SEC West is the Biggest Fraud of All Time

[ginman]

The part I find interesting about all of this is that in general IE posters bought into the SEC hype as well. It's hard not to with all of the media attention. How many people on here stated or thought LSU would crush ND.

 

[Guest]

Don't know if I quoted all this correctly, but here is the bowl data for each conference along with a list of teams in relation to their preseason rankings vs their end of season rankings. To state that the SEC has been mediocre on bowl games outside one or two elite teams is simply not accurate. To state that the SEC is overrated each year is also not accurate. (Fla is the only team that fell in the top 10 in that category.)

Thanks. As I have stated a million times, I don't care about rankings because they are fatally flawed for several reasons. See my post above for an explanation and a statistical analysis (#183). Also, I agree that ND has benefited from ranking bias as much as any program in the past, in case you want to use that card. Regardless, quoting rankings as a measure of anything tangible quickly loses influence with me. Head to head is all I care about, as stated to you the last time we danced this dance.

edit: This is the typical SEC argument posed by T3. The only thing they have to stand on rankings which has been shown many times over to not reflect the reality as demonstrated by head to head results.

 

[GoldenToTheGrave]

LOL. Bama is gonna be back in the hunt next fall. And while there has not been much discussion on the subtle changes Saban is making in his recruiting efforts, he is getting 4-5 players the last two classes that are more built to play the spread game. We should see these players start to make some impact the next couple of years. All is well in T Town. Just gotta get better overall and keep grinding.

And all is well in SB. The Irish have something to build on and I expect them to be right there as well. Next year is already here. Exciting times for sure.

With the way you guys recruit and how much you pay your coaches if Bama wasn't in the hunt every year heads should roll.

 

[T Town Tommy]

Thanks. As I have stated a million times, I don't care about rankings because they are fatally flawed for several reasons. See my post above for an explanation and a statistical analysis. Also, I agree that ND has benefited from ranking bias as much as any program in the past, in case you want to use that card. Regardless, quoting rankings as a measure of anything tangible quickly loses influence with me. Head to head is all I care about, as stated to you the last time we danced this dance.

I simply posted out what was requested. You stated that the bowl record for the SEC outside the one or two elite teams were mediocre. That wasn't accurate. The rankings info was included in my original post and was simply added in with the quotation. But you are correct. head to head is what really matters. Not rankings. And this year the SEC really stunk it up. But I do believe dismissing them on the grounds of one bad bowl season is a little premature.

 

[IrishJayhawk]

SEC Bias: Why the Southeastern Conference Earns More Hype than Other Leagues - One Foot Down[/url]

The SEC's ~10-year dominance has been ridiculous. They've earned it on the field. As I said previously, let's see a couple more full seasons (and not just a handful of bowl games) of the rest of the country evening the playing field.

^This

 

[GoldenDomer]

In the words of Jameis, they still "skrong."

They lost a few bowl games but don't think that means the empire has fallen. The biggest impact may be some recruits taking harder looks at the Big10.

 

[Me2SouthBend]

Where's Finebaum today?

 

[T Town Tommy]

Where's Finebaum today?

Editing his "My Conference Can Beat Your Conference" book if I were guessing.

 

[Guest]

I simply posted out what was requested. You stated that the bowl record for the SEC outside the one or two elite teams were mediocre. That wasn't accurate. The rankings info was included in my original post and was simply added in with the quotation. But you are correct. head to head is what really matters. Not rankings. And this year the SEC really stunk it up. But I do believe dismissing them on the grounds of one bad bowl season is a little premature.

You did not post head to head results, which are the current topic of discussion. You discussed rankings, which have been shown to mean little. Actually the bowl results are accurate. Your post did not contest that. You discussed rankings flaws which lead to unexpected bowl results. I did not disputed that. That is, in fact, part of my argument. Your argument is flawed by more than a surface analysis which you have not been able to refute. That's why most here are tired of the SEC arguments and are ready for change - we can see on the field that the hype of the rankings and media bias are falling quickly apart. And have been for a while (see post #183).

 

[IrishJayhawk]

You did not post head to head results, which are the current topic of discussion. You discussed rankings, which have been shown to mean little. Actually the bowl results are accurate. Your post did not contest that. You discussed rankings flaws which lead to unexpected bowl results. I did not disputed that. That is, in fact, part of my argument. Your argument is flawed by more than a surface analysis which you have not been able to refute. That's why most here are tired of the SEC arguments and are ready for change - we can see on the field that the hype of the rankings and media bias are falling quickly apart.

