsense is when your top team gets upset and the SEC emerges stronger afterwards by inflating the ranking of David. This has happened often over the years.

Contrast that with what happens to the Pac 12 when their top team is upset, or what used to happen in the B1G (before this unusual celebration by the pollsters/media this year)

If you'd like to discuss a comparable thing, like the AP poll, Michigan did fall, and would have slid further if not for the unranked Clemsoning elsewhere. But you're discussing an in-depth playoff ranking, not a silly poll put out by unathletic writers and university water boys.
BuckeyeNation27 said:
Right. Because a decade long history of SEC poll favoritism is negated by that.
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Precisely, and if the B1G starts getting half of their conference ranked in the top-25 each preseason for sweet coat tail riding, I'll call shenanigans on that too. I think most felt Nebraska was fake good this year.
Gcashwell said:
Bowl game records by conference over the previous decade say you are incorrect.
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Naturally, because we don't evaluate SEC teams by what they do, we evaluate them by what other teams (mostly Bama) do. So wannabes like Arkansas, Tennessee, Miss St and others get incredibly inflated rankings because of their proximity to greatness.
 
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Is it an SEC issue specifically, or a perception of conference strength issue generally?

I certainly get how teams like Ole Piss and the Milkmen have continued to be ranked this season despite loss after loss after loss and I certainly understand the past... decade? of SEC shit teams getting the benefit of the doubt just because they're in the SEC. But, now that scUM dropped a game to Iowa and didn't fall at all (whereas, in years past, scUM would likely have tumbled ... what... 5 to 10 spots?) it seems to me a straight faced argument can be made that it's not SEC bias so much as perceived conference strength bias at work
 
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Buckeyeskickbuttocks said:
Is it an SEC issue specifically, or a perception of conference strength issue generally?

I certainly get how teams like Ole Piss and the Milkmen have continued to be ranked this season despite loss after loss after loss and I certainly understand the past... decade? of SEC [Mark May] teams getting the benefit of the doubt just because they're in the SEC. But, now that scUM dropped a game to Iowa and didn't fall at all (whereas, in years past, scUM would likely have tumbled ... what... 5 to 10 spots?) it seems to me a straight faced argument can be made that it's not SEC bias so much as perceived conference strength bias at work
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I would agree with this. That said, we have one example in a decade plus of a B1G David (PSU) being inflated for slaying Goliath (OSU). There have been many such situations in the SEC, and so yanks like us aren't going to let go of that soapbox so quickly.

Usually, we see the lowly team stay unranked or way at the bottom of the polls when they take down a flagship B1G school.
 
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Gcashwell said:
There's tons of fans everywhere that discuss the strengths and weaknesses of their conference relative to others.
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I'm well aware. I think it's idiotic, and only done to make themselves feel better.

But if for some reason it needed to be discussed, there's a ton of things that should go into it.....not just rankings or bowl record.
 
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Gcashwell said:
Rankings, bowl record, out of conference record, championships, all things the sec was dominant in for a time.
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Ha.

All things Bama was dominant in for a long time and continues to be. LSU and Florida stepped up when Bama didn't. That's not an SEC thing, that's a 3 teams thing.

The rankings for SEC teams got thrown into an echo chamber to where Missouri beats Miss St who beats A&M who beats Tenn.......and all of those teams get elevated. Because maybe one of them beat Bama or LSU. The two Mississippi teams being #1 and #2 a few years ago was the pinnacle of that nonsense. So.....yeah.....the SEC was dominant in rankings. Because they were in the SEC.

Bowl records, I've already talked about why I don't trust them. People put so much value in it, as if it were the perfect encapsulation to that team's entire season. That's not always how players play bowl games. No coach tells their team they need to win the bowl game for the conference (I dunno....I could actually see SEC coaches doing something that stupid). But that's how people treat it. SEC #3 beat ACC #6....SEC IS SUPERIOR!!!!!!!!!!!!!

OOC record? Really. I know Bama actually goes outside of their zipcode in the non-conference, but the SEC as a whole typically doesn't and didn't during the last 10 years. And while we're on the subject of SEC OOC.......nice week of games before everybody's rivalry game. That's pathetic.

Championships, that's Bama....not DA SEC. Fucking South Carolina fans chanting SEC when their team isn't shit and won't ever be shit is the exact reason conference superiority exists. They're mad because their team sucks.....so if they can pretend they're actually the 5th best team in the country behind the 4 that beat them, then high five!



So yeah.....I guess gut feel, if you want to minimize it by calling it that. There were years when the SEC wasn't very good at all before people were even allowed to talk about it. Tennessee always got brought up as an SEC talking point. No. Florida after Urban. No. Fucking Missouri and aTm walked into the SEC and didn't skip a beat. Typical SECtard was telling me Ohio State would be .500 if they had to play in the SEC, and here's aTm winning a division in year one.

If you want to truly figure out conference superiority for some dumb reason, it would be an exhaustive endeavor. The SEC certainly did have a stretch where they were the best. But it wasn't as long as SEC fan wants to believe, and it wasn't as big of a gap between other conferences as SEC fan wants to believe.
 
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jwinslow said:
The "good SEC loss" cyclical nonsense is when your top team gets upset and the SEC emerges stronger afterwards by inflating the ranking of David. This has happened often over the years.

Contrast that with what happens to the Pac 12 when their top team is upset, or what used to happen in the B1G (before this unusual celebration by the pollsters/media this year)

If you'd like to discuss a comparable thing, like the AP poll, Michigan did fall, and would have slid further if not for the unranked Clemsoning elsewhere. But you're discussing an in-depth playoff ranking, not a silly poll put out by unathletic writers and university water boys.
Precisely, and if the B1G starts getting half of their conference ranked in the top-25 each preseason for sweet coat tail riding, I'll call shenanigans on that too. I think most felt Nebraska was fake good this year.
Naturally, because we don't evaluate SEC teams by what they do, we evaluate them by what other teams (mostly Bama) do. So wannabes like Arkansas, Tennessee, Miss St and others get incredibly inflated rankings because of their proximity to greatness.
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Yep, makes a lot of sense, especially if you think, "What does TV want?" With Speight out, Michigan should have fallen further. BUT TV wants 2 vs 3 or 4 at 12 on the 26th.
 
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BuckeyeNation27 said:
Ha.

All things Bama was dominant in for a long time and continues to be. LSU and Florida stepped up when Bama didn't. That's not an SEC thing, that's a 3 teams thing.
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I find it hard to argue with 7 national championships in a row by the SEC, coming from 4 different teams. My personal perception of the SEC peaked at the end of that streak (2012) and has been tapering off since then.

To your point though, the SEC bias (right or wrong) helped them be in that BCS championship game every single year. Getting to the game is half the battle. I'd guess they would have had 4-5 championsips in that 7 year span if the 4-team playoff was used at the time.
 
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