re: Mike Leach on Playoff Committee

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This year they drifted away from this. This year the humans were the frickup.

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Well, we can certainly agree on this. The committee changes every year, so each one is different . I had been a staunch supporter of prior committees because of how fluid their rankings were from week to week. They didn’t “drop” or “raise”anyone, didn’t “punish” or “reward.” They simply re-ranked teams every week based on all the data up to that point in the season. And each week there were new data points that affected the rankings. But they were fluid and made it easier to justify their final rankings, because it the biggest data points came in the conference championship game week.

But this committee dug their heels in and didn’t do that. Ohio State was ranked 1 in the 1st poll for example, because of their 2 good wins However, those good wins kept getting worse as those teams they beat kept losing to other teams. Not that Ohio State should have gotten penalized, but they should have been re-ranked as new data points appeared.

But this committee relies way too much on the eye test, and his behind “best,” only without the humility to concede they might not know who’s “best.” And they put themselves in a corner that was surely to bite them in the arse down the road. Oregon should have never been as high as they were after losing to Washington. Bama should never have been 8th if “best” was their criteria. Florida State should have immediately dropped out of the top 4 after Travis went down if they were gonna wind up holding that against them. Several other examples.

I have always believed it should be “most deserving,” because that at least tries to be objective. “Best” is completely subjective and makes the committee look narcissistic and stupid, quite frankly. They all thought Oregon was better than Washington (though they had to have Washington higher because of the head-to-head, which just goes to show how inconsistent they were and how they cherry picked different criteria every week). And they all thought Georgia was going to beat Bama. So how can they not see that they DON’T KNOW WHO’S BEST. It was right in their face twice this weekend.

Finally, if they are gonna hide behind who they think is “best,” there is no reason Georgia shouldn’t be in. There is not 1 committee member, if they’re being honest, that wouldn’t favor Georgia over both Washington and Texas in the playoff. And a month from now when they get healthy, most would favor Georgia over Michigan and at least half would favor them over Bama. So they switch to “most deserving” when it suits them and they can hide behind that because the other teams “deserved” to be in because they won their conference championship. Then switch away from it for Florida State who did undefeated (unlike Texas and Bama) due to “best,” which again, they just proved they don’t know who that is, as much as their narcissistic selves have convinced themselves they do.