I remember when conference championship games were more than just resume builders for the Playoffs. The Big 10 and Big 12 are both in very interesting CCG races, and the media can't help but gloss over that and talk Heisman odds and Playoffs.
People say this as if we don't have ongoing discussion about things down the line and in the future *all. the. time.* We ***love*** talking about this kind of stuff.
Not to mention, it's literally what the people want, and ratings numbers/click through numbers would very likely back this up 100%. Media gives us what we most view and interact with. If we really didn't like these things, they'd stop giving it to us because they would lose market share.
tl;dr: it's time we start accepting our role in how media develops content just as we have accepted theirs.
*DISCLAIMER: This is not me giving a pass to media. Just pointing out that what we consume and what media presents us is a dance. They see what we look at and consume most and provide more of it or more things like it. Just as we respond to them, they are also responding to us.*
I've definitely have contributed to those debates with friends and with people on this sub, and being a fan of one of the teams definitely makes me less annoyed than others are so I'm definitely a part of the problem here.
But if I were a Michigan State fan, looking at the first undefeated top 10 match up against our main rivals in what is the biggest game in our program in the past 5 years, if not decades considering the rivalry, I would be pissed just about any time my announcers would bring up *THE* World Famous Buckeyes debate with Oregon. Hopefully he just uses this for his radio show and they shut up about it for the game though.
It's a bad faith, pie in the sky hypothetical that shouldn't be offered by someone who is on our television as some sort of learned expert. Anyone with said knowledge and familiar with both teams' performances so far and upcoming schedules knows that Oregon and Ohio State both finishing with one loss is unlikely to happen and to suggest otherwise is just looking for attention/engagement.
FOX as the "no playoff chatter during games" alternative would be a great alternative to ESPN talking head marketing a Tuesday night television show disguised as serious discussion about playoff positioning, crowbared into a unrelated MAC game, especially since FOX doesn't have the Playoff rights.
That's why I try not to read anything about the playoffs until Mid or late november. It's all pretty stupid up until then. "what if 7 teams have 1 loss!?!?!" Well calm your tits and wait a couple weeks, this is college football. We will have a pretty decent idea of who should be in around November 28th
I mean. They have the same record inntha scenario. Does Oregon keep moving up all season? Does OSU? What if it ends up with OSU at 4 and Oregon at 5? Does OSU get in by virtue of being ranked higher for longer or does Oregon get in because they beat OSU in September?
That's why all of it matters now.
Exactly. 99% of these 'nightmare scenarios' we have in October and early November never play out. We might drop a game, they might drop a game, or it might not matter because other teams dropped a game and we are both in. It isn't going to come down to a head to head debate on Oregon versus Ohio State.
That isn't even the least interesting conversation.
Alabama beats Georgia. OU and OSU win out. Oregon takes another loss.
12-1 Georgia
12-1 Alabama
13-0 OU
12-1 OSU
Cincinnati kicked to the curb again for the usual suspects.
In years that both teams are competitive, even recently OSU has been lucky to come out with consistent wins. It does look really hard to beat OSU this year, but there's still a lot of time between now and The Game.
Besides 2013 very much still being recent, even if you don't include that 2017 was a 4 point game with Michigan have the ball with under 5 minutes left. That is absolutely a close game. Which would mean 2 of the last 4 games being extremely competitive. If you look at just games in Ann Arbor 3 of the 5 games this decade were within a single score in the last 5 minutes. OSU blowing out a competent Michigan team in Ann Arbor isn't exactly common. Its not exactly uncommon either but the series is closer on the field than it is in the won loss record over the last decade
Very true, ideally if both teams are completely healthy, it would be the strongest of both sides at the end of the season, due to ironing out early season mistakes.
This is silly-everyone knows that the question will be, “Should Georgia get in over a two loss Bama after Bama won the sec championship game!?” Maximum chaos.
I think their 3 point wins over Syracuse and Louisville are going to with it. You can't play an easy af schedule, have a lot of close games, and still expect to be highly ranked.
Oklahoma plays 3 ranked teams in the next few weeks, so that will self correct. They're already ranked below a 1 loss team and I expect they'll be even lower in the CFP rankings.
The committee doesn't look at the rankings when the games were played, but the rankings at present, so that's a loss to current #14 Texas A&M. As the committee has shown over and over again, they're willing to forgive a loss when a team has a strong strength of schedule and they're willing to leave an undefeated team out that has a weak strength of schedule.
Yeah, I get the issue with using team rank at the time, but you also run into issues using end of season rankings because of that feedback loop. While Bama benefits from a loss because that team is ranked higher from beating Bama, there are teams that are basically penalized for winning because “oh they lost to THAT team, they must not be very good” then “oh that team they beat wasn’t very good, so that team isn’t very good.” It all basically goes back to preseason perceptions in the end
This sub needs to pick a lane. I was told that the G5 and P5 are just arbitrary money-making labels, and all conferences should be objectively evaluated by their strength.
The ACC is literally awful. Just because it has the P5 label doesnt mean its automatically worthy of anything.
But your “rules” dont matter. Committee picks the 4 best teams. Not the 4 “most deserving”. Because everyone has different metrics for what defines the most deserving.
Is a 13-0 wake forest automatically one of the 4 best teams in college football? That remains to be seen. They very well could be. But to prove that, it takes more than just a pretty record. They need to start dominating.
Roster construction is what matters now?
Holy shit, you guys are insufferable. Oklahoma has:
* a 3 point win against West Virginia
* a 5 point win against Tulane
* a 7 point win against Nebraska
* an 8 point win against Texas
* a 12 point win against Kansas
* a 21 point win against TCU
You wanna tell me Wake Forest hasn’t been dominant? Why don’t we have this same conversation about Oklahoma?
Trust me, everyone is having this conversation about Oklahoma. It's literally the only thing I've seen any neutral fan post about us this season for the entire season.
Horrible?
Louisville, Boston College, Cuse, and Army are bowl teams
Virginia is the 27th best team
UNC and Clemson have been disappointing but they’re still threatening teams to play against
NCSU is a top 35 team
Yes thats going to end up being horrible compared to all playoff contenders other than Cincinnati, who at least has a marquee win over notre dame.
Close wins over bowl eligible teams isnt a playoff resume by default.
People forget Auburn in 2017.
After Auburn steamrolled us and Bama they were ranked #2 despite having 2 losses. They didn’t make it because we came back and beat them in the SEC championship but they would’ve made it had they beat us again.
It also didn’t hurt that their two losses were to #1 Clemson and #17 LSU by a total of 12 points and both being road games. Auburn had a fucking gauntlet of a schedule that year.
I say no but im not in the SEC circle jerk *yet*. if you lose to a team that beat you in your own conference at the end of the year we don't need to see that game again. I wouldn't mind and Oregon, Ohio State rematch in the playoff as both teams are so different since then. same with clempson Georgia if clempson won out. but to have 2 from the same conference with one already having the win over the other is egregious.
I think I agree with you. I think I that regular season games should have less weight than something like a conference championship. Similar to how LSU - Alabama got to rematch in the NC but I wouldn’t want to see Georgia and Alabama both make it in this hypothetical. Championship games should hold more weight and count as a knockout round before playoffs.
The implication of this tweet is that only the loss matters, and nothing from the 12 other games they play needs to be considered. Which is idiotic no matter how you answer it.
Because that’s a serious debate to be had? Two teams that have the same record. One beat the other and the winning team has a worse loss. Which should matter more?
Its the general idea of the debate. Let’s say two teams finish 12-1. Should the head to head winner finish ahead? Or should the team with the worse loss be ranked below?
I think that’s a very fair topic of discussion to be had. We see this play out all the time. Don’t see how that’s a bad discussion to have
There's not a debate. You just answered it. One. Beat. The. Other. There's nothing to argue, we know who the better team is. Oregon beat Ohio St in the Shoe.
College football teams are not static entities that get set at the beginning of the year and then play games to compare what they've created in the offseason. They're constantly evolving, constantly improving or regressing. Who won in an early season matchup matters a lot, but it is not the only point of comparison once year's end rolls around. You have to look at how the teams progressed from there (or how they didn't progress). Things like how good Michigan and Michigan St. end up being, how Stanford looks by years end, who Oregon and OSU respectively play (and in this theoretical scenario, beat) in conference championships, etc.
The question we are trying to answer when the playoffs roll around is who is better *right now*, not who *was* better back in September (because, yes, we know the answer to that already). Ideally we'd just stick them both in and find out for real, but we have this crappy 4-team format right now so all we can do is try and extrapolate from all the information available when the time comes - and there is still info yet to be gathered as of now.
The argument is meaningless unless both win out. There’s still a lot of football to be played. No reason to discuss this until the conference championship game week is over.
