Preseason Predictions Topic

You'd pick every game in the preseason?  That seems like a hopeless waste of time.
9/5/2013 9:16 AM
Posted by AlCheez on 9/5/2013 9:16:00 AM (view original):
You'd pick every game in the preseason?  That seems like a hopeless waste of time.
If I was a voter, I would do that.  Ideally I would have a computer program or excel sheet that would allow me to input the schedules and link the teams with my projected result and then the actual result and alert me to differences.
9/5/2013 9:26 AM
You do realize if you were a voter that you'd have a full-time job that was what resulted in you being a voter, right?
9/5/2013 9:32 AM
Posted by AlCheez on 9/5/2013 9:33:00 AM (view original):
You do realize if you were a voter that you'd have a full-time job that was what resulted in you being a voter, right?
Yep.  I could go through every game in about an hour and pick the winner of every single game.  The harder part would be compiling and keeping track, which is why I would want to use a program that remembers all of that, pulls results automatically (if possible), and then links everything together.
9/5/2013 11:34 AM
Seems like moranis is making a little sense but making it more difficult than necessary.   Picking every game is a waste of time.    Is Kentucky going to challenge the top 25?   New Mexico State?    Settle on a top 30-35 and pick the first 4-5 weeks.   There probably aren't that many SC/GA, ND/MI, LSU/TCU, AL/TAMU type games on the docket anyway.   Adjust as needed. 
9/5/2013 11:35 AM
Posted by moranis on 9/5/2013 11:34:00 AM (view original):
Posted by AlCheez on 9/5/2013 9:33:00 AM (view original):
You do realize if you were a voter that you'd have a full-time job that was what resulted in you being a voter, right?
Yep.  I could go through every game in about an hour and pick the winner of every single game.  The harder part would be compiling and keeping track, which is why I would want to use a program that remembers all of that, pulls results automatically (if possible), and then links everything together.
The initial picks is one thing (and I think an hour is pretty quick if you're making thoughtful enough picks to use as a basis for this) but I think the keeping up with it would be a way bigger mess than you're accounting for once you get more than a week or two and start having a bunch of legit deviations from your predictions.  It's not just keeping track - every time you miss you have to completely deal with a domino effect in schedules and so forth.   Unless just you're talking about basically building a computer program that spits out rankings for you based on the combination of your predictions and the actual results, as opposed to you actually evaluating things each week.
9/5/2013 11:47 AM (edited)
Posted by MikeT23 on 9/5/2013 11:35:00 AM (view original):
Seems like moranis is making a little sense but making it more difficult than necessary.   Picking every game is a waste of time.    Is Kentucky going to challenge the top 25?   New Mexico State?    Settle on a top 30-35 and pick the first 4-5 weeks.   There probably aren't that many SC/GA, ND/MI, LSU/TCU, AL/TAMU type games on the docket anyway.   Adjust as needed. 
Yes, I actually pretty much agree with the overall premise, I just think trying to completely micro-manage like this is pretty unrealistic for a voter given that voting isn't your actual job.
9/5/2013 11:49 AM
FWIW, looking at the scheds of the three teams I've been yammering about(Clemson, GA, SC), I'd have taken GA over Clemson and SC over GA had I been asked a week ago.   Now, not that GA needed an incentive to win against SC, I think I'd go the other way.   The fans should be out of their mind and crowd noise is a bigger deal in college.   IMO, SC has to jump out to a lead to shut them up so they can run their offense.    No matter what happens, Clemson only has two losable games on their sched now, FSU and SC, so they'll disappear from the radar.   SC shouldn't really be tested until FL after this week.   And GA, if they lose this week, gets a week off(essentially) before they face LSU.   If they drop the first two, I wouldn't bet the GA/LSU game with your money as the GA team could go either way at that point.

Anyway, despite all that yammering, I'd have picked all three to go 10-2 before the season.   Clemson drops 2 of their 3 tough games, GA drops 2 of their 4 tough games(including the FL game with the other three) and SC drops 2 of their three tough ones(or blows it against someone like Vandy or TN).
9/5/2013 1:48 PM
Posted by AlCheez on 9/5/2013 11:47:00 AM (view original):
Posted by moranis on 9/5/2013 11:34:00 AM (view original):
Posted by AlCheez on 9/5/2013 9:33:00 AM (view original):
You do realize if you were a voter that you'd have a full-time job that was what resulted in you being a voter, right?
Yep.  I could go through every game in about an hour and pick the winner of every single game.  The harder part would be compiling and keeping track, which is why I would want to use a program that remembers all of that, pulls results automatically (if possible), and then links everything together.
The initial picks is one thing (and I think an hour is pretty quick if you're making thoughtful enough picks to use as a basis for this) but I think the keeping up with it would be a way bigger mess than you're accounting for once you get more than a week or two and start having a bunch of legit deviations from your predictions.  It's not just keeping track - every time you miss you have to completely deal with a domino effect in schedules and so forth.   Unless just you're talking about basically building a computer program that spits out rankings for you based on the combination of your predictions and the actual results, as opposed to you actually evaluating things each week.
I don't think it would be all that difficult to really keep track, because the reality is you only have to submit 25 teams each week, most of which even if they move around are going to be the same teams all year long.  As mike says, there really are only going to be 35 teams or so that should ever make this sort of ranking unless you are just terrible at picking games.

