***OFFICIAL CFP Rankings Show Watch Thread***

[ClubCy]

You don’t have to tell me the system favors the big names, you’re preaching to the choir - but one of the justifications for expanding the playoffs was making it more “fair” and getting more ”deserving” teams in. So using the expanded playoffs as a way to get more SEC teams in - without having a clearly defined qualification criteria - rubs a lot of us the wrong way. I think if SMU loses to Clemson, it’s at least a valid question as to whether they or Alabama get that last spot. It shouldn’t be automatically Bama.

This is why I’ve been saying for years that there ought to be a clear, unquestionable criteria for making the playoff - and it ought to be winning your conference. The notion of “at large” selections just doesn’t feel right. I don’t care if you go 11-1 and somehow miss out on your conference championship … someone in your own conference proved they were better, what justification do you have to say you should get a shot at being called best in the nation? I’d blow everything up, start fresh with 12 regional conferences of no more than 12 members. The conference championship games become the de facto first round, with the 12 winners advancing to the Tournament of Champions. No one can ever say a team got in unfairly … the rules and the criteria are clear, and if you’re 12-0 and lose your CCG, that’s just too bad.

Opening up all these at-large spots just creates the opportunity for this to become a B1G/SEC invitational, which is kinda what we’re getting.

Gonna push back a little here. With how big the conferences are now tiebreakers hold too much weight. I guarantee we “would have cared” if we would have missed out on the Big 12 championship game if Houston would have beat BYU. Whoever would have gone would have had the same record as us without playing us and we would have never been givin the opportunity to play for a championship or spot in the playoff.

Even if you break it down back to regional conferences we’d then just hear politics from each conference.

 

[KidSilverhair]

Gonna push back a little here. With how big the conferences are now tiebreakers hold too much weight. I guarantee we “would have cared” if we would have missed out on the Big 12 championship game if Houston would have beat BYU. Whoever would have gone would have had the same record as us without playing us and we would have never been givin the opportunity to play for a championship or spot in the playoff.

Even if you break it down back to regional conferences we’d then just hear politics from each conference.

I think you and I are saying the same thing, kinda. Tiebreakers hold too much weight, because conferences are too big and you can’t always get a clear-cut champion because the schedules aren‘t the same. That’s the biggest issue I have with the system right now - there’s no on-field way to adequately determine conference championship game teams, which only amplifies the arguments and conflicts over who’s “deserving.”

It stinks that Iowa State is in a four-way tie for best record in the conference with three teams that they didn’t even play. But it’s nice that the tiebreakers went our way, at least.

 

[NYCYFan]

I don't even know where to begin with all this.
Boise State moves up a spot for barely beating a bad Oregon team at home. I know that teams had to jump up due to Miami plummeting but still...
Alabama moves up 2 spots after beating an unranked Auburn at home while South Carolina moves up only 1 spot after being #12 Clemson on the road. Miami ahead of South Carolina and Ole Miss despite having zero quality wins and two losses to unranked teams.

I knew Alabama was getting the nod, it was written in the stars, big name brand bias is as obvious as it's ever been.
It's funny seeing the chairman on ESPN talking about "data points" in terms of not moving the teams that aren't playing this week yet they largely ignored the "data point" of Alabama beating Auburn at home compared to South Carolina beating Clemson on the road. Completely ignored it, gave Alabama more credit for being an unranked team compared to the #12 team. I'm not surprised but it's still appalling to see it play out in real time.

 

[BillBrasky4Cy]

I don’t understand all the angst over our ranking and the playoff rankings in general. The B12 2 loss teams are ranked fairly. Surely nobody thought prior to the season that a 2 loss Big 12 team would get in without winning the championship game? Or be ranked above every 3 loss SEC team?

The only gripe I have is Boise is overrated given their lack of quality wins. Also think Miami is a bit overrated.

So 3 loss Bama, South Carolina, and Ole Miss are all properly ranked? It's crap that the SEC gets to taught parity but for the Big 12 it's a bad thing.

 

[CloneIce]

I don't even know where to begin with all this.
Boise State moves up a spot for barely beating a bad Oregon team at home. I know that teams had to jump up due to Miami plummeting but still...
Alabama moves up 2 spots after beating an unranked Auburn at home while South Carolina moves up only 1 spot after being #12 Clemson on the road. Miami ahead of South Carolina and Ole Miss despite having zero quality wins and two losses to unranked teams.

