"Welcome back, my friends
To the show that never ends
We're so glad you could attend
Come inside! Come inside!" ~ELP
Once again, we enter the Twilight Zone of voter induced hysteria. No, I don't mean the last POTUS election. I mean AP, RJ Young, and Massey's Index!
Let's take a look at the AP, shall we?
Ray vs AP
Now, you Sooner fans should not be upset about what I'm about to do to your team, ok? This goes for MSU and Oregon fans, too. This is straight up math and facts.
I feel the need to point out that the AP voters are a joke. Let's start with Oklahoma:
- Oklahoma's OW% is .380 (19-31).
- Their total margin of victory (not including FCS WCU) is 61 points in 7 games (8.7 pts/gm).
- Take out TCU and it's 40 points in 6 games (6.7 pts/gm).
- They had to
- hold off Tulane & Nebraska,
- come back vs WVa,
- hold off KState,
- come back vs Texas & KSU.
- Their OOW% is .713, which means that the teams they've beaten have been beaten by everyone else, too. Self-evident, but I wanted to spell it out.
- OU's SoS is .491, good for 109th of 130.
- For reference, UTSA is also 8-0, their OW% is .531 and their OOW% is .542; their SoS is .534 for 74th of 130
This is the team the AP has 4th. So why is OU 4 while UTSA is 23? Pre. Season. Bias. OU started at 2. UTSA didn't. And while UTSA certainly faced smaller schools and probably deserves the lower rank (I have them at 34, as you can see), no way does OU deserve to be 4.
What about Oregon?
- OW% .500, OOW% .538, SoS .513 for 95th of 130
- Their OSU win accounts for opponent wins to one loss, so without OSU
- the OW% is .432,
- OOW% .537,
- SoS .467 for 120th or 130
In other words, Oregon is riding a single victory right now, as most of their others are against sub-par teams.
Michigan State?
- OW% .395, OOW% .679, SoS .490 for 113th of 130.
- The team they struggled to put away 20-15 lost to Ohio State 54-7. At home.
But the voters of the AP have MSU only 3 spots behind OSU.
So let's look at OSU, who the AP has at 5.
- OW% .500, OOW% .586, SoS .529 for 81st of 130
- How about if they beat Oregon?
- OW% .480, OOW% .607, SoS .522 for 85th of 130
- Only moves them up to 7 for me
There is literally no case you can make that voters "know better." They clearly do not. I get that the AP is trying to 1) stay relevant in the Bill James era, and 2) give us what they think are "what if" ranks. Even those aren't very good mainly because they are self-fulfilling. And how about that clear SEC bias?
- Alabama drops from 1 to 5 after losing to a team the AP thought did not deserve a top 25 ranking
- Ohio State drops from 3 to 9 after losing to a team the AP deemed worthy of being ranked 12
- More relevant, Iowa dropped from 2 to 11 after losing to an unworthy team
- Penn State dropped from 7 to 20 after losing to another of the unworthy
In the weeks that followed
- Alabama dropped to 5, then went to 4 then 3
- OSU dropped to 9, then went 10, 11, 7, 6, 5, 5
- Iowa dropped to 11 and jumped to 9 this week
But hey, no bias, right?
SEC, Pac12, and AAC are all heavily over-ranked. The mean difference is only 5.5, but that SD!
Massey's Composite
I'm a huge fan of Ken Massey. What I do here is purely for my enjoyment, as I think a composite system is a spectacular way to look at teams who almost never play each other. The only thing I might change would be to exclude systems that seek to emulate voters. Shouldn't be hard to find those: just perform a basic variance check against the AP like I did above and eliminate any that are too close!
I look at these and think that we're not so far off from a truly excellent system.
The mean and SD are half of what they are with just the AP (which is a component of Massey's system). Now it's the SEC and Big12 over-ranked, and the ACC under-ranked.
Transitive Property
Had another guy on Facebook tell me that my algorithm sucks because I have ND over Cincy and they beat ND.
In a world of perfect competition (which your Econ teacher should have explained to you is a fantasy), Cincy would be ranked above the Irish. It's difficult for me to have that conversation with the uninitiated, as they simply do not understand that who you beat matters, and that one great win does not offset beating a bunch of inferior teams (yes, I'm looking at you, Sooners - and you still do not have a great win).
Let's take a look and break it down:
Both teams have 6 wins against FBS schools. Cincy has a win vs FCS Murray St that we do not count.
ND has beaten 6 teams with .6205 average 1st level points, while the Manbearpigs have beaten 6 teams with an average of .5205 1st level points including Notre Dame. It's not about the one game, it's about the body of work. Isn't that what the talking heads preach right up until they say stupid things like "beat x ranked teams" and "eye test?" It's not that complicated, but you have to understand the method and then agree that all teams should be treated equally. How often do you see or hear about SEC or B1G bias? I mean, outside of here.
All. The. Time.
So here's a proven way to eliminate that, and the results we get are legitimate no matter what your gut tells you because this is not a predictor! My system is not telling you that ND beats Cincy if they play again. It is telling you that the Irish have a better body of work even with the loss.
I guess what you really have to accept (and we can see how well this is going with the whole vaccine thing) is that what you "know" ain't necessarily so!
Thanks for reading!
Ray
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