As you can see from the lovely logo serving as the ballot's banner, the Blog Poll is now officially a data set in CBS Sports' weekly college football rankings. Practically speaking, this means several things:
Some early adjustments:
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| Rank | Team | Delta |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Alabama | -- |
| 2 | Oklahoma | -- |
| 3 | Missouri |  1 |
| 4 | Texas | 1 |
| 5 | Penn State | 1 |
| 6 | LSU |  3 |
| 7 | Vanderbilt | -- |
| 8 | Brigham Young | 1 |
| 9 | Southern Cal | 6 |
| 10 | Boise State | -- |
| 11 | Utah | -- |
| 12 | Texas Tech | -- |
| 13 | Oklahoma State | -- |
| 14 | California | 12 |
| 15 | Georgia | 6 |
| 16 | Northwestern | -- |
| 17 | Florida | 3 |
| 18 | Michigan State | 8 |
| 19 | Virginia Tech | 7 |
| 20 | Ohio State | 6 |
| 21 | North Carolina | 5 |
| 22 | Wake Forest | 2 |
| 23 | Florida State | 3 |
| 24 | Ball State | 2 |
| 25 | Georgia Tech | 6 |
0 recs | 32 comments
Does the Big East suck?
Totally agree on dumping UConn and USF . . . that league winner should be co-champ at 5-2, possibly an 8-4 team in a BCS bowl. Yippee!!!!!!
You look at Vandy’s schedule and think 10-2 is possible. I’m guessing it’s more like 8-4. Way too high, though can’t argue with season so far. Remind me some of Virginia a year ago
-close win after close win.Records validate them, but Utah, BYU and Boise don’t belong this high. Not at this point.
edsp - October 6, 2008
what...
Vanderbilt beats #18 Auburn and is now 5th? What?
pleaseplaykindle - October 6, 2008
I actually chucked when I saw that and then went cross-eyed n/t
TXinDC - October 6, 2008
You were overrating Auburn in the first place
But Vandy’s slot is a little ridiculous, brah.
Holly Anderson - October 6, 2008
I see where you're going with Vandy...
But while their schedule has been tougher than Texas’, I’m not convinced that Auburn is all that good to begin with, and Texas has destroyed everyone while Vandy has fought tooth and nail for a lot of their wins.
billyzane - October 6, 2008
Vandy is about 6 too high
based on their wins so far.
So is Cal.
jimjar - October 6, 2008
Cal should certainly be below Georgia...
They both beat (unranked) ASU, but Georgia more decisively and on the road. Georgia’s loss is to #1 Alabama, Cal beat (#19) Michigan State but lost to unranked Maryland.
jimjar - October 6, 2008
I was going to comment on Cal
Way too high for a team that got blown out against Maryland.
the1austin - October 6, 2008
Noted
Vandy’s rating actually took a hit this week, with Ole Miss’ loss. They will drop—good catch one and all.
Peter Bean - October 6, 2008
but they should've never been there, even if ole miss won..
..South Carolina is not as good as they sound. I think your mancrush w/ vandy is going to your head and messing w/ your logic..lol
vy til i die - October 6, 2008
I can't remember
how do you rank teams again? Is it based on performance so far (reward current W/L’s), or the relative ability of a team to beat everyone “below” them in the rankings? Or some other method?
Either way I can’t get your rankings to make any sense to me.
MMHorns - October 6, 2008
Resume ranking
On-field performance matters more than anything else. Where there’s not much data or near-identical looking resumes, subjective opinions are interjected.
We’re still pretty early in the season, so there’s room to quibble with ordering here, but I think this is a pretty fair shake.
Peter Bean - October 6, 2008
Kentucky
You have them ranked last week, and after such a great performance against your #1, how would they drop out of the ranking?
PS. I like AP or Coaches poll much better than yours.
Cyrus - October 6, 2008
esp. behind Wake Forest..
the team that lost to FREAKIN’ Navy. PB, I know you have a hectic work schedule, which might lead to this schedule being in this order, but don’t you think you’re rankings are really bad. Might I request a second opinion from maybe BZ?
vy til i die - October 6, 2008
Do I think my rankings are bad?
