[washingtonismoney]

So what's the point of a season:  to get to the NC game (prove yourself more deserving than all but one other team in the nation), or just to be a really good team?

False choice. The point of being a really good team is to give yourself the best chance of getting to, and winning, the national championship game.

Let me ask you this: do you think Stanford should have been in the NC game in any of the last 5 years (i.e., that Stanford  underperformed to talent)?  Despite Stanford's gaudy record over that span, I think that's a legit question.

Do I think they should have? Absolutely not; it's silly to suggest otherwise, for any team in college football. Because the field is limited to two teams, luck plays by far the biggest role in determining who goes and who doesn't. It's really just basic math. A team that has a 90% chance of winning each and every game only has a ~25% chance of being undefeated over 13 games.

And given the difficulty of Stanford's schedule over the past five years, it's silly to think Stanford had those kind of odds to begin with. Everyone, even the most talented, slip up. Whether it's Florida losing to Ole Miss or Alabama falling to Texas A&M, teams slip up. Stanford isn't exempt; it's fan blindness to think otherwise.

So that's not how I judge it. I think coaches put teams in position to be one of the seven or so best teams in the country and see what happens from there. They had the talent to do so -- and did -- in 2010 and 2013. They didn't really have the talent in 2012; winning the conference and the Rose Bowl was overachieving. 2011 is the closest Stanford has come to underachievement given the talent on hand, and I really don't think it was all that great. (Esp. with the number of injuries.)

[washingtonismoney]

So what's the point of a season:  to get to the NC game (prove yourself more deserving than all but one other team in the nation), or just to be a really good team?

False choice. The point of being a really good team is to give yourself the best chance of getting to, and winning, the national championship game.

Let me ask you this: do you think Stanford should have been in the NC game in any of the last 5 years (i.e., that Stanford  underperformed to talent)?  Despite Stanford's gaudy record over that span, I think that's a legit question.

Do I think they should have? Absolutely not; it's silly to suggest otherwise, for any team in college football. Because the field is limited to two teams, luck plays by far the biggest role in determining who goes and who doesn't. It's really just basic math. A team that has a 90% chance of winning each and every game only has a ~25% chance of being undefeated over 13 games.

And given the difficulty of Stanford's schedule over the past five years, it's silly to think Stanford had those kind of odds to begin with. Everyone, even the most talented, slip up. Whether it's Florida losing to Ole Miss or Alabama falling to Texas A&M, teams slip up. Stanford isn't exempt; it's fan blindness to think otherwise.

So that's not how I judge it. I think coaches put teams in position to be one of the seven or so best teams in the country and see what happens from there. They had the talent to do so -- and did -- in 2010 and 2013. They didn't really have the talent in 2012; winning the conference and the Rose Bowl was overachieving. 2011 is the closest Stanford has come to underachievement given the talent on hand, and I really don't think it was all that great. (Esp. with the number of injuries.)