re: Scheduling is old news but Chris Low nailed it

With the conference as big as it has gotten there shouldn't be any permanent opponents. They should have a rotating schedule.

/thread

Bama fans have said also to quit griping & win your division. Does anybody else see the hypocrisy in this statement?

I get the constant complaining, but the fact is this is a non-issue if Tennessee (the 2nd winningest program in SEC history) doesn't completely fall flat on their face over the last 5 years

AL.com Article

Here is a post about schedules from Al.com that I mistakingly put on SEC Rant yesterday.

It is a factual analysis by a GUMP media not an emotional rant or whine.


It does not consider just LSU Bama but the impact of schedules on all SEC teams ability to win the SEC.

I am reposting it in hopes it may add some realistic factual anyalsis to this whole discussion and to give the LSU fans some real factual amumition from the GUMPS.

Sorry of Germans. Don't care. We need to face the ture facts. When the GUMP media is on Miles side, things are going to change.Wait to ESPN and rest get on board.

I can hear them saying the No.2 SEC team does not deserve to go to the playoffs because they really didn't play the SEC top teams so we don't know how good they are.

The article in general observed:

How teams were originally slotted into divisions naturally plays a big factor in these results. Playing Kentucky and Vanderbilt every year is usually a nice treat for SEC East teams.

Who teams play annually from the opposite division has a significant Impact, too. For the first 11 years of the eight-game schedule, when teams played two permanent cross-divisional opponents, Auburn drew Florida annually while Alabama faced Vanderbilt.

It found the following played the easiest schedules since 1992:

Florida has played the easiest schedule since 1992, with its opponents owning a .469 SEC winning percentage over those years. Close behind the Gators are Georgia (.471) and Alabama (.483).

Some other points AL.com found were:

Last year, Alabama and Georgia played the first SEC Championship Game in which both participants avoided the top three teams from the opposite division. The opponents for Alabama and Georgia each had a combined .375 SEC winning percentage, tied for the third-easiest schedules ever by SEC division winners.

In the last 9 years only 2 Divisional Champions have play teams with a .500 winning record. Everyone else was below .500

Only Auburn 1997, LSU 2003 and Alabama 2012 reached Atlanta without playing either Vanderbilt or Kentucky.

Since 1992, Alabama has played more games against Vanderbilt (14) than Florida and Georgia combined (12).

Here is the table Al.com provided comparing the strength of schedules for SEC teams since 1992. (Note the easiest Schedules over that period were are Florida, Georgia, Bama and Tenn. Maybe the big 3 from the east are the big 3 because of their schedule weakness.

Team Opponents' SEC win % Games vs. Vandy/KY Division Titles
Florida .469 42 10
Georgia .471 42 5
Alabama .483 20 8
Tennessee .485 42 5
Ole Miss .496 29 0
Mississippi State .498 27 1
LSU .511 20 5
South Carolina .512 42 1
Kentucky .514 21 0
Arkansas .522 13 3
Auburn .528 15 4
Vanderbilt .539 21 0

Here is their breakdown of the easiest division champs schedules.

Easiest SEC Division TitlesTeam Opponents' SEC win %
Georgia 2011 .313
Mississippi State 1998 .328
Alabama 2012 .375
Georgia 2012 .375
Tennessee 1997 .391
Alabama 2008 .391
Florida 2009 .391
LSU 2011 .391
Florida 1992 .398
Alabama 1992 .406
Florida 1994 .406
Arkansas 2006 .406
Alabama 1996 .422
Florida 1999 .422
Florida 1995 .438
LSU 2005 .438
Georgia 2005 .438
LSU 2007 .438
Alabama 2009 .438
Alabama 1994 .453
Arkansas 1995 .453
Tennessee 1998 .453
Florida 2008 .453

Here are the hardest:

Hardest SEC Division TitlesTeam Opponents' SEC win %
Florida 1996 .469
Tennessee 2001 .469
Arkansas 2002 .469
Georgia 2003 .469
Tennessee 2004 .469
Florida 2000 .484
Georgia 2002 .484
Auburn 2004 .484
Florida 2006 .484
Tennessee 2007 .484
Alabama 1999 .500
Auburn 2000 .500
Auburn 2010 .500
South Carolina, 2010 .500
Florida 1993 .508
Auburn 1997 .516
LSU 2001 .516
LSU 2003 .516
Alabama 1993 .547

Finally the infamous Mr. Womack is quoted as saying:

"There will be some years when you'd have a favorable schedule just based on what the situation is in that particular year and how the rotation gets set up," SEC Executive Associate Commissioner Mark Womack said. "Those things are cyclical. If you do a 12-year schedule, strengths and weaknesses are going to change over that 12-year period."

Yes it is hard to see what is going to happen 12 years down the road. But Bama played Vandy more than Fla and Ga combined. Surely until recently it could be assumed Vandy wasn’t going to be good. Yet Bama got to play them more than their Divisional opponents combined.
And this year you gave Bama Ky to play. Al.com considers Ky and Vandy to be the 2 worst teams winning percentage teams since 1992.

I heard Miles in response to a question say that it was up to the media to get the scheduling fair.

I know things change from year to year. But I personally believe given the TV money and the SEC Network the league will go to a NFL type of scheduling where you play your Division, everyone in your division plays everyone in another division and there are some games based on strength of teams.

Flame away. But we needed to see how the SEC office is not just screwing LSU but other teams also.

I like it

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that keeps it close to fair for both the east and west.

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I just read that the teams we play this year in the East (Florida and Georgia) went 14-2 last year in league play. Alabama's opponents from the east went 1-15. Amazeballs!

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Nothing will happen to change this until the SEC starts getting some heat from ESPN and the national media

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Well, I'm sorry, but if you think ESPN and the national media are going to do this and potentially damage one of their top darlings, you are highly mistaken.

All you have to do is look at 2011:

Their darling Bama beat only three FBS teams with a winning record, one of which was 7-5. EIGHT teams on their 12 game schedule were 6-6 or worse.

Despite this ridiculously easy schedule, Bama finished THIRD in the SEC and STILL got in the title game because of the media.

Let that sink in: LSU in 2011 beat as many teams IN THE TOP 5 than Bama beat that were better than 6-6.

Amazing, really. But that's the life of a media darling in CFB, a sport that is owned and run by the media.

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Things are changing.With its investment in the SEC ESPN needs to have games people want to watch allover the country, not just La & Miss.

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I'm not trying to be an arse, but how are things changing? Look at 2012.

Bama had one of the easiest SEC schedules since expansion (as pointed out in the thread) and got to play another media darling that beat only 2 ranked teams while struggling to beat Pitt and BYU among others.

That is the same old same old. Two media darlings with ridiculously easy schedules, and one of them still couldn't win out.

It is all about ratings at the end of the day. Bama and ND will give ESPN higher ratings than a team like LSU. End of story.

Nothing is going to change. In fact, the four team playoff will only expose their bias even more when they cram two more darlings in the final four who could not win the games they were supposed to win. I can already see a 11-1 or 10-2 Third Place USC, ND, Bama, Ohio State, UF or Michigan being in the playoff next to unbeaten conference champs.

Face it, CFB is a modern-day WWE. It is all set up with the winners chosen ahead of time either via the media or via rigged scheduling. Should someone like a 2011 LSU screw up the narrative by winning big games like "The Game of the Century", they will simply erase history by allowing the darling another shot. The playoff will allow them to do that for 2, maybe 3 other teams annually.