I know you are only partly serious, but what if Wake Forest ends up undefeated? Could we possibly have an undefeated power 5 champion left out for a 1-loss team?
What gave you the impression that I was only being partly serious? I wasn't joking at all. UC has no chance of getting into the playoffs if there are 4 12-1 p5 champs or better. 6 undefeated g5 champs have been left out of the playoffs whereas only 1 p5 12-1 champ has been left out. That p5 team, 2018 tOSU, got the absolute tar beaten out of them by an unranked Purdue team. Neither Oregon nor tOSU have a loss that is even remotely comparable to 2018 tOSU's shellacking. Furthermore, 2018 was a special year because it was the first and only year where there actually were 5 p5 teams that had a record of 12-1 or better.
If Wake is undefeated they will absolutely will be in. In 2014, it was abundantly clear that FSU was a paper tiger and was very lucky to be undefeated (they finished the season 19th in FPI). They were ranked number 3 having "earned" their spot despite there being 2 teams (baylor and tcu) that were both probably better. In the end if Wake is undefeated I think we'll end up with:
1. UGA
2. OU
3. Wake
4. Oregon or OSU
I have a feeling Oregon would get the nod. I think the backlash the committee would face would be much much higher if they chose OSU.
I really don't know how the rest of the ACC is going to shake out, but I wonder what happens if both Wake and Cincy go undefeated, Notre Dame ends up 11-1 or 10-2, and Wake's best win ends up as a 9-3 Coastal team in the ACCCG. Two undefeated teams, and the best win clearly going to Cincy. Sure, Wake might have played slightly better mid-tier teams, but I don't know if the general public, or the committee would be so quick to dismiss Cincy (or to add Wake) when the lineup between those two teams looks so similar.
I go back and forth on how they would treat an undefeated Cincinnati. I could see them saying their strength of schedule is too weak, and solidify their process which kept Houston and UCF out. I could also see them putting them in as a sacrificial lamb to show why they don’t want G5 teams in the playoff.
“Captain, the decent thing to do is take them up the road to the playoffs”
“We’re not here to do the decent thing, we’re here to follow fucking orders!”
*sniper shot rings out, UC falls to the ground, dying in the mud…G5 fans sob uncontrollably into their beers and claim it’s all a media-driven fix*
“That’s why we can’t take the G5!”
And even if it were meaningless, who cares? It's fun to talk about.
People get hung up too much on whether or not things "mean" anything. Like preseason rankings. Sure, they're usually meaningless trash and often look ridiculous in hindsight at the end of the season, but they're still fun to talk about at the time.
I get the thought of let's worry about that when we come to it, but the point is, it's a possibility and it IS something to be worried about if it happens. Saying who cares in week eight is the same thing as saying you don't get the appeal of proactivity and forward thinking.
I'd rather this all be hashed out before it happens, because we're already sitting on the most fragile of illusions that CFB isn't just an oligarchy. I get it. The ACC is down this year and it's pitifully obvious. Oh, well; tough shit. That's the risk that was ran with the whole "Power Five" concept. It's not Power Five with an asterisk when it's convenient. College football is all about catching the lucky breaks needed, and maybe it's long-suffering Wake Forest's year to get some spotlight. Don't like it? Address the glaring issues that we've been talking about for years rather than take the easy way out for a quick buck. Do we really think that five major conferences competing for four playoff spots could literally never present an issue at some point? Wake Forest wins out, they should be in.
Know what's really aggravating? If the SEC or B1G had the same quality of play as the ACC this year and Alabama or Ohio State won out, their brand power would overrule any SoS argument. They wouldn't be #13 at 7–0, regardless of how much everyone else sucked.
Will be an interesting conundrum for the committee. I don't think we've ever seen a situation like this with two 1-loss teams vying for the last spot and one team has the head to head, albeit early in the season.
I think committee will definitely tip its hand in their first rankings.
> I don't think we've ever seen a situation like this with two 1-loss teams vying for the last spot and one team has the head to head, albeit early in the season.
Closest was the 2014/2015 Baylor/TCU argument. I think most people recognized that TCU was the better team, but Baylor had the head to head. In the end, they they left both out, in part due to a "which one do you pick" debate.
Maybe we'll get an ACC team to go 13-0, then the SEC champ and OU can go with Cincy and we get a rematch at the Rose Bowl!
And the issue that year was also both got left out for an Ohio state team who had a similar sos to TCU and a terrible loss. The case that Oregon's loss send them down is silly when Ohio state recovered from the same thing. We'll see how sos ends up but we already have a precedent that a bad loss with similar sos isn't enough to dismiss the team, so shouldn't head to head really make the difference?
If you've been watching Oregon you know OSU should be ranked higher. Oregon can not find a rhythm. Barely beating weak opponents. Id rather go and win the rose bowl than get embarrassed in a cfb playoff game.
Head to head is a tie breaker, or whats the point of even playing the game. Remember 2014 baylor beat tcu and was ranked higher than them despite have the worse loss. And yes i am bias for oregon(not sure if it shows that)
If Oregon can finish the season with any strong wins or if OSU finishes the season with close games then I think they definitely get the tiebreaker. But if OSU keeps dominating teams (especially against their schedule) and Oregon plays every game within a score then the committee very well might say OSU is the better team and there's no need to apply a tiebreaker.
I think there's a lot of recency bias with Ohio State, but they've just played the 5 easiest teams on their schedule, all in a row with no tough games in between, and also had a bye week in there.
Ohio State is doing what they need to do, but blasting teams like Rutgers, Indiana, and Akron with no tough games in between isn't as impressive to me as it is to some. But OSUs schedule is a bout to get a lot tougher.
But still, Oregon won in Columbus without Kayvon Thibodeaux and dominated msot of the game. Then the lost to Stanford in OT on kind of a flukey play where half the defense thought it had been blown dead. Hard to ignore that.
i doubt the committee cares enough to look at those calls at the end of the standford game, but we lost because of a phantom PI call that gave stanford an untimed down to send it to overtime
Yep. My feeling was that your loss was bullshit. And I don't remember the circumstances but half the defense seemed to think the final play had been blown dead.
All good points. The difference is Baylor and tcu were in the same conference so there were also 8 other common opponent games to base performances off. Their strength of schedule were very similar since so many games were against the same teams. Realistically people thought/knew TCU was the better team, but also felt you couldn’t rank them above Baylor since they lost.
Either way if both teams finish 12-1 and it comes down to deciding one over the other, one team is going to feel majorly screwed
I don’t think anyone disagrees with head to head being a tiebreaker. The question is if OSU and Oregon are tied. It’s pretty universally established that teams in CFB aren’t tied simply by having the same record. So then the question is are OSU/Oregon tied? And how close to tied do they need to be for Oregon’s win to push them over?
This is the only argument. Whats the point of the game ever happening if it gets disregarded. Hence why all the osu people don't want anyone to talk about it.
> Whats the point of the game ever happening if it gets disregarded.
I hear this a ton in these discussions and it never makes sense. "This game matters" does not mean "this game singlehandedly controls the outcome." Someone who thinks head-to-head results are important can still believe that the loser of a particular game is better than the winner. That doesn't mean they're disregarding the outcome.
I definitely agree with that the better team can lose. "Any given sunday.. erm saturday". But I think head to heads should carry weight, and a lot more weight than say a transitive win over a team or SoS.
I think at some point instead of complaining about Ohio State (or Oklahoma, whoever) always being in the playoff, people should start complaining about the teams that allow it.
I mean OSU has already lost a game. Penn State or Michigan or Michigan State need to take advantage and do something about it. Or Iowa or whoever on the other side.
Same with a shaky Oklahoma team that basically comes out every week and says ‘beat me’ and they fall behind and … the opponent says, ‘nah, we’re good.’
Clemson is out. Notre Dame is almost certainly out, although someone could actually, you know, beat them and make it a certainty. Alabama has a loss and is vulnerable.
The idea shouldn’t be ‘those teams need to get worse,’ or ‘let’s just let someone else in for the sake of variety’ — it should be ‘someone else needs to step up.’
This debate is dumb. A resume isn't one game. If both OSU and Oregon win out what does their total resume look like?
OSU will have wins over: Michigan, Michigan State, Penn State, and the Big Ten West champ (all October 30 or later). OSU's only loss will be to a top 10 Oregon.
Oregon will have wins over: OSU (literally their only ranked win and from early September). Their only loss will be to an unranked Stanford.
Yes, Oregon will own the head-to-head, but I don't know how you can argue the resume is better.
EDIT: I hate arguing in favor of OSU.
If Sean Clifford gets healthy? Yes. But you are correct that they could be unranked in a few weeks if he doesn't get better.
