Champion! Last week Crayton, Soobahk40050, and Skyhawk scored a week-leading 15/20, avoiding the snake bitten Clemson Tigers.

The Stay Away From My Stock Portfolio Award goes to BuckminsterFuller who put 5 on both Ohio State and Clemson but 0 on Michigan and USC.

The Dead Valley Award goes to Wahoowa84, who over the course of the season poured 46 points into the Clemson Tigers, only to see them lose their second game this week.

How the Last Week Will Work
There will be no weekly award based on wins/losses. All that matters is the 4 teams selected next Sunday for the playoff. The Dummy Voter will not vote for you. If you skip this week, 0 points will be assigned to all teams.

You can alter your vote all the way until USC kicks off against Utah.

4 Minor Awards will go to the humans with the most points for each of the 4 playoff teams. 1 Major Award will go to the human with the most points for all 4 teams combined. Participation Trophies will be handed out with your final, overall rank (see graphic). Ties for awards will be decided by the pollster who most recently "won" a week; if the same week, the most recent before that will be used.

If you finish below fivethirtyeight, your name will be erased from the annals of history and your participation trophy melted into a golden tumor (it's a thing). If ESPN is the overall leader, all awards will be disassembled and burned on a heap!!

I've pared down the standings, below, to include only those with a theoretical chance of a participation trophy. 4 scenarios are listed beneath the standings with current points for each scenario. Feel free to vote for Alabama and work out those potential scenarios too.


My ballot
5 Georgia
5 Michigan
5 TCU
5 Ohio State

Allstate Playoff Predictor
5 Georgia
5 Michigan
5 TCU
4 Ohio State
1 USC

fivethirtyeight
5 Michigan
5 Georgia
4 TCU
3 USC
2 Ohio State
1 Kansas State (uh....)

Screw Michigan!

Georgia 5
Michigan 5
TCU 5
USC 3
Ohio State 2

(11-28-2022 01:16 PM)Crayton Wrote:  Champion! Last week Crayton, Soobahk40050, and Skyhawk scored a week-leading 15/20, avoiding the snake bitten Clemson Tigers.

The Stay Away From My Stock Portfolio Award goes to BuckminsterFuller who put 5 on both Ohio State and Clemson but 0 on Michigan and USC.

The Dead Valley Award goes to Wahoowa84, who over the course of the season poured 46 points into the Clemson Tigers, only to see them lose their second game this week.

How the Last Week Will Work
There will be no weekly award based on wins/losses. All that matters is the 4 teams selected next Sunday for the playoff. The Dummy Voter will not vote for you. If you skip this week, 0 points will be assigned to all teams.

You can alter your vote all the way until USC kicks off against Utah.

4 Minor Awards will go to the humans with the most points for each of the 4 playoff teams. 1 Major Award will go to the human with the most points for all 4 teams combined. Participation Trophies will be handed out with your final, overall rank (see graphic). Ties for awards will be decided by the pollster who most recently "won" a week; if the same week, the most recent before that will be used.

If you finish below fivethirtyeight, your name will be erased from the annals of history and your participation trophy melted into a golden tumor (it's a thing). If ESPN is the overall leader, all awards will be disassembled and burned on a heap!!

I've pared down the standings, below, to include only those with a theoretical chance of a participation trophy. 4 scenarios are listed beneath the standings with current points for each scenario. Feel free to vote for Alabama and work out those potential scenarios too.

My ballot
5 Georgia
5 Michigan
5 TCU
5 Ohio State

Allstate Playoff Predictor
5 Georgia
5 Michigan
5 TCU
4 Ohio State
1 USC

fivethirtyeight
5 Michigan
5 Georgia
4 TCU
3 USC
2 Ohio State
1 Kansas State (uh....)

I'm not last? Apparently the bottom of the barrel award is more elusive than I thought : )

I am soooo tempted to add Ohio state instead of TCU... lol

5 Georgia
5 Michigan
5 TCU
5 USC

Georgia 5
Michigan 5
TCU 5
USC 5

It's time to throw all the chips on the table

Tried that last week and the results were...less than desirable. If I ask nicely, would it be possible to wager 20 on Georgia this week?

