Is Auburn really the 7th best team?

[auburnphan 6,050]

Rankings are still based off of pre-season polls which are garbage.   What people think teams can be not what they put out on the field.  Nobody deserves their spots at this point.  I believe polls should not start until the 4th or 5th week of the season personally.

[The Freak 2,526]

I figure we will be one of the highest ranked X-loss team in the country all season long.

We need to get better to keep it in the top 10, 15, 20.

[McLoofus 35,182]

18 minutes ago, auburnphan said:

Rankings are still based off of pre-season polls which are garbage.   What people think teams can be not what they put out on the field.  Nobody deserves their spots at this point.  I believe polls should not start until the 4th or 5th week of the season personally.

Totally agree. I know the playoff rankings start later and are supposed to be independent but you know they're not. These polls still swing weight and as long as they're subjective they need to get some data first. 

[gr82b4au 5,568]

Anything outside the top 6 does not matter at this point. Those teams look to be heads and shoulders better than every other team. Of course all of this could change depending on injuries, etc. I will say that our defense alone may be worth the rating. 

[AURex 1,994]

My apology for that last line. I thought I had deleted it before I hit the submit button. I know it was unnecessary and not within the standards for forum decorum.

 

[McLoofus 35,182]

1 minute ago, AURex said:

My apology for that last line. I thought I had deleted it before I hit the submit button. I know it was unnecessary and not within the standards for forum decorum.

 

Aw, maaaaaan now I wish I'd seen it

[DAG 33,975]

14 minutes ago, gr82b4au said:

Anything outside the top 6 does not matter at this point. Those teams look to be heads and shoulders better than every other team. Of course all of this could change depending on injuries, etc. I will say that our defense alone may be worth the rating. 

Yeah LSU, Bama, UGA, OU and Clemson just looks way ahead of everyone else at this point. 

[Auhud08 596]

Every team right now has a major flaw:

Clemson- run was shutdown by A&M offense relied on back shoulder throws

alabama- their interior o line doesnt look good right now. You can pass on em

lsu- from the looks of it their D has good run stopping ability but not great pass D. They havent been able to/had to run the ball yet

Georgia- youth in some places, idk if fromm has taken any steps forward thus far

OU- typical OU team-exceptional offense, not great Defense (might not matter)

someone previously said that outside of the above teams everyone else looks to be on the same page. I agree. I dont know that Auburn is deserving of top 10 right now but who else would you put there?

[I_M4_AU 7,792]

Just by the *eye* test so far, no we are not the #7 team in the nation.  However, the trend on improvements we normally see from Gus, I am willing to wait and see how it turns out.

[McLoofus 35,182]

6 minutes ago, Auhud08 said:

I dont know that Auburn is deserving of top 10 right now but who else would you put there?

That's always the question and there's never a good answer at this point in the season. 

As for the list of teams above us, that's where I have to go back to past results. They all have more or less been good and stayed good and won the games they were supposed to and finished good. There are variations and LSU is probably the closest thing to an outlier but overall, those programs all have a lot more reason to be optimistic based on track record than we do. All of those coaches are on at least their 3rd year and those are all just really stable, solid programs with consistent success. So I can understand them being ranked where they are.

But like @auburnphan said, we shouldn't have rankings this early in the season. 

 

[tigerbrotha12 2,362]

12 hours ago, AURex said:

I am not a CGM hater. On the other hand, I am not a blind sunshine pumper. I look for credible evidence, reasonable evaluation. Some people on this board (I will not name names) condemn me and love to throw stupid wrestling gifs at me because I don't pump enough sunshine. Do I care? No.

The question here is, does Auburn really deserve a #7 ranking (coaches poll) or #8 ranking (other polls)? Has Auburn actually demonstrated we are one of the top 8 teams in the country?

Ya know, it is really early in the season. I admit I do not know the answers to these questions. But from the discussions on this board, I don't think anyone is really expecting Auburn to win the SEC-W or be in the CFP. Could it happen? Yeah, maybe. And I would be thrilled if it happens!!!!

But looking at Nix so far, our RBs so far, our OL so far, the play calling by CGM so far ..............

The question is not "CAN Auburn win games?" Yes! Auburn can win games. The question is, does Auburn deserve to be ranked as the 7th best team in the country ..... NOW?

 

That last line won't fly here. Don't post things like that.

We've got the second best win of the season in college football. As of right now, and the way these polls are structured, yes, Auburn deserves that ranking. We'll re-evaluate in a few weeks

[Tigerpro2a 5,650]

1 hour ago, BigWhiskey91 said:

With the way all the major conferences handle OOC and conference game scheduling, it usually takes 4-6 weeks to get a real feel for how teams are. Auburn being in the top 10 is a combination of the value of the Oregon win and teams above us losing. 

