David Shaw: CFP should look at full schedules

[TexasExes98]

I like Shaw, always have, however, he just sounds whiny. Win all your games, period. Who cares if you schedule some FCS welding school in November, don't get beat by the likes of San Diego State in OOC and take care of business during conference play. No PAC team was worthy of a playoff berth last year, not even USC. SC has been blasted by teams outside their weak conference the last 2 years in a row with the exception of PSU in the Rose Bowl, but even then they got lucky as hell against the Nittany Lions. Anyway, the PAC looks like it will be the weakest P5 conference again this year so I don't think any team from that conference can afford to lose one game.

 

[outofyourmind]

Potato Salad. You left out Potato Salad. :smh:

 

[Deep Creek]

This is what is most important to the CFP Committee:

1. Name on the Jersey
2. How much money it will generate
3. Blah Blah Blah
4. Blah Blah Blah
5. Blah Blah Blah
6. Some more shit
7. More Blah
8. Strength of Schedule

Did I leave anything out????

Should have stopped at #2.

 

[NolePride]

Total load of crap. I posted the numbers .... it's the ACC & SEC that don't venture out to play teams out of their comfort zone. The PAC, B1G, and Big 12 play home & aways with P5 teams across the country. Both the ACC & SEC have four OOC games every season yet they play the least amount of P5 teams. Go figure eh.

Nonsense.

Here is the Top 10 for reg season scheduled games vs OOC teams
from the Other Power Conf. (Since 1998...the start of the BCS era)

Syracuse 48
USC 46
Fla St 45
Clemson 39
Ga Tech 38
UNC 36
VPI 31
UCLA 31
Stanford 31
W Forest 30
Duke 30

To save embarrassment I didn't even type Washington's numbers.

USC travels the country...always has...but the rest stay huddled
in some safe space, guarded by Illegal aliens.

 

[NolePride]

IIRC, there are only a handful of teams playing 2 P5s OOC this year. USC, Purdue, Ohio State, Texas, & West Virginia. (Washington if BYU is considered P5) I may have missed one. Seems like there were a couple of others.

And there are 5 ACC schools playing multiple games vs P5 teams w/o BYU)
Fla St
Clemson
Louisville
Duke
Pitt

 

[nddulac]

And there are 5 ACC schools playing multiple games vs P5 teams w/o BYU)
Fla St
Clemson
Louisville
Duke
Pitt

This is why the effects of replacing an OOC game with a conference game would increase the average strength of schedule for the SEC more than for the ACC - because the ACC plays, on average, a tougher schedule out of conference.

Added in edit: I'm going to walk that back a bit. That statement is true of the 2017 season, but not true in the previous three (2016, 2015, 2014).

 

[Kaplony]

Here is an analysis of the ACC from last year, using my final computer ratings. I did this three times.

1. Drop the highest rated FBS team from the out-of-conference schedule, while still maintaining at least one P5 opponent, and replace that team with the average of the conference.
2. Drop the lowest rated FBS team from the OOC schedule, and replace that with the conference average.
3. Drop the average of the FBS teams on the OOC schedule, and replace that with the conference average.

The results were:
1. In the first case (the best possible scenario for 4down20’s hypothesis that an extra conference game doesn’t matter) the average conference strength of schedule decreased slightly (by 0.04 points per game.)
2. In the second case (the least favorable to 4down20’s case) the average conference SOS increased by 1.7 points per game.
3. In the third case (the most balanced of the three), the average conference strength of schedule increased by 0.4 points per game.

So the conclusion here is that 4down20 is wrong. Playing an extra conference game would increase the strength of schedule on average for a top conference such as (in this case) the ACC in 2017.

One problem: Your using incompatible data to reach your conclusion. You are assuming that your ratings would be the same in each scenario but we've already established that a 9 game conference schedule ensures an additional loss for half of your conference so the ratings wouldn't be the same in both scenarios.

But regardless, there is absolutely no figuring required to know that Clemson's SOS would go down significantly if we had played Duke (the next Coastal team up in the rotation) instead of Auburn last year and that's all I care about. I'm a Clemson fan, not some conference nut-rider making excuses for why their conference has been left out of the playoffs twice and half the time they did make it got absolutely curbstomped.

 

[nddulac]

Added in edit: I'm going to walk that back a bit. That statement is true of the 2017 season, but not true in the previous three (2016, 2015, 2014).

Going down a rabbit hole here ...

I'm not sure that is a fair assessment either. Rather than looking only at average schedule strength, it might be more instructive to look at the difference between the average team rating and the average schedule strength. By that metric, the tougher OOC schedule goes to

2017: SEC
2016: SEC
2015: ACC
2014: ACC

One reason that the two are probably close is that those teams that play more than one OOC P5 opponent regularly do it because of a fixed cross-conference rivalry like Louisville/Kentucky, Florida/Florida State, or Clemson/South Carolina. All of these affect both conferences.

 

[nddulac]

One problem: Your using incompatible data to reach your conclusion. You are assuming that your ratings would be the same in each scenario but we've already established that a 9 game conference schedule ensures an additional loss for half of your conference so the ratings wouldn't be the same in both scenarios.

