SEC SEC SEC ESPN should change their name to WELUVSEC. No matter that Alabama plays boxsters community college club football team for the first 4 or 5 games and is ranked 1 because they won by 70. UO playing top teams instead of Aloha HS football will never be seen by ESPN as a good thing.
There should be a rule that every teams first game is against a worthwhile opponent. Georgia should have played Alabama. Utah should have played Oregon. Oklahoma should have played Baylor. Ohio State should have played Michigan and Texas A&M should have played Portland State!
Thanks for this very relevant breakdown of our parched playoff mirage. My gut tells me that PAC parity will cannibalize itself right out of the playoffs again. There is no room for error down the stretch.
That being said, and I might be the minority here, but I’ll take a top tier nonconference game any day over a patsy schedule. Without Georgia, the Ducks would not be this galvanized and playing this well. That Georgia game made every other game on the schedule feel less scary.
Competitors want to play the best every single year, they live to be tested against the best. If you don’t, then maybe you shouldn’t be playing at all. I don’t even care to watch when an FCS team is scheduled. I still do to feed my football addiction, but I’d much rather watch us play three ranked nonconference games.
The beautiful, unique part about college football is that every game matters all season. Does scheduling a beast in September hurt playoff hopes? Maybe, but you have a true championship team then you can only really beat yourselves. Champions will win the tough games that matter and be on top at the end. If UO is a championship team, they will win out. Good luck keeping a P5 team with 12 straight wins out of a playoff game.
Great insight as always. Hope to see USC and Ducks in Vegas for a CFB birth. Love Reece Davis and just learned he is an Alabama grad. No clue why he is so anti - Duck and certainly anti Pac-12
TCU has zero losses and might win out. So final four would be georgia, winner of Michigan and Ohio State, TCU and u pick last team. Georgia will repeat in the natty; defense still rules. Pac-10 or pac-12 needs Larry back to get new tv deal,or have a stadium that holds more than 60,000. Remember Rose Bowl and LA coliseum are off to the BIG 10 and just 70 million each in total revenue. Bill Walton and his conference of champions might get $ 30 million each if they can get a new tv deal. 70 million minus 30 million is only 40 million more. each for Bruins and Trojans, but these schools did not jump for money/ they were tired of getting beat up by power-houses in Pac-10 0r pac-12 like colorado and baby Bears in Berkeley, CA. UCLA has a minor debt of just south of 100 million dollars that Chip does not have to worry about. USC is just plain smart to take a pay cut to play with the big boys of the Big 10, and be close to the SEC for non-league rugby matches. Reser holds 25,000 this year, and last crowd at Penn State was about 107,000 last month. Give the pac-10 five years to be real in football and basketball and Autzen must be expanded past 60,000. Reser will be 50 k for next year; wow , half of what the Big House in Michigan holds. pac-10 sinking fast and top 10 rankings mean nothing unless you make the final four in football. So sad that Georgia just barely beat Ducks in Sept..........Bo knows.
argument why Oregon should be picked over Tenn. 1) Conf. Champion 2) Although both have 1 loss, both to Ga., , Tenn. played them after already reaching their peak, while Ore played them first game, new coach, new QB, still learning the system, Now, be honest (committee) Since losing to Georgia, which team has improved the most? OREGON!
John: Would you be so kind to explain how a team can be ranked #6 and their conference opponents have a combined 11-26 record.. Include their non conference opponents and it is 17-36.
Next time to talk to Davis, you could point out that Ohio State won the national championship in 2014 after losing its second game (not first) at home in Columbus (not in Georgia) to a team that finished the season 6-6 (not the No. 1 ranked undefeated defending national champions). And the Buckeyes lost that game by two touchdowns--giving up 34 points. Plus Urban Meyer was an established head coach, not a newcomer like Dan Lanning. Guess I'm not smart enough to see much difference between that loss and Oregon's.
I would say the experiment of PAC 12 teams playing “neutral” field games in Atlanta should be over. We’ve now had UW/Auburn, Oregon/Auburn, and Oregon/Georgia all end up as losses. First game of the season against a top 10 team is bad enough, but on the road and the three hour body clock difference… how many more advantages do you want to give away? These programs don’t need the $5 million that bad, and the other option isn’t only Portland State. There are plenty of P5 teams which would do a home and home with Oregon.
I want to take a second to thank you for the Rich Brooks podcast. Thoroughly enjoyable. I was at the "49 Special" Terry Obee 1989 game as a college senior (at Western) with my then girlfriend, now wife of 30(!) years. It was her first Duck game, and Rich had it right...was thinking "here we go again", right until that play. The tailgating afterwards was over the top with people urinating on, and throwing gravel at Husky RV's. (Parking lot was gravel then, and the Huskies would take over much of the East lot). We finally went to a pizza place called Pietro's (may still be there...I live in SD now), and it was wall to wall Duck fans. A Husky group came in, and the whole place started booing... they turned around and left. Brooks was a gem. His teams punched well above their weight.
SEC SEC SEC ESPN should change their name to WELUVSEC. No matter that Alabama plays boxsters community college club football team for the first 4 or 5 games and is ranked 1 because they won by 70. UO playing top teams instead of Aloha HS football will never be seen by ESPN as a good thing.
I love that Oregon played Georgia.
There should be a rule that every teams first game is against a worthwhile opponent. Georgia should have played Alabama. Utah should have played Oregon. Oklahoma should have played Baylor. Ohio State should have played Michigan and Texas A&M should have played Portland State!