I don't see how you refuted the bowl arguments or the link posted by Rocket above. That has some pretty darn good objective data, in my opinion. TTT is not trying to make excuses for this year. But the SEC has, objectively (in my opinion), earned a lot of it's reputation.

 

[Guest]

I don't see how you refuted the bowl arguments or the link posted by Rocket above. That has some pretty darn good objective data, in my opinion. TTT is not trying to make excuses for this year. But the SEC has, objectively (in my opinion), earned a lot of it's reputation.

He did not make a bowl argument to refute in his last post. He only discussed rankings, which are subjective and I posted an analysis on this along with my own.

Bowl results are in line with head to head and OOC scheduling, which was the original topic of discussion. He moved it toward rankings because they have been, for most of the last few years, heavily biased toward the SEC. It is the only argument he has left, and what was shown this year, to be a sham. Plus, studying trends of SEC OOC results show that they have been weakening for several years, which I did post data for (#183 which nobody wants to address yet, lol).

In other words, he posted subjective data which has been refuted by objective data. Argument lost.

 

[T Town Tommy]

You did not post head to head results, which are the current topic of discussion. You discussed rankings, which have been shown to mean little. Actually the bowl results are accurate. Your post did not contest that. You discussed rankings flaws which lead to unexpected bowl results. I did not disputed that. That is, in fact, part of my argument. Your argument is flawed by more than a surface analysis which you have not been able to refute. That's why most here are tired of the SEC arguments and are ready for change - we can see on the field that the hype of the rankings and media bias are falling quickly apart. And have been for a while (see post #183).

Head to head results of what? I posted the SEC's regular season head to head matchups against the Power Five conferences. I posted the SEC's head to head bowl game results against the Power Five conferences. If you want the team by team breakdown for the last 15 years then you can look that up yourself. You stated in your original post that outside one or two elite SEC teams, the conference has had a mediocre bowl record. I simply posted out what the conference bowl record actually was. The data I posted refuted your original statement. Pretty simple to me.

Again, I am not gonna stay out here all day and defend the SEC. But if you are going to reference me in a post, then I would appreciate it if you at least get the facts and data correctly. Not too much to ask I would think.

 

[irishfan]

LOL. Bama is gonna be back in the hunt next fall. And while there has not been much discussion on the subtle changes Saban is making in his recruiting efforts, he is getting 4-5 players the last two classes that are more built to play the spread game. We should see these players start to make some impact the next couple of years. All is well in T Town. Just gotta get better overall and keep grinding.

And all is well in SB. The Irish have something to build on and I expect them to be right there as well. Next year is already here. Exciting times for sure.

Pretty brutal schedule next year though. Bama has to go to Auburn, Georgia, and A&M. Plus LSU/Arkansas at home, and Wisky to open the year at a neutral site.

When was the last time you guys played UGA in the regular season? I feel like those two teams never play one another....

 

[IrishJayhawk]

He did not make a bowl argument to refute in his last post. He only discussed rankings, which are subjective and I posted an analysis on this along with my own.

Bowl results are in line with head to head and OOC scheduling, which was the original topic of discussion. He moved it toward rankings because they have been, for most of the last few years, heavily biased toward the SEC. It is the only argument he has left, and what was shown this year, to be a sham. Plus, studying trends of SEC OOC results show that they have been weakening for several years, which I did post data for (#183 which nobody wants to address yet, lol).

In other words, he posted subjective data which has been refuted by objective data. Argument lost.

The whole first part of his post is about head-to-head matchups. And you still haven't addressed the link in Rocket's email.

Also, declaring yourself the winner doesn't not necessarily make it so.

 

[Old Man Mike]

Saban is a very "good" {i.e. successful at creating a system on and off the field} college football head administrator, and he and his staff are well-motivated by extreme monetary rewards.

The school, whether defined as a football factory or not, obviously is willing to pay huge amounts of money for personnel and facilities, perhaps more than any other such institution for an "extracurricular activity" {there is an unarguable "values" issue here}, in order to win football games.

This system and its facilitation by the organization is powerful and cleverly designed so as to attract elite athletes in large numbers into the program {see for example Saban's choice to send out recruiting letters to high school students picturing the vast amounts of money on the faces of checks that the NFL recruits got --- using every non-academic lever one has at one's disposal to bring immature young studs in}, so that the highly paid staff have loads of talent to work with to win football games.

This should indicate at least two things about this particular organization:

1). Its position as a football-factory powerhouse is VERY unlikely to diminish without some dramatic personnel or institutional changes. The idea that the university has any interest at all in changes towards a more academic approach seems without data of any credible kind. Personnel changes can occur {ex.Saban retiring, going senile, dying} but whether that would change much is unknown.