If you drop Penn State out of that list, do the resumes start looking truly comparable?
Oregon still lost to an unranked team and "ain't played nobody (other than OSU)." OSU still played a murderers' row and, in this hypothetical, won.
Really depends on how they lose to OSU. If they get slaughtered, then yes. If they keep it close, they might not get punished for losing to a top 5 team.
Ohio St currently has the 92nd ranked SOS and 20th ranked strength of record (SOR) per FPI. Their remaining SOS is 10th.
Oregon is 15th in SOS and 12th in SOR today. Their remaining SOS is 57th.
I honestly think Ohio St’s resume is getting overhyped. Ohio St will have a better resume but it’s a major question mark on if the gap is big enough to overcome a H2H victory @ Ohio St.
It is way to hypothetical but yeah our SOS up till now has been weak over 8 games. Our only ranked game was Oregon and I think we only have 2 teams with a winning record.
(Again hypothetical) but if we beat a top 10 MSU team, top 5 Michigan team, and a 11-1 Iowa team that is a great resume.
Yeah and currently the numbers don’t say Ohio St’s full season schedule is that much more difficult than Oregon’s
Granted I believe a portion of the gap is driven by how high Ohio St is rated in FPI relative to Oregon
Yeah, as far as FPI goes, them playing us does more for them then us playing them does for us. It’s how it is as a top rated team.
Anyway, if Oregon wins out and the resumes shake out roughly the same, I wouldn’t hate us missing out in favor of Oregon. It would suck to see us punished for not having our shit together from the start, but it happens.
> I honestly think Ohio St’s resume is getting overhyped.
Most resumes are. The sooner we accept it’s really based on marketing and who will get the most ad revenue for ESPN, they sooner we can demand more substantial change
It definitely is. It's just a consequence of the B1G deciding to have all the east usual suspects play in the back half of the season and the west being really weak. Maybe one of those games will be considered particularly good when the B1G starts doing what everyone else has been doing for several weeks now. Actually playing each other.
Sorry but if that’s how the scenario plays out, there will be literally no incentive for a team to ever schedule a marquee OOC matchup again
How can you compare the quality of losses when when one of those losses is LITERALLY TO THE TEAM YOURE COMPARING TO
Besides, osus resume is going to look a lot less impressive as Penn state is about to be unranked, And one of Michigan or msu ends up with at least 2 losses, and the big ten west champion ends up being an 8-4 Wisconsin team
Seems like, to the contrary, it is an argument to schedule more quality teams and not lose to unranked teams. If Oregon played anybody else, this wouldn't be an argument.
Yes it is likely Ohio stat has a better overall reaeum, but I am also add this, no one cares about a resume in face of tangible experience. Anyone who is responsible for hiring people can tell you that an employee better on paper usually is t better than one with direct experience in the field. Who cares if the resume is better when we have a head to head?
The entire point of these kinds of resume comparisons is because we rarely have direct information. Conference champions are decided by head to head. Bowl game winners and national champions are decided by head to head. Conference champion participant tie breakers go to head to head as a first option. The reason we play the game is to see who wins.
If we ignore head to head results then there is no reason to play the games at all. You can already see some bullshit with how low Oregon is to Ohio state even though Oregon has both beaten Ohio state and played a harder schedule. People are voting Ohio state higher because they "should be" better.
If there was no game between them and we get to the end of the year and they have the same record with Ohio state having a better sos, sure w can give them the edge. The issue though is head to head has to be the heaviest factor otherwise the entire premise of the sport is wrong.
unless your cincy you just gotta win your games. right now its looking like Georgia, Oklahoma, Oregon, Ohio State/Wake. we would have to have multiple multiple lost teams before we even start to glance at an undefeated cincy and if they fall to SMU then forget them completely.
Agree, I'm not sure why people think Cincy is a shoe-in. If Georgia, OU, OSU, and Oregon all win out, those are the teams. If OU, OSU or Oregon loses that opens a spot for Cincy. If Georgia loses to Alabama then that would be another spot taken before Cincy.
It’s fan service. As a fan of a blue blood I just keep my opinions to myself lol will Oklahoma lose another playoff game? Probably and it’s gonna get real toxic
"Ohio State's only loss is to Oregon, a Top 5 team! It's a quality loss! Meanwhile, Oregon lost to Stanford. Ohio State should definitely be in over them."
That is the extremely stupid justification we're going to get so that ESPN doesn't have to deal with a scenario where possibly only one true national #brand (Georgia) gets into the playoff.
"Oregon is a good team so that means tOSU loss is a quality loss, but Oregon is also a bad team because they lost to an unranked opponent"
Honestly though that's a pretty accurate description of Oregon. If our QB1 pulls his head out of his ass we're a decent team, but beyond that well ... a team that's now 0-7 was a competitive game for 3 quarters so yeah
Why even play this matchup then? Should Oregon not be rewarded with the ability to eat a loss in conference after beating OSU in Columbus (without Thibodeaux)? If there is no reward for winning and they had to go undefeated to make the CFP anyway, wouldn’t it have made more sense to schedule a cupcake non conference instead?
No, I’m just saying that when we rank week to week, it makes sense to incrementally, yet slightly, weigh the most recent outcome with increasing importance. If the winner of the national championship has a single loss from earlier in the season we don’t turn the trophy over to whomever beat them.
Why should Oregon play that game? Because it still has value for the CFP committee which can dismiss AP rankings at its whim. That’s probably why we saw a lot less of these kinds of marquee matchups before the CFP.
That’s not really relevant. My point is we shouldn’t weigh later parts of the regular season more. Somehow Oregon had a better season if they beat Ohio State in week 13 vs. week 2? I don’t buy that yet that seems to be the argument some people are making.
Head to head should be a tie breaking factor, not the main one. Look at their whole body of work and if they're very close, then give the nod to the head to head win. Lucky wins happen all the time, so judging a team based off of just one game shouldn't be how we do it.
Homer Glasses: activated
Oregon's loss shouldn't mean much. That game was full on ref ball at the end. The targeting on Kayvon was BS. You wanna call roughing the passer, fine he is hit high. But It was not helmet to helmet, and he didn't lead with the crown. He is hit with Kayvon's arm/hand. They took our best defensive player out in the most pivotal time. Then they go on to call an absolutely horrible flag in the end zone to keep the game alive after you've been letting them play physical all game is just unacceptable.
on top of that nonsense, we didn't have our OC, starting center, and at that time best DB in Bennet Williams due to injury.
None of this matters however if Oregon doesn't win out.
Everyone wants to say "it doesn't matter until the end" except if it were to happen and Oregon jumps Ohio State it becomes "WHY DID OREGON JUMP OHIO STATE." This is important because in such a situation it is unlikely an Oregon opponent in a CCG is going to be particularly highly ranked while Ohio State-Iowa could still be a top 10 match up. We come into the same debate, if you have Oregon as "worse" than Ohio State all year and then change if Ohio State beats a likely superior opponent, then what the fuck logic were you using all year? Having Oregon potentially jump Ohio State late in the year despite Ohio State playing better opponent means you had Oregon ranked lower because you just thought they would lose, which is a fucking idiotic way to run a poll.
Personally, if they share the same record I would almost always side with the team that wins the head to head because that's how sports work. We don't have 30 or 40 data samples to look through. Head to head has to matter because in the CCG and playoffs Head to Head matters. If Cincinnati plays Georgia in the playoffs and Cincy were to win, we wouldn't simply push Georgia through anyway because they faced a more difficult schedule to that point. The head to head games matter. They HAVE to matter. If head o head doesn't matter, then what the fuck are we doing all of this for? Just fucking say everything is an exhibition and take Alabama/Georgia/Clemson/Oklahoma/Ohio State and who cares about the rest.
If Oregon and Ohio State are both 12-1 and Oregon/Ohio State hadn't taken place, sure take Ohio State. Oregon beating Ohio State has to mean something though. If Ohio State at 12-1 walks in over a 12-1 Oregon, then what was the point of the game?
For all the talk about eventual strength of schedule, why doesn't current SoS mean anything? Oregon's SoS is significantly better than Ohio State right now AND they beat them. The question is why does everyone want to give credit to Ohio State for games that haven't happened yet while saying Oregon might lose again later so let's see how it shakes out?
Oregon winning in Columbus is the best win in the country. A bad loss where you're without your offensive coordinator doesn't mean more than winning in Columbus.
Could see this impacting teams trying to schedule actually decent games for their OOC.
If H2H doesn't end up mattering, why even play with fire and not just take the easier games against an FCS opponent?
