Auburn a sleeper in SEC West

[corchjay 5,311]

How does the defending SEC West champs become the sleeper? 

Corso is an idiot

[Tigger1985 806]

We obviously need some one with orange and blue glasses to revise this again. Probably got the ok from Tuscaloosa to start this.

[aujeff11 6,243]

30 minutes ago, corchjay said:

How does the defending SEC West champs become the sleeper? 

Corso is an idiot

Because another team in our division won the championship last year?

[AUpreacherman22 3,885]

I think ranking the SEC teams

1. bama

2. uga

3. Auburn

is pretty accurate, if not a little generous.  Defense will be solid to elite, but our offense has been known to completely sabotage games!  With our schedule, finishing second in the West would be a pretty good achievement.   

[bigbird 60,512]

3 hours ago, corchjay said:

How does the defending SEC West champs become the sleeper? 

 

[AU64 10,122]

3 hours ago, aujeff11 said:

Because another team in our division won the championship last year?

Nah...Auburn won the division championship last year.....might have been a sleeper last year when we weren't picked to win anything....but check with bama and the dawgs about what they found in Auburn.   This year for better or worse, just about everyone figures us to be bama's best competition in the West....which is the same as being their best competition in the SEC.    Hoping that is the case although those 2 road games promise to be no fun. 

[aujeff11 6,243]

14 hours ago, AU64 said:

Nah...Auburn won the division championship last year.....might have been a sleeper last year when we weren't picked to win anything....but check with bama and the dawgs about what they found in Auburn.

Well, “in Auburn” isn’t going to happen this year and we all know Gus doesn’t have a win on the road against our rivals yet. Bama and Georgia played in the recent NC so it’s pretty easy to see why they are the most popular pick even if some of it is uninformed. Taking a different angle, a lot of our fans want Auburn to be slept on. We won’t be, but we are also not hearing outrageous championship predictions either. That’s about where we need to be. There are a lot of questions regarding our team and our can season can swing either way. 

[corchjay 5,311]

We will be a top 10 pick.  My guess will be #9 to start the season.  

[GwillMac6 20,671]

TAMU is the sleeper for down the road. The big 3 in the sec west is about to become the big 4 and the toughest division in football will get even tougher. Jimbo coming to our division is not what I wanted to see happen.

[gr82be 14,423]

14 minutes ago, corchjay said:

We will be a top 10 pick.  My guess will be #9 to start the season.  

Top 10 sounds pretty good at first and then you realize that it's most likely the equivalent of 3rd in the SEC. 

[AU64 10,122]

8 hours ago, gr82be said:

Top 10 sounds pretty good at first and then you realize that it's most likely the equivalent of 3rd in the SEC. 

Who you play and where you play them is a big deal in the SEC.....as noted earlier , schedule is not in our favor. Top Ten nationally  is good....period...

[Zeek 16,649]

11 hours ago, corchjay said:

We will be a top 10 pick.  My guess will be #9 to start the season.  

I would love for us not to be ranked to start the year. That's what we need.

[toddc 13,194]

2 hours ago, Zeek said:

I would love for us not to be ranked to start the year. That's what we need.

We had a big discussion on here a while back as to whether being ranked highly is a curse for Auburn or not! I think one of the writers for AU kind of disproved it, but I can’t find the thread.

[Scotty2Hotty 520]

On 4/12/2018 at 5:45 PM, aubiefifty said:

Him and Terry Bowden had one hell of an argument on national TV over Auburn cheating.

First time ever hearing this. Link?

The oft-told story of why Corso hated AU was Dye kicked him out of practice once. 

[McLoofus 35,182]

20 hours ago, Zeek said:

I would love for us not to be ranked to start the year. That's what we need.

Being that kind of team is how you get left out of national title games/playoffs. It's also one way you lose recruiting battles.

Perception is a self-fulfilling prophecy. Michael Jordan got all the calls.

