they dont, its called dominating the line of scrimmage and running the ball down someones throat, not playing against defenses with ZERO nfl players on it
Yes, because the SEC's terrible offenses last year are an indication of how good they are. The SEC is good, but their top 2-3 teams have given them a giant ego as a whole conference that frankly, doesn't stand up when you get past Alabama, LSU and UGA or USC.
Last season the SEC had 8 of 12 games finish with a winning record and I think 9 were bowl eligible. Combined they had a 97-58 record.
In 2010 there were 10 of 12 teams bowl eligible. In 2009 10 of 12 teams had a winning record. You're reaching big time here. Not to mention these teams have to play a lot of in conference games every season. You can't expect a lot of 9+ win teams simply for that reason.
I'm talking about this year (though it looks like a few are at .500 now).
Of course, it's not like any small team like Louisiana-Monroe could challenge any SEC teams.
Yes, because the SEC's terrible offenses last year are an indication of how good they are. The SEC is good, but their top 2-3 teams have given them a giant ego as a whole conference that frankly, doesn't stand up when you get past Alabama, LSU and UGA or USC.
the facts speak for themselves, SEC dominates the country, regardless of what you think of the kentucky's or vanderbilts....they win BCS title games, they have the most players drafted to the NFL...they beat up on other conferences in bowl games...what more is supposed to happen?
the facts speak for themselves, SEC dominates the country, regardless of what you think of the kentucky's or vanderbilts....they win BCS title games, they have the most players drafted to the NFL...they beat up on other conferences in bowl games...what more is supposed to happen?
Since 1998:
Quote:
SEC vs. PAC-12 regular season: 10-12
SEC vs. PAC-12 bowl games: 1-0
SEC vs. Big 12 regular season: 6-10
SEC vs. Big 12 bowl games: 21-8
SEC vs. ACC regular season: 42-36
SEC vs. ACC bowl games: 16-9
SEC vs. Big 10 regular season: 7-4
SEC vs. Big 10 bowl games: 19-19
SEC vs. Big East regular season: 16-15
SEC vs. Big East bowl game: 3-8
Sure doesn't look like domination (except Big 12 and ACC in bowl games).
Here's some other data showing that things are usually factored in the SEC's favor for the BCS title (though that hasn't been the case for every team that's made it):
Quote:
Start the season with two of the top four teams being from the SEC, as was the case in 2010 with Alabama and Florida, and in 2011 with Alabama and LSU, and the conference is virtually guaranteed to be represented in the title game -- and this is an important point -- even if neither of those two schools end up winning the conference.
To be the best, so goes to the old sports adage, you've got to beat the best. But since only SEC teams are consistently declared the best, only SEC teams get the chance to prove themselves against "the best."
It's a chicken-or-the-egg situation. Does the SEC get favorable rankings because it's so good? Or is the SEC so good because it gets favorable rankings? I argue for the latter.
In 2010, for example, the Auburn Tigers began the season with a consensus ranking of #23, behind SEC rivals Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, and Georgia. The only way a team regarded so lightly early in the season can possibly climb into the national championship game -- which Auburn did that year -- is to beat a slew of highly ranked opponents, which Auburn also did that year. Because polls are arranged from the outset so that SEC teams will face the most highly ranked opponents over the course of a season, only teams from the SEC are time and again able to manage this feat.
Not to mention most bowl games are played in SEC territory, so it's usually visiting teams in a hostile environment.
Here's how the self-fulfilling BCS prophecy breaks down in the SEC's favor over the course of a season.
The preseason top twenty-five is stocked with the usual high-profile teams from across the country -- teams, not coincidentally, already scheduled for heavy broadcast exposure. Thanks to its gaudy TV contracts, many of these ranked teams come from the SEC.
Once the season is underway, if a highly ranked SEC team beats another highly ranked SEC team, the winner rises higher in the polls than it might normally, based on the fact that it's just beaten a "top-tier" team from the country's "elite" conference. By the same coin, the losing SEC team in this scenario doesn't drop as far as it might otherwise, since, after all, it has lost to a presumably powerful "top-tier" team from the country's "elite" conference.
When "good" SEC teams suffer losses in league play, this allegedly proves how tough the SEC is from top to bottom. If an SEC leader wins all of its league games, this allegedly proves how great that team is, given that it somehow managed to go undefeated against a monster SEC schedule -- ignored is the fact that SEC teams have pulled off this putative miracle for the last four straight seasons.
For God's sake, it's tougher to go undefeated in the Colonial Athletic Association than it is in the SEC.
If the same things happen in other conferences, however, the collective football media reverse the logic, claiming that if, say, a Mountain West Conference league leader loses to a lower-ranked Mountain West team, this merely proves how bad that losing team is, not how good the Mountain West is. In the same way, if a league leader goes undefeated in the Mountain West, the feat is said to merely demonstrate how weak the conference is, not accepted as proof of the strength of the unbeaten team.
Though its teams are rarely given the opportunity, the Mountain West, not the SEC, has the highest winning percentage of any conference in BCS bowl games (.750), even though its teams travel further to play in BCS games than just about any others and with fewer supporting fans.
The double standard also allows non-conference victories rolled up by "champions" such as the 2009 Alabama Crimson Tide against the likes of Florida International, North Texas, and Tennessee-Chattanooga to be regarded as evidence