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Blog Poll v.15.1 - Final Regular Season

Here is my final ballot of the 2008 regular season along with my logic for how I sorted out the bevy of one loss teams at the top.

I have never been convinced that Florida is the best or even in the top two of the one loss teams.  With seven teams all having one loss, why does the team with arguably the worst loss get a shot at the BCS title game?  Florida's loss to 8-4 Mississippi isn't terrible but among the seven 1L teams it is the only home loss in the group.  USC's loss to Oregeon St (also 8-4) isn't all that much better but at least USC lost on the road and on a quirky Thursday night game.

In addition I think that USC has been more dominant since their loss than Florida has and I sincerely believe that USC and Oklahoma are currently the two best teams in the country.

What it comes down to is that people believe the Big 12 and SEC are the best conferences in the country (which is true) and therefor the winners of those conferences belong in the BCS Title game (which is specious logic at best).  If we are going to declare the title game to be between the winners of the best two confercences then why bother wtih any rankings or polls or anything.

Maybe Florida will win the title game and be the mythical national champ.  But at this point and over the last few weeks I have just not seen anything that shows me they are clearly better than USC.

RankTeamDelta
1 Oklahoma 1
2 Southern Cal 3
3 Texas --
4 Florida --
5 Alabama 4
6 Penn State 1
7 Texas Tech 1
8 Ohio State --
9 Utah 1
10 Boise State 4
11 Cincinnati 4
12 Oklahoma State 1
13 Oregon 7
14 Georgia Tech 10
15 Michigan State 3
16 TCU 1
17 Georgia 8
18 Northwestern 1
19 Pittsburgh 6
20 Iowa 1
21 Virginia Tech 5
22 Boston College --
23 Oregon State 10
24 Mississippi 2
25 East Carolina 1

 

Dropped Out: Missouri (#12), Ball State (#16), West Virginia (#23).

Apparently it is blog poll ballot day todya at TDG.  Once again tell me my ballot is whack.  Maybe I'll change it.

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Comments

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Mythical Playoff

I whole heartedly agree with your assessment of USC. They look to me like the best team in the country. I do disagree with Oklahoma, however. I guess you have to put them in the title game now, but I think Texas should have been there. In any of the other 5 BCS conferences, Texas would have won that tie breaking scenario with Oklahoma and Texas Tech.

I also think Utah should be #3. Mark my words, they will beat Alabama by double digits. I also think TCU is better than all of the teams ahead of them up to Boise State. That should be a great bowl game. Too bad no one will watch it—I’m really looking forward to that one. Man, this would have been a great year for an 8 team playoff. This is how I would have ranked the top 8 for a battle royale:

(1) USC vs (8) Boise State
(4) Texas vs (5) Oklahoma

(2) Penn State vs (7) Ohio State
(3) Utah vs (6) Florida

You really couldn’t go wrong with playoff like that. The seeds are rather meaningless since they would all have tough games. The Texas/Oklahoma and PSU/OSU first round matchups were coincidental. But I like it since it eliminates teams from the same conference right away.

Yes, Utah and Boise State really are that good. The MWC does not get enough credit. I think they are ahead of the Big East and ACC this year and arguably have been for the last few years now. The top 3 teams from the MWC are a combined 32-4 (Utah, TCU, BYU). They were a combined 5-1 versus BCS conference teams this year (TCU lost to Oklahoma 35-10—but hey, they held them to the same score as Texas!). The most interesting first round matchup would have been Florida vs Utah; Urban Meyer past and present.

I don’t really have anything to back up Boise State—I just think they should have earned respect by now. No one wants to play them from a BCS conference; the one that did play them lost—and they very nearly made the Rose Bowl (Oregon State). The WAC is usually better than it was this year. Hawai’i and Fresno State are down.

by rencito on Dec 9, 2008 6:09 PM CST reply actions  

USC at 2 is a.....

absolute joke

what have they done this year besides get called the most talented team in the nation by all the media? lets see they won at home against ohio state (who was missing their best player and had the wrong quarterback in for a majority of the game) they lost to oregon state ( a pretty decent team) and then they went on to beat up on one of the worst PAC 10 conferences in recent memory
all USC has done is killed Pac 10 opponents who absolutely suck if any of the teams in the top 5 of the ap and bcs polls got to play the likes of washington and washington state I’m sure their defensive numbers would look just as good as the Trojans do
of course they still won the pac 10 (only because oregon state blew their chance to play into it) and now they get a home game at the rose bowl

by tubbytime20 on Dec 10, 2008 6:43 PM CST reply actions  

what has Florida done that USC hasn't?

Florida lost at home to Mississippi.
USC lost on the road to Oregon State (with two fewer days to prepare)

How about using Washington as a common opponent…
USC 56-0 (home)
OK 55-14 (road)
Not an argument that USC should be in over OK, but at the very least they belong in the same conversation.

And you can’t discount the Ohio State game. Regardless of who was playing that game was a total domination. The OSU defense was healthy and wanted nothing to do with stopping USC. It was the most points scored on the OSU defense all year by 2 TDs (Minn was second!!).

I realize you can make a good argument for Florida as #2, but I fail to see why USC is just dismissed and nobody seems to be talking about them. Or even Penn State for that matter. Their loss was on the road and look what they did to the team USC lost to.

Obviously the only thing that matters is that Florida played in the SEC. If we are just going to give it to the winning teams from the consensus two best conferences then what is the point of any polls or BCS formulas?

what you say here can, and will, be used against you

by GopherNation on Dec 11, 2008 5:02 PM CST up reply actions  

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