[AUld fAUx@ 2,584]

On 4/15/2018 at 10:29 AM, Zeek said:

I would love for us not to be ranked to start the year. That's what we need.

 

22 hours ago, toddc said:

We had a big discussion on here a while back as to whether being ranked highly is a curse for Auburn or not! I think one of the writers for AU kind of disproved it, but I can’t find the thread.

Higher preseason rank does seem to correlate to Win% but not strongly, and our best/undefeated seasons (going back 40 yrs) occurred in yrs the AP had us from unranked up to 17th.

[For charting, "unranked" defined as 26, so higher preseason rankings are to the right]

[McLoofus 35,182]

27 minutes ago, AUld fAUx@ said:

 

Higher preseason rank does seem to correlate to Win% but not strongly, and our best/undefeated seasons (going back 40 yrs) occurred in yrs the AP had us from unranked up to 17th.

[For charting, "unranked" defined as 26, so higher preseason rankings are to the right]

Alas, those strong performances in the face of low expectations have more often precipitated sharp declines than sustained health, with said low expectations being, of course, a function of poor performances in seasons prior.

In one of the two best seasons in program history, we ultimately watched two other teams play for the ultimate prize strictly because they entered the season ranked more highly than us. 

Conversely, our reigning national champion should certainly be grateful that they were perceived to be a championship-caliber team entering the season. They've received this benefit of the doubt twice in the last decade. 

High expectations are merely an indicator that things are going well. As long as I want Auburn to be good at football, then I will want others to expect Auburn to be good at football. 

[AUld fAUx@ 2,584]

1 hour ago, McLoofus said:

Alas, those strong performances in the face of low expectations have more often precipitated sharp declines than sustained health, with said low expectations being, of course, a function of poor performances in seasons prior.

In one of the two best seasons in program history, we ultimately watched two other teams play for the ultimate prize strictly because they entered the season ranked more highly than us. 

Conversely, our reigning national champion should certainly be grateful that they were perceived to be a championship-caliber team entering the season. They've received this benefit of the doubt twice in the last decade. 

High expectations are merely an indicator that things are going well. As long as I want Auburn to be good at football, then I will want others to expect Auburn to be good at football. 

Sorry, only intending to address the oft-mentioned weakness of pre-season polls to predict a season. In that vein, further note that our three highest (rightmost) preseason rankings in the period "predicted"  below-par seasons.

I also posted before I got down to your next (v below v).

5 hours ago, McLoofus said:

Being that kind of team is how you get left out of national title games/playoffs. It's also one way you lose recruiting battles.

Perception is a self-fulfilling prophecy. Michael Jordan got all the calls.

I cannot argue with either of your ^ two ^. 

[McLoofus 35,182]

Just now, AUld fAUx@ said:

Sorry, only intending to address the oft-mentioned weakness of pre-season polls to predict a season. In that vein, further note that our three highest (rightmost) preseason rankings in the period "predicted"  below-par seasons.

On this I completely agree, and should have previously offered some sort of "thinking out loud" qualification as opposed to framing a rebuttal that wasn't intended as such. 

[WarDamnEagleWDE 12,737]

8-5 isn't going to win the west. 

[keesler 5,924]

20 hours ago, WarDamnEagleWDE said:

8-5 isn't going to win the west. 

It could get us to the Sugar....ala 2016

[WarDamnEagleWDE 12,737]

4 minutes ago, keesler said:

It could get us to the Sugar....ala 2016

That was sad. 

[Brad_ATX 13,654]

5 minutes ago, WarDamnEagleWDE said:

That was sad. 

Not if you were partying as hard as I was in NOLA!

[McLoofus 35,182]

54 minutes ago, Brad_ATX said:

Not if you were partying as hard as I was in NOLA!

[Tiger Refuge 6,662]

13 minutes ago, McLoofus said:

And just like that, no one is thinking about being a sleeper anymore.