Week 8
This is a series I've now been doing for 8 years. The post attempts to visualize all AP Poll ballots in a single image. Additionally it sorts each AP voter by similarity to the group. Notably, this is not a measure of how "good" a voter is, just how consistent they are with the group. Especially preseason, having a diversity of opinions and ranking styles is advantageous to having a true consensus poll. Polls tend to coalesce towards each other as the season goes on.
Audrey Dahlgren has left the poll, and been replaced by Jack Ebling. Ebling was previously a voter in 2021 and 2022. His ballot doesn't actually appear on site, but since he's the only one missing, I worked backwards to figure out his votes.
The most consistent voter this week is Kayla Anderson. Matt Murschel is in first on the season, followed by Blair Kerkhoff, Johnny McGonigal, John Pierson, and Amie Just.
At the other extreme, Don Williams was the biggest outlier this week. Jon Wilner has usurped Brett McMurphy as the biggest outlier this seasonfollowed by Kirk Bohls, David Jablonski, and Mike Niziolek.
How sweet that the Michigan vote put Georgia at 1 and both Georgia affiliations put Michigan at 1
At the very least our voters are anything BUT biased
Like the Florida voter who has Georgia at 6 or the voter that has Michigan at 7 ? 🌚
Which is so dumb. Like okay, you think Michigan should be 7 because they haven’t played anyone. Disagree, but fair. But you also have Georgia at 1? What a fucking clown Chris Murray is.
I mean one of the Bama affiliates has us at 11
Full respect to an affiliate that can be honest about their team and doesn’t compromise their credibility by ranking rivals poorly or showing extreme bias toward their preferred team
There is no Florida voter, Matt Baker absolutely hates the Gators
His bio is Indiana native and Northwestern grad.
Wow UCLA man took that loss personally (or is drowning in copium)
Maybe just a product of he’s not watching as many games as he should be considering he’s an AP voter, but he definitely watched that game and saw a good team in Oregon St
Jon Wilner is adopting the quality loss for the Pac-12 it seems
I don’t get how he can have usc unranked (which is fine in my mind) but then also have Utah like 15th
Oregon above ou is a choice...
But did OU lose to Washington?
Everyone has lost or will lose to Washington.
Except Washington State, they’ll be driven by hate
Not after whatever the fuck that Arizona game was
I mean Arizona almost did that to USC too
Arizona's stadium (I don't know what it's called) is the West Coast kinnick stadium
It’s literally (and you’re not going to believe this) Arizona Stadium
Touche...
Hate can only do so much. Cougs just got gaped.
Watch it be confusing OU and UO
Them above Texas is dumb as well. UT has a win over Bama while Oregon’s best win is Colorado
Wilner is a moron
OU Twitter going to attack him like they did Emily until he changes it
Only 2 people with Oregon State above UNC and, shocker, they’re both Pac 12 folk.
He also has Ohio State ranked ahead of Michigan. He must have some really good herb.
That’s because MI has literally planned no one and OSU has a top 10 win on road.
How does one accomplish this elusive “top 10 win on the road”?
Who out of the top 10 has OSU beaten on the road?
I believe they are referring to the 2 loss team in South Bend
We're in the top 15 now!
But not too 10 as indicated above
ND when OSU played them in south bend. At the time they were in the top 10. If you beat a team when they are in the top 10 it counts as a top 10 win.
Who has Michigan played?
I personally see no issue with that poll
It's not the worst ballot I've seen, but Chuck Landon dropping us to 14 hurts a little bit. I'll never say Utah is bad, but also until Rising is back I'm surprised they're above us in his eyes.
A lot of other good stuff on his ballot though.wow his ballot is actually trashNow I'm just nervous because the clowns I usually think are clueless have oregon higher than expected. How often are dumb people right?
Chucks had me scratching my head. Not only are you guys and us behind Utah. But we completely took care of business with them just a couple of weeks ago.
You guys may have gotten the win on the field, but clearly the transitive property of football win is more important.
Utah>UCLA>WSU>OSU
/S if it's not obvious enough.
Agreed. Though that WSU loss doesn't look as good now, I firmly believe you guys are #3 in the conference.