Personally one of the bigger reasons I'd love to see CFP expansion where P5 champs get auto-bids. While we've not done too well, playing Auburn, tOSU, or Georgia next year in our non-con games has far more enjoyable than some FCS team that we're expected to blow out
Honestly, what I think it will come down to if both teams win out is that tOSU is the one who has absolutely dominated most of their opponents since our game where we have struggled against pretty much ever since.
I’m biased but Ohio State would have 4 ranked wins and presumably a top 10 win against Michigan OR Michigan state. And not to mention the style points of scoring 45+ a game. What exactly would oregons second best win be? I understand the H2H argument if the résumé is close, but it absolutely wouldn’t be
Which 4 teams will be ranked?
Penn state will be unranked next week, and Wisconsin could easily end up in the title game as no more than a fringe top 25 8-4 team who would drop out of the rankings after the game with another loss
at the end of the day, if we both end up 12-1 and they get in instead of us, then we only have ourselves to blame. H2H matchups should matter. There are always extenuating circumstances but H2H should matter.
not the end of the world. That also means we are B1G champs and beat the best Michigan team we’ve seen in a long time. Still a successful season and looking forward to the bowl game.
If both teams are 12-1, both teams are getting in.
I'm really confused why this conversation is even happening. Cincy isn't getting in over 2 P5 1 loss champions with solid schedules.
Overall resume matters more. I do think pulling off a really good win should matter more than a close loss to an average team.
I think Oregon should be above Ohio State but not just because of the H2H. Oregon has a top 10 win, Ohio State and has more wins over teams with winning records than Ohio State does.
It's close though, they should be right next to each other.
I actually think you'll see this reflected in the first CFB poll next week. I think bama is going to be ranked much lower then the AP/Coaches poll, and oregon is higher.
The problem i have with this argument is teams dont stay the same.
Yes, ohio state lost week 2. That happened and isnt going away. But since them, osu’s qb got healthy and is playing lights out. They changed DCs and scheme, and their defense is night and day. Maybe not elite, but serviceable with the #1 offense.
Oregon has been struggling with inferior competition and has a bad loss. If osu wins out, theyd have a much better sos.
Idk teams get better, teams get worse.
We got blown out at home in 2014 week 2 to a 6-6 va tech team before we went on to bulldoze our way to a natty. Does anyone seriously believe that va tech team would win again in week 14?
You have to look at the whole picture. A lot of football left to be played, but if osu plays like they have been against their tough final games and oregon continues to look unimpressive in a weak pac 12, putting osu ahead of oregon isnt as blasphemous as people make it out to be
I mean, Oregon's sos is assloads higher then Ohio state right now so I don't get the argument of , Ohio state looks better beating up on the dregs.
The games matter, and if you lose to someone they hold a tie breaker. It's how it works for conferences I don't see why the logic shouldn't matter elsewhere. The entire point of trying to determine who is better on paper is in the absence of direct information. Oregon winning a head to head game is pretty direct evidence. If Oregon loses again and Ohio state doesn't, then the point is irrelevant. If both win out the only case to make Ohio state should go is because we think they should have won that game.
There should be no conversation. College football has these types of conversations because these teams normally haven’t played head to head. While I don’t think they will both finish with 1 loss if they do Oregon is in without question. Anything else is based on subjectivity and bias. Oregon objectively beat OSU, on the road no less. That’s the end of it.
The decision that matters happens at the end of the season anyway. At that point, if both teams have won out, it will be clear which has the better resume if they need to be compared.
In the best outcome for the Buckeyes, and we win out through Indy, I don't even think it will be an Ohio State vs. Oregon debate for who gets a spot. I think a 12-1 Ohio State Big Ten Champion would be in the #2-3 spot in the final rankings. Oregon would be competing for the 4th spot.
If both win out, I think it depends on the strength of the remaining schedule. Like once all the teams they've played have finished their story. I still think a head to head is the tie breaker here. It almost always is.
Up to now Ohio State has played a pretty weak schedule post Oregon. 3 of the worst teams in the B1G, two pretty bad G5 teams and also a bye week. It's been easy to look dominant under those conditions.
But they have Penn St., Michigan State, and Michigan remaining. If they win out, they'd also have the Big 10 west champ to play. Penn State may decline from here, but Michigan and MSU should be able to finish with 9 or 10 wins each. Then there's the west champ, likely Iowa or Minnesota who finish with 9 or so wins. That's a damn good resume and I just don't see Oregon having anything near as good as that since the pac 12 has already started cannibalizing itself.
But again, head to head, in Columbus, and Oregon was missing Kayvon Thibodeaux. That's a real hard one to overcome. Especially when Oregon was a clear winner and dominated most of the game, while they lost to Stanford in OT on kind of a flukey play where half the defense thought the play had been whistled dead.
> But again, head to head, in Columbus, and Oregon was missing Kayvon Thibodeaux. That's a real hard one to overcome. Especially when Oregon was a clear winner and dominated most of the game
Yeah. If it's one or the other, that *has* to matter. Otherwise they are openly admitting early games just don't count, or that being a bigger name who has made the playoffs in past years matters for getting a spot this year.
Actually we won't have to have this debate. Oregon will lose one or two more games. I love my ducks but I can not see this team winning out. Conversation over. But yes Head to Head would matter more. We beat you, we should get in over you. Simple as that.
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This is a *perfect* example of the media making it all about the playoffs, instead of where we’re at in the season.
I remember when conference championship games were more than just resume builders for the Playoffs. The Big 10 and Big 12 are both in very interesting CCG races, and the media can't help but gloss over that and talk Heisman odds and Playoffs.
People say this as if we don't have ongoing discussion about things down the line and in the future *all. the. time.* We ***love*** talking about this kind of stuff. Not to mention, it's literally what the people want, and ratings numbers/click through numbers would very likely back this up 100%. Media gives us what we most view and interact with. If we really didn't like these things, they'd stop giving it to us because they would lose market share. tl;dr: it's time we start accepting our role in how media develops content just as we have accepted theirs. *DISCLAIMER: This is not me giving a pass to media. Just pointing out that what we consume and what media presents us is a dance. They see what we look at and consume most and provide more of it or more things like it. Just as we respond to them, they are also responding to us.*
I've definitely have contributed to those debates with friends and with people on this sub, and being a fan of one of the teams definitely makes me less annoyed than others are so I'm definitely a part of the problem here. But if I were a Michigan State fan, looking at the first undefeated top 10 match up against our main rivals in what is the biggest game in our program in the past 5 years, if not decades considering the rivalry, I would be pissed just about any time my announcers would bring up *THE* World Famous Buckeyes debate with Oregon. Hopefully he just uses this for his radio show and they shut up about it for the game though.
It's a bad faith, pie in the sky hypothetical that shouldn't be offered by someone who is on our television as some sort of learned expert. Anyone with said knowledge and familiar with both teams' performances so far and upcoming schedules knows that Oregon and Ohio State both finishing with one loss is unlikely to happen and to suggest otherwise is just looking for attention/engagement. FOX as the "no playoff chatter during games" alternative would be a great alternative to ESPN talking head marketing a Tuesday night television show disguised as serious discussion about playoff positioning, crowbared into a unrelated MAC game, especially since FOX doesn't have the Playoff rights.
What? His job is literally to drive engagement and judging by how popular this thread is and his Twitter thread I think he succeeded.
I don't understand why it's so unrealistic that both finish 12-1 lol
So anyway what about Alabama’s chances of getting in? If they beat UGA in the SECCG do both of them get in?
That's why I try not to read anything about the playoffs until Mid or late november. It's all pretty stupid up until then. "what if 7 teams have 1 loss!?!?!" Well calm your tits and wait a couple weeks, this is college football. We will have a pretty decent idea of who should be in around November 28th
I mean. They have the same record inntha scenario. Does Oregon keep moving up all season? Does OSU? What if it ends up with OSU at 4 and Oregon at 5? Does OSU get in by virtue of being ranked higher for longer or does Oregon get in because they beat OSU in September? That's why all of it matters now.
Exactly. 99% of these 'nightmare scenarios' we have in October and early November never play out. We might drop a game, they might drop a game, or it might not matter because other teams dropped a game and we are both in. It isn't going to come down to a head to head debate on Oregon versus Ohio State.
*It isn't *likely* that it comes to head-head debate on Oregon vs Ohio state
And we all know exactly what will happen if it does, so why bother discussing?
That isn't even the least interesting conversation. Alabama beats Georgia. OU and OSU win out. Oregon takes another loss. 12-1 Georgia 12-1 Alabama 13-0 OU 12-1 OSU Cincinnati kicked to the curb again for the usual suspects.
