Conference Realignment

[orientalnc]

Talking about cornbread, "up nawth" they put sugar in it, and mostly flour. It's almost like cake.
Give me buttermilk and corn meal, cooked in a cast iron skillet please.

With plenty of bacon grease.

My cornbread recipe (I'm the bread chef in our household) has 3/1 yellow corn meal and no sugar. Sugar is for the Yankees. I alternate between butter and bacon grease. But, I have an 8" iron skillet that has never held anything but cornbread in its almost 100 years of use. Thanks Mom. I have kept it pure in your and your mom's memory.

 

[orientalnc]

Best four teams are something like
Michigan
Ohio State
Oregon
UGA

This is an answer we will never be able to verify. But, why do you think uga was better than Bama? When they played on Thanksgiving weekend Bama won. The same could be said of Oregon, who lost twice this year to Washington.

The team with the best resumes were
Washington
FSU
Michigan
Texas

I think I agree, but it was clear the committee was not trying to reward resume crafting.

 

[CEB]

Best four teams are something like
Michigan
Ohio State
Oregon
UGA

The team with the best resumes were
Washington
FSU
Michigan
Texas

Alabama doesn’t make a best four list, unless you’re a Bama fan

I mostly agree (and realize the point being made is about Bama), but how do you rationalize Oregon in the “best four” and leave out an undefeated team that beat them twice?

 

[WreckinGT]

I mostly agree (and realize the point being made is about Bama), but how do you rationalize Oregon in the “best four” and leave out an undefeated team that beat them twice?

If Oregon played Washington again tomorrow they would be favored over them for the third time and would likely lose for the third time. That's how stupid the eye test is.

 

[Northeast Stinger]

I had no intention of watching them but, alas, had nothing better to do. For the first time in forever the playoffs had compelling games in the first round.

Yep, I decided to watch 10 minutes out of curiosity and ended up watching the whole game. Hate to say it but I was kind of mesmerized by Michigan. Other than shooting themselves in the foot they seemed to be on a whole different level than Bama.

 

[Northeast Stinger]

I grew up in the South and eating collards and peas is not just a New Year's day thing for me. I failed to mention the wedge of cornbread on that plate last night.

Stop it. Just shut up.

I’m two hours away from lunch.

Have some collards left but unfortunately the peas and ribs are finished.

 

[slugboy]

This is an answer we will never be able to verify. But, why do you think uga was better than Bama? When they played on Thanksgiving weekend Bama won. The same could be said of Oregon, who lost twice this year to Washington.


I think I agree, but it was clear the committee was not trying to reward resume crafting.

When you say “but Bama beat UGA”, you’re comparing resumes. Also, you’re just honing in on one example vs the entire season
If you were just looking at two teams, then you could look at head to head. but when a team has any losses, you get “UGA beat x who beat y who beat Bama”. There are over 130 teams. “Best” is measuring volume across 12 dimensions (games). Head to head just measures one length.
You teach school—would you compare Alice and Bob based on one test, or would you look at all their tests? And all their homework grades?
UGA had a better offense through the year and better defense through the year.
Ironically, UGA’s problem against Bama is that their best player was injured—similar to FSU.
But overall, on any given day, based on their offensive and defensive stats (and game film), you favor UGA over Bama on a neutral field. On the one time they faced off, Bama won.


As for resumes: If you want to look at the history, that one time they matched up, then you’re looking at resumes, and Bama comes out ahead—but it’s not all about head to head. They both have a loss, but Bama’s strength of schedule was better, and their wins in aggregate are more impressive than UGA’s. But they still lost to Texas, and that counts against them.

So, yeah, you have a yardstick that puts Bama ahead of UGA, but that yardstick puts them behind FSU. You can’t switch yardsticks between comparing teams.

Back to being a teacher—you can put together a grading rubric in a bunch of ways. You don’t get hung up on one grade unless your rubric does. Bama got one really good grade, but overall they wouldn’t have a top four grade on most reasonable rubrics. The CFP committee not only got myopic about one grade, but they got hung up on something that wasn’t an emphasis before.

If you had put one committee in a room to say “this is how we will grade the teams” and another committee in another room to follow those rules, you don’t get Bama in the top four. You had to have a committee that would bend the rules to get Bama in

 

[Oldgoldandwhite]

If Oregon played Washington again tomorrow they would be favored over them for the third time and would likely lose for the third time. That's how stupid the eye test is.

