Preseason Rankings

UgagSucks

UgagSucks

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We all know how worthless the preseason rankings are. Here is another great example: FSU started off #4 and now they are 0-2 in the ACC. That's why they should not come out with rankings until week 5 or 6.
 
iceeater1969

iceeater1969

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Here in Pensacola the fsu crowd is ready for blood. The dc has to get it going against clemson and Miami or he is gone.
 

Oldgoldandwhite

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The main problem, in this current era, is the built in bias as it effects the playoffs. If you are ranked early on and beat a couple of ranked teams, your resume looks great. No matter where those teams wind up. As it stands now, if Bama and Tech wound up with two losses, they would finish about 20 spots ahead of us.
 
ramblinvak

ramblinvak

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I think everyone pretty much agrees that rankings are useless early in the season, but I think the networks need them to drive viewers for games and talking points. Hard to hype up games without having some quantitative comparison on the team as a whole, and I think that is the only reason they are still around.
 
kg01

kg01

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Oldgoldandwhite said:
The main problem, in this current era, is the built in bias as it effects the playoffs. If you are ranked early on and beat a couple of ranked teams, your resume looks great. No matter where those teams wind up. As it stands now, if Bama and Tech wound up with two losses, they would finish about 20 spots ahead of us.
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That's what drives me crazy when these media guys say, "Oh, just ignore the early-season rankings. Hyuk, hyuk. It'll all work itself out... the only rankings that matter are the committee's rankings at season-end, blah, blah, blah .."

Well, no that's not true at all. As you said, there is an inherent and obvious bias due to these pre-rankings. It's extremely difficult for an unranked team to leapfrog all the falling, preseason ranked SEC teams then leapfrog all the other falling P5 ranked teams to make it to a high enough level to rate to the playoff committee. Look how long it took for OMiss to fall out and folks still want to rank them with all those losses!

The notion that they're so above-it-all that they ignore these rankings is either ignorant, arrogant or agenda-driven.
 
SteamWhistle

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ramblinvak said:
I think everyone pretty much agrees that rankings are useless early in the season, but I think the networks need them to drive viewers for games and talking points. Hard to hype up games without having some quantitative comparison on the team as a whole, and I think that is the only reason they are still around.
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Wouldn't mind seeing...
Head Coach : Ted Roof
Defensive Coordinator : Charles Kelly
 
GTNavyNuke

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Agree 100% that preseason rankings have little accuracy. And after GT playing Miami even except for JTs two fumbles, either we are a top 20 caliber team or Miami isn't. I expect Miami to be trashed in the next 5 weeks. Time will tell.
 
AE 87

AE 87

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GTNavyNuke said:
Agree 100% that preseason rankings have little accuracy. And after GT playing Miami even except for JTs two fumbles, either we are a top 20 caliber team or Miami isn't. I expect Miami to be trashed in the next 5 weeks. Time will tell.
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LOL. I don't get this hate Tech first mentality. Maybe we are a top 20 caliber team when not self destructing.
 
Jmonty71

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What was UGA pre-season ranked? Thank you.... Look at Oklahoma, Ole Miss.... On the other side. Louisville has climbed. UNC lost to UGA in a game that UNC played horrible.

Personally, I wished the polls didn't come out until the 4th week. The reason? Simple. Teams ranked high will remain high, as long as they don't lose. While unranked teams have to claw their way up. At the end of the season, if there are ties in records, the team with the higher pre-season rank, usually gets the nod on higher bowl games.
 
jeffgt14

jeffgt14

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The rankings technically don’t come out until November. The AP Poll is in no way official rankings but ESPN and others will continue to use it because that’s how you get viewers. Advertising #3 Louisville vs #5 Clemson gets a lot more viewership than advertising unranked Louisville vs unranked Clemson. There are a lot of casual football fans out there that just want to put it on a good game and if they see a top 5 matchup they’ll watch just because. I can’t fault ESPN one bit for doing it.

If the AP Poll didn’t exist then a Clay Travis Armchair QB Poll would probably exist consisting of rankings 1-14 being all SEC schools and that’s what ESPN will use because it’s the only poll around until November.
 

takethepoints

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Used to be that you could actually get something from the early polls. Then all of a sudden the NCAA put on recruiting limits and all that "progress toward a degree" stuff. Now, the number of teams that you can count on being really good from year to year is vanishingly small and the turnover from early polls is dramatic. The role of sheer bum luck has also increased as the number of consistently good teams has shrunk.

This is something we should have learned as a fan base in 2014. Nobody thought we would do better then break even that year and we almost ran the table. This is one reason why I heavily discount the "gloom and doom" we often hear after a Tech loss. I, like most people, think we've already played our two toughest opponents. Do I - or anybody else - know that for certain at this point? Nope. I sure hope the consensus is right because we should do ok this year if it is. But … maybe not.
 
Jmonty71

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takethepoints said:
Used to be that you could actually get something from the early polls. Then all of a sudden the NCAA put on recruiting limits and all that "progress toward a degree" stuff. Now, the number of teams that you can count on being really good from year to year is vanishingly small and the turnover from early polls is dramatic. The role of sheer bum luck has also increased as the number of consistently good teams has shrunk.

This is something we should have learned as a fan base in 2014. Nobody thought we would do better then break even that year and we almost ran the table. This is one reason why I heavily discount the "gloom and doom" we often hear after a Tech loss. I, like most people, think we've already played our two toughest opponents. Do I - or anybody else - know that for certain at this point? Nope. I sure hope the consensus is right because we should do ok this year if it is. But … maybe not.
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We may have played the 2 toughest on the schedule. But, that doesn't mean we are all in the clear. Beat Pitt and go from there. UNC, Duke, VT and UGA have had our number over the last few seasons. We need to pay them back and get wins against all of them.
 

FightWinDrink

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jeffgt14 said:
The rankings technically don’t come out until November. The AP Poll is in no way official rankings but ESPN and others will continue to use it because that’s how you get viewers. Advertising #3 Louisville vs #5 Clemson gets a lot more viewership than advertising unranked Louisville vs unranked Clemson. There are a lot of casual football fans out there that just want to put it on a good game and if they see a top 5 matchup they’ll watch just because. I can’t fault ESPN one bit for doing it.

If the AP Poll didn’t exist then a Clay Travis Armchair QB Poll would probably exist consisting of rankings 1-14 being all SEC schools and that’s what ESPN will use because it’s the only poll around until November.
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This is exactly why it won't go away. Doesn't matter how accurately it corresponds to the final results as long as it helps brings in viewers
 
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