MikeTheTiger71

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Only the one that hasn't won a natty.

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In a sport LSU has never won nor should there be any inherent expectation that they should.

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Arkansas and tennessee have lost 3 straight and 3 out of 4 sec series

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Baseball is a sport prone to streaks and slumps. While catching a hot streak in the NCAA tournament can be the ticket a CWS title, a slump in April tells us very little about who will be hot in June. You have to look at the overall picture, not snapshots in time. Arkansas did have a bad series loss at home, but they also won road series against Vandy and Ole Miss. Tennessee lost 2 home series, but also won road series against Alabama and Ole Miss.

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Fsu has lost 2 conference series and hasnt played as tough a schedule. Only 2 q2 games for fsu

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Both have played 3 series against teams in the Top 25 of either ELO or RPI. The difference is 2 of the 3 were on the road for FSU and 2 of 3 at home for Clemson. Both are 4-5 in those games. That said, I can buy the Q2 series wins for Clemson being a differentiator.

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Georgia? Lol just lost 5 of their last 7 and got swept by vandy.

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And Clemson was swept by NC State. Again, timing should not have that much effect on the rankings especially when both teams are 2-4 in their last 2 weekend series.

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Bama? Come on

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They are 10-7 vs Q1 compared to Clemson at 9-8, so I’m not sure why that’s so crazy a notion. 5-2 vs 10-2 vs Q2 doesn’t move the needle much.

I think you are putting too much emphasis on the number of series losses. Not only because of all the one-run wins for Clemson, but also because they have only played one road series against a Top 25 (ELO or RPI) opponent. The number of road series against the Top 25 is pretty determinant of the number of series losses for the top teams this year. LSU bucks that trend with 3 Top 25 road series and only 2 series losses. The same is true for Georgia. Texas has 0 Top 25 road series and 0 series losses. UNC has 1 and 1. FSU has 2 and 2. Arkansas and Tennessee have 3 and 3. UCI and Coastal Carolina have 1 and 1. WVU has 1 and 1. Auburn has 2 and 2. Vandy has 4 and 4. The outliers are Oregon St with 1 Top 25 road series and 2 series losses and Alabama with 3 road series and 4 losses. Overall, the Top 15 in the RPI have exactly as many series losses as they have played Top 25 road series. Clemson’s one series loss is the expected result for a Top 15 team. It shouldn’t put them at #3.

Arkansas (8-7), Tennessee (9-6), Georgia (10-8), and Alabama (8-7), all have winning records in conference play against the Top 25 (RPI or ELO), though Tennessee and Alabama do have non-Top 25 series losses. Clemson and FSU are 4-5. Clemson went 2-1 in their preseason classic as did Tennessee and Arkansas. Georgia and FSU didn’t play any real competition. Alabama made up for their non-Top 25 series loss by going 3-0 against NC State, Coastal Carolina, and Troy. Alabama and FSU could go either way, but Arkansas, Georgia, UNC, and Tennessee belong ahead of Clemson.

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You dont get dinged for margin of victory in polls, and you shouldnt

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Where did I suggest they should be? I was only countering the argument that they should be ranked higher for having only one series loss despite being 5th in the ACC standings. It wasn’t just one bad weekend. They have been walking a tightrope all season and finally fell off. Their 13-8 conference record is more indicative of their performance than the 6-1 series record.

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Which is fine, but why did Clemson drop 1 spot? They were outscored 26-8 over the weekend and got run ruled.

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Like I said, I agree that Clemson and FSU don’t make sense. I discussed that in greater detail in my prior post. Clemson in particular is bizarre to be ranked #3 when they are 5th in ACC with no quality non-conference series wins and middle of the pack stats in conference play.

Both sets of rankings are bizarre to me. In some cases they are completely overreacting to the results of one series. In others they seem infatuated with certain teams for no obvious reason. Arkansas hasn’t played well lately, but they are still 14-7 in conference play. It makes no sense for them to be #10/11, while BA has 11-10 Auburn at #5. It seems like they must be using some sort of rating formula that’s similar to RPI, which also has Auburn too high. I don’t get what either poll sees in Clemson. They are now 5th in the ACC standings and in the middle of the pack in conference stats both offensively and defensively. They don’t have any high profile non-conference wins to offset their conference performance. D1 dropped Arkansas and Tennessee several spots after series losses, but Clemson stays at #3 after getting swept? FSU is similar at #4 in the ACC standings and a joke of a non-conference weekend slate.

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they aren’t playing good ball right now

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2nd in the SEC with 5 series wins out of 7. That’s bad?

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Man it’d be nice to have a team that can hit like this

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You mean a team that puts up 12 runs in the rubber match and has scored 136 runs in conference play to 133 for Tennessee without the benefit of a bandbox home field?

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Clemson got swept Oregon St got swept FSU loses series Arkansas loses series Tennessee loses series

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None of this can be true. These are the teams I was told were more capable of making a deep run in the NCAA tournament than LSU. It’s almost like all the naysayers have no clue what’s going on outside of LSU.

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At the time of the post they were

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No, they weren’t. They just took advantage of the backend of the pitching staff just like LSU did to theirs today. That’s why they play 3 game series. You can’t judge until the series is complete.

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But Tennessee is the better hitting team. We’ve seen that, they’re outhitting us 2 to 1 on our own field and have controlled both games.

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Both teams have 133 runs scored in conference play as I type, but Tennessee plays in a band box. Tennessee had the offensive advantage because they threw more of their best arms in the first two games. That is showing today.