I agree. Oregon looks really good on paper. I could easily see us in that situation if we had gone undefeated. Would have been interesting to see what would have happened if a 12-0 or 11-1 ND would have been snubbed.

 

[RonJohn]

When you say “but Bama beat UGA”, you’re comparing resumes. Also, you’re just honing in on one example vs the entire season
If you were just looking at two teams, then you could look at head to head. but when a team has any losses, you get “UGA beat x who beat y who beat Bama”. There are over 130 teams. “Best” is measuring volume across 12 dimensions (games). Head to head just measures one length.
You teach school—would you compare Alice and Bob based on one test, or would you look at all their tests? And all their homework grades?
UGA had a better offense through the year and better defense through the year.
Ironically, UGA’s problem against Bama is that their best player was injured—similar to FSU.
But overall, on any given day, based on their offensive and defensive stats (and game film), you favor UGA over Bama on a neutral field. On the one time they faced off, Bama won.


As for resumes: If you want to look at the history, that one time they matched up, then you’re looking at resumes, and Bama comes out ahead—but it’s not all about head to head. They both have a loss, but Bama’s strength of schedule was better, and their wins in aggregate are more impressive than UGA’s. But they still lost to Texas, and that counts against them.

Back to being a teacher—you can put together a grading rubric in a bunch of ways. You don’t get hung up on one grade unless your rubric does. Bama got one really good grade, but overall they wouldn’t have a top four grade on most reasonable rubrics. The CFP committee not only got myopic about one grade, but they got hung up on something that wasn’t an emphasis before.

If you had put one committee in a room to say “this is how we will grade the teams” and another committee in another room to follow those rules, you don’t get Bama in the top four. You had to have a committee that would bend the rules to get Bama in

The NFL has a set of rules that determine who gets into the playoffs. They don't negotiate late in the season to determine who gets in.

The "rules" or whatever you call a loose set of criteria that might be used for the CFP includes head-to-head. Almost every tie-breaker scenario I have ever seen includes head-to-head.

If you don't want to include "one game" results, then the parody twitter post about Bill Hancock's committee moving Alabama to the championship game would actually be reality. Why does the result of the games matter at all?

 

[bobongo]

My cornbread recipe (I'm the bread chef in our household) has 3/1 yellow corn meal and no sugar. Sugar is for the Yankees. I alternate between butter and bacon grease. But, I have an 8" iron skillet that has never held anything but cornbread in its almost 100 years of use. Thanks Mom. I have kept it pure in your and your mom's memory.

Yeah, no sugar - yech. My mom also had a big black iron skillet just for cornbread. Wish I still had it. Wish I still had my mom, too.

 

[Northeast Stinger]

When you say “but Bama beat UGA”, you’re comparing resumes. Also, you’re just honing in on one example vs the entire season
If you were just looking at two teams, then you could look at head to head. but when a team has any losses, you get “UGA beat x who beat y who beat Bama”. There are over 130 teams. “Best” is measuring volume across 12 dimensions (games). Head to head just measures one length.
You teach school—would you compare Alice and Bob based on one test, or would you look at all their tests? And all their homework grades?
UGA had a better offense through the year and better defense through the year.
Ironically, UGA’s problem against Bama is that their best player was injured—similar to FSU.
But overall, on any given day, based on their offensive and defensive stats (and game film), you favor UGA over Bama on a neutral field. On the one time they faced off, Bama won.


As for resumes: If you want to look at the history, that one time they matched up, then you’re looking at resumes, and Bama comes out ahead—but it’s not all about head to head. They both have a loss, but Bama’s strength of schedule was better, and their wins in aggregate are more impressive than UGA’s. But they still lost to Texas, and that counts against them.

So, yeah, you have a yardstick that puts Bama ahead of UGA, but that yardstick puts them behind FSU. You can’t switch yardsticks between comparing teams.

Back to being a teacher—you can put together a grading rubric in a bunch of ways. You don’t get hung up on one grade unless your rubric does. Bama got one really good grade, but overall they wouldn’t have a top four grade on most reasonable rubrics. The CFP committee not only got myopic about one grade, but they got hung up on something that wasn’t an emphasis before.

If you had put one committee in a room to say “this is how we will grade the teams” and another committee in another room to follow those rules, you don’t get Bama in the top four. You had to have a committee that would bend the rules to get Bama in

We’ve said this ad-nauseam but the committee was predetermined to put the SEC champ in. It would have been a no brainer if uga had won, canceling out their weak schedule, as well as giving the committee an undefeated SEC team. But, alas….

