(10-01-2023 12:47 AM)JRsec Wrote:  

(10-01-2023 12:19 AM)TrojanCampaign Wrote:  

(09-30-2023 02:41 PM)SouthEastAlaska Wrote:  Well USC escapes Boulder after recovering the onside kick. If I was a USC fan I would really worry about my defense. This is the 2nd week in a row that they have looked bad. Typical Lincoln Riley team, great offense and no defense.

USC 48 - Colorado 41 Final

This is incorrect. None of us have been fooled by the paper tiger pac-12 stats. I will continue to say it. It’s easy to look amazing against bad teams.

Utah's defeat of what we now know is a wholly pedestrian Florida team lent credence to the "Strength" of the PAC 12. USC's offense looks up to speed, but the defense needs work. Washington is a bit better. Oregon may be a bit better than that. All in all the PAC's top is playing better. But early victories based upon past reputations of schools has been a bit misleading. Consider Notre Dame's loss to Ohio State by the narrowest of margins and their fortunate win at Duke and I'd say this is the new norm under NIL for all schools. And anyone who tosses Michigan's name out there needs to read aloud to the world the first 9 games on Michigan's schedule and then justify the ranking. They play Penn State in the 10th game, Maryland in the 11th, and Ohio State in the 12th. Their most solid win to date is Rutgers, a good team and improved team, but likely not CFP quality.

The truth is virtually everyone is overrated who is in the top 10 and they are there because, well, they rounded up the usual suspects. I don't see a complete team in the SEC, nor in the Big 10, nor in the PAC 12, and when OU/UT is played we might know a bit more about the Big 12. Just how good FSU is remains a mystery, but the rest of the ACC all has flaws, some minor, many glaring.

I think this is as close to parity as we can get. The healthiest very good but not complete team will win it all this year.

Or Kentucky is good

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(10-01-2023 09:45 AM)JRsec Wrote:  

(10-01-2023 07:48 AM)TrojanCampaign Wrote:  

(10-01-2023 12:47 AM)JRsec Wrote:  

(10-01-2023 12:19 AM)TrojanCampaign Wrote:  

(09-30-2023 02:41 PM)SouthEastAlaska Wrote:  Well USC escapes Boulder after recovering the onside kick. If I was a USC fan I would really worry about my defense. This is the 2nd week in a row that they have looked bad. Typical Lincoln Riley team, great offense and no defense.

USC 48 - Colorado 41 Final

This is incorrect. None of us have been fooled by the paper tiger pac-12 stats. I will continue to say it. It’s easy to look amazing against bad teams.

Utah's defeat of what we now know is a wholly pedestrian Florida team lent credence to the "Strength" of the PAC 12. USC's offense looks up to speed, but the defense needs work. Washington is a bit better. Oregon may be a bit better than that. All in all the PAC's top is playing better. But early victories based upon past reputations of schools has been a bit misleading. Consider Notre Dame's loss to Ohio State by the narrowest of margins and their fortunate win at Duke and I'd say this is the new norm under NIL for all schools. And anyone who tosses Michigan's name out there needs to read aloud to the world the first 9 games on Michigan's schedule and then justify the ranking. They play Penn State in the 10th game, Maryland in the 11th, and Ohio State in the 12th. Their most solid win to date is Rutgers, a good team and improved team, but likely not CFP quality.

The truth is virtually everyone is overrated who is in the top 10 and they are there because, well, they rounded up the usual suspects. I don't see a complete team in the SEC, nor in the Big 10, nor in the PAC 12, and when OU/UT is played we might know a bit more about the Big 12. Just how good FSU is remains a mystery, but the rest of the ACC all has flaws, some minor, many glaring.

I think this is as close to parity as we can get. The healthiest very good but not complete team will win it all this year.

You seem to be the only person willing to admit this for some reason. I said in my previous post that I don't think the top 10 teams in the PAC-12 are bad. But I'm just not buying the narrative that there are four and I standing to what I said.

My issue is I just don't comprehend the inconsistency of the AP poll. For example, let's compare Miami and Washington. Why is Washington rank so much higher than Miami despite Miami having a better win? And consistently recruiting better than Washington?

I understand you have to rank team somewhere to begin with. But it has become this weird system to where you can't rearrange teams that you obviously got wrong.

Top brands are the largest draws for television. Ranked teams also draw more viewers when they play ranked teams. The AP Poll is nothing but an advertising tool for the networks now and it reflects that, not necessarily who is best. And it's the same schools which are ranked in the top 10-15 in that poll at the start of every season to provide hype for games. Add to that the fact that sports writers promote their own home market's teams and you have it. At least now with the CFP the selected schools get to win it on the field, but even in that process there is recency bias and brand bias. I do think however the win / loss record at the end of the regular season helps that selection become far more accurate than the polls during the season.

Trojan,

As the Hall of fame coach Bill Parcels said "You are what your record says you are". As JR correctly points out, NIL and soon to come pay for play are going to create a level of parity in college football that we have never seen before. I couldn't count all of the players in various games mentioned in the broadcasts that were transfer players on new teams. I mean that's how Colorado flipped their team, an unprecedented 68 transfer players.