There’s no good reasoning to drop Oregon that far. Extremely close and great game on the road vs a clear top team, huge rivalry, big 4th down plays by both teams and lose by 3? Oregon is rightly still top 10 in the aggregate but still.
Chuck has Utah 4 spots above OrSU, who beat them 21-7 last week. Methinks Chuck just doesn't watch Pac12 football
Hello, Nemesis.
At least we get to split happiness so far this season? A good compromise leaves neither of us happy though...
Chuck had us at 13 last week and 17 this week after a 12pt ranked win.
Yeah, seems a bit goofy, thats a huge miss
Not egregious but a head scratcher nonetheless — he had KU and WVU ranked 22 and 24 respectively. They both lost this weekend, and he kept them both ranked, down to 24 and 25. Explain that one?
Yeah Chuck Landon seems like he doesn’t know football. IMO both Oregon and UW should be top 5 but that wasn’t gonna happen. Oregon shouldn’t have dropped more than 1. And UW not moving at all after having the toughest win of any team is ridiculous (only arguable win tougher is OU over Texas but Texas shouldn’t have been ranked 3 to begin with
Michigan at 7 is a choice
UNLV beating UNR in Reno yesterday was just the kind of petty payback I needed for him consistently putting Michigan at 7 the last three weeks. Fuck Chris Murray
I’ve heard on some message boards that UNLV was actually the school that kicked off the current NCAA sign stealing fiasco. Weird times.
His ballot really doesn't make much sense. If it's resume how is Georgia 1? Also based on his other ranks it should be OU, Washington, OSU, FSU due to his ranking of their wins.
If it's a power ranking Michigan at 7 it's just dumb
My guess would be that it's primarily a resume ranking, but leaving the two time defending champions at #1 until they lose.
if only michigan was the 2 time defending big 10 champ :/
Again, that shows a lack of consistency. If we are factoring in last year’s results, Michigan should be ranked #2 out of the undefeated teams
I think this person is only factoring in last year's results for Georgia, by virtue of them being 2x defending national champions.
At the end of the day though, who gives a shit what this one single voter considers? The voters in aggregate are clearly factoring in Michigan's recent history + dominant performance as they've been locked into the top 2 all season.
Yep, Michigan doesn’t get that benefit of the doubt that Georgia does
I would rank Michigan last among all undefeated teams and behind Oregon + Texas, and this isn’t me being biased (If it were they would be unranked)
We have no idea how good they are, even Penn State played a P5 OOC. If you’re the champion, you’ve earned the right to hold what you have until you lose it. With everyone else? You haven’t earned a thing and Michigan has done nothing to prove that they are worth anything championship caliber so far. They will eventually have their chances, but those are a month away. The polls will work themselves out if Michigan wins their games, but for now no one should blame any voter for ranking them outside the Top 5
You’d put us behind Air Force, JMU, and Liberty? Okay buddy
Yes
Do you have B-21 Raiders? I don’t think so
Until you can hover over enemy targets to deliver a tactical strike completely undetected at 60k feet you’re behind Air Force
Don’t be a smartass, you know exactly the 8 teams I meant
So let’s take names out and see if I understand your argument.
Team A is the two time defending champs. They get the benefit of the doubt pretty much no matter what as long as they don’t lose. Okay fair.
Team B has made the CFP the last two years. They’ve returned most of their starters and have decimated every team they’ve played. Also undefeated, but they should be ranked behind not only undefeated P5 teams, but 2 teams with a loss. Because their schedule has been easy. (Though not much different from team A)
You absolutely have a bias and have made the stupidest statement I’ve read on this subreddit all season. Impressive feat.
Sorry that I believe in this classic way of thinking, Michigan hasn’t won anything the last 2 years in the postseason while Georgia has. For the polls, the Big 10 championship doesn’t matter. They haven’t won a playoff game, they got routed by Georgia 2 years ago and lost to TCU who got obliterated in the Natty. Oh they won the Big 10, congratulations what about a National Championship? Nope
If Michigan is as good as their fans think they are, they’ll prove it when they get their chances next month
Classic way of thinking? Oregon has a loss and their best win is… Texas Tech? Colorado?
But they should definitely be ranked higher than Michigan. I’m just glad you’re going to look silly at the end of the season.