 

[Northeast Stinger]

I get what you are saying but, otoh, what FSU did (or did not do depending on your perspective) in their bowl game does severely diminish (imo) their credibility and any sympathy I had for them at one point. Ball State and UT Martin were more competitive against Uga than the Seminoles. I get that they had players sit out but your second and third teamers should be better than Ball State and UT Martin if you are a serious contender for the NC.

In a vacuum that makes sense but Ball State and UT Martin had teammates used to playing with each other, not players who were seeing the field together for the first time. Then there’s the motivation issue. Ball & T Martin would have been sky high at the chance of playing the defending national champion while uga was probably having a hard time getting up for them. Then there’s FSU’s thrown together team, probably still disappointed about playing a meaningless consolation game, and uga being motivated to prove a point.

Bottom line is the Orange Bowl meant nothing and proves nothing. FSU remains one of the few one loss teams in the nation and should be ranked as such. But a sloppy playoff committee, and a one off game, will forever obscure a brilliant season by one of the country’s strongest teams.

 

[slugboy]

The NFL has a set of rules that determine who gets into the playoffs. They don't negotiate late in the season to determine who gets in.

The "rules" or whatever you call a loose set of criteria that might be used for the CFP includes head-to-head. Almost every tie-breaker scenario I have ever seen includes head-to-head.

If you don't want to include "one game" results, then the parody twitter post about Bill Hancock's committee moving Alabama to the championship game would actually be reality. Why does the result of the games matter at all?

I’m fine with using head to head as a tiebreaker between two teams. That’s what the NFL does.
They don’t use it to compare three teams, or four teams, or 131 teams.
Bama wasn’t in a position to get the benefit of a tiebreaker. It wasn’t between them and UGA for the last slot.

Again—pick your yardstick—if it’s the four teams that accomplished the most, then FSU is in the CFP, and they aren’t the last in. Bama isn’t in.

If your yardstick is the four teams with the best odds to win, Oregon and UGA are in, and Bama isn’t.

If your yardstick is the fewest injured 5* athletes at the end of the season, tell coaches before the season starts, because they’ll rest their stars more.

 

[RonJohn]

I’m fine with using head to head as a tiebreaker between two teams. That’s what the NFL does.
They don’t use it to compare three teams, or four teams, or 131 teams.
Bama wasn’t in a position to get the benefit of a tiebreaker. It wasn’t between them and UGA for the last slot.

Again—pick your yardstick—if it’s the four teams that accomplished the most, then FSU is in the CFP, and they aren’t the last in. Bama isn’t in.

If your yardstick is the four teams with the best odds to win, Oregon and UGA are in, and Bama isn’t.

If your yardstick is the fewest injured 5* athletes at the end of the season, tell coaches before the season starts, because they’ll rest their stars more.

This year, in my opinion, head-to-head did come in to play. They didn't put the mutts in over Alabama because of the championship game. Comparing those two teams, the mutts lost to Alabama. They didn't put FSU in because they couldn't get Alabama in over Texas, because of the head-to-head. If the mutts had won, I think it would have been mutts-Michigan-Washington-FSU. Texas would have been left out. Since Alabama beat the mutts, the only way to get Alabama in was to also have Texas in. The only way to get Texas in was to move FSU out. If there had been no head-to-head between Texas and Alabama, FSU and Alabama would have been in.

My biggest complaint is that Bill Hancock's committee has not been consistent, at least in their pronounced reasons for the rankings. One year better win is much more important than worse loss. Then the next year worse loss obviously excludes a team even if they had much better wins than the selected teams. Some times strength of schedule matters, then other times it isn't important if a team is undefeated. This year is the first time that I remember injury being a primary factor to exclude a team. It certainly appears that they decide who they think should be in and then they develop "reasons" for them being in as opposed to objectively looking at the teams and making rational decisions.

Next year the major conference champions will get in automatically. However, the rest of the field will be made up of mostly, if not completely, SEC and Big10 teams. It is still not a real "championship". It will still primarily be a beauty pageant.

 

[Techster]

B1G will be aired on FOX...so this championship game will be a free 3+ hour advertisement for B1G/FOX on ESPN.

 

[bobongo]

I’m fine with using head to head as a tiebreaker between two teams. That’s what the NFL does.
They don’t use it to compare three teams, or four teams, or 131 teams.
Bama wasn’t in a position to get the benefit of a tiebreaker. It wasn’t between them and UGA for the last slot.

