Worse than BYU is GA Tech....they're 16th, 7 teams - almost half of the teams that are ranked ahead of them - have more losses. # of losses don't seem to be a factor at all with them. I know I'd be pissed if I were a GT fan
I’m going to go out on a limb here and say that the committee is not too worried about teams that far out. Their only chance to maybe make the playoffs is to win their conference championship. If I was a Ga. Tech fan, I would be pissed because the ACC didn’t provide them with a ranked opponent. They have to go to the SEC for that.
Bingo!!! I guess what I'm saying is that is exactly the point. If as you suggested, who you play doesn't matter and the number of losses is all that matters, Ga Tech wouldn't be ranked any lower than 8th and right in line for a playoff spot. In this case it's quite the opposite. Number of losses doesn't matter and who they've played is all that matters. What the committee is telling us here in the case of Ga Tech is that who you play/strength of schedule is a major factor in their decisions. To that point, GT strength of record (SOR) is 17 - exactly where they are ranked
Gosh, I guess you’re right. Let’s just scrap the committee and use SOR. Aggie#1, Aggies #1! Just kidding. All I’m saying is that last year, the 12 teams in the playoffs all had 2 losses or less, with the exception of Clemson who got in on an automatic bid. Every undefeated team, every 1 loss team (with the exception of Army???) and the rest were 2 loss teams all made it in. It sure looks like they were counting losses to me.
That must be it....must be our uniforms or maybe the helmets that gave us the nod over those gnarly looking things those Aggies and Hoosiers show up with.....
It's looking like one of James Madison, Tulane or North Texas will take one of the 12 slots and unless Miami somehow wins the ACC that the ACC Champion will take one of the 12 slots as well. So just like last year, you have to be in the top 10 if you want to hold on to your playoff slot. The 2 teams at #11 and #12 are going to be kicked to the curb by the automatic qualifiers from the Group of 5 and the ACC.
Great question, I looked it up. JMU is 16, No TX is 15 and Tulane is 26. For some context Miami is 21, Utah is 19, Vandy 13 and that team up north is 20. JMU and Tulane SOR is superior to that of several teams in the CFP top 15
Just for context, neither JMU nor North Texas has played even 1 team ranked in the latest CFP Rankings. Tulane played 1 ranked team and lost. I’m still not sure what SOR is telling us. Tulane’s SOS is 68, JMU SOS is 77, and N. Texas SOS is 78. I think I know what SOS is telling us and I don’t need thousands of simulations to get it.
So when I see a system that rates JMU's schedule almost equal to the Longhorns schedule, I say that system is total BS. Longhorns have played a much, much, much tougher schedule than JMU. If we played that JMU schedule we would be undefeated and Arch would be in the conversation for the Heisman.
I get it, guys/programers have to do something, and if they like football they have to come up with programs that rate teams, predict stuff, etc. There SOR, FPi, Sagrin, etc But the output of these programs is why we don't do the BCS stuff anymore. Granted the Committee is a no win assignment, it's impossible for them to come up with 12 teams that are unassailable in there record. Sure it's easy to pick the undefeated teams in Power 4 conferences,esp the Big 10 and the SEC. But the rest are a crap shoot. Just to pick on the Aggies, of the 6 SEC teams in the top 12, A&M, Georgia, Alabama, Ole Miss, OU and Vanderbilt...guess how many the Aggies have played. Their best win is vs Notre Dame when the refs failed to call holding on the last play, by holding I mean tackling our DL who was trying to rush the QB. Call that and it wipes off the TD and puts them 15 yds further back and not likely to make the play to win the game...of course I know that what ifs are for losers. Indiana played 7 out of the 8 worst teams in the Big 10, and get to play the worst team to finish the season, don't look at their out of conference teams. They did beat Oregon. My point isn't that A&M or IU don't deserve their rankings, they do deserve them. But if you factor in SOR stats as a big factor then may OU would be better than both of them in spite of 2 losses. I don't have an answer of course, and will opine that the problem won't go away with 16 teams, which truthfully I like and support. It will go away if football divorces itself from the NCAA, the conferences go back to being regional for all non-football sports and the top 32, 48 or even 64 teams form a league and create divisions based on geography and have a playoff like the NFL where SOS or SOR or losses don't matter, win your division and you are in, simple. Play in a tough division, tough luck.
Terry, I get what you’re saying, but as it stands now, rankings are everything. If you don’t win your conference championship, then your ranking determines whether you get in the playoffs or not. SOR seems to ignore rankings. SOS places an emphasis on rankings. You’re right though, I think we’re headed to a 50 or 60 member league.
So very much confusion over what SOR is and what it is not. It does NOT rank teams by strength of schedule, tho SOS is a critical variable in its construct BUT it is not the only variable. Unlike SOS, the results of the games you played on your schedule also count. It is NOT ranking the JMU schedule ahead of the Texas schedule. The Texas SOS is 7th strongest out of 136, JMU schedule is 125th. SOR is a result. It's telling us that based on all the games of all the teams from all the years in recent history what has been the probability that a team has been able to better or equal that specific record against that specific schedule. To that end, you can't disagree with it because it is what it is. To do so is the equivalent of disagreeing with what happened yesterday. What happened, happened whether you like it or not. You can however disagree about the interpretation of yesterday's events and how you apply them in decision making. To that end, what is SOR is telling us about Texas -v- JMU??? In the most recently updated rankings Texas SOR is ranked 12th and JMU is ranked 18th. What that says is that based upon historical results only 9% (12/136) of teams would have been the equal or better than the Texas record against that same schedule and 13% (18/136) of teams would have been able to equal or surpass JMU record against JMU schedule. Is it telling us that one is better than the other team? NO...it just provides another measure from which to make judgements, simply that. So in that regard it is telling us that historically it has been more difficult for a team to do what Texas has done, what JMU has done against their schedule has historically been more difficult than what Miami or Tennessee has done against their schedule, i.e., inferior SOR's -v- JMU. It may not be your favorite metric but it only stands to reason that it is superior to SOS alone because it counts the results. If results didn't count and you're a SOS proponent then we should go ahead and give Wisconsin the NATTY given they have the best SOS. TOK to your point about BCS, computers, etc.....I understand for what it was back in the day. However, we now live in a world where the automation of data and ability of digital analytics is so vastly more advanced than it was in that day and age, the comparisons are like between the stone age and todays quantum computing/AI/self-driving society. Every play/snap, every formation, every personnel package, every pre-snap motion, etc in every game situation against every front, defensive structure and every scheme in every position of the field and their results is now digitized and scoured for insights virtually at the speed of light. In the BCS era we were still loping around in the pre-historic jungle of data analytics. Needless to say I find our current capabilities far superior, imperfect tho they may be....