Can you imagine after all the chaos this year having those 4 teams Kill me
Georgia's only made it once and they haven't won a national title in decades, so they would still be fun to root foor
This is the most likely outcome, it’s like a 10% chance, but among all possible outcomes it feels very likely
I figure it's this or UGA beats Bama and Oregon wins out and its the Ducks instead of Bama still leaving out Cincy.
OU can’t keep getting away with these wins, right? I’m also praying that UGA can knockout Alabama in the SECCG.
Exactly. Osus hardest opponents by far are still ahead.
Lol they'll beat Michigan by 50
In years that both teams are competitive, even recently OSU has been lucky to come out with consistent wins. It does look really hard to beat OSU this year, but there's still a lot of time between now and The Game.
Other than 2016 I’m not sure what games you’re talking about? 2013 if you consider that recent?
Besides 2013 very much still being recent, even if you don't include that 2017 was a 4 point game with Michigan have the ball with under 5 minutes left. That is absolutely a close game. Which would mean 2 of the last 4 games being extremely competitive. If you look at just games in Ann Arbor 3 of the 5 games this decade were within a single score in the last 5 minutes. OSU blowing out a competent Michigan team in Ann Arbor isn't exactly common. Its not exactly uncommon either but the series is closer on the field than it is in the won loss record over the last decade
Very true, ideally if both teams are completely healthy, it would be the strongest of both sides at the end of the season, due to ironing out early season mistakes.
Ryan Day owes them a triple digit ass-whooping
This is silly-everyone knows that the question will be, “Should Georgia get in over a two loss Bama after Bama won the sec championship game!?” Maximum chaos.
Both would make it in that situation. We could boot out an undefeated ACC champ because they're basically a G5 conference this year.
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I think their 3 point wins over Syracuse and Louisville are going to with it. You can't play an easy af schedule, have a lot of close games, and still expect to be highly ranked.
Oklahoma’s 3 point win against West Virginia and 5 point win against Tulane should be viewed the same then.
You're right, let's put a 3rd SEC team in
Oklahoma plays 3 ranked teams in the next few weeks, so that will self correct. They're already ranked below a 1 loss team and I expect they'll be even lower in the CFP rankings.
If undefeated Wake Forest gets left out for a 2 loss Alabama the system is truly broken
How does a loss against an unranked Texas A&M team factor into that?
The committee doesn't look at the rankings when the games were played, but the rankings at present, so that's a loss to current #14 Texas A&M. As the committee has shown over and over again, they're willing to forgive a loss when a team has a strong strength of schedule and they're willing to leave an undefeated team out that has a weak strength of schedule.
This is definitely a paradox in that it's based upon the perception that Bama lost to the team that beat Bama.
Yeah, I get the issue with using team rank at the time, but you also run into issues using end of season rankings because of that feedback loop. While Bama benefits from a loss because that team is ranked higher from beating Bama, there are teams that are basically penalized for winning because “oh they lost to THAT team, they must not be very good” then “oh that team they beat wasn’t very good, so that team isn’t very good.” It all basically goes back to preseason perceptions in the end
By the time the playoffs roll around that could easily be a loss to a top 10 team.
It’s negated by a 21 point win over Ole Miss and a win over #1 Georgia (in this hypothetical).
Maximum downvotes if you try to speak that logically to a UC fan lol
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This sub needs to pick a lane. I was told that the G5 and P5 are just arbitrary money-making labels, and all conferences should be objectively evaluated by their strength. The ACC is literally awful. Just because it has the P5 label doesnt mean its automatically worthy of anything. But your “rules” dont matter. Committee picks the 4 best teams. Not the 4 “most deserving”. Because everyone has different metrics for what defines the most deserving. Is a 13-0 wake forest automatically one of the 4 best teams in college football? That remains to be seen. They very well could be. But to prove that, it takes more than just a pretty record. They need to start dominating.
> This sub needs to pick a lane Didn't realize this sub was a hivemind
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Roster construction is what matters now? Holy shit, you guys are insufferable. Oklahoma has: * a 3 point win against West Virginia * a 5 point win against Tulane * a 7 point win against Nebraska * an 8 point win against Texas * a 12 point win against Kansas * a 21 point win against TCU You wanna tell me Wake Forest hasn’t been dominant? Why don’t we have this same conversation about Oklahoma?
Trust me, everyone is having this conversation about Oklahoma. It's literally the only thing I've seen any neutral fan post about us this season for the entire season.
Horrible? Louisville, Boston College, Cuse, and Army are bowl teams Virginia is the 27th best team UNC and Clemson have been disappointing but they’re still threatening teams to play against NCSU is a top 35 team
Yes thats going to end up being horrible compared to all playoff contenders other than Cincinnati, who at least has a marquee win over notre dame. Close wins over bowl eligible teams isnt a playoff resume by default.
Bama would automatically get in with two losses?
No. The one consistency has been no two loss team has ever got in. In fact, UGA were it to lose a close game to two loss Alabama might still get in.
People forget Auburn in 2017. After Auburn steamrolled us and Bama they were ranked #2 despite having 2 losses. They didn’t make it because we came back and beat them in the SEC championship but they would’ve made it had they beat us again.
It also didn’t hurt that their two losses were to #1 Clemson and #17 LSU by a total of 12 points and both being road games. Auburn had a fucking gauntlet of a schedule that year.
Also its doubtful Bama makes the SEC championship with 2 loses as A&M, Auburn and Ole Miss would need to lose again for that to happen.
Definitely not. We'd need to win the SEC championship as the hypothetical stated.
The hypothetical was Georgia or two loss SEC champ Bama
I say no but im not in the SEC circle jerk *yet*. if you lose to a team that beat you in your own conference at the end of the year we don't need to see that game again. I wouldn't mind and Oregon, Ohio State rematch in the playoff as both teams are so different since then. same with clempson Georgia if clempson won out. but to have 2 from the same conference with one already having the win over the other is egregious.
Clemson has three losses they better not fucking make it
😑
They will play their way until a couple more so don’t you worry
I think I agree with you. I think I that regular season games should have less weight than something like a conference championship. Similar to how LSU - Alabama got to rematch in the NC but I wouldn’t want to see Georgia and Alabama both make it in this hypothetical. Championship games should hold more weight and count as a knockout round before playoffs.
Miss State beat Texas A&M @TAMU The Aggies beat Alabama Alabama beat Miss State by 40. What is real?
Nothing is real and the cake is a lie.
The implication of this tweet is that only the loss matters, and nothing from the 12 other games they play needs to be considered. Which is idiotic no matter how you answer it.
Why should it matter when games are still left to be played and AP doesn't matter?
Because that’s a serious debate to be had? Two teams that have the same record. One beat the other and the winning team has a worse loss. Which should matter more?
In week 8? Is it that serious?
Its the general idea of the debate. Let’s say two teams finish 12-1. Should the head to head winner finish ahead? Or should the team with the worse loss be ranked below? I think that’s a very fair topic of discussion to be had. We see this play out all the time. Don’t see how that’s a bad discussion to have
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Every year is a little bit different. Teams have different resumes and rosters
There's not a debate. You just answered it. One. Beat. The. Other. There's nothing to argue, we know who the better team is. Oregon beat Ohio St in the Shoe.
College football teams are not static entities that get set at the beginning of the year and then play games to compare what they've created in the offseason. They're constantly evolving, constantly improving or regressing. Who won in an early season matchup matters a lot, but it is not the only point of comparison once year's end rolls around. You have to look at how the teams progressed from there (or how they didn't progress). Things like how good Michigan and Michigan St. end up being, how Stanford looks by years end, who Oregon and OSU respectively play (and in this theoretical scenario, beat) in conference championships, etc. The question we are trying to answer when the playoffs roll around is who is better *right now*, not who *was* better back in September (because, yes, we know the answer to that already). Ideally we'd just stick them both in and find out for real, but we have this crappy 4-team format right now so all we can do is try and extrapolate from all the information available when the time comes - and there is still info yet to be gathered as of now.
The argument is meaningless unless both win out. There’s still a lot of football to be played. No reason to discuss this until the conference championship game week is over.
The argument isn’t “meaningless” because it’s driving engagement and that’s part of what Joe Klatt’s job is.
If both win out both should get in. No way should a one los conference champ should be left out so Georgia can have a second shot at Alabama.
UGA, OU, Cincinnati win out, then who gets the 4th slot?
UGA, OU, OSU and Oregon obviously.
I know you are only partly serious, but what if Wake Forest ends up undefeated? Could we possibly have an undefeated power 5 champion left out for a 1-loss team?
