CFB PLAYOFF FINAL AND NO SEC

[RonJohn]

A few years of a 12 team playoff might forces pundits to find different criteria for their prognostications.

I don't think the pundits will reach the same conclusions. They will believe that they were 75% accurate in the preseason predicting who would go to the CFP, and that 75% is an outstanding result. They will profess that Boise, ASU, Indiana, and SMU didn't deserve to be in the CFP and that their predictions were actually 100% accurate but the committee got it wrong. The big problem with sports pundits and sports fans (SEC fans in particular) is that facts don't matter at all. They all arrive at an opinion, then spin whatever facts might support that opinion while ignoring any facts that obviously don't support their opinion. I believe that in many cases, they know they are two-faced about "facts", and don't care. They want to validate their importance in the sports pundit world, or support their team, and whatever spin can support that is what they use.

 

[Root4GT]

I don’t know why this point continues to need to be made.

It came about as at least one poster claimed the 4 final teams were not highly ranked after their losses. nD did drop out of the top 10 after a week 2 loss to NIU but worked their way back to the top ten and top 5 fairly quickly after starting the year in the top 10. The other 3, nor UGA, never dropped out of the top 10 after losses.

Preseason Polls generally get most of the top teams correct, not necessarily in the correct order. There will always be some suprise teams like ASU and Indiana this year and like FSU in the opposite direction.

Simply dismissing the polls as useless is sillier than saying they are reasonable and will be correct more than incorrect.

If GT crashes the party with a 10-2 season 2 years in a row we will be a preseason top 15 the next year.

GT fans too often feel our team is put down unfairly. We exceeded expectations the past 2 years but barely by winning several very close games. Credit to our players and coaches.

If Ling is healthy and returns based on our improved defense we will be picked to win 7 or 8 games next season.

 

[forensicbuzz]

Wait the GT Swarm says preseason predictions are made by lazy people who don’t bother to know anything. The Swarm is never wrong

I doubt most people on here would scoff at at least 8 of the preseason Top10 belonging in the Top25. It's the rest of the preseason predictions that are hot garbage (in my opinion).

 

[billga99]

I doubt most people on here would scoff at at least 8 of the preseason Top10 belonging in the Top25. It's the rest of the preseason predictions that are hot garbage (in my opinion).

My wish which will never happen is don't put rankings in until October. But way too much money to be made in hyping preseason content. Now the perceived top tier teams get huge latitude in staying in the rankings with losses and even undefeated unranked teams have to wait many weeks to break into the Top 25.

 

[Northeast Stinger]

My wish which will never happen is don't put rankings in until October. But way too much money to be made in hyping preseason content. Now the perceived top tier teams get huge latitude in staying in the rankings with losses and even undefeated unranked teams have to wait many weeks to break into the Top 25.

It’s true. It’s harder for unranked teams to rise in standings and easier for them to fall out of the rankings, whereas ranked teams are quite resilient in overcoming losses, and can climb quickly back into the rankings with a few wins.

 

[roadkill]

Preseason polls are widely derided as meaningless clickbait, but if more than a passing effort is put into them, they can be useful prognostications. If I were a sportswriter assigned the task of picking a preseason top 25, I’d examine the following factors:

• Prior year performance
• Coaching stability
• Projected team talent

The last factor has become more difficult to evaluate with the advent of near-instant transfers, but talent composite is still of some value. This past season, 7 of the 12 playoff teams were in the top 11 in overall talent per 247, and 9 were in the top 25. The outliers were Indiana, ASU, and Boise State, the latter 2 being mandatory seeds anyway due to winning conference championships. Indiana overperformed, but against a weak schedule.

The beauty of the 12-team playoff is that it dilutes the advantages that some teams (looking at you, SEC) usually get via being highly ranked in preseason. They have to prove it on the field.

 

[LT 1967]

Preseason polls are widely derided as meaningless clickbait, but if more than a passing effort is put into them, they can be useful prognostications. If I were a sportswriter assigned the task of picking a preseason top 25, I’d examine the following factors:

• Prior year performance
• Coaching stability
• Projected team talent

The last factor has become more difficult to evaluate with the advent of near-instant transfers, but talent composite is still of some value. This past season, 7 of the 12 playoff teams were in the top 11 in overall talent per 247, and 9 were in the top 25. The outliers were Indiana, ASU, and Boise State, the latter 2 being mandatory seeds anyway due to winning conference championships. Indiana overperformed, but against a weak schedule.

The beauty of the 12-team playoff is that it dilutes the advantages that some teams (looking at you, SEC) usually get via being highly ranked in preseason. They have to prove it on the field.

I agree with your factors concerning the preseason rankings. Of the 3 factors, I believe Team talent is the most important of the 3. The Blue-Chip Ratio is a good indicator of the talent level. The Blue-Chip Ratio is simply the percentage of 4-star and 5-star players on the team versus the total number of recruits over the last 4-year period. Below is the most recent list I could find which is for the 2021-22-23-24 recruiting cycles. This list includes transfers. Below the list is an article by Bud Elliot who is the originator of the Blue-Chip ratio. It is worth reading. The list below is from this article. The author acknowledges the exceptions that do not live up to their team talent. But it is hard to ignore the correlation between the BCR and the teams that are in the Playoffs and in the preseason rankings. One quote below from the article concerning development of players.