But it also ensures a win for half of the conference. In the end, the average strength of schedule for the conference would be unaffected.

Again: math

 

[4down20]

What was that you were saying again? It would be Georgia because you already have Missouri in your rotation and you're adding a 9th conference game. And you said adding that 9th P5 opponent (Georgia) in place of any OOC opponent would lower your SOS. You're completely full of shit.

No, it would have been Missouri, Georgia isn't up for rotation for another 4 years.

Try again.

 

[4down20]

Those teams prove the point that 8 conference games would be easier. Cal and Colorado would have been .500 if they played an 4th OOC instead of a conference opponent.

/sigh -it depends on opponent that gets replaced.

 

[Deep Creek]

One problem: Your using incompatible data to reach your conclusion. You are assuming that your ratings would be the same in each scenario but we've already established that a 9 game conference schedule ensures an additional loss for half of your conference so the ratings wouldn't be the same in both scenarios.

But regardless, there is absolutely no figuring required to know that Clemson's SOS would go down significantly if we had played Duke (the next Coastal team up in the rotation) instead of Auburn last year and that's all I care about. I'm a Clemson fan, not some conference nut-rider making excuses for why their conference has been left out of the playoffs twice and half the time they did make it got absolutely curbstomped.

Would your SOS have gone down if you had payed Duke instead of Kent State? Don't think so.

That said, Clemson normally plays 2 P5s every year. That's better than 90% of P5 schools.

 

[Kaplony]

But it also ensures a win for half of the conference. In the end, the average strength of schedule for the conference would be unaffected.

Again: math

LOL

Take away Duke's highest ranked FBS OOC game last year and you replace Northwestern. A game they won.

Instead they get Clemson, a game they would have lost.

Now Duke is 5-7 in the regular season instead of 6-6 and they don't get the chance to beat NIU in the Quick Lane Bowl to finish 7-6 and their ranking is lower in your "rankings" which lowers Clemson's ranking.

 

[Kaplony]

Would your SOS have gone down if you had payed Duke instead of Kent State? Don't think so.

That said, Clemson normally plays 2 P5s every year. That's better than 90% of P5 schools.

That wasn't the premise of the scenario we were discussing.

But for the record, when the ACC tried to go to 9 games a few years back the only G5 game we dropped was to keep the UGA series and that was only because of a fanbase revolt. We did drop series with Ole Miss and Oklahoma State though.

We make too much money from home games to sacrifice one for an additional H&H outside of South Carolina with a 9 game conference slate.

 

[4down20]

This is why you are a poor judge of what constitutes "bad math".

Since I reported the average strength of schedule, the fluctuations caused by having some teams play strong teams and other play weak teams mathematically cancel one another, and the result on the average strength of schedule is unchanged from what you get if you simply use the average for each team.

Except the majority of those teams stay on the schedule every fucking year anyway dipshit. The majority of the strength in the SEC is in the SEC West. The majority of the strength of the Big10 is in the Big10 East.

If you are too stupid to understand that the conference average is different from division to division in each conference as a result of the teams being rotated being different, then you are even dumber than I thought. There is no such thing as "conference average" that applies when the rotations is only a few teams while the majority of the schedule is set with the same teams every year.

This is where a basic understanding of high school algebra is useful. Unfortunately, you have just demonstrated a lack of that level of understanding.

You're a professor right? Because you lack the ability to actually apply the math to the real world, as you've demonstrated here.

 

[Deep Creek]

No, it would have been Missouri, Georgia isn't up for rotation for another 4 years.

Try again.

Tell me that ain't accurate?

If it is, one Bama class would go through their entire eligibility without playing Georgia....if you hadn't played them in the NCG last year or a CCG some year?

 

[Deep Creek]

That wasn't the premise of the scenario we were discussing.

But for the record, when the ACC tried to go to 9 games a few years back the only G5 game we dropped was to keep the UGA series and that was only because of a fanbase revolt. We did drop series with Ole Miss and Oklahoma State though.

We make too much money from home games to sacrifice one for an additional H&H outside of South Carolina with a 9 game conference slate.

That's the reason all of them do it. Even though the majority of your fans don't really want to see Kent State or the Citadel, they haven't revolted enough to hit the school's pocketbook.

 

[Rolltide94]

That's the reason all of them do it. Even though the majority of your fans don't really want to see Kent State or the Citadel, they haven't revolted enough to hit the school's pocketbook.

Kent State is what allows us to afford to buy all the polish for our fleshlights...the cost of polish is too damn high!

 

[Kaplony]

That's the reason all of them do it. Even though the majority of your fans don't really want to see Kent State or the Citadel, they haven't revolted enough to hit the school's pocketbook.

Our fans want to see home games, not watch one on TV.

 

[RoyUte]

No, it would have been Missouri, Georgia isn't up for rotation for another 4 years.

Try again.

Hey dumb fuck, you already have Missouri on the schedule, you are adding a 9th. Are you going to continue to ignore that you said replacing any of your OOC games with a 9th P5 (Georgia) would make your SOS go down or are you going to answer that?