TOP 25

[DutchFan2004]

Was a little surprised at the week 1 rankings in that there is only 3 points between Wartburg and Monmouth after Wartburg clearly dominated Monmouth.  If the polls are correct now and Wartburg is clearly the #3 team in the IIAC it does not make a lot of sense that Monmouth should be getting votes IMHO.  I don't say this to slight Monmouth or to run that program down I only say it does not make a lot of sense.  I know it is early in the season but the score indicates that the preseason was wrong.  I don't think the voters can say that this was a Wartburg upset either with the way the game turned out. 

[Mr. Ypsi]

With all due respect, there is also the phrase "on any given Saturday".  Since I hadn't studied the preseason poll in detail, I was a bit surprised that Wartburg didn't enter the Top 25.  Pretty clearly the voters felt that Monmouth had been totally over-rated (dropping from 164 to 19 points) but didn't feel that Wartburg was therefore a 'super' team (rising from 0 to 22 points).

I think it is a plus that voters didn't over-react to a single game.  While Monmouth will have no real chance at redemption until the payoffs (if they make them), Wartburg will have a couple of chances to show their worth.

[DutchFan2004]

I agree with what you said, I wasn't saying that Wartburg would be in the top 25, I expected them to get votes for being in the top 25, I guess I was more shocked that Monmouth was still getting votes at all.  A team that had no votes for the top 25 dominated the 17th ranked team and they are three points away?  I also know that with 25 ballots there could be some on there that are still thinking Monmouth is worthy of 24-25 place.  I might be inclined to think that if the game had been close. With respect to you as well I agree " on any given day" but the Knights pretty much dominated the game.  I might think that if the Knights had won by 3 or less or in OT then there is some room for doubt.  I also know that there are many teams worthy of votes this early in the season.  My point is that if Monmouth got 19 25th place votes they would have 19 points.  With that many votes and the way Wartburg dominated I would think those 19 voters would have put Wartburg ahead of Monmouth at 24 and thus Wartburg would have had 38 points.  See my point?  I don't claim to be an expert and I don't study the nation as a whole like Pat and Keith, but when there is a a lopsided win like this one I would tend to say that Wartburg at this point and time is much better than Monmouth.  I don't know where they will wind up but I tend to think head to head speaks loudly. 

[footballdaddy]

Mr. Yipsi and DF2004 both have valid points. It looks like the preseason rankings were more about last year than this year. Judging from this week's podcast, it looks like Monmouth was over rated and Wartburg is being viewed as a maybe a 3rd place IIAC team instead of 4th. At this point Wartburg has the most impressive win in the IIAC. I don't know if next week will change anything. We'll have to see what happens once the conference season starts.

[Mr. Ypsi]

I tried to send an e-mail to Clyde Hughes using the address in his Around the Midwest column, but Outlook Express said it didn't go through, so I'll try answering his question here.

He couldn't figure out how NCC could crush Cornell and drop two places, while IWU struggled to beat Hope and rose two places.  The answer is really quite simple if you look at points received and remember that teams cannot be looked at in isolation.

Ranked teams are supposed to crush a team like Cornell - that doesn't gain extra credit.  NCC basically was unchanged (down one point) but got passed by Willamette and Hardin-Simmons who both (on the road) beat teams vastly better than Cornell.  IWU DID lose 23 points.  They entered the poll because once the season starts, voters converge in the voting; in the pre-season poll it took 93 points to land in 25th place, this week it took only 64.  As the season progresses it is a safe bet that the list of (and points received by) ORVs will continue to shrink.  IWU rose because UWSP and Monmouth both lost and dropped below them.

[DutchFan2004]

From your post "Ranked teams are supposed to crush a team like Cornell"  I know that Wartburg is not Cornell and they are much better than the Rams.  My point is, and I must not have made it clear is that how can a voter honestly vote Monmouth higher than Wartburg?  With only 3 points between them and only 25 voters there has to be someone on the panel of voters placing Monmouth higher than the Knights.  I have no problem with any of the voters not voting for the Knights, but with the results of that game being clearly in favor of the Knights I just don't see how a voter could not vote the Knights higher than the Scots. I know that there will be a smaller list of teams that receive votes and that the other teams point totals should go up as the season goes on.  Mr Ypsi have I made my point or contention more clear?  I understand the point you made on any given day but this apparently was not a given day I might even say it was a borderline beat down.  It wasn't the MIAC monkey stomp but was only one point away from it.  If voters don't go by head to head (and I know that OT games and 3 or less wins may fall into upsets or the any given day game) what other objective criteria is there?

[Mr. Ypsi]

DF2004,

I understand your point, and really can't explain how Wartburg led Monmouth by only 3 points.  I kinda doubt any particular voter put Monmouth over Wartburg, so maybe it was just different voters - a few who earlier felt so strongly about Monmouth that they gave them the benefit of the doubt for one 'slip-up', but didn't think Wartburg, based on one game, was yet worthy of ranking.  Just a guess, but that's the only explanation I've got.

My previous post was addressing a different question.

[DutchFan2004]

Mr Ypsi,

That is the only thing that can explain it.  I can understand if that were a close game but it wasn't.  Monmouth never really threaten to win or even take a commanding lead is my point.  I know maybe I am beating a dead horse but head to head games should have more weight and IMHO it is not really giving a team credit if a voter just simply says well Wartburg got lucky.  Just my two cents and its not even worth that much 

[Mr. Ypsi]

Aside from conference loyalty (which I fully understand) I'm having trouble understanding a Dutch fan being so passionate in defense of the Wartys!

