Much appreciation to the tens of readers who took part in the Hurt and Helped Themselves columns. With so much of the season in the books, we (or I) can get a jump on what the members of the CFB Playoff committee should be thinking (if they’re playing with a full deck).
There’s no real formula I use for this, but if there were, it’d be something along the lines of Record + Good wins x 0.2 (games put on the schedule that looked like reasonably decent efforts to strain yourself out of conference) /assumed strength of schedule the remainder of the way.
It’s basically common sense. What is your record? Who have you defeated on the way to that record? If you have a good record and didn’t defeat anyone really all that good, did you at least attempt to put someone worth a sneeze on the schedule and get unlucky that they didn’t turn out good (Ohio State, TCU), or did you just bring a gun to a stick fight and then tell everyone you kicked a bunch of people’s butts at the party (Baylor)?
Then, you look at whom you play down the road and guess the likelihood of who makes it in. This is not a “who deserves to be the top four NOW.” Go to our poll for that stuff. It is a compilation of who deserves it, divided by who is most likely to get in.
Let’s go to the committee’s meeting room:
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In the Club
1. Ohio State: The Buckeyes started turning the screws on folks around this time last year. We all know what happened in the end.
2. Clemson: Don’t overlook road games at Miami and N.C. State the next two weeks. Clemson is heavily better than everyone on its remaining schedule, save Florida State, and the Tigers get the ‘Noles at home.
3. Utah: The Utes, by virtue of playing in the Pac-12, have a tougher row to hoe than Clemson, otherwise they’d be up there at 2.
4. Alabama: It’s tough to see where the Tide lose another game, plus they get LSU at home, where you’ll be able to see a team stack 11 in the box and still possibly win.
Outside, drinks in hand, waiting for it to not be at capacity
5. TCU: The Horned Frogs get Baylor at home, but surely giving up points like your cranky old neighbor gives out toothbrushes on Halloween will catch up to them, no?
6. Michigan State: Sparty has only two road games left; the only problem is that one is against Ohio State in what will likely be a winner take all (assuming your version of “all” is the Big Ten East) situation and a playoff elimination game.
7. Baylor: Folks love Baylor, but so far it’s been like your mid-week over-35 basketball league and Dirk Nowitski starts showing up. Give me something more than that to go on.
8. LSU: A game at Alabama looms. So does a game at Ole Miss. One of these is not entirely like the other. Still, you’ve got to stop that offensive line from eating souls to knock the Tigers out.
At home, waiting for Uber (Please Advertise?) to get there
9. Oklahoma State: The Cowboys play literally everyone of consequence at home this year, which is nice. They’re still probably too young, but much more odd things have happened. People thinking Macklemore is good at music, for instance …
10. Iowa: The Hawkeyes finish up with Indiana, Minnesota, Purdue, and Nebraska. They’re unbeaten. Eventually, we assume they’ll need to play someone of consequence from the East.
11. Memphis: I want to see the Tigers win out, just to see the kvetching and the squirming as the committee whispers things into the mic accidentally thinking it’s on a commercial break like, “The Grizzlies play football too?”
12. Florida State: Much like Iowa, the schedule is such that one slip-up is probably the end of days for their, but as of now, the Seminoles have a cold one and they’re just waiting on that ride. The difference is, unlike Clemson, they play a team still playing for something in the SEC East (Florida) to close out the season.
Got caught trying to get in with a fake ID (reserved for teams on the verge of getting themselves kicked out).
13. Florida
14. Notre Dame
15. Oklahoma
16. Texas A&M
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