Georgia 5
Michigan 5
TCU 4
USC 4
Ohio State 1
Alabama 1

UGA 5
TCU 5
USC 5
Michigan 5

Georgia 5
Michigan 5
TCU 4
USC 4
Ohio State 2


As an aside, I’m completely baffled by ESPN’s analytics group. They’re only giving USC a 20% chance of making the playoffs, although they believe that USC has a 38% of winning their only remaining game. Basically, ESPN is stating that the CFP doesn’t know how to select playoff teams and their proprietary algorithms are more useful than reality. By contrast, 538 is mathematically correctly predicting that USC’s chances of making the playoffs (@ 47%) is equal to their chances of beating Utah in the PAC CCG. ESPN has lost credibility…they need a refresher in high school statistics.

OTOH, I tried to play the odds all season…and fared badly by betting heavily on Alabama, Clemson and Ohio State. Only Ohio State has a shot.

(11-30-2022 01:01 PM)Wahoowa84 Wrote:  Georgia 5
Michigan 5
TCU 4
USC 4
Ohio State 2


As an aside, I’m completely baffled by ESPN’s analytics group. They’re only giving USC a 20% chance of making the playoffs, although they believe that USC has a 38% of winning their only remaining game. Basically, ESPN is stating that the CFP doesn’t know how to select playoff teams and their proprietary algorithms are more useful than reality. By contrast, 538 is mathematically correctly predicting that USC’s chances of making the playoffs (@ 47%) is equal to their chances of beating Utah in the PAC CCG. ESPN has lost credibility…they need a refresher in high school statistics.

OTOH, I tried to play the odds all season…and fared badly by betting heavily on Alabama, Clemson and Ohio State. Only Ohio State has a shot.

Well, to guess at what they mean, maybe they think that USC could win, but the win by itself might not be enough to make cfp. if it's close or some such.

(11-30-2022 01:55 PM)Skyhawk Wrote:  

(11-30-2022 01:01 PM)Wahoowa84 Wrote:  Georgia 5
Michigan 5
TCU 4
USC 4
Ohio State 2


As an aside, I’m completely baffled by ESPN’s analytics group. They’re only giving USC a 20% chance of making the playoffs, although they believe that USC has a 38% of winning their only remaining game. Basically, ESPN is stating that the CFP doesn’t know how to select playoff teams and their proprietary algorithms are more useful than reality. By contrast, 538 is mathematically correctly predicting that USC’s chances of making the playoffs (@ 47%) is equal to their chances of beating Utah in the PAC CCG. ESPN has lost credibility…they need a refresher in high school statistics.

OTOH, I tried to play the odds all season…and fared badly by betting heavily on Alabama, Clemson and Ohio State. Only Ohio State has a shot.

Well, to guess at what they mean, maybe they think that USC could win, but the win by itself might not be enough to make cfp. if it's close or some such.

The CFP committee has never penalized a team for winning a CCG against a top quality (#11) opponent. This would be a new standard of “eye” test. That is comparable to rewarding Ohio State for not playing a game.

(11-30-2022 03:11 PM)Wahoowa84 Wrote:  

(11-30-2022 01:55 PM)Skyhawk Wrote:  

(11-30-2022 01:01 PM)Wahoowa84 Wrote:  Georgia 5
Michigan 5
TCU 4
USC 4
Ohio State 2


As an aside, I’m completely baffled by ESPN’s analytics group. They’re only giving USC a 20% chance of making the playoffs, although they believe that USC has a 38% of winning their only remaining game. Basically, ESPN is stating that the CFP doesn’t know how to select playoff teams and their proprietary algorithms are more useful than reality. By contrast, 538 is mathematically correctly predicting that USC’s chances of making the playoffs (@ 47%) is equal to their chances of beating Utah in the PAC CCG. ESPN has lost credibility…they need a refresher in high school statistics.

OTOH, I tried to play the odds all season…and fared badly by betting heavily on Alabama, Clemson and Ohio State. Only Ohio State has a shot.

Well, to guess at what they mean, maybe they think that USC could win, but the win by itself might not be enough to make cfp. if it's close or some such.