2). People of a moral bent {such as old college professors, esp. Catholic ones like myself} will see that system as fundamentally IMmoral, and find it very difficult to admire anything about it, and will say so. This saying-so will create the response among football-is-god thugs that "we" are a bunch of irritatingly elitest assholes, who are to be hated every chance that arises. Well, so were the Prophets.

 

[Guest]

Head to head results of what? I posted the SEC's regular season head to head matchups against the Power Five conferences. I posted the SEC's head to head bowl game results against the Power Five conferences. If you want the team by team breakdown for the last 15 years then you can look that up yourself. You stated in your original post that outside one or two elite SEC teams, the conference has had a mediocre bowl record. I simply posted out what the conference bowl record actually was. The data I posted refuted your original statement. Pretty simple to me.

Again, I am not gonna stay out here all day and defend the SEC. But if you are going to reference me in a post, then I would appreciate it if you at least get the facts and data correctly. Not too much to ask I would think.

You did post records, but some of the data is older. I mentioned in my post that I didn't consider beyond 10 years, and some of yours go to 2000. The SEC does have a pretty good record but is is biased toward the turn of the century. That is why my analysis differs from yours, where the record is less than stellar.

 

[Guest]

The whole first part of his post is about head-to-head matchups. And you still haven't addressed the link in Rocket's email.

Also, declaring yourself the winner doesn't not necessarily make it so.

True. I wasn't arguing with Rocket, but I will go look at it.

He did post records but my time frame was different than his. He looked back 15 years on some of his stats. I stated the trend, especially for the last few years, was that the field was catching up to the SEC. And over 10 years, I don't consider the SEC to be dominant. They have good teams, but not as good as their hype indicates. This year was a down year for them and I think the beginning of a sea change as evidenced by Saban's comments on winning after the game.

 

[T Town Tommy]

He did not make a bowl argument to refute in his last post. He only discussed rankings, which are subjective and I posted an analysis on this along with my own.

Bowl results are in line with head to head and OOC scheduling, which was the original topic of discussion. He moved it toward rankings because they have been, for most of the last few years, heavily biased toward the SEC. It is the only argument he has left, and what was shown this year, to be a sham. Plus, studying trends of SEC OOC results show that they have been weakening for several years, which I did post data for (#183 which nobody wants to address yet, lol).

In other words, he posted subjective data which has been refuted by objective data. Argument lost.

The rankings info in my original post from a few months back showed that the SEC is actually performing better than their preseason rankings with the exception of Florida. If it makes you feel better, I can edit the post above to take the rankings info out. The "objective" data you mention is what quantifies the "subjective" data. In other words, the preseason rankings are subjective and only proven out by the results on the field which leads to the end of season rankings - or the closest we can get to "objective" data. In this case, the "objective" data does indeed show that the "subjective" data is flawed. The only problem is the fact that it shows your argument to be inaccurate since the only team in the SEC who is "subjectively" overrated to start the year is Florida.

 

[T Town Tommy]

You did post records, but some of the data is older. I mentioned in my post that I didn't consider beyond 10 years, and some of yours go to 2000. The SEC does have a pretty good record but is is biased toward the turn of the century. That is why my analysis differs from yours, where the record is less than stellar.

If one goes back to the beginning of the BCS era, the data shows the SEC to be average. That is the data most throw out when discussing the SEC in relation to other conferences. The era of SEC dominance is really only about 10 years old IMO. The data I posted went back to around 2000. I don't know for sure but if we were to remove 2000-2004 from the data I posted, I would think the SEC would look even more dominant. I don't really care to do that however. As I have said, I am not spending my day trying to defend the SEC. Just don't believe dismissing them for one bad bowl season is wise.

 

[NCND]

Sec, Sec, Sec! Get outta here with that noise.

 

[Guest]

The rankings info in my original post from a few months back showed that the SEC is actually performing better than their preseason rankings with the exception of Florida. If it makes you feel better, I can edit the post above to take the rankings info out. The "objective" data you mention is what quantifies the "subjective" data. In other words, the preseason rankings are subjective and only proven out by the results on the field which leads to the end of season rankings - or the closest we can get to "objective" data. In this case, the "objective" data does indeed show that the "subjective" data is flawed. The only problem is the fact that it shows your argument to be inaccurate since the only team in the SEC who is "subjectively" overrated to start the year is Florida.

