Aug. 4, 2011
RATTO ARCHIVE
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Every year, the coaches and Associated Press preseason football polls come out, and every year people scream that the poll is invalid because nobodys played a game yet.
And every year, people are wrong.
Fact is, the polls are invalid because theyre polls, and the time of year really doesnt matter. They are trying to measure something that cannot be measured, trying to adjudicate opinions on facts that will never be in evidence.
And I should know, damn it. Im an AP voter of long and silly standing.
News
The coaches poll came out Thursday and offered the following typical insights:
-- The coaches pick the usual suspectsat least the coaches who even bother to pick at all. The SEC had eight, the Big XII (which is actually X) had four and the Big X (which actually has XII) had five. If you dig deeper and go into the Also Receiving Votes portion
NEWS: Stanford sixth in Top 25 poll, Sooners No. 1
-- Seven of the Top 25 are currently under investigation for NCAA rules violations, and will have to make the soul-searing decision, How much contrition should we show these weasels? Because thats what the NCAA always asks for in these things. A ring-kiss, a few were-not-worthies and a quick self-flagellation behind the dumpster in the rear of the building.
-- The coaches poll remains the stupidest and least valuable poll of them all because most coaches have more important agendas than an accurate poll, and one of them is preparing their own teams for the upcoming season. One of them is not paying attention to anyone they do not play, and every team in the country does not play 234 other FCS or FBS schools
-- The first poll should look wildly different by the time of the second poll. If it doesnt, your pollsters are idiots.
-- Every person who fulminates about his or her teams position in a preseason poll is also an idiot. They dont know any more than anyone else, and in many cases they know even less.
But that isnt the key here. The key is that the season has started, because college football is entirely about people screaming at each other. There are 1,440 games, not including playoffs and bowls, and the only thing we will truly know at the end is which SEC team will win the national title. Which is probably as it should be because the SEC cares more about football than any other group of people on earth, with the singular exception of Vanderbilt, which typically doesnt.
Even that paragraph will cause people to scream, because nothing is ever settled in this sport, and those who want it to be dont understand the fans. They would rather not know the best team and scream about it all spring and summer than to know the best team. That is the one great flaw of the playoff systemit robs the 119 non-champions of the right to say the system stinks and their team is clearly better but got screwed. Its a little like re-fighting the Civil War 146 years after the last one ended. The war doesnt end until the last person shuts up about it.
And thats why the preseason poll, as predominantly useless as it is, still has this one thing going for it. It riles people up, and that is why college football matters in America. Because we mostly like being riled up, no matter how we say otherwise.
So go out there today and pick an Oklahoma-Alabama fight at your local tavern this evening. Itll be the like the first day of training camp, and youll find out what kind of shape youre in.
Ray Ratto is a columnist for Comcast SportsNet Bay Area