The CFP committee has never penalized a team for winning a CCG against a top quality (#11) opponent. This would be a new standard of “eye” test. That is comparable to rewarding Ohio State for not playing a game.

538 uses the CFP rankings as part of their input. So, each Tuesday night they update their predictions to reflect the new input.

ESPN does not look at human polls. Their sim uses variable weights on things like strength of schedule, most recent loss, game control, etc. They give 40% chance that the committee values metrics that make the Trojans look better than at least one other 1-loss team.

This may be true for a ‘typical’ committee, but the Allstate Playoff Predictor is blind to the fact that ‘this’ committee is already placing a heavier weight on USC-friendly metrics.

Strategically, I think the committee should have kept USC behind Ohio State to protect themselves from their own recency bias, because USC can justifiably jump the Buckeyes with a win over the Utes.

(11-28-2022 09:17 PM)Skyhawk Wrote:  

(11-28-2022 01:16 PM)Crayton Wrote:  How the Last Week Will Work
There will be no weekly award based on wins/losses. All that matters is the 4 teams selected next Sunday for the playoff. The Dummy Voter will not vote for you. If you skip this week, 0 points will be assigned to all teams.

You can alter your vote all the way until USC kicks off against Utah.

4 Minor Awards will go to the humans with the most points for each of the 4 playoff teams. 1 Major Award will go to the human with the most points for all 4 teams combined. Participation Trophies will be handed out with your final, overall rank (see graphic). Ties for awards will be decided by the pollster who most recently "won" a week; if the same week, the most recent before that will be used.

I'm not last? Apparently the bottom of the barrel award is more elusive than I thought : )

I am soooo tempted to add Ohio state instead of TCU... lol

5 Georgia
5 Michigan
5 TCU
5 USC

Soooo, is it too late to re-add ohio state?

lol

I feel for USC - that loss affected more than just that game, so many other things were on the line for them.

TCU loses. UNC is up on Clemson. Purdue gets an early TD. Georgia took care of business, but the Top 4 teams are preforming below expected.

Maybe some of us (me) with lots of points on Bama have a shot. ?

My NY6 expectations (not necessarily what I think should happen):

CFP
Peach Bowl: #1 Georgia vs #4 Alabama
Fiesta Bowl: #2 Michigan vs #3 Ohio St
NY6
Sugar Bowl: Tennessee vs Kansas St
Rose Bowl: Utah vs Penn St
Cotton Bowl: TCU vs Tulane
Orange Bowl: Clemson vs ???

The Orange Bowl will cause commotion. It's the ACC Champion (likely Clemson) against 1 of Notre Dame, B1G school, or SEC school. The highest ranked right now is LSU (#14). LSU lost by 20 to #1 Georgia in the SEC Championship Game. The next highest ranked is South Carolina (#19) followed by Notre Dame (#21). Do they give LSU the Orange Bowl? Does South Carolina get a chance to beat Clemson again? Do they give it to Notre Dame? Are they hoping Michigan loses to Purdue placing the Boilermakers in the Rose Bowl and sending Penn St to the Orange Bowl?

(12-03-2022 09:44 PM)BePcr07 Wrote:  My NY6 expectations (not necessarily what I think should happen):

CFP
Peach Bowl: #1 Georgia vs #4 Alabama
Fiesta Bowl: #2 Michigan vs #3 Ohio St
NY6
Sugar Bowl: Tennessee vs Kansas St
Rose Bowl: Utah vs Penn St
Cotton Bowl: TCU vs Tulane
Orange Bowl: Clemson vs ???

The Orange Bowl will cause commotion. It's the ACC Champion (likely Clemson) against 1 of Notre Dame, B1G school, or SEC school. The highest ranked right now is LSU (#14). LSU lost by 20 to #1 Georgia in the SEC Championship Game. The next highest ranked is South Carolina (#19) followed by Notre Dame (#21). Do they give LSU the Orange Bowl? Does South Carolina get a chance to beat Clemson again? Do they give it to Notre Dame? Are they hoping Michigan loses to Purdue placing the Boilermakers in the Rose Bowl and sending Penn St to the Orange Bowl?

