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The coaches are this myopic? - OutsiderFan - 09-04-2018

The new coaches poll is out, and features Stanford at #9 and Washington at #11.

Let's get this straight. Washington largely outplays #9 Auburn in a virtual home game for the Tigers 3,000 miles from Seattle, and the Huskies fall 5 spots after a close loss. Meanwhile, Stanford beats a MWC team at home while being held to 50 yards rushing, and Stanford moves up 4 spots? Even worse, Penn State needs OT to beat Appalachian State at home, and they are ranked ahead of Washington also?

Some coaches shouldn't be voting.  Here's a more accurate Top 10:

1. Alabama
2. Clemson
3. Georgia
4. Ohio State
5. Auburn
6. Oklahoma
7. Wisconsin
8. Notre Dame
9. Washington
10. Stanford

RE: The coaches are this myopic? - stupac2 - 09-04-2018

I mean, the coaches poll has always been really dumb, it's not worth getting too worked up about.

I'm kind of surprised Stanford is at #9, you'd think that people would see Love's disastrous showing and discount us going forward, aerial fireworks aside. I guess we'll see what the thinking people do when the AP poll comes out.

RE: The coaches are this myopic? - JPR36 - 09-04-2018

(09-04-2018, 11:39 AM)stupac2 Wrote:  I mean, the coaches poll has always been really dumb, it's not worth getting too worked up about.

I'm kind of surprised Stanford is at #9, you'd think that people would see Love's disastrous showing and discount us going forward, aerial fireworks aside. I guess we'll see what the thinking people do when the AP poll comes out.

That's one way of looking at it. Another way would be "well, if the other team's defense figures out a way to stop Love, Stanford can beat them through the air."
Then again, I can't help wondering how much the coaches really study the details of all the other games. I could see them saying Stanford beat a pretty decent team (SDSU) by three touchdowns, so they must be good.

RE: The coaches are this myopic? - OutsiderFan - 09-04-2018

(09-04-2018, 11:49 AM)JPR36 Wrote:  
(09-04-2018, 11:39 AM)stupac2 Wrote:  I mean, the coaches poll has always been really dumb, it's not worth getting too worked up about.

I'm kind of surprised Stanford is at #9, you'd think that people would see Love's disastrous showing and discount us going forward, aerial fireworks aside. I guess we'll see what the thinking people do when the AP poll comes out.

That's one way of looking at it. Another way would be "well, if the other team's defense figures out a way to stop Love, Stanford can beat them through the air."
Then again, I can't help wondering how much the coaches really study the details of all the other games. I could see them saying Stanford beat a pretty decent team (SDSU) by three touchdowns, so they must be good.

Surely they did, but if coaches are going to punish Washington for barely losing to Auburn, and reward Penn State for barely beating App State, what is the point of scheduling tough teams? Are coaches really saying they want to have easier opponents? Because they are the ones voting in their poll.  

I realize they aren't the CFP Committee and the committee probably would have UW ranked higher than PSU, but it's still a bad look, IMO.

RE: The coaches are this myopic? - JPR36 - 09-04-2018

(09-04-2018, 11:54 AM)OutsiderFan Wrote:  
(09-04-2018, 11:49 AM)JPR36 Wrote:  
(09-04-2018, 11:39 AM)stupac2 Wrote:  I mean, the coaches poll has always been really dumb, it's not worth getting too worked up about.

I'm kind of surprised Stanford is at #9, you'd think that people would see Love's disastrous showing and discount us going forward, aerial fireworks aside. I guess we'll see what the thinking people do when the AP poll comes out.

That's one way of looking at it. Another way would be "well, if the other team's defense figures out a way to stop Love, Stanford can beat them through the air."
Then again, I can't help wondering how much the coaches really study the details of all the other games. I could see them saying Stanford beat a pretty decent team (SDSU) by three touchdowns, so they must be good.

Surely they did, but if coaches are going to punish Washington for barely losing to Auburn, and reward Penn State for barely beating App State, what is the point of scheduling tough teams? Are coaches really saying they want to have easier opponents? Because they are the ones voting in their poll.  

I realize they aren't the CFP Committee and the committee probably would have UW ranked higher than PSU, but it's still a bad look, IMO.

Hey, I agree with you. There's a reason why coaches like body bag games.

RE: The coaches are this myopic? - Goose - 09-04-2018

It also could be that the coach's think Washington is overrated to begin with. They are at best the same team that didn't win the PAC-12 North last year. Why are they world-beaters this year? I think the coach's may be taking this into account and correcting an initial problem. If Washington won, OK, maybe they are improved over last year. They didn't win, so.....

RE: The coaches are this myopic? - OutsiderFan - 09-04-2018

AP is now out and it looks more reasonable. Pretty much my ranking, with Auburn and Wisconsin flipped.  Don't really see how Wisconsin should be ahead of Auburn given Auburn has the best win of any team right now, but whatever.

1. Alabama
2. Clemson
3. Georgia
4. Ohio State
5. Wisconsin
6. Oklahoma
7. Auburn
8. Notre Dame
9. Washington
10. Stanford

RE: The coaches are this myopic? - qwerty49 - 09-04-2018

(09-04-2018, 11:39 AM)stupac2 Wrote:  I mean, the coaches poll has always been really dumb, it's not worth getting too worked up about.

I'm kind of surprised Stanford is at #9, you'd think that people would see Love's disastrous showing and discount us going forward, aerial fireworks aside. I guess we'll see what the thinking people do when the AP poll comes out.

This was all about the scoreboard.  31-10 is a good thumping, even though those of us at the game were certainly not too impressed with all those 3 and outs in the first half.

