Grandpa Duck No. 1 Share Posted November 20, 2021 Our Beloved Ducks are ranked #3 by the CFP, #4 by the AP, and #5 by USA (coaches). Other pollsters have a substantially lower opinion of our favorite players' and coaches' efforts. Sports polling has been around for longer than most of us. It was in the Sports Pages of The Coos Bay Times when I first began reading that predecessor to The World, in about 1947, at age eight. There was one published poll in our newspaper, the AP that is still around. Somewhat later, about 1950, the UPI, at that time the coaches poll, came along. Then they dropped out because they did not want to be a part of sports betting. During my lifetime sports polling has changed a great deal, as has college football. For the purposes of participating with more than 200 others in my nephew Pete’s college football pool, one of the sources that I rely upon for my ten weekly picks is the Massey College Football Ranking Composite, available at masseyratings.com. Wikipedia states the following about Massey: “Kenneth Massey is an American sports statistician known for his development of a methodology for ranking and rating sports teams in a variety of sports. His ratings have been a part of the Bowl Championship Series since the 1999 season. He is an assistant professor of mathematics at Carson–Newman University in Tennessee.” The Massey composite is made up of sixty, yes (60), different computer ranking “authorities”, including those you may have heard of, like USA Today, Associated Press, and Jeff Sagarin, to a about 57 you could care less about, like Weighted Win Paths and PerformanZ. Our Ducks do not rank nearly so highly with the rest of the Massey Composite prognosticators as they place with the recognized polsters. The average Duck rank for all 60 contributors to Massey’s list is 14.68. The range of ranking is #3, by “Joby Nitty Gritty” and the CFP to #34 by “Boggo”. To compare, Georgia has an average ranking of 1.07, and a range of #1 to #3, with two ranking them second, one third, and all the rest of them at the top. The Massey top ten is: 1. Georgia 2. Ohio State 3. Michigan 4. Alabama 5. Notre Dame 6. Oklahoma State 7. Cincinnati 8. Michigan State 9. Wisconsin 10. Oklahoma The Ducks come in at #13, up from #15 last week. Jeff Sagarin has us at #12. I write to encourage comments about the great discrepancy between where the more commonly known rankings place Our Beloved Ducks, and this composite placement by many computer geeks’ efforts, some of whom just may skew their computer programs to favor their favorite conference, or even a particular team. My own belief is that for so long as the earth rotates from west to east, teams in the west will always be at a disadvantage because the other teams play earlier in the day before many of the east coast sports writers, talking heads and self-appointed experts have imbibed in their favorite beverages. Our western teams are viewed through their diminished senses, if at all. 2 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jon Joseph Moderator No. 2 Share Posted November 20, 2021 Great take, thank you. The ESPN models also have the Ducks ranked far lower than does the PO Committee. But all of these machines depend upon, so far at least, human programming. The Ducks will take heat for being ranked 4 but what justification is there to have Bama at 2? Bama's at 2 because 4L Mississippi State is 25? Prior to the BCS and the monetizing of CFB, games did not kick off when many on the east coast are asleep or as you so noted, inebriated. Of course many games simply were not televised and coaches were making less, usually far less, than $1M a year. Frankly, I enjoyed the game far more when what mattered was the Run For The Roses and playing the Big 10 champ in the Rose Bowl. When no one bowed down to the SEC. When ESPN was not a CFB media cartel. The field will be going to 12 as early as 2023. 5 P5 champs in, a G5 team in and 6 at large. Then other than for seeding purposes, much of this 'stuff' will not matter. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
HappyToBeADuck No. 3 Share Posted November 20, 2021 Grandpa Duck thank you for sharing that awesome history lesson. You speak with first hand knowledge, personal experience and wisdom. Love to hear more. Go Ducks. Scoreboard is the fact that trumps opinion. 1-0.... 1 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Charles Fischer Administrator No. 4 Share Posted November 20, 2021 On 11/19/2021 at 6:18 PM, Grandpa Duck said: Our western teams are viewed through their diminished senses, if at all. Now that....is great writing! Thank you for the time and research to share with us. Mr. FishDuck Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