Personally I think Herbstreit is too full of himself and always has been. I think he should take some lessons from Coach Barnum….a class act.
Thanks for this very relevant breakdown of our parched playoff mirage. My gut tells me that PAC parity will cannibalize itself right out of the playoffs again. There is no room for error down the stretch.
That being said, and I might be the minority here, but I’ll take a top tier nonconference game any day over a patsy schedule. Without Georgia, the Ducks would not be this galvanized and playing this well. That Georgia game made every other game on the schedule feel less scary.
Competitors want to play the best every single year, they live to be tested against the best. If you don’t, then maybe you shouldn’t be playing at all. I don’t even care to watch when an FCS team is scheduled. I still do to feed my football addiction, but I’d much rather watch us play three ranked nonconference games.
The beautiful, unique part about college football is that every game matters all season. Does scheduling a beast in September hurt playoff hopes? Maybe, but you have a true championship team then you can only really beat yourselves. Champions will win the tough games that matter and be on top at the end. If UO is a championship team, they will win out. Good luck keeping a P5 team with 12 straight wins out of a playoff game.
Tell Rece Davis Alabama has an LSU problem. And a Texas problem. And a Tennessee problem. And is about to have an Ole Miss problem.
Seriously, fuck these guys and their bullshit SEC bias
The playoff picture is quite the mess... thanks for mopping to make the picture a little clearer for us all.
Rece is a putz
It’s simple - Win Well and everything else generally falls into place
GO DAWGS
Great insight as always. Hope to see USC and Ducks in Vegas for a CFB birth. Love Reece Davis and just learned he is an Alabama grad. No clue why he is so anti - Duck and certainly anti Pac-12
TCU has zero losses and might win out. So final four would be georgia, winner of Michigan and Ohio State, TCU and u pick last team. Georgia will repeat in the natty; defense still rules. Pac-10 or pac-12 needs Larry back to get new tv deal,or have a stadium that holds more than 60,000. Remember Rose Bowl and LA coliseum are off to the BIG 10 and just 70 million each in total revenue. Bill Walton and his conference of champions might get $ 30 million each if they can get a new tv deal. 70 million minus 30 million is only 40 million more. each for Bruins and Trojans, but these schools did not jump for money/ they were tired of getting beat up by power-houses in Pac-10 0r pac-12 like colorado and baby Bears in Berkeley, CA. UCLA has a minor debt of just south of 100 million dollars that Chip does not have to worry about. USC is just plain smart to take a pay cut to play with the big boys of the Big 10, and be close to the SEC for non-league rugby matches. Reser holds 25,000 this year, and last crowd at Penn State was about 107,000 last month. Give the pac-10 five years to be real in football and basketball and Autzen must be expanded past 60,000. Reser will be 50 k for next year; wow , half of what the Big House in Michigan holds. pac-10 sinking fast and top 10 rankings mean nothing unless you make the final four in football. So sad that Georgia just barely beat Ducks in Sept..........Bo knows.
argument why Oregon should be picked over Tenn. 1) Conf. Champion 2) Although both have 1 loss, both to Ga., , Tenn. played them after already reaching their peak, while Ore played them first game, new coach, new QB, still learning the system, Now, be honest (committee) Since losing to Georgia, which team has improved the most? OREGON!
this , of course thinking TCU loses one, and if not, would 1 loss Mich. fall below Oregon?
One more Q, I also believe the committee would have no problem picking a 1 beaten champion USC over Tenn, and 1 loss Mich
John: Would you be so kind to explain how a team can be ranked #6 and their conference opponents have a combined 11-26 record.. Include their non conference opponents and it is 17-36.
What am I missing?
Do that analysis for ALL the teams in the top 10, report back what you find.
Rece Davis is a poor man's Chris Fowler.
Next time to talk to Davis, you could point out that Ohio State won the national championship in 2014 after losing its second game (not first) at home in Columbus (not in Georgia) to a team that finished the season 6-6 (not the No. 1 ranked undefeated defending national champions). And the Buckeyes lost that game by two touchdowns--giving up 34 points. Plus Urban Meyer was an established head coach, not a newcomer like Dan Lanning. Guess I'm not smart enough to see much difference between that loss and Oregon's.
Love me some Coach Barnum. And Reece Davis? What are you looking at, man?
I would say the experiment of PAC 12 teams playing “neutral” field games in Atlanta should be over. We’ve now had UW/Auburn, Oregon/Auburn, and Oregon/Georgia all end up as losses. First game of the season against a top 10 team is bad enough, but on the road and the three hour body clock difference… how many more advantages do you want to give away? These programs don’t need the $5 million that bad, and the other option isn’t only Portland State. There are plenty of P5 teams which would do a home and home with Oregon.
I want to take a second to thank you for the Rich Brooks podcast. Thoroughly enjoyable. I was at the "49 Special" Terry Obee 1989 game as a college senior (at Western) with my then girlfriend, now wife of 30(!) years. It was her first Duck game, and Rich had it right...was thinking "here we go again", right until that play. The tailgating afterwards was over the top with people urinating on, and throwing gravel at Husky RV's. (Parking lot was gravel then, and the Huskies would take over much of the East lot). We finally went to a pizza place called Pietro's (may still be there...I live in SD now), and it was wall to wall Duck fans. A Husky group came in, and the whole place started booing... they turned around and left. Brooks was a gem. His teams punched well above their weight.