The problem there is that any argument for Bama based on close losses to highly ranked teams is also true of TCU.

(12-03-2022 09:50 PM)Soobahk40050 Wrote:  

(12-03-2022 09:44 PM)BePcr07 Wrote:  My NY6 expectations (not necessarily what I think should happen):

CFP
Peach Bowl: #1 Georgia vs #4 Alabama
Fiesta Bowl: #2 Michigan vs #3 Ohio St
NY6
Sugar Bowl: Tennessee vs Kansas St
Rose Bowl: Utah vs Penn St
Cotton Bowl: TCU vs Tulane
Orange Bowl: Clemson vs ???

The Orange Bowl will cause commotion. It's the ACC Champion (likely Clemson) against 1 of Notre Dame, B1G school, or SEC school. The highest ranked right now is LSU (#14). LSU lost by 20 to #1 Georgia in the SEC Championship Game. The next highest ranked is South Carolina (#19) followed by Notre Dame (#21). Do they give LSU the Orange Bowl? Does South Carolina get a chance to beat Clemson again? Do they give it to Notre Dame? Are they hoping Michigan loses to Purdue placing the Boilermakers in the Rose Bowl and sending Penn St to the Orange Bowl?

The problem there is that any argument for Bama based on close losses to highly ranked teams is also true of TCU.

I think a 12-1 TCU whose only loss was to a Top 10 Kansas St in OT is worthy of the #4 seed. I just think they'll give it to Alabama. If it were how I'd vote:

CFP
Peach Bowl: #1 Georgia vs #4 TCU
Fiesta Bowl: #2 Michigan vs #3 Ohio St
NY6
Sugar Bowl: Alabama vs Kansas St
Rose Bowl: Utah vs Penn St
Orange Bowl: Clemson vs Tennessee
Cotton Bowl: USC vs Tulane

(11-30-2022 06:10 PM)Crayton Wrote:  

(11-30-2022 03:11 PM)Wahoowa84 Wrote:  

(11-30-2022 01:55 PM)Skyhawk Wrote:  

(11-30-2022 01:01 PM)Wahoowa84 Wrote:  Georgia 5
Michigan 5
TCU 4
USC 4
Ohio State 2


As an aside, I’m completely baffled by ESPN’s analytics group. They’re only giving USC a 20% chance of making the playoffs, although they believe that USC has a 38% of winning their only remaining game. Basically, ESPN is stating that the CFP doesn’t know how to select playoff teams and their proprietary algorithms are more useful than reality. By contrast, 538 is mathematically correctly predicting that USC’s chances of making the playoffs (@ 47%) is equal to their chances of beating Utah in the PAC CCG. ESPN has lost credibility…they need a refresher in high school statistics.

OTOH, I tried to play the odds all season…and fared badly by betting heavily on Alabama, Clemson and Ohio State. Only Ohio State has a shot.

Well, to guess at what they mean, maybe they think that USC could win, but the win by itself might not be enough to make cfp. if it's close or some such.

The CFP committee has never penalized a team for winning a CCG against a top quality (#11) opponent. This would be a new standard of “eye” test. That is comparable to rewarding Ohio State for not playing a game.

538 uses the CFP rankings as part of their input. So, each Tuesday night they update their predictions to reflect the new input.

ESPN does not look at human polls. Their sim uses variable weights on things like strength of schedule, most recent loss, game control, etc. They give 40% chance that the committee values metrics that make the Trojans look better than at least one other 1-loss team.

This may be true for a ‘typical’ committee, but the Allstate Playoff Predictor is blind to the fact that ‘this’ committee is already placing a heavier weight on USC-friendly metrics.

Strategically, I think the committee should have kept USC behind Ohio State to protect themselves from their own recency bias, because USC can justifiably jump the Buckeyes with a win over the Utes.

In other words…

538 tries to predict what the CFP Committee will do (by incorporating the Committee’s guidance from the previous rankings).
ESPN tries to influence what the CFP Committee should do (by disregarding the Committee’s, and other polls’, guidance).

Seems that the 538 methodology will be the more accurate predictor of playoff participants. 538 is using more of the available, relevant data.