Our defense barring injury will keep us in every game we play. Offense is still clearly looking for an identity. Kent State is looking pretty bad in preventing explosive plays so our offense should be able to produce this weekend. Not sure if anyone looks at S&P rankings but they have Tulanes Defense ranked ahead of LSU. Not saying that’s accurate, but this weekend will be a good measuring stick of where we are at on offense. If still lack identity and are unable to produce explosive plays, it may be time to worry. 

I am not confirming nor denying but Have you seen LSU's Defense? They should legitimately be dominant and so far they just aren't. I hope the struggle continues for them Odd as it may be. They will improve though.

[AUsince72 11,084]

40 minutes ago, McLoofus said:

Aw, maaaaaan now I wish I'd seen it

He said "Oh, how I love me some McLoofus!"

Not sure what the Mods had against that... 

[Brad_ATX 13,654]

10 hours ago, TexasTiger said:

Nobody plays our schedule.

A&M has it worse than us this year.  They play the West and have road games at Clemson and UGA.

[Sully to Beasley 643]

Does bammer deserve to be ranked #2 in the country since they have played two  powder puff teams these first 2 weeks of the season? That question is as silly as the original question asked in this thread. The rankings at this point in the season are of course meaningless. Will Auburn finish #7 or #17 or unranked? I don't know and neither does anyone else.

[Dual-Threat Rigby 8,662]

IDK how anyone still reacts to early season rankings. I personally like to be high as possible so we have a buffer when we inevitably lose, but other than that, there shouldn't be any reaction, positive or negative

[The Freak 2,526]

12 minutes ago, AUsince72 said:

He said "Oh, how I love me some McLoofus!"

Not sure what the Mods had against that... 

They must have had someone report the post as throwing shade at sexuality or handicapped people.

[McLoofus 35,182]

19 minutes ago, AUsince72 said:

He said "Oh, how I love me some McLoofus!"

Not sure what the Mods had against that... 

Oh, damn, yes let's get the mods in here asap and maybe a psychiatrist? 

[abw0004 10,110]

11 minutes ago, The Freak said:

They must have had someone report the post as throwing shade at sexuality or handicapped people.

It wasn't either.  If I remember correctly, it was a shot at the mods directly, insinuating foul language without saying it (implying).  I don't think it even had to be reported, although I guess it could have been.

[triangletiger 1,599]

 

Quote

Is Auburn really the 7th best team?

 

Are we talking in the SEC or nationally?

[AUFriction 1,179]

Early polls are meaningless, and part of the reason is that it is unclear what the polls are really supposed to say. What the polls currently do is to try to project how things will look at the end of the season. These polls are completely meaningless. Some teams are installing new offenses/defenses, which can be a pro or a con. New schemes mean limited film, but it also means the players are still learning. We don't really KNOW a lot about any team at this point. Take Auburn for example... If Oregon ends up being a terrible team at season's end, that win meant nothing. If Tulane wins their conference, the sluggish play might not have meant anything at all. 

Ultimately, there's  just not enough data points early in the season. Per the idea of regression to the mean, most teams are going to have a game or two where they play above their potential and a game or two where they play below their potential. By the conclusion of the season, we have more data points, so it is easier to triangulate on the actual ratings. At this point, we very limited data on each team, and we don't know whether the games that have been played end up being outliers in the season (hence my "pump the breaks" and "stop overreacting" responses on other topics). 

It should also be noted that, because there's such limited data, analysts are a) overreacting to everything that happens and b) largely basing their opinions on what they saw last year. 

So, to your question more directly, do we deserve to be rated as high as we are? I'd argue that our high rating is just as justified as everyone else's. It isn't because we have particularly looked great. You cold make the argument that our schedule so far puts us in the top 10.  Per preseason expectations, we've arguably had the toughest schedule in the top 10. Tulane and Oregon are both considered leading candidates for conference championships. However, given that preseason expectations questionable at best anyway, it is hard to make that argument. The best reason we deserve the rating we have is that the ratings at this point are so meaningless and pointless that you can make an argument for a lot of different teams being rated in the top 10.  

 

[bg5 536]

I don't think we really know what we have on Off. yet. On Def. we are really good but on Off. we don't know. I think we played very very vanilla last week. I didn't see the same Off. as the week before. I want to hope that this was on purpose and that we didn't want to show some of the things that we are still putting in. Many if not most of you probably don't agree but it's just my opinion. Now the missed passes that Nix had and not being able to run against a second tier Def. should still not happen but what I am saying is that he didn't do much of the deception that we are used to in this Off. last week and I think that was on purpose. I don't expect to see anything fancy this week either but I would say that the next game against Tx A&M is when we can truly tell what we have. Until then I don't know if the 7th ranking is too high or not. I think outside Clemson and maybe one or two others the rest of the best teams in the country are in the SEC and I don't have a problem believing that we are in the top five in the SEC.    

[wde1968 262]

Yes they are most definitely the number 7 team. IN THE SEC

[aucom96 1,618]

[sevenlee36 1,654]

No