For the record, my preseason top 6 on this method would be 1. Alabama 2. Ohio State 3. Oregon 4. Stanford 5. Clemson 6. Louisville.  I think the first two will be 13-0, Oregon will be 12-1 (loss at Washington), Stanford (loss vs. Oregon) 11-1, Clemson12-1 (loss at S. Carolina), Louisville 11-1 (loss at Cincinnati).  Thus both Louisville and Clemson I have falling from the ranks of the unbeatens in their last regular season game.  I haven't gone any further than that, but I suspect I would have 7-10 all from the SEC, but again I didn't go through enough of the schedules to do that.  Those records are also obviously after the conference championships.
9/5/2013 3:14 PM (edited)
Yeah, but you can't ignore the rest of the teams, unless you're not really going to be looking at schedule strength when doing you're doing your ranking analysis after the preseason.  Since you said you would factor that into the initial rankings, I assumed that would continue.

For instance, say Clemson's season goes exactly as you anticipated.  You said earlier that that would mean that they couldn't move up past anyone who didn't lose a game you didn't expect them to lose.  I assume the converse would be true that no one behind them could move past them unless they won a game they were "supposed" to lose.  But what if several of Clemson's opponents over-perform your expectations?  Or under-perform?  Or the same for teams around them?  And there's always several teams that really surprise and several that really disappoint - doesn't there come a point in the season where it becomes silly to be basing your rankings off of predictions made about those teams in the pre-season?
9/5/2013 2:48 PM (edited)
You don't have to ignore the teams, but you also don't have to pay as close attention as you are saying either.  I mean the conference games are mostly just going to wash out (if Penn State is 4-4 in the Big 10 as opposed to 6-2, but Wisconsin is 6-2 instead of 4-4, it basically washes out).  So the non-con is where you really need to watch these things and most of that is done by the fifth week, when you aren't going to have much movement anyway.

But yeah if the Pac 12 as a whole underperforms a bit while the ACC overperforms then yeah, Clemson could maybe move ahead of Stanford or Oregon or whatever.

9/5/2013 3:13 PM
Posted by stinenavy on 8/30/2013 12:31:00 PM (view original):
I'll throw some picks out there.

I think it'll be one of Oregon or Stanford (I'll pick Stanford since they are at home) vs Louisville for the NC.

Oklahoma wins the Big 12, and their BCS bowl game.
Oklahoma won a BCS bowl game. So I got one thing right.


LOL at moranis hyping up Florida...
1/3/2014 1:10 AM
Posted by stinenavy on 1/3/2014 1:10:00 AM (view original):
Posted by stinenavy on 8/30/2013 12:31:00 PM (view original):
I'll throw some picks out there.

I think it'll be one of Oregon or Stanford (I'll pick Stanford since they are at home) vs Louisville for the NC.

Oklahoma wins the Big 12, and their BCS bowl game.
Oklahoma won a BCS bowl game. So I got one thing right.


LOL at moranis hyping up Florida...
yeah not so great from me, though I too had Oklahoma winning a BCS bowl game.
1/3/2014 6:19 AM
Posted by MikeT23 on 9/5/2013 1:48:00 PM (view original):
FWIW, looking at the scheds of the three teams I've been yammering about(Clemson, GA, SC), I'd have taken GA over Clemson and SC over GA had I been asked a week ago.   Now, not that GA needed an incentive to win against SC, I think I'd go the other way.   The fans should be out of their mind and crowd noise is a bigger deal in college.   IMO, SC has to jump out to a lead to shut them up so they can run their offense.    No matter what happens, Clemson only has two losable games on their sched now, FSU and SC, so they'll disappear from the radar.   SC shouldn't really be tested until FL after this week.   And GA, if they lose this week, gets a week off(essentially) before they face LSU.   If they drop the first two, I wouldn't bet the GA/LSU game with your money as the GA team could go either way at that point.

Anyway, despite all that yammering, I'd have picked all three to go 10-2 before the season.   Clemson drops 2 of their 3 tough games, GA drops 2 of their 4 tough games(including the FL game with the other three) and SC drops 2 of their three tough ones(or blows it against someone like Vandy or TN).
Holy ****.  Forgot about this one.

Clemson-loses to FSU/SC
SC-blows one against TN
GA-stunk up the joint mostly due to injuries
1/3/2014 7:19 AM
1/3/2014 12:35 PM
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