"That is not to say that development does not matter. It certainly does. But nobody wins a national title by player development in lieu of elite recruiting. Plenty of coaches who are regarded as elite have never sniffed winning it all because they can't accumulate enough talent. On the other hand, there are examples of coaches who are not regarded as premier head men who have won it all thanks to elite recruits. Not to lump them into the same category, but nobody ever accused Gene Chizik, Les Miles, Mack Brown or Ed Orgeron of being tactical masterminds."

School BCR with transfers

Ohio State----86%
Alabama------82%
Georgia-------77%
Oregon-------71%
Texas---------70%
LSU-----------66%
Clemson------64%
Oklahoma----63%
Notre Dame--63%
Texas A&M---63%
Florida--------58%
Penn State----57%
Miami---------56%
USC-----------54%
Michigan------54%
Florida State---53%

Blue-Chip Ratio 2024: These 16 college football teams can actually win the national championship

Breaking down the programs that have done well enough on the recruiting trail to win the first 12-team CFP in the 2024 season

www.cbssports.com

 

[Heisman's Ghost]

Friends who haven’t been to a football game in years announced they are headed to Atlanta to see Ohio State. Didn’t tell them I would be pulling for Notre Dame but found it interesting that they would drive to Atlanta just to see a B1G team.

Yeah, I’m beating a dead horse, but I still think we would be amazed at the extra fans Tech would pick up if we were in the B1G. I think the uga fan base is pretty well saturated and there are fans looking for someone else to pull for.

Notre Dame vs. Ohio State? Its a shame they both can't lose.

 

[Northeast Stinger]

I agree with your factors concerning the preseason rankings. Of the 3 factors, I believe Team talent is the most important of the 3. The Blue-Chip Ratio is a good indicator of the talent level. The Blue-Chip Ratio is simply the percentage of 4-star and 5-star players on the team versus the total number of recruits over the last 4-year period. Below is the most recent list I could find which is for the 2021-22-23-24 recruiting cycles. This list includes transfers. Below the list is an article by Bud Elliot who is the originator of the Blue-Chip ratio. It is worth reading. The list below is from this article. The author acknowledges the exceptions that do not live up to their team talent. But it is hard to ignore the correlation between the BCR and the teams that are in the Playoffs and in the preseason rankings. One quote below from the article concerning development of players.

"That is not to say that development does not matter. It certainly does. But nobody wins a national title by player development in lieu of elite recruiting. Plenty of coaches who are regarded as elite have never sniffed winning it all because they can't accumulate enough talent. On the other hand, there are examples of coaches who are not regarded as premier head men who have won it all thanks to elite recruits. Not to lump them into the same category, but nobody ever accused Gene Chizik, Les Miles, Mack Brown or Ed Orgeron of being tactical masterminds."

School BCR with transfers

Ohio State----86%
Alabama------82%
Georgia-------77%
Oregon-------71%
Texas---------70%
LSU-----------66%
Clemson------64%
Oklahoma----63%
Notre Dame--63%
Texas A&M---63%
Florida--------58%
Penn State----57%
Miami---------56%
USC-----------54%
Michigan------54%
Florida State---53%

Blue-Chip Ratio 2024: These 16 college football teams can actually win the national championship

Breaking down the programs that have done well enough on the recruiting trail to win the first 12-team CFP in the 2024 season

www.cbssports.com

I would think another cross metric would be to look at end of year performance grades of returning players. That seems like an even more straight forward evaluation than blue chip numbers. Or at least it would be a mitigating factor. Let’s say a team has 8 returning starters on offense and, to keep it simple, those starters on average graded out at 83 or above. That would be pretty strong team based on returning starters. As for the 3 new starters it would then make sense to know if they were 4 or 5 star recruits, or, if transfers, how they graded out on their previous teams.

Obviously, all of this is just trying to get a broader picture of teams after you’ve first looked at won / loss records and the nature of those wins and losses.

 

[Northeast Stinger]

Notre Dame vs. Ohio State? It’s a shame they both can't lose.

Neither is in the SEC so win-win to me.

 

[Heisman's Ghost]

Neither is in the SEC so win-win to me.

There is that and I suppose the Irish/Buckeyes matchup is far preferable to any SEC team being in the finals. I hate them. I used to go to the Florida games and I was always impressed with how well behaved, respectful the Gator fans were to opposing teams and that was hard to do with LSU, Tennessee, and UGA in the Gator Bowl. Florida managed to largely avoid Alabama unless it was in the SEC championship game and we did not bother to go to see them play Vanderbilt.

 

[stinger78]

It’s true. It’s harder for unranked teams to rise in standings and easier for them to fall out of the rankings, whereas ranked teams are quite resilient in overcoming losses, and can climb quickly back into the rankings with a few wins.

It appears to be the case.