I think Oregon will finish with 3 losses eventually, the Pac 12 is a wild place
But I don’t judge teams on how I think they will finish, but how they are right now. I think Washington is the 2nd best team in the country and they put up a rousing fight against them in Seattle
I don't necessarily agree but you make an interesting point.
Ultimately your final sentence is right and polls in the middle of October don't mean much given how much football there is left to play.
"SEC" is a resume line item.
Might just be taking out his frustration of their schedule
But I agree with the other dude that commented that some undefeated team currently has to be #7. So I can respect the opinion as long as no 1 loss team is ahead of Michigan
Yeah Michigan at 7 is just an idiotic statement. Yeah they haven't played "anybody" if you will but....when they've played those "nobody" teams the games been effectively over at halftime. Michigan is not the 3rd best team in the B1G.
Dude, I clean up on the neighborhood elementary BB court but doesn’t mean I should be drafted for the NBA. People have implicated bias’s for teams that are not reflected in the SoS. fSU and OU both have the same schedule with wins over ranked opponents.
Resume but UGA is defending champ and gets the benefit of the doubt.
I disagree with it, but as long as the only people above you are also undefeated, it's only a little dumb.
SOME undefeated team has to be in 7th
just a heads up, you said "unranked" instead of "undefeated" in your first sentence
thanks thanks
Didn't come to play school.
I'd say the point differential in those games can help as well. Or how much land they have on the undefeated map :D
Even the point differentials don't tell enough of the story. Michigan only played starters in the 4th in one game this season for example. AP voters should be watching these games.
Said this before as he's had you there for a few weeks but would make sense if the rest of his rankings showed he was just very serious about SOS, but they just don't at all.
Michigan at 7? Fine. Georgia at 1 and Michigan at 7? Dumb.
Bro thinks we’re the worst undefeated P5 team. What’s the rationale? SOS?
I don’t agree with Michigan at 7 one bit, but if 1.5% of voters thinks Michigan is the 3rd best team in the division (which isn’t that far of a stretch, even if I disagree) having UGA/Oklahoma/FSU above them too makes sense.
Prophetic
It is where I would rank them today. Michigan's best win is what? Rutgers? There more than seven undefeated teams so one of them has to be seven. Putting the one with the least impressive resume there makes sense.
Man, I appreciate the vote of confidence, but all the people who have Penn State ahead of OU, UW, and OSU are just wrong. We've done nothing to support being ahead of those teams. Maybe you could make the argument of us being ahead of FSU, but I don't buy it.
Eh, we’ll find out this week where you belong.
I find it interesting how the Georgia affiliate put Michigan at 1 and the Michigan affiliate put Georgia at 1
Not one voter had Bama ahead of Texas this week. Is everyone ok now? What should we complain about?
How about the guy with USC at 16 and Notre Dame at 21?
I also see a USC 12 / ND 18
There are a couple other USC > ND
Edit: One has USC 14 and ND 19 but chose to keep Louisville over ND, surely purely based on Head-2-Head since Louisville hasn’t beat anyone notable besides ND.
USC over ND is vaguely defensible for the occasional rogue voter imo because they still have a better record.
I think we should be ahead because the difference in schedule is way too big to mean you can use record to overrule the H2H result but it's not one of those "straight up ignoring the actual games" type of choices because they do have one important thing going for them.
The voter that put us at 11 and left Louisville unranked is worse than any of those USC over ND examples imo.
The fact that some put Alabama ahead of Oregon. Oregon went toe to toe with Washington. Alabama went toe to toe with…checks notes…Arkansas.
You realize the poll isn’t for that week’s results ?
Chuck Landon has Ole Miss ahead of Bama
RAGE!!!! ANGER!!!!
I’m not, we’re tied with Bama in the coaches poll.
I see a couple with Alabama ahead of UNC or Oregon. That’s the new thing to bitch about
Of course
Damn two people had us at #3? I like those guys. Fuck that guy that had us at 8 though.
Emily Leiker swapped OU texas to the correct order after she got ratioed to hell for it last week with both of us on a bye.
Bullying works!
If she had just explained it….