(12-03-2022 10:25 PM)Wahoowa84 Wrote:  

(11-30-2022 06:10 PM)Crayton Wrote:  538 uses the CFP rankings as part of their input. So, each Tuesday night they update their predictions to reflect the new input.

ESPN does not look at human polls. Their sim uses variable weights on things like strength of schedule, most recent loss, game control, etc. They give 40% chance that the committee values metrics that make the Trojans look better than at least one other 1-loss team.

This may be true for a ‘typical’ committee, but the Allstate Playoff Predictor is blind to the fact that ‘this’ committee is already placing a heavier weight on USC-friendly metrics.

Strategically, I think the committee should have kept USC behind Ohio State to protect themselves from their own recency bias, because USC can justifiably jump the Buckeyes with a win over the Utes.

In other words…

538 tries to predict what the CFP Committee will do (by incorporating the Committee’s guidance from the previous rankings).
ESPN tries to influence what the CFP Committee should do (by disregarding the Committee’s, and other polls’, guidance).

Seems that the 538 methodology will be the more accurate predictor of playoff participants. 538 is using more of the available, relevant data.

The committee itself is fickle; what they value can change week to week and ESPN has (arguably) tried to account for that variability. The "USC-friendly metric" the committee was valuing may have been school name... which means Alabama may have a stronger case than either ESPN or fivethirtyeight think.

By most accounts the committee was rather presumptuous putting USC at #4 before they won anything (or maybe it was overreacting to the Buckeyes' loss, like the UT loss to South Carolina the week before). Now that the Trojans have lost too, I think ESPN's numbers overall are more accurate (1% on Clemson, not fivethirtyeight's 22% or my 0%).

As mentioned, somewhere, Massey-Peabody had a gig with the Washington Post for 2 years predicting the playoff. They also accounted for the 'this year' committee, but had more realistic playoff odds than fivethirtyeight. A shame they weren't renewed.

"Influence"? I'm not sure they are 'trying' to influence the outcome, but as a large voice in sports they certainly have that capacity. Like the polls, the committee can say those rankings don't matter, but we all know they do. ESPN still relies more on talking heads than FPI and "The Allstate Playoff Predictor". If their talking heads were gaming scenarios with the Predictor (maybe they are?) I think we can justifiably call that "influencing".

(12-03-2022 10:15 PM)BePcr07 Wrote:  I think a 12-1 TCU whose only loss was to a Top 10 Kansas St in OT is worthy of the #4 seed. I just think they'll give it to Alabama. If it were how I'd vote:

CFP
Peach Bowl: #1 Georgia vs #4 TCU
Fiesta Bowl: #2 Michigan vs #3 Ohio St
NY6
Sugar Bowl: Alabama vs Kansas St
Rose Bowl: Utah vs Penn St
Orange Bowl: Clemson vs Tennessee
Cotton Bowl: USC vs Tulane

I can see that (both the "should" as well as the "will").

No idea what the committee will do. Announcers (ABC) during the XII game seemed pretty confident TCU would make it. I could even see TCU staying at #3 because of their "close loss" compared to Ohio State (but really to split the two BT teams).

If Clemson blows out UNC does their "championship" vault them all the way to #4? The fact that that is even a question, leaves a bad taste in my mouth. I really wish they would move to an open-source ranking algorithm; perhaps with low resolution so the committee can still be used to break ties.

The playoff teams WILL be as follows:

1. Georgia
2. Michigan
3. Ohio State
4. TCU

According to ESPN, TCU's strength of schedule compared to Ohio State and Alabama is actually better than either one. Also, they have the same record against teams currently in the Top 25 (2-1) as the Buckeyes and a better record thana Alabama in the same category (2-2). And before anybody else says anything, Alabama lost TWICE! TCU only lost once: In its conference title game. In overtime. So that should count for something. Kansas State is currently a Top 15 team anyway so it's not like they lost to someone who's unranked.

But of course, people like quo are gonna troll. (Tulane beat the Big XII champion. So friggin' what, sparky? That happened earlier in the season. And really, Tulane had a hell of a turnaround this year. Quit crapping on their season.)