Look, Kentucky has four wins—one solid (Louisville) and three forgettable (WKY, MTSU, Norfolk). They aren’t being “punished” for losing a close game to Alabama; it’s just that they now join the one-loss teams but have no quality wins to counter the loss.
Wake Forest on the other hand throttled a solid Baylor team in Waco, beat Ole Miss, and won at Florida State. The loss to Navy is why they sit near the bottom of the ballot, but that’s three quality wins against one for Kentucky. The Wildcats can re-earn a ranking when they pick up some more wins.
Peter Bean - October 6, 2008
not necessarily BAD...
..but I guess inconsistent. Some teams that shouldn’t drop, do and some that really have no business up so high are (ie Vandy), but I think Baylor is not that good YET, but b/c of Griffin, we give teams credit for beating them.
Northwestern has beaten no one (Iowa is not good), and they are 16? I don’t get some of this logic, maybe b/c there was no initial explanation for them. I think the main reason I question the rankings was b/c of Vandy jumping us. We good, Peter, we good..lol
vy til i die - October 6, 2008
My point on Kentucky
I don’t feel that strong about Kentucky. But you can’t have them at #17 one week and out of top 25 after a close loss to Alabama. My general feeling on your ranking is that you just punish/reward teams way too much just based on last week’s win/loss.
Cyrus - October 6, 2008
Ranking are only in relation to other teams
If, by the results of the past weekend, 8 more teams now have better resumes than Kentucky, then you absolutely CAN move them from 17 to out of the top 25 after a close loss to Alabama. Yes, the close loss to Alabama doesn’t really hurt their resume at all in an absolute sense. But rankings aren’t absolute, they’re relative to other teams. If there are 25 teams that after this past week have resumes better than Kentucky’s then Kentucky isn’t a top 25 team, no matter what they were ranked last week and what they did this past weekend.
This wild shifting is the result of resume ranking this early in the season. Because there aren’t a ton of data points yet, a team can dramatically improve its resume with 1 win or kill it with 1 loss. I can’t necessarily say that all of PB’s wild ranking shifts are justified, but this is the reason they occur. The reason they don’t occur in the AP and Coaches polls is because those pollsters are rarely using true resume ranking. And as a result, they have a severe case of ballot inertia in which once they place a team in a certain spot, they’re rarely if ever going to get moved down until they lose. That’s a much worse way to rank teams because, while it gives you the results you expect during the season, it artificially influences the end result based on how you ranked teams at the beginning of the season (when you had absolutely no data basis on which to rank those teams).
billyzane - October 6, 2008
re
Are you telling me if Kentucky was Idle last week, they would still be out of the top 25? Ofcourse PB can only answer this, but I doubt it.
This wild shifting could be because of bad memory as well. Teams should be ranked on the whole resume, and not just the result, but how they played.
Cyrus - October 6, 2008
I don't think you fully understand resume ranking...
If there are 25 teams with better resumes than Kentucky, then yes, Kentucky would not be in the top 25. I don’t think that’s a hard concept. Resumes change from week to week. Even if Kentucky’s resume didn’t change, other teams’ did. And if enough of those teams got better resumes while Kentucky’s stayed the same to the point where Kentucky no longer has one of the top 25 resumes in the nation, they should not be ranked in the top 25. Please tell me what is wrong with this.
I agree with your last point that how they played is taken into account. Kentucky almost lost to Middle Tennessee State. So it was taken into consideration, I’m sure.
billyzane - October 6, 2008
dude
I may be dumb, but not as dumb as you think. :)
My point was, if Kentucky was idle last week, PB would have still had them in top 25, and hence your argument is wrong. Basically, I think PB throw them out of the 25 because of the loss, not because of other teams gaining a better resume. Ofcourse this is speculation, but I highly doubt it that 8+ teams got a better resume than an Idle Kentucky.
Cyrus - October 6, 2008
yeah, sorry, i re-read and then re-posted.
It’s a question for him obviously, but I’m saying it’s not unreasonable. And besides, it’s quite reasonable to think that a close loss to Alabama is in fact worse for the resume than being idle.
billyzane - October 6, 2008
Okay, I slightly misinterpreted your question.