How do we bully her into unranking Miami lmao
“If Miami lost >1 game or lost to UNC by >3 points maybe they’d be unranked” - Emily Leiker, probably
Thanks to OU Twitter for cyberbullying an AP voter into correcting her ballot!
First thing I looked for 😂 honestly that’s way more embarrassing than just having a bad take and sticking to it
And both teams had a bye lmao. I'd love to hear her explanation... mainly because there is no logical explanation for swapping them unless she backtracks what she said last week.
Maybe she just doesn’t watch football? Ranking miami should be grounds to lose your vote.
Thanks James, but we’re not 8th…
You're right, we should be higher!
Not 8th yet.
UCLA guy is a big fan of OSU I suppose
Game day number 2 on the way!
Man if you had told me before last season we’d be as high as 21 on some ballots
Is it really that big a surprise? We were at the point of dominating most of the FCS and played so many P5 teams close over the last decade. I feel like the whole program knew we were ready
Matt Baker went full potato.
Even as an Ohio State fan, I’m wondering what is that man smoking?
Michael Lev new best friend
I’ll have seven of whatever Mike Niziolek ordered, please.
I don’t know of a kool aid strong enough to justify Carolina above Oklahoma. Or Texas or Oregon either honestly.
I see he’s an Indiana beat reporter…is he Jim Delaney’s burner account to prop up his Tar Heels? Cause that is certainly a choice to put UNC over Oklahoma.
I swear these guys make deals to swap homer picks. “I can’t put my team that high/ my rival that low. You wanna trade bad takes?”
Florida guy put us at 6 😂😂 I can honestly respect that
I like how we get slightly better and worse in these rankings every week.
I can’t wait for November. I think Michigan is going to smack PSU again this year and then we can stop with the “they haven’t played anyone” BS.
Matt Baker 😔
I still can't wrap my head around the dual kU and Mizzou affliation
For most of these voters the affiliation just represents a journalistic beat and not an alma mater or fandom. Many are tasked to multiple teams in the same geographic area.
The Kansas City Star newspaper, of which that reporter is based, serves both states. I would call Columbia and Lawrence outlying areas, but they are still- oh, you're a Mizzou fan. So it's kind of like how the St. Louis Post-Dispatch follows both Mizzou and Illinois.
Shoutout to the two voters that think head to head wins matter
Interesting a few voters had UW not even moving up one spot with a victory over a top 10 team
Love the local guy being a homer putting us at 12 when we should be closer to 21
Love you Barber and Counts
Thanks for posting these. I always like to check the distribution of votes for my team, and this makes it super easy to do!
Matt Baker not only has my team at #1 but no SEC team in the top 5, so I really like the cut of his jib!
Georgia at 6 certainly is a vote
Some of these guys don’t use the same logic for every team. Georgia at 6 could make sense if you’re just going on quality wins. You’d have to put OU, Wash, and FSU above them and Michigan even if you think the latter teams might be more talented. Instead it’s just a “meh, I’m not impressed” hand wave 🙄
Shoutout to Hargis for unashamedly showing his home team bias
Thank you to OU Twitter for bullying Emily Leiker into fixing her ballot!
Matt Baker is watching a parallel universe version of this season.
What specifically?
I love that multiple polls have us ranked directly after LSU. I don’t know if LSU even knows where the Tiger Rag is, but a student might steal it if we end the year ranked higher than them lol
Don Barber putting us ahead of LSU is certainly a choice
Lmao shout out to the ucla guy thinking beating ucla should put Oregon State at #8
Looking at the number of voters that had Washington somewhere in the top 4 this week, I think they're going to break through and replace Michigan, tOSU, or FSU next week. They're really close. Oklahoma doesn't seem to be at that level yet
Ohio State plays Penn State and FSU plays Duke so they could easily jump them, but I don't think they jump over Michigan with a win against Arizona State
Except if penn state beats Ohio state wouldn’t they move up? Everything is really tight right now.
If penn state wins this weekend they should jump Washington, fsu and obviously osu. Washington shouldn't jump osu if osu wins because penn state is a higher ranked win than Oregon
Whoever is out there ranking Florida is stuck in 2008
Everyone has OU, Texas, and Alabama in the correct order this week despite OU and Texas having bye weeks…
Edit: Wrong week.