Monmouth has no realistic chance of redemption until the playoffs (if they make them); Wartburg has a couple of chances to move up (unfortunately, their best chance is beating the Dutch)!

[Unless it is beating Coe, because Augie already beat the Dutch - which I'm sticking my neck out for on various Pickems.  And THAT's conference loyalty! ]

[DutchFan2004]

Mr Ypsi,


It is not about conference loyalty at all.  Even though I had another son that attended Wartburg. I do not support the football program.  It is a parent thing.  To be loyal to both sons I support the Wartburg tennis program and to be loyal to the other son I support the Dutch football program.  I would be saying this about your Auggie Vikings they had beat Monmouth and then were only 3 points ahead.  If one team dominates the other and voters discount it are they really thinking their position through from an objective point of view or is there an adjenda to their vote.  I am not saying that is the case here.  But as a fan and somewhat a critical thinker I find it odd and somewhat a position that is not supportable.  It is more about the thought process in the voters minds.  I admit that it is a more pronounced situation that it involves a team in the conference I follow and support.  I do think my position is one of strength though.  As for the Vikings beating my Dutch time will tell my friend.  I would expect nothing less from you supporting your conference.   

[K-Mack]

It's definitely strange and a valid question.

Without really knowing what other voters do, it  seems like some set their order and then move teams up or down 3 or 5 or 10 spots based on any one particular loss. I agree DF2004 that h2h is the strongest measure we have, and I'm also a big proponent of re-ordering from scratch (though I myself don't do it every week, it's a good exercise to make sure you are putting teams where they belong in comparison to other teams and not just kind of where they were last week, give or take a bit)

I agree with Ypsi's sentiment in that as you give it time, the votes will sort themselves out and crystallize around a more solid group.

But it definitely looked silly to have Monmouth ahead of Wartburg in any way, and even worse with the Scots laying another egg in Week 2.

I wonder if we could write a computer program that would take into account all h2h results and not let you vote for a team that lost to a significantly lower-ranked team ... at least until later in the season when certain results are bound to conflict.

Nerds? A lil help?

[Ryan Tipps]

Nerds? A lil help?

This is a computer message board. No nerds here.

[Ron Boerger]

I wonder if we could write a computer program that would take into account all h2h results and not let you vote for a team that lost to a significantly lower-ranked team ... at least until later in the season when certain results are bound to conflict.

Hmm, isn't this the kind of thinking that led to that abortion of a system called the BCS??   

[K-Mack]

I just meant something that would red-flag a vote in the way spellcheck does in Word. You could still do it if you wanted to.

As it is, Pat sends out a detailed rundown of what each team receiving votes has done not just in the week in question, but the entire season. Sometimes though the more information you have, the more likely some key detail is to get lost in the sauce.

If we've learned nothing over the years, it's that neither purely stat-based or purely subjective matters really take the entire picture into account.

[K-Mack]

Thought this would be worth discussing here. I am asking some questions with open-ended answers;

To whom it might concern, I just clarified an item in ATN. The original part was written very late at night and I didn't properly say what I wanted to get at:

If you didn't read the column between 12:15 and 3;15 today, you'll notice no difference.

Here's the update:

Poll positions

If after the third week of games, it’s okay for the AFCA to put out its first poll (we kid, we kid), it’s okay for ATN to dip into these waters. Let’s take a quick look at the art/science of top 25 polling.

Here’s the question of the week: Why is Linfield ranked?

Cal Lutheran’s defeat of the then-No. 4 Wildcats, followed by the Kingsmen’s loss to unranked Pacific Lutheran cast doubt upon the whole West Coast. If CLU rose up to 15, then dropped to 24th after the loss, how can Linfield be any higher than 25? And by that logic, PLU (2-0) should be somewhere in the poll as well.

Whether or not a pollster votes for No. 16 Linfield, now 0-1, depends on methodology. If voting for the top 25 teams at this very moment, based on what we know only of 2010, then it’s fair to drop the Wildcats right out of the top 25. They have a loss, to a team that lost to an unranked team, and no wins to offset it.

But some voters no team should drop from No. 4 to ‘also receiving votes’ because of a single game.

I never like to look at polls as one-week deals. Our top 25 is an organism evolving as the teams do each season. Teams rarely stick to the script, consistently producing the same output each week, so why should we? Plus, one could very well believe that Linfield, even with a loss, is still one of the 25 best teams in the country.

I think in the end they will be, but as of this week, I didn’t vote for them. I didn't have any grounds to do so, even though two weeks ago they were in my top 5.

But here's where polls are tricky: But do I really believe Trine (No. 14) would beat Linfield if they played this week? What's the right way to judge what we know, based on recent results, and what we suspect, based on historical strength? Should we take last week's ranking into account, or start fresh from the top every week? Certainly a team isn't owed a spot in this week's poll because it was ranked last week. Yet we often wonder how a certain result can produce so much movement in a single week.

A loss like Cal Lutheran's to Pacific Lutheran can produce a ripple effect for a team like Linfield, even though later in the year the Wildcats might defeat the Lutes and render that triangle of results mostly useless.