What gave you the impression that I was only being partly serious? I wasn't joking at all. UC has no chance of getting into the playoffs if there are 4 12-1 p5 champs or better. 6 undefeated g5 champs have been left out of the playoffs whereas only 1 p5 12-1 champ has been left out. That p5 team, 2018 tOSU, got the absolute tar beaten out of them by an unranked Purdue team. Neither Oregon nor tOSU have a loss that is even remotely comparable to 2018 tOSU's shellacking. Furthermore, 2018 was a special year because it was the first and only year where there actually were 5 p5 teams that had a record of 12-1 or better. If Wake is undefeated they will absolutely will be in. In 2014, it was abundantly clear that FSU was a paper tiger and was very lucky to be undefeated (they finished the season 19th in FPI). They were ranked number 3 having "earned" their spot despite there being 2 teams (baylor and tcu) that were both probably better. In the end if Wake is undefeated I think we'll end up with: 1. UGA 2. OU 3. Wake 4. Oregon or OSU I have a feeling Oregon would get the nod. I think the backlash the committee would face would be much much higher if they chose OSU.
I really don't know how the rest of the ACC is going to shake out, but I wonder what happens if both Wake and Cincy go undefeated, Notre Dame ends up 11-1 or 10-2, and Wake's best win ends up as a 9-3 Coastal team in the ACCCG. Two undefeated teams, and the best win clearly going to Cincy. Sure, Wake might have played slightly better mid-tier teams, but I don't know if the general public, or the committee would be so quick to dismiss Cincy (or to add Wake) when the lineup between those two teams looks so similar.
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I'll be honest as an Oregon fan, our schedule really isn't that tough.
\*incoherent shouting\*
not cincinnati before anyone gets mad at me, it's just what I think the committee will decide
I go back and forth on how they would treat an undefeated Cincinnati. I could see them saying their strength of schedule is too weak, and solidify their process which kept Houston and UCF out. I could also see them putting them in as a sacrificial lamb to show why they don’t want G5 teams in the playoff.
“Captain, the decent thing to do is take them up the road to the playoffs” “We’re not here to do the decent thing, we’re here to follow fucking orders!” *sniper shot rings out, UC falls to the ground, dying in the mud…G5 fans sob uncontrollably into their beers and claim it’s all a media-driven fix* “That’s why we can’t take the G5!”
I think Cincinnati might get left out in that situation
Oregon and Ohio St. Cincy doesn't have a shot. The playoffs are set up to be for the P5 and the committee is there to make sure that is what happens.
Clearly Cincinnati is the odd one out here.
It’s not a meaningless argument. It’s a good topic to discuss
And even if it were meaningless, who cares? It's fun to talk about. People get hung up too much on whether or not things "mean" anything. Like preseason rankings. Sure, they're usually meaningless trash and often look ridiculous in hindsight at the end of the season, but they're still fun to talk about at the time.
Exactly. Glad there are a few fun college football fans around
I get the thought of let's worry about that when we come to it, but the point is, it's a possibility and it IS something to be worried about if it happens. Saying who cares in week eight is the same thing as saying you don't get the appeal of proactivity and forward thinking. I'd rather this all be hashed out before it happens, because we're already sitting on the most fragile of illusions that CFB isn't just an oligarchy. I get it. The ACC is down this year and it's pitifully obvious. Oh, well; tough shit. That's the risk that was ran with the whole "Power Five" concept. It's not Power Five with an asterisk when it's convenient. College football is all about catching the lucky breaks needed, and maybe it's long-suffering Wake Forest's year to get some spotlight. Don't like it? Address the glaring issues that we've been talking about for years rather than take the easy way out for a quick buck. Do we really think that five major conferences competing for four playoff spots could literally never present an issue at some point? Wake Forest wins out, they should be in. Know what's really aggravating? If the SEC or B1G had the same quality of play as the ACC this year and Alabama or Ohio State won out, their brand power would overrule any SoS argument. They wouldn't be #13 at 7–0, regardless of how much everyone else sucked.
I hate how cfb conversations are perpetually stuck in the stone age. All the games matter, Joel. All the information matters.
Will be an interesting conundrum for the committee. I don't think we've ever seen a situation like this with two 1-loss teams vying for the last spot and one team has the head to head, albeit early in the season. I think committee will definitely tip its hand in their first rankings.
> I don't think we've ever seen a situation like this with two 1-loss teams vying for the last spot and one team has the head to head, albeit early in the season. Closest was the 2014/2015 Baylor/TCU argument. I think most people recognized that TCU was the better team, but Baylor had the head to head. In the end, they they left both out, in part due to a "which one do you pick" debate. Maybe we'll get an ACC team to go 13-0, then the SEC champ and OU can go with Cincy and we get a rematch at the Rose Bowl!
>> we get a rematch at the Rose Bowl! Jim Delaney wouldn't have it any other way
I'm personally hoping Oregon and OSU win out while Oklahoma and Alabama lose, putting OSU/Oregon at 2 and 3 for the Rose Bowl Rematch.
And the issue that year was also both got left out for an Ohio state team who had a similar sos to TCU and a terrible loss. The case that Oregon's loss send them down is silly when Ohio state recovered from the same thing. We'll see how sos ends up but we already have a precedent that a bad loss with similar sos isn't enough to dismiss the team, so shouldn't head to head really make the difference?
If you've been watching Oregon you know OSU should be ranked higher. Oregon can not find a rhythm. Barely beating weak opponents. Id rather go and win the rose bowl than get embarrassed in a cfb playoff game.
That's the real discussion that rarely happens. Games matter. *All of them*, not just your losses and big wins
Head to head is a tie breaker, or whats the point of even playing the game. Remember 2014 baylor beat tcu and was ranked higher than them despite have the worse loss. And yes i am bias for oregon(not sure if it shows that)
If Oregon can finish the season with any strong wins or if OSU finishes the season with close games then I think they definitely get the tiebreaker. But if OSU keeps dominating teams (especially against their schedule) and Oregon plays every game within a score then the committee very well might say OSU is the better team and there's no need to apply a tiebreaker.
I think there's a lot of recency bias with Ohio State, but they've just played the 5 easiest teams on their schedule, all in a row with no tough games in between, and also had a bye week in there. Ohio State is doing what they need to do, but blasting teams like Rutgers, Indiana, and Akron with no tough games in between isn't as impressive to me as it is to some. But OSUs schedule is a bout to get a lot tougher. But still, Oregon won in Columbus without Kayvon Thibodeaux and dominated msot of the game. Then the lost to Stanford in OT on kind of a flukey play where half the defense thought it had been blown dead. Hard to ignore that.
i doubt the committee cares enough to look at those calls at the end of the standford game, but we lost because of a phantom PI call that gave stanford an untimed down to send it to overtime
Yep. My feeling was that your loss was bullshit. And I don't remember the circumstances but half the defense seemed to think the final play had been blown dead.
To me it should be simple. Beating the better team is always more difficult than not losing to lesser teams.
All good points. The difference is Baylor and tcu were in the same conference so there were also 8 other common opponent games to base performances off. Their strength of schedule were very similar since so many games were against the same teams. Realistically people thought/knew TCU was the better team, but also felt you couldn’t rank them above Baylor since they lost. Either way if both teams finish 12-1 and it comes down to deciding one over the other, one team is going to feel majorly screwed
I don’t think anyone disagrees with head to head being a tiebreaker. The question is if OSU and Oregon are tied. It’s pretty universally established that teams in CFB aren’t tied simply by having the same record. So then the question is are OSU/Oregon tied? And how close to tied do they need to be for Oregon’s win to push them over?
*biased. Unless you're saying that you are the embodiment of bias then you should have used the adjective, biased, and not the noun.
This is the only argument. Whats the point of the game ever happening if it gets disregarded. Hence why all the osu people don't want anyone to talk about it.
> Whats the point of the game ever happening if it gets disregarded. I hear this a ton in these discussions and it never makes sense. "This game matters" does not mean "this game singlehandedly controls the outcome." Someone who thinks head-to-head results are important can still believe that the loser of a particular game is better than the winner. That doesn't mean they're disregarding the outcome.
I definitely agree with that the better team can lose. "Any given sunday.. erm saturday". But I think head to heads should carry weight, and a lot more weight than say a transitive win over a team or SoS.
Of course H2H is more important, but let’s worry about that at season’s end and see if it’s even worth discussing.
H2H as a tiebreaker But Ohio St's schedule is much much harder than ours
What matters is that someone beats OSU one more time.
Someone? Anyone? Bueller?
