You really have to question the writers

As it seems to go every football season, the writers have again provided us with an interesting Top 25 as we near the midpoint of the season. The following is the recent AP Top 25 Poll...

1. LSU (65) 6-0 1,625

2. California 5-0 1,538

3. Ohio State 6-0 1,511

4. Boston College 6-0 1,346

5. South Florida 5-0 1,339

6. Oklahoma 5-1 1,221

7. South Carolina 5-1 1,183

8. West Virginia 5-1 1,059

9. Oregon 4-1 1,047

10. USC 4-1 1,024

11. Missouri 5-0 966

12. Virginia Tech 5-1 910

13. Florida 4-2 822

14. Arizona State 6-0 752

15. Cincinnati 6-0 705

16. Hawaii 6-0 634

17. Kentucky 5-1 612

18. Illinois 5-1 595

19. Wisconsin 5-1 551

20. Kansas 5-0 336

21. Florida State 4-1 307

22. Auburn 4-2 248

23. Texas 4-2 136

24. Georgia 4-2 131

25. Tennessee 3-2 90

The first 9 actually look pretty good. Though I personally think Boston College and South Florida are overrated, you can't argue with their placement at this point of the season. Starting at #10 is where things get interesting. Using what we will call the Michigan Principle, USC is ranked entirely too high. I realize that Appy St. is 1-AA and Stanford is a BCS school but the upsets are similar with Top 5 teams losing at home to underdogs of at least 25. In Week 2, Michigan was unranked yet USC remains in the Top 10. Looking at our own poll, I see that we have USC at #12 but that doesn't mean we are right either. Moving on we see Missouri at #11 despite embarrassing Nebraska in a way that USC did not. Personally, I think Missouri is better than both BC and USF, but that is for another day. I'm not a big fan of the common opponent argument because teams match up in different ways but Missouri did play Nebraska better than USC did. Now we move to Florida who is somewhat of a tricky subject. This is where common opponent gets dangerous. Auburn ranked #22 beat Florida ranked #13 in Gainesville but also lost to Miss. St. at Jordan-Hare. At the same time, Florida destroyed Tennessee and hung real close with #1 LSU. I don't know whether Auburn should be ranked ahead of Florida as the Miss. St. loss was bad, but they should be closer in the rankings. We'll lastly move to the Georgia and Tennessee. Both teams have two losses to currently ranked Top 25 teams. That being equal you have to rely on head to head competition. Tennessee dominated Georgia this past weekend and clearly demonstrated that they are the better team. It's debatable that either should be ranked but if they are going to be ranked, then Tennessee should be higher.

What we have here, especially in the top 15 is a case of human nature and our desire to be right. I imagine it is giving the writers fits having to rank teams such as Boston College and USF in the top 5. The writers were very high on USC and UF entering the season and dropping them now would hurt their credibility. Throw in the fact that the AP provided USC a share of the championship in 2003 and it looks even more suspicious when USC's lost is treated that much differently than Michigan's loss.

Lastly, I realize that the Coaches and Harris polls have just as many inconsistencies but I don't expect much from them. Coaches and SID's are notorious Sunday Box Score guys and the Harris poll pretty much makes itself look stupid on it's own without the need for anyone to point out its problems. The AP Poll awards its own championship at the end of the season independent from other polls and computer models. This fact means we must hold the AP to a higher standard because with the power to award a championship comes more responsibility. My hope is that by the end of the year the press is able to step back and objectively look at they way they vote. There are just too many questions at this point of the season.