Read this article, and you get a better idea.
Why SEC Isn't As Great In Football As You Think | ThePostGame

The overall record of SEC against world, including bowl games, isn't as great as some make it out to be. From the article (two years old):

EC vs. PAC-12 regular season: 10-12
SEC vs. PAC-12 bowl games: 1-0
SEC vs. Big 12 regular season: 6-10
SEC vs. Big 12 bowl games: 21-8
SEC vs. ACC regular season: 42-36
SEC vs. ACC bowl games: 16-9
SEC vs. Big 10 regular season: 7-4
SEC vs. Big 10 bowl games: 19-19
SEC vs. Big East regular season: 16-15
SEC vs. Big East bowl game: 3-8

Here is simple graphic showing overall the SEC doing well over the last 10 years.

SEC dominant over past decade against Power 5 conference competition

They did better than everyone else, but are not dominant as people make them out to be. Yes they have a winning record driven mostly by the top few teams (never argued that and stated LSU, Auburn, and Alabama are usually pretty good to great). But after those top couple of teams, the results are mediocre which leads to rankings bias when the SEC doesn't schedule much OOC. This year, the bowl results show how overrated they have become.

This is consistent with my argument that the SEC is not as dominant top to bottom as people have said even though they have a winning record in the last 10 years. It is dominated by the top few teams who run semi-pro programs and (depending on your definition of CFB success) should be commended. The rest of the SEC, is well, overrated.

edit: What does that lead to? It leads to overhyped, average Mississippi teams being ranked in the top 5 all year when they ended up being fairly mediocre when exposed against good teams OOC. Alabama built their reputation on those teams and showed they weren't as good this year as they were in 2012, when they were completely dominant. What did the committee do? They allowed the SEC bias to shut out other good Power 5 teams and kept some of them out of the playoffs. It also promoted Alabama as a #1 when they were really a pretender.

 

[NCND]

I'm gonna absolutely love the excuses on the Pawwwwwwl show today. Gonna be EPIC.

 

[T Town Tommy]

Pretty brutal schedule next year though. Bama has to go to Auburn, Georgia, and A&M. Plus LSU/Arkansas at home, and Wisky to open the year at a neutral site.

When was the last time you guys played UGA in the regular season? I feel like those two teams never play one another....

Ga... maybe 2009 or 2010. The infamous blackout game I believe.

We need to go to nine games in conference. We should be playing the Ga's and Fla's more often IMO. Too long between rotations in the eight game format.

 

[NCND]

The good thing about this postseason is there (shouldn't) be as much bias for that conference in the preseason polls.

 

[IrishLion]

I'm gonna throw this out there:

The only reason Bama "got exposed" is because Lane Kiffin is the dumbest human being on the planet.

Bama would've been better off running the ball every single play, and punting when it didn't get 10 yards.

AT THE VERY LEAST, if you refuse to hand the ball to DERRICK HENRY, throw it to AMARI COOPER ON YOUR FINAL DRIVE.

Did he think that Cooper as a decoy was the best option?

 

[T Town Tommy]

The good thing about this postseason is there (shouldn't) be as much bias for that conference in the preseason polls.

But the data has shown the SEC doesn't get much bias in preseason polls anyway outside of Fla. If I were guessing I think we will see Bama, Auburn, LSU, Arkansas, Mizzou, and Ga in the preseason top 25 next fall.

 

[T Town Tommy]

I'm gonna throw this out there:

The only reason Bama "got exposed" is because Lane Kiffin is the dumbest human being on the planet.

Bama would've been better off running the ball every single play, and punting when it didn't get 10 yards.

AT THE VERY LEAST, if you refuse to hand the ball to DERRICK HENRY, throw it to AMARI COOPER ON YOUR FINAL DRIVE.

Did he think that Cooper as a decoy was the best option?

Not a great night for Wonder Boy. Something tells me that Nick will spend a little more time with his OC during the off season to explain the finer details of how to defeat an opponent.

 

[IrishSteelhead]

Sims didn't have a particularly good night either. He made quite a few bad throws, and held the ball too long, taking losses when he should have gotten rid of it. He certainly didn't do LK any favors.

 

[irishfan]

Not a great night for Wonder Boy. Something tells me that Nick will spend a little more time with his OC during the off season to explain the finer details of how to defeat an opponent.

Kiffin outsmarted himself with the playcalling for sure. But, Smart/Saban had a pretty crappy gameplan on D as well. 537 yards allowed....

Bama could have won if Kiffin stuck with the run game more, but that D wasn't doing much against OSU either.

 

[IrishSteelhead]

How banged up was Collins heading into the game? Feel like he was down for an extended period a handful of times on defense.