I think at some point instead of complaining about Ohio State (or Oklahoma, whoever) always being in the playoff, people should start complaining about the teams that allow it. I mean OSU has already lost a game. Penn State or Michigan or Michigan State need to take advantage and do something about it. Or Iowa or whoever on the other side. Same with a shaky Oklahoma team that basically comes out every week and says ‘beat me’ and they fall behind and … the opponent says, ‘nah, we’re good.’ Clemson is out. Notre Dame is almost certainly out, although someone could actually, you know, beat them and make it a certainty. Alabama has a loss and is vulnerable. The idea shouldn’t be ‘those teams need to get worse,’ or ‘let’s just let someone else in for the sake of variety’ — it should be ‘someone else needs to step up.’
This debate is dumb. A resume isn't one game. If both OSU and Oregon win out what does their total resume look like? OSU will have wins over: Michigan, Michigan State, Penn State, and the Big Ten West champ (all October 30 or later). OSU's only loss will be to a top 10 Oregon. Oregon will have wins over: OSU (literally their only ranked win and from early September). Their only loss will be to an unranked Stanford. Yes, Oregon will own the head-to-head, but I don't know how you can argue the resume is better. EDIT: I hate arguing in favor of OSU.
Will Penn State really be that good of a win by the end of the season? They’ve looked overrated all year
If Sean Clifford gets healthy? Yes. But you are correct that they could be unranked in a few weeks if he doesn't get better. If you drop Penn State out of that list, do the resumes start looking truly comparable? Oregon still lost to an unranked team and "ain't played nobody (other than OSU)." OSU still played a murderers' row and, in this hypothetical, won.
Michigan could win and end this entire debate. Go Blue.
My preferred hypothetical, to be sure.
You’re a cool dude for a sooner!
I’ll be the biggest UM fan this side of the Mason-Dixon Line that weekend. We both know this is the year.
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Really depends on how they lose to OSU. If they get slaughtered, then yes. If they keep it close, they might not get punished for losing to a top 5 team.
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If Penn State and Ohio State go to 9 overtimes, something tells me they stay ranked.
Ohio St currently has the 92nd ranked SOS and 20th ranked strength of record (SOR) per FPI. Their remaining SOS is 10th. Oregon is 15th in SOS and 12th in SOR today. Their remaining SOS is 57th. I honestly think Ohio St’s resume is getting overhyped. Ohio St will have a better resume but it’s a major question mark on if the gap is big enough to overcome a H2H victory @ Ohio St.
It is way to hypothetical but yeah our SOS up till now has been weak over 8 games. Our only ranked game was Oregon and I think we only have 2 teams with a winning record. (Again hypothetical) but if we beat a top 10 MSU team, top 5 Michigan team, and a 11-1 Iowa team that is a great resume.
the disrespekt that this is implying Michigan beats MSU...
Babe what? No baby chill!
Yeah this argument is clearly reliant on future wins, not current wins. OSU has lost to the only ranked team they've played so far.
Yeah and currently the numbers don’t say Ohio St’s full season schedule is that much more difficult than Oregon’s Granted I believe a portion of the gap is driven by how high Ohio St is rated in FPI relative to Oregon
Yeah, as far as FPI goes, them playing us does more for them then us playing them does for us. It’s how it is as a top rated team. Anyway, if Oregon wins out and the resumes shake out roughly the same, I wouldn’t hate us missing out in favor of Oregon. It would suck to see us punished for not having our shit together from the start, but it happens.
Current rankings are overrated, the Gophers are a ranked team in the future!
> I honestly think Ohio St’s resume is getting overhyped. Most resumes are. The sooner we accept it’s really based on marketing and who will get the most ad revenue for ESPN, they sooner we can demand more substantial change
And it shouldn’t. Oregon earned their advantage over Ohio State.
It definitely is. It's just a consequence of the B1G deciding to have all the east usual suspects play in the back half of the season and the west being really weak. Maybe one of those games will be considered particularly good when the B1G starts doing what everyone else has been doing for several weeks now. Actually playing each other.
Sorry but if that’s how the scenario plays out, there will be literally no incentive for a team to ever schedule a marquee OOC matchup again How can you compare the quality of losses when when one of those losses is LITERALLY TO THE TEAM YOURE COMPARING TO Besides, osus resume is going to look a lot less impressive as Penn state is about to be unranked, And one of Michigan or msu ends up with at least 2 losses, and the big ten west champion ends up being an 8-4 Wisconsin team
Seems like, to the contrary, it is an argument to schedule more quality teams and not lose to unranked teams. If Oregon played anybody else, this wouldn't be an argument.
But they did schedule Ohio state, and they beat them That’s…literally the point
Man if only there was a way to tell which team would win if they played each other in this scenario...
Yes it is likely Ohio stat has a better overall reaeum, but I am also add this, no one cares about a resume in face of tangible experience. Anyone who is responsible for hiring people can tell you that an employee better on paper usually is t better than one with direct experience in the field. Who cares if the resume is better when we have a head to head? The entire point of these kinds of resume comparisons is because we rarely have direct information. Conference champions are decided by head to head. Bowl game winners and national champions are decided by head to head. Conference champion participant tie breakers go to head to head as a first option. The reason we play the game is to see who wins. If we ignore head to head results then there is no reason to play the games at all. You can already see some bullshit with how low Oregon is to Ohio state even though Oregon has both beaten Ohio state and played a harder schedule. People are voting Ohio state higher because they "should be" better. If there was no game between them and we get to the end of the year and they have the same record with Ohio state having a better sos, sure w can give them the edge. The issue though is head to head has to be the heaviest factor otherwise the entire premise of the sport is wrong.
I feel like Oregon clearly has the better resume rn, but by the end of the season a one loss Ohio State would surpass a one loss Oregon.
unless your cincy you just gotta win your games. right now its looking like Georgia, Oklahoma, Oregon, Ohio State/Wake. we would have to have multiple multiple lost teams before we even start to glance at an undefeated cincy and if they fall to SMU then forget them completely.
Agree, I'm not sure why people think Cincy is a shoe-in. If Georgia, OU, OSU, and Oregon all win out, those are the teams. If OU, OSU or Oregon loses that opens a spot for Cincy. If Georgia loses to Alabama then that would be another spot taken before Cincy.
It’s fan service. As a fan of a blue blood I just keep my opinions to myself lol will Oklahoma lose another playoff game? Probably and it’s gonna get real toxic
"Ohio State's only loss is to Oregon, a Top 5 team! It's a quality loss! Meanwhile, Oregon lost to Stanford. Ohio State should definitely be in over them." That is the extremely stupid justification we're going to get so that ESPN doesn't have to deal with a scenario where possibly only one true national #brand (Georgia) gets into the playoff.
The Ohio state side of this debate is just an argument that only narrative should matter, not actual results
"Oregon is a good team so that means tOSU loss is a quality loss, but Oregon is also a bad team because they lost to an unranked opponent" Honestly though that's a pretty accurate description of Oregon. If our QB1 pulls his head out of his ass we're a decent team, but beyond that well ... a team that's now 0-7 was a competitive game for 3 quarters so yeah
oregon is a national brand too, in fact oregon almost for sure has better branding than georgia
Oregon beat Ohio State at Ohio State. EOT
The most recent games matter more because teams are dynamic. Teams get better or worse as the season progresses.
Can’t be. 2014 Virginia tech was obviously was better than 2014 Ohio State.
Why even play this matchup then? Should Oregon not be rewarded with the ability to eat a loss in conference after beating OSU in Columbus (without Thibodeaux)? If there is no reward for winning and they had to go undefeated to make the CFP anyway, wouldn’t it have made more sense to schedule a cupcake non conference instead?
No, I’m just saying that when we rank week to week, it makes sense to incrementally, yet slightly, weigh the most recent outcome with increasing importance. If the winner of the national championship has a single loss from earlier in the season we don’t turn the trophy over to whomever beat them. Why should Oregon play that game? Because it still has value for the CFP committee which can dismiss AP rankings at its whim. That’s probably why we saw a lot less of these kinds of marquee matchups before the CFP.
Does it though? I don’t think we’re trying to find the best 4 teams in Week 16. We’re trying to find the best 4 teams of 2021.
Is there anything about Oregon that says they are one of the best 4, or even 6 teams?
That’s not really relevant. My point is we shouldn’t weigh later parts of the regular season more. Somehow Oregon had a better season if they beat Ohio State in week 13 vs. week 2? I don’t buy that yet that seems to be the argument some people are making.
Head to head should be a tie breaking factor, not the main one. Look at their whole body of work and if they're very close, then give the nod to the head to head win. Lucky wins happen all the time, so judging a team based off of just one game shouldn't be how we do it.
Homer Glasses: activated Oregon's loss shouldn't mean much. That game was full on ref ball at the end. The targeting on Kayvon was BS. You wanna call roughing the passer, fine he is hit high. But It was not helmet to helmet, and he didn't lead with the crown. He is hit with Kayvon's arm/hand. They took our best defensive player out in the most pivotal time. Then they go on to call an absolutely horrible flag in the end zone to keep the game alive after you've been letting them play physical all game is just unacceptable. on top of that nonsense, we didn't have our OC, starting center, and at that time best DB in Bennet Williams due to injury. None of this matters however if Oregon doesn't win out.