I knew Alabama was getting the nod, it was written in the stars, big name brand bias is as obvious as it's ever been.
It's funny seeing the chairman on ESPN talking about "data points" in terms of not moving the teams that aren't playing this week yet they largely ignored the "data point" of Alabama beating Auburn at home compared to South Carolina beating Clemson on the road. Completely ignored it, gave Alabama more credit for being an unranked team compared to the #12 team. I'm not surprised but it's still appalling to see it play out in real time.

Speaking of ignoring data points - you are missing the key one. Alabama beat South Carolina head to head. I think it wound be appalling if the committee ignored that.

 

[NoCreativity]

Reading this thread just reinforces how much I dislike what the sport has turned into.

I'm pretty happy we are playing for a Big 12 championship, but it doesn't feel as satisfying as it would have even 5 years ago.

I'll just stick to the NFL.

 

[Cyclonsin]

Speaking of ignoring data points - you are missing the key one. Alabama beat South Carolina head to head. I think it wound be appalling if the committee ignored that.

SCar lost to both Bama and Ole Miss. Of those three SEC teams, whom are all essentially tied, they unfortunately have to be out for that reason alone.

 

[NYCYFan]

Speaking of ignoring data points - you are missing the key one. Alabama beat South Carolina head to head. I think it wound be appalling if the committee ignored that.

That was already taken into account with the current rankings when Alabama was ranked 13 and South Carolina 15, that win was already calculated into the formula. The only data point that changed since then was Alabama beating unranked Auburn at home and South Carolina beating #12 Clemson on the road and for that Alabama gets bumped up 2 compared to South Carolina's 1.

 

[CloneIce]

So 3 loss Bama, South Carolina, and Ole Miss are all properly ranked? It's crap that the SEC gets to taught parity but for the Big 12 it's a bad thing.

Which teams do you believe should be ranked above them?

Do you believe all the conferences are currently equal and any two loss team should jump a 3 loss team? I am sorry, as much as I like the Big 12 we were a good league with lots of decent teams, but we don’t have the top end teams this year in comparison to B10 or SEC. That’s nothing new. And I don’t think a 2 loss Miami has much of an argument- I think they are overrated if anything.

 

[Clone9]

Blow it all up. These at-large bids ruin it. It should be auto-bids only, you should have to win your conference to get into a playoff, like how most other sports are... not possible now of course that the SEC and Big Ten gobbled up all the big brands making conferences lopsided. They complain now when they get left out but are still cashing the check. They'll expand the playoff, add more auto bids for the SEC and we'll have the same issues.

I can't think of a single sport where this is the case. NCAA basketball? NFL? NBA? MLB? Champions League? None of these require you to win the conference to make the playoffs.

 

[CloneIce]

That was already taken into account with the current rankings when Alabama was ranked 13 and South Carolina 15, that win was already calculated into the formula. The only data point that changed since then was Alabama beating unranked Auburn at home and South Carolina beating #12 Clemson on the road and for that Alabama gets bumped up 2 compared to South Carolina's 1.

In my opinion, it’s silly to blindly follow the rankings the week before and treat them as gospel. You have two 9-3 teams from the same conference with similiar resumes, the team that won head to head should get the spot. Seems obvious.

 

[Clark]

So 3 loss Bama, South Carolina, and Ole Miss are all properly ranked? It's crap that the SEC gets to taught parity but for the Big 12 it's a bad thing.

Would Iowa State be closer than a touchdown underdog against any of those teams on a neutral field?

I think the strength of schedule algorithms favor the SEC too much, probably due to recruiting rankings not being the indicator they once were and not having as clear of a way to quantify on field talent. I think that will work itself out over time.

The name brand bias part is going to be tougher to get rid of but it's going to take those teams getting in and losing.

 

[werdnamanhill]

If the Big 12 went to 8 conference games, the committee would punish us for weak schedules. Stop trying to assign logic to committee decisions that are not based on logic. Well, at least not logic based on competition

 

[NYCYFan]

In my opinion, it’s silly to blindly follow the rankings the week before and treat them as gospel. You have two 9-3 teams from the same conference with similiar resumes, the team that won head to head should get the spot. Seems obvious.