Again—pick your yardstick—if it’s the four teams that accomplished the most, then FSU is in the CFP, and they aren’t the last in. Bama isn’t in.

If your yardstick is the four teams with the best odds to win, Oregon and UGA are in, and Bama isn’t.

If your yardstick is the fewest injured 5* athletes at the end of the season, tell coaches before the season starts, because they’ll rest their stars more.

My yardstick is simple. The teams that played their way in and deserve to be there based upon their record deserve to be in the playoff. I'm not going to parse out who was injured, who looked best on a piece of paper, or who had the best odds in Vegas. None of that matters one whit and shouldn't. FSU went out of its way to schedule Florida and LSU OOC, went undefeated in the schedule the ACC handed them, and were still denied. The issue here is one of basic fairness. A team that should have already been eliminated in the regular season by Texas got in over a team that deserved to be there. All the who's better and who's favored in someone's opinion means nothing.

 

[slugboy]

This year, in my opinion, head-to-head did come in to play. They didn't put the mutts in over Alabama because of the championship game. Comparing those two teams, the mutts lost to Alabama. They didn't put FSU in because they couldn't get Alabama in over Texas, because of the head-to-head. If the mutts had won, I think it would have been mutts-Michigan-Washington-FSU. Texas would have been left out. Since Alabama beat the mutts, the only way to get Alabama in was to also have Texas in. The only way to get Texas in was to move FSU out. If there had been no head-to-head between Texas and Alabama, FSU and Alabama would have been in.

My biggest complaint is that Bill Hancock's committee has not been consistent, at least in their pronounced reasons for the rankings. One year better win is much more important than worse loss. Then the next year worse loss obviously excludes a team even if they had much better wins than the selected teams. Some times strength of schedule matters, then other times it isn't important if a team is undefeated. This year is the first time that I remember injury being a primary factor to exclude a team. It certainly appears that they decide who they think should be in and then they develop "reasons" for them being in as opposed to objectively looking at the teams and making rational decisions.

Next year the major conference champions will get in automatically. However, the rest of the field will be made up of mostly, if not completely, SEC and Big10 teams. It is still not a real "championship". I will still primarily be a beauty pageant.

There was one tiebreaker—Bama vs Texas for the #4 slot. The committee looked at head to head and booted the #3 team to get in the #4 and #5 teams.

 

[RonJohn]

There was one tiebreaker—Bama vs Texas for the #4 slot. The committee looked at head to head and booted the #3 team to get in the #4 and #5 teams.

There was discussion even after the SEC championship game that the mutts were still the best team in the country. The head-to-head between Alabama and the mutts kept the mutts out.

I agree with you that Texas should have been the #4 team and that Bill Hancock moved FSU in order to have a rationale to put Alabama in.

 

[Roswellgoldmember]

This year, in my opinion, head-to-head did come in to play. They didn't put the mutts in over Alabama because of the championship game. Comparing those two teams, the mutts lost to Alabama. They didn't put FSU in because they couldn't get Alabama in over Texas, because of the head-to-head. If the mutts had won, I think it would have been mutts-Michigan-Washington-FSU. Texas would have been left out. Since Alabama beat the mutts, the only way to get Alabama in was to also have Texas in. The only way to get Texas in was to move FSU out. If there had been no head-to-head between Texas and Alabama, FSU and Alabama would have been in.

My biggest complaint is that Bill Hancock's committee has not been consistent, at least in their pronounced reasons for the rankings. One year better win is much more important than worse loss. Then the next year worse loss obviously excludes a team even if they had much better wins than the selected teams. Some times strength of schedule matters, then other times it isn't important if a team is undefeated. This year is the first time that I remember injury being a primary factor to exclude a team. It certainly appears that they decide who they think should be in and then they develop "reasons" for them being in as opposed to objectively looking at the teams and making rational decisions.

Next year the major conference champions will get in automatically. However, the rest of the field will be made up of mostly, if not completely, SEC and Big10 teams. It is still not a real "championship". It will still primarily be a beauty pageant.

I think they are pretty consistent in that Bama gets in and change the criteria as needed.

 

[57jacket]

The way I watch these games that I'm interested in, but don't want to spend all the time glued to the TV:
Record the game. Then about an hour after it starts, watch with fast forward. when an interesting play shows up, play that at normal speed. Double or triple though ads, and dumb play by play guys banter. Total time: about 45 minutes depending on the interesting plays.