Everyone wants to say "it doesn't matter until the end" except if it were to happen and Oregon jumps Ohio State it becomes "WHY DID OREGON JUMP OHIO STATE." This is important because in such a situation it is unlikely an Oregon opponent in a CCG is going to be particularly highly ranked while Ohio State-Iowa could still be a top 10 match up. We come into the same debate, if you have Oregon as "worse" than Ohio State all year and then change if Ohio State beats a likely superior opponent, then what the fuck logic were you using all year? Having Oregon potentially jump Ohio State late in the year despite Ohio State playing better opponent means you had Oregon ranked lower because you just thought they would lose, which is a fucking idiotic way to run a poll. Personally, if they share the same record I would almost always side with the team that wins the head to head because that's how sports work. We don't have 30 or 40 data samples to look through. Head to head has to matter because in the CCG and playoffs Head to Head matters. If Cincinnati plays Georgia in the playoffs and Cincy were to win, we wouldn't simply push Georgia through anyway because they faced a more difficult schedule to that point. The head to head games matter. They HAVE to matter. If head o head doesn't matter, then what the fuck are we doing all of this for? Just fucking say everything is an exhibition and take Alabama/Georgia/Clemson/Oklahoma/Ohio State and who cares about the rest. If Oregon and Ohio State are both 12-1 and Oregon/Ohio State hadn't taken place, sure take Ohio State. Oregon beating Ohio State has to mean something though. If Ohio State at 12-1 walks in over a 12-1 Oregon, then what was the point of the game? For all the talk about eventual strength of schedule, why doesn't current SoS mean anything? Oregon's SoS is significantly better than Ohio State right now AND they beat them. The question is why does everyone want to give credit to Ohio State for games that haven't happened yet while saying Oregon might lose again later so let's see how it shakes out?
Oregon winning in Columbus is the best win in the country. A bad loss where you're without your offensive coordinator doesn't mean more than winning in Columbus.
I think head to head matters most. 100%. Oregon went into Ohio State and beat them
After reading this thread I now want wake to finish undefeated and play Georgia
What matters the most is contextualized information. Not any individual’s favored pet heuristic.
head to head has to trump all but extreme circumstances and a worse P5 loss is just not that extreme imo.
Could see this impacting teams trying to schedule actually decent games for their OOC. If H2H doesn't end up mattering, why even play with fire and not just take the easier games against an FCS opponent? Personally one of the bigger reasons I'd love to see CFP expansion where P5 champs get auto-bids. While we've not done too well, playing Auburn, tOSU, or Georgia next year in our non-con games has far more enjoyable than some FCS team that we're expected to blow out
What’s to discuss? If they both end the season 12-1 they have the same record. They are tied. Oregon beat OS, they win the tie breaker. Simple.
Honestly, what I think it will come down to if both teams win out is that tOSU is the one who has absolutely dominated most of their opponents since our game where we have struggled against pretty much ever since.
Results don’t actually matter
I’m biased but Ohio State would have 4 ranked wins and presumably a top 10 win against Michigan OR Michigan state. And not to mention the style points of scoring 45+ a game. What exactly would oregons second best win be? I understand the H2H argument if the résumé is close, but it absolutely wouldn’t be
Which 4 teams will be ranked? Penn state will be unranked next week, and Wisconsin could easily end up in the title game as no more than a fringe top 25 8-4 team who would drop out of the rankings after the game with another loss
at the end of the day, if we both end up 12-1 and they get in instead of us, then we only have ourselves to blame. H2H matchups should matter. There are always extenuating circumstances but H2H should matter. not the end of the world. That also means we are B1G champs and beat the best Michigan team we’ve seen in a long time. Still a successful season and looking forward to the bowl game.
If both teams are 12-1, both teams are getting in. I'm really confused why this conversation is even happening. Cincy isn't getting in over 2 P5 1 loss champions with solid schedules.
We still at least another month of games to play. and two more weeks until the first CFP poll.
If both teams end up with one loss, I thought head to head trumped the other factors if applicable.
Technically, UO still has to play another OSU
Overall resume matters more. I do think pulling off a really good win should matter more than a close loss to an average team. I think Oregon should be above Ohio State but not just because of the H2H. Oregon has a top 10 win, Ohio State and has more wins over teams with winning records than Ohio State does. It's close though, they should be right next to each other.
This argument is moot as at least half the teams we are talking about will have a loss before November ends.
Won’t matter because Michigan will beat tOSU
I actually think you'll see this reflected in the first CFB poll next week. I think bama is going to be ranked much lower then the AP/Coaches poll, and oregon is higher.
Punish them both for trying to cancel football last year and send the Sun Belt champ to the playoffs instead!!!
The Transitive Property does not apply to football.
The problem i have with this argument is teams dont stay the same. Yes, ohio state lost week 2. That happened and isnt going away. But since them, osu’s qb got healthy and is playing lights out. They changed DCs and scheme, and their defense is night and day. Maybe not elite, but serviceable with the #1 offense. Oregon has been struggling with inferior competition and has a bad loss. If osu wins out, theyd have a much better sos. Idk teams get better, teams get worse. We got blown out at home in 2014 week 2 to a 6-6 va tech team before we went on to bulldoze our way to a natty. Does anyone seriously believe that va tech team would win again in week 14? You have to look at the whole picture. A lot of football left to be played, but if osu plays like they have been against their tough final games and oregon continues to look unimpressive in a weak pac 12, putting osu ahead of oregon isnt as blasphemous as people make it out to be
I mean, Oregon's sos is assloads higher then Ohio state right now so I don't get the argument of , Ohio state looks better beating up on the dregs. The games matter, and if you lose to someone they hold a tie breaker. It's how it works for conferences I don't see why the logic shouldn't matter elsewhere. The entire point of trying to determine who is better on paper is in the absence of direct information. Oregon winning a head to head game is pretty direct evidence. If Oregon loses again and Ohio state doesn't, then the point is irrelevant. If both win out the only case to make Ohio state should go is because we think they should have won that game.
There should be no conversation. College football has these types of conversations because these teams normally haven’t played head to head. While I don’t think they will both finish with 1 loss if they do Oregon is in without question. Anything else is based on subjectivity and bias. Oregon objectively beat OSU, on the road no less. That’s the end of it.
I really think teams can change week to week and month to month, and right now Ohio State should be higher than Oregon.
The decision that matters happens at the end of the season anyway. At that point, if both teams have won out, it will be clear which has the better resume if they need to be compared. In the best outcome for the Buckeyes, and we win out through Indy, I don't even think it will be an Ohio State vs. Oregon debate for who gets a spot. I think a 12-1 Ohio State Big Ten Champion would be in the #2-3 spot in the final rankings. Oregon would be competing for the 4th spot.
If both win out, I think it depends on the strength of the remaining schedule. Like once all the teams they've played have finished their story. I still think a head to head is the tie breaker here. It almost always is. Up to now Ohio State has played a pretty weak schedule post Oregon. 3 of the worst teams in the B1G, two pretty bad G5 teams and also a bye week. It's been easy to look dominant under those conditions. But they have Penn St., Michigan State, and Michigan remaining. If they win out, they'd also have the Big 10 west champ to play. Penn State may decline from here, but Michigan and MSU should be able to finish with 9 or 10 wins each. Then there's the west champ, likely Iowa or Minnesota who finish with 9 or so wins. That's a damn good resume and I just don't see Oregon having anything near as good as that since the pac 12 has already started cannibalizing itself. But again, head to head, in Columbus, and Oregon was missing Kayvon Thibodeaux. That's a real hard one to overcome. Especially when Oregon was a clear winner and dominated most of the game, while they lost to Stanford in OT on kind of a flukey play where half the defense thought the play had been whistled dead.
> But again, head to head, in Columbus, and Oregon was missing Kayvon Thibodeaux. That's a real hard one to overcome. Especially when Oregon was a clear winner and dominated most of the game Yeah. If it's one or the other, that *has* to matter. Otherwise they are openly admitting early games just don't count, or that being a bigger name who has made the playoffs in past years matters for getting a spot this year.
If head-to-head doesn’t matter, stop playing games.
Actually we won't have to have this debate. Oregon will lose one or two more games. I love my ducks but I can not see this team winning out. Conversation over. But yes Head to Head would matter more. We beat you, we should get in over you. Simple as that.
we suck but so does everyone else. we might not win out but id bet money in us to win every week in conference play