Quote:
Originally Posted by GirlySports
Yes I'm ok with that. Because it's a ranking, not a standing. Alot of sports do it. Not everything has to be a set structure of regular season and playoffs.
There are year end championships in tennis and golf and they are determined by rankings of previous years and this year. They are also worth millions of dollars. Nadal could have a terrible 2011, win no tournaments and drop no lower than 5th? The following year he'll be hurting though. And next year Alabama will be hurting too, this one loss to South Carolina lasts a long time.
It's not what they 'think' may be true. It's not a prediction, it's a ranking of previous work. NCAA football doesn't start from scratch. They go "here's a ladder of teams from 1 to 25, you guys decide what happens next." As teams win they rise, as teams lose they drop but only slightly because of who they lost to. Alabama started the year #1 because they had won 19 in a row and are the defending champions, it's continuous. It's like a handicap because there are so many teams and the schedules are not balanced. Of course results on the field still matter. Alabama is not going unpunished for losing yesterday, they might not be #1 again for YEARS because of it. I would argue that it's even a steeper penalty then just losing one ordinary game because next year, they will start lower down the ladder because of it.
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Yeah, I was just having a look at Sagarin's ratings today, and on the metric that's included in BCS calculations, Alabama dropped from 1st all the way down to 17th. The top ten according to his formula are Boise, TCU, Oklahoma, Oregon, Michigan State, Oregon State, Stanford, LSU, Auburn, Nebraska. Ohio State is ranked 23rd (by far the easiest schedule of any team mentioned).
http://www.usatoday.com/sports/sagarin/fbt10.htm (The red column is the one relevant to the BCS).
Even if humans undervalue losses like the one yesterday, once the computers get involved in a couple weeks, they'll take it much more seriously, and that has an equalizing effect.