Your statements that the PAC is "Overrated" could be applied to any conference or school right now. That's why you should go and read SoCals response to you, he points out the metrics that are always used to judge conferences, and the PAC is the best right now. Even if USC and Stanford both lose to ND, we'll still be the best regular season conference this year. Just like the NFL, the regular season will mean nothing come bowls and playoffs. Those results will be determined by who's the healthiest and who's hot.

There are only 2 bad schools in the PAC right now, Stanford and ASU. That is a major difference for the conference and a strength we haven't seen since 00-01. That's over 20 years of futility that I have pointed out many times on this site and one that was most certainly earned. The PAC has consistently been the 4th or more often the 5th ranked P conference in that 20+ year stretch. Last year they ascended to 3rd and this year they're number 1. This doesn't mean we're going to see a national champion this year, in fact we'll be lucky to get a team in the playoff because I firmly believe they're going to beat each other up. That fact doesn't mean the conference is weak just that we have 6 or so really well matched schools that are going to have some dog fights coming up.

You should sit back and enjoy this last season of the PAC, I know I will.

(10-01-2023 07:48 AM)TrojanCampaign Wrote:  

(10-01-2023 12:47 AM)JRsec Wrote:  

(10-01-2023 12:19 AM)TrojanCampaign Wrote:  

(09-30-2023 02:41 PM)SouthEastAlaska Wrote:  Well USC escapes Boulder after recovering the onside kick. If I was a USC fan I would really worry about my defense. This is the 2nd week in a row that they have looked bad. Typical Lincoln Riley team, great offense and no defense.

USC 48 - Colorado 41 Final

This is incorrect. None of us have been fooled by the paper tiger pac-12 stats. I will continue to say it. It’s easy to look amazing against bad teams.

Utah's defeat of what we now know is a wholly pedestrian Florida team lent credence to the "Strength" of the PAC 12. USC's offense looks up to speed, but the defense needs work. Washington is a bit better. Oregon may be a bit better than that. All in all the PAC's top is playing better. But early victories based upon past reputations of schools has been a bit misleading. Consider Notre Dame's loss to Ohio State by the narrowest of margins and their fortunate win at Duke and I'd say this is the new norm under NIL for all schools. And anyone who tosses Michigan's name out there needs to read aloud to the world the first 9 games on Michigan's schedule and then justify the ranking. They play Penn State in the 10th game, Maryland in the 11th, and Ohio State in the 12th. Their most solid win to date is Rutgers, a good team and improved team, but likely not CFP quality.

The truth is virtually everyone is overrated who is in the top 10 and they are there because, well, they rounded up the usual suspects. I don't see a complete team in the SEC, nor in the Big 10, nor in the PAC 12, and when OU/UT is played we might know a bit more about the Big 12. Just how good FSU is remains a mystery, but the rest of the ACC all has flaws, some minor, many glaring.

I think this is as close to parity as we can get. The healthiest very good but not complete team will win it all this year.

You seem to be the only person willing to admit this for some reason. I said in my previous post that I don't think the top 10 teams in the PAC-12 are bad. But I'm just not buying the narrative that there are four and I standing to what I said.

My issue is I just don't comprehend the inconsistency of the AP poll. For example, let's compare Miami and Washington. Why is Washington rank so much higher than Miami despite Miami having a better win? And consistently recruiting better than Washington?

I understand you have to rank team somewhere to begin with. But it has become this weird system to where you can't rearrange teams that you obviously got wrong.

This post is a far cry from "the Pac is wildly overrated". They had 6 ranked teams at the end of last year, and they'll probably have 6 ranked next week, too. Are any of the 6 not worthy of being ranked at all? I think they're all worthy, and we can quibble endlessly about the exact ranking each should have, but it's just barking at the moon. The games will be played, Championships will be determined on the field, and most of us will go home pissed off at the end of another failed season, but some of us will have reason for optimism for next year at least.

As JR said, the AP poll is more of a marketing tool these days, the CFP Rankings are all that matter (though the final AP poll is usually pretty close to the final CFP rankings). We can look at 3 examples right now of schools that are wildly separated by the rankings today, but perhaps won't be so wildly separated when the first CFP ranking comes out:

#2 Michigan
#14 OU
#18 Miami

Miami has, by far, the best win of the group, a 15 point thumping over a 4-1 SEC team that might be decent this year, but wasn't highly regarded due to our 5-7 record last year. OU was 6-7 last year, so they didn't garner much attention in preseason rankings, but they appear to have recovered nicely after getting raided by Riley on his way out the door. They don't have a single win better than Miami's, but their overall group of wins and the way they've won them force us to take them seriously this year. And Michigan? They beat a decent Rutgers, a few also-rans, but they've also looked pretty good in all of their games.

There is basically no daylight between these 3 today. Fortunately, we'll know more in a few weeks, and know a whole lot more after the CCGs are played.