You were asking for a factual determination of whether Kentucky would have dropped out of the top 25 in this particular poll if they had been idle instead of lost. You’re right, only PB can answer. Perhaps he treated the close loss to the #1 team as equal to their current resume (i.e. their resume is exactly the same) and just thought that enough other teams passed them to knock them out. Perhaps he treated the loss as a slight ding (but not much of a hit to the resume because Alabama’s good and the game was close).
It’s up to a particular resume-ranker how much value they assign to a loss to a good team versus a loss to a mediocre team versus a win against a bad team, etc. Everyone has slightly different methodologies for how they calculate the worth of a resume. And no matter how well Kentucky played, they still have a 1 in the loss column. That counts for something, certainly. Maybe you think it counts for less than PB does, I don’t know. But it’s a piece of data that every resume ranker takes into consideration when coming up with his rankings.
billyzane - October 6, 2008
Well
I absolutely get what you’re saying, and I think you’re perfectly justified in deciding for yourself that Kentucky’s resume on the whole remains stronger than Wake’s, insofar as you think their close loss to Alabama is—if not quite a positive—not a loss you count against them too much. I don’t think you’re crazy for thinking that, though I’m a little surprised that my own reasoning strikes anyone as a stretch.
In any case, the issue is not whether Kentucky was idle last week, or even whether they lost or if they won: All that matters is their body of work as compared to other teams’ bodies of work. In this case, I see one loss, one decent win, and nothing else. And in my mind that’s not as good as what Wake Forest has done, for example.
I think both value judgments are defensible, so we can agree to disagree on this one.
Peter Bean - October 6, 2008
I think Wake has a better resume than Kentucky
yes, Kentucky played Alabama very close and that was their first loss of the season. But look at their wins: Louisville (mediocre at best), Norfolk State, Middle Tennessee State (by 6! if you want to talk about close wins and losses, MTSU was 1 yard away from scoring a TD as time expired to win!) and Western Kentucky. Meanwhile, Wake has beaten Baylor, Ole Miss and Florida State. Baylor and Louisville are comparable and the others aren’t even close.
So Kentucky’s 1 loss is much better than Wake’s 1 loss, yes. But Wake’s wins are also much better than Kentucky’s wins. In my opinion, more than impressive enough to take Wake past Kentucky. They’re pretty close though. It’s an arguable point, but not clear cut like you guys seem to think.
billyzane - October 6, 2008
part-time kentucky fan, as most of y'all well know
While their defense is tremendous, I myself don’t believe they’re anywhere near deserving of a top-25 ranking this year. But just wanted to state that it’s nice to know that they’re at least in the conversation.
But c’mon. Northwestern? 16? Really???
jc25 - October 6, 2008
Cal can't move up 12 spots...
… they lost at Maryland who just lost to Virginia 31-0. Yeah Michigan State is a good win and Arizona State is decent, but that Maryland loss is bad.
Sweed4Heisman - October 6, 2008
My guess:
Had Cal’s loss to Maryland came this last week instead of couple of weeks ago, PB would have ranked them outside of top 25. Yes PB?
Cyrus - October 6, 2008
OK, but...
… if you’re going to discount the loss to Maryland because it was a few weeks ago, you would also have to discount the Michigan State win since it came on the opening weekend.
Sweed4Heisman - October 6, 2008
Is it really possible
to separate resume ranking from power rankings this early in the season? Let’s not kid ourselves about what we’re doing here.
Why is LSU ranked in the top 10? Their best win is probably Auburn, who looks thoroughly mediocre right now. So LSU appears to be ranked so highly based on Auburn’s rep (thoroughly unjustified at this point) and their own reputation (not in the spirit of resume ranking).
Am I wrong?
andy_wooster - October 7, 2008
No you're definitely right
There’s still a lot of subjectivity being subjected here. I finally bumped LSU down three this week, but still felt a little stupid with them ranked highly at all. They’ve done nothing yet.
The alternative is a true resume ranking balloting, which I’ve done in previous years even this early in the season, but (1) it takes more number-crunching time than I have right now and (2) it’s really messy in the early going.
Peter Bean - October 7, 2008
thanks
I actually don’t have a problem with hybrid resume-power rankings this early in the season. As you said, a pure resume ranking is really tough to do at this point in the season.
I think the ideal is to use some amount of power ranking early in the season, and gradually increase the importance of resume on a week-by-week basis.
andy_wooster - October 7, 2008
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