I don't think it's silly because when they rank these teams every week it's based on what the team did to date so when they ranked Alabama and South Carolina 13 and 15 respectively the Alabama win over South Carolina was already accounted for so what's changed since then? What happened last week with the Auburn and Clemson wins of which Alabama got more credit for. Otherwise what's the point of the previous week rankings and, futhermore, the results this past week.

 

[HFCS]

I specifically said that several of those teams didn't have marquee wins either. I was comparing us to several of those teams on your list (which you seemed to cherry pick which teams to include).

But if you think we had a difficult schedule (0 games against current ranked teams) and are upset that we are #16 in the CFP rankings, which I said feels about right, I'm not sure you what to tell you.

Nobody’s upset about that.

They are upset because ASU, BYU and Colorado are all lower in the committee rankings than AP and the teams in the other major three conferences are all a little higher.

The committee obviously devalues the Big 12 over conferences like ACC, AAC and MWC that are objectively worse conferences.

Long term we are screwed if something doesn’t change. We aren’t going to “prove ourselves” if every year we get one team and it’s a true road game vs the 5th ranked team. No conference would have a great result penciled into that spot every season.

 

[cyclones500]

Boise State being ahead of Big 12 champ could be argued, but is almost entirely indirect.

Defeated UNLV (which beat Houston and KU)
Defeated Wazzu (which beat Tech; but which also lost to Wyoming).

No other wins are high-quality.

Regarding the "Best win is good loss" to UO ... what does the margin have to be for that to qualify? It was 3, but what if it had been 7? 10? Anything that covered the spread? (No recollection what the line was for that game). Obviously it isn't going to harm a team's profile losing to #1 team, but it seems to be the primary "proof" of worthiness.

Yes, BSU should be in, but assumption that it's absolutely the #4 AQ is a bit puzzling, to say the least.

 

[HFCS]

Speaking of ignoring data points - you are missing the key one. Alabama beat South Carolina head to head. I think it wound be appalling if the committee ignored that.

I keep saying this but it’s not the position of SEC and Big Ten teams that is screwing us in our rankings every week.

It’s the ACC, MWC and even AAC that are getting more credit than Big 12 for playing objectively easier schedules.

There is a rational for Alabama at 11. There’s nothing on Miami’s resume that’s superior to BYU’s resume. Just one example.

 

[Kettes]

Reading this thread just reinforces how much I dislike what the sport has turned into.

I'm pretty happy we are playing for a Big 12 championship, but it doesn't feel as satisfying as it would have even 5 years ago.

I'll just stick to the NFL.

I'm guessing most people, here, are with you.

 

[Clark]

Boise State being ahead of Big 12 champ could be argued, but is almost entirely indirect.

Defeated UNLV (which beat Houston and KU)
Defeated Wazzu (which beat Tech; but which also lost to Wyoming).

No other wins are high-quality.

Regarding the "Best win is good loss" to UO ... what does the margin have to be for that to qualify? It was 3, but what if it had been 7? 10? Anything that covered the spread? (No recollection what the line was for that game). Obviously it isn't going to harm a team's profile losing to #1 team, but it seems to be the primary "proof" of worthiness.

Yes, BSU should be in, but assumption that it's absolutely the #4 AQ is a bit puzzling, to say the least.

Arizona State has a better argument here for sure but for ISU there really isn't a marquee win to hang your hat on. It would be one thing if the Big 12 had 4 teams tied at the top with 2 losses because they all beat each other but that isn't really the case. Most of them never played each other so even within your own conference there wasn't even an opportunity for many quality wins. That's more of a fluke than anything else but makes it tough to argue.

 

[StLouisClone]

If Boise and SMU both lose, I wouldn't be surprised if the Big 12 winner jumps all the way to #8 in the rankings which would give them the 3rd seed in the playoffs. Conference championships are supposed to carry a lot of weight. Here's what the final rankings might look like if Oregon, Texas and ISU win.

1. Oregon 13-0
2. Texas 12-1
3. Notre Dame 11-1
4. Ohio State 10-2
5. Penn State 11-2
6. Georgia 10-3
7. Tennessee 10-2
8. Iowa State 11-2
9. Indiana 11-1
10. Clemson 10-3
11. Alabama 9-3
12. UNLV 11-2
13. SMU 11-2
14. Miami 10-2

I'm now less concerned about Clemson jumping Iowa State. In Week 10, the committee ranked 7-1 ISU at #17 and 6-2 Clemson at #23. Why would they now put a 3-loss Clemson ahead of a 2-loss ISU?