RE: The coaches are this myopic? - washingtonismoney - 09-04-2018

(09-04-2018, 01:47 PM)qwerty49 Wrote:  This was all about the scoreboard.  31-10 is a good thumping, even though those of us at the game were certainly not too impressed with all those 3 and outs in the first half.

I mean, if we're going really granular, probably important to distinguish some of the first-half drives:
FIRST DRIVE: reasonably successful offensively, marred by missed FG and miscommunication 
SECOND DRIVE: unsuccessful, but another miscommunication (this time to JJAW) plays starring role in obstructing success
THIRD DRIVE: sort of a moderate drive (5 plays/25 yards) aided by personal foul call; a missed third-and-medium

The next two drives -- fourth and fifth -- were the sole three-and-outs in the first half. Then the offense got to passing, and passing more successfully, just before halftime. And that was that. 

So a large part of the offensive misadentures in the first half were errors you'd think will get ironed out as the season progresses. That's not to absolve the coaches, who I think took a poor approach to the game until the end of the first half. But it's a little simplistic to say "first half bad, second half good."

RE: The coaches are this myopic? - CornFed - 09-04-2018

Simplistic, but accurate.

RE: The coaches are this myopic? - BostonCard - 09-04-2018

(09-04-2018, 11:29 AM)OutsiderFan Wrote:  The new coaches poll is out, and features Stanford at #9 and Washington at #11.

Let's get this straight. Washington largely outplays #9 Auburn in a virtual home game for the Tigers 3,000 miles from Seattle, and the Huskies fall 5 spots after a close loss. 

First of all, with one game played, the functional difference between a team ranking #11 (as the coaches did) and #9 as you ranked them is insignificant.  Pretty much every ranking right now has a big margin of error, and a 2 position difference is just meaningless.  Even well into the season, a two position ranking difference is effectively noise beyond the second or third ranked team.  So, I don't know why you are upset at the coaches.

Secondly, given that there's a lot of uncertainty around every ranking, every data point is important.  Thus, a loss, even to an expected good team should be damaging to ranking.  Why?  Well, part of Washington's pre-season ranking at #6 is the recognition that it might be better than 6 and it might be worse than 6.  Losing to a presumed good team doesn't mean that a top-10 ranking is out of the cards, but it does suggest that unless the outcome of that game was an outlier, that it is unlikely that Washington is an elite (top-5 team).  On the other hand, we don't know if they would also lose a game to a somewhat weaker team, since they haven't played.  Nor do we know if Auburn is as good as we think it is (it beat Washington, so you can presume it's not bad, but you could easily see a situation where Auburn is, after a few losses, ranked a something like #15, and Washington, after a couple of losses is hanging around #20).  So, if you figure Washington might reasonably be as good as #6 and reasonably as bad as #20 (depending on what subsequent games show), a ranking at #11 might be a reasonable place to slot them while you wait for more data.  Or you could slot them at #9, after all, this early the two rankings are basically identical.

From a Bayesian perspective, you figure current ranking = prior ranking + game results.  In most cases, because the likely outcome happened (Stanford was a 14-point favorite and won, the only new thing we know is that the downside risk, that Stanford is a middling or worse team, is less likely, even though it was a lowish probability event to begin with).  With Washington, they lost a game they were just one point dogs, so that loss is pretty informative.

But here's the thing, we have a whole new slate of games this week to further update our priors.  Washington plays North Dakota, so unless Washington loses, that game will not be informative.  On the other hand, Stanford plays USC as a 4-ish point favorite.  If we win that game, like Auburn's win against USC it will establish that, unless USC was massively overrated or the game was a fluke, Stanford is unlikely to be worse than a good team.  Lose to USC, and, like UW, you can reasonably say that we are unlikely to be elite.

BC

RE: The coaches are this myopic? - StanfordMatt - 09-04-2018

They should really rename the poll to the “Amway Administrative Assistants to the Head Coach Poll” but I guess that doesn’t have the same ring to it.

RE: The coaches are this myopic? Pac12 = 6 votes - ADPinWDC - 09-04-2018

Looks like 6 of the Pac12 coaches get a vote, out of 65 cast each week.  
https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/ncaaf/2018/08/02/amway-coaches-poll-65-college-football-coaches-panel/881592002/ 
With pollling driving Playoffs ultimately, one would expect the ACC, SEC and B1G to look out for each other and push the Pac12 down a couple clicks if they can; ditto on the Big12.  We need to beat ranked teams out of conference early, period.  WASH failed.  
We get a shot at NDAM on Sept 29 -- since they beat MICH, a win in South Bend gives us two other horses to pull our cart:  NDAM and MICH. 
AZST gets a shot at MIST on Saturday, so a Devils win could help us down the line.  
After WASH vs AUBN and STAN vs NDAM, there are not many games on the slate to help us.  
[I do not expect UCLA to beat @OKLA, and U$C and NDAM do not play until the last game of the season in LA.]  
A majority of pundits see any Pac12 Champ having TWO losses -- OUT, again.

RE: The coaches are this myopic? - Hulk01 - 09-05-2018

Washington could have won, but to my eyes appeared to be outpowered by a very good but certainly not great team.

RE: The coaches are this myopic? - cardcrimson - 09-05-2018

(09-04-2018, 08:10 PM)StanfordMatt Wrote:  They should really rename the poll to the “Amway Administrative Assistants to the Head Coach Poll” but I guess that doesn’t have the same ring to it.

Exactly. The real coaches don't pay any attention to the poll until it starts to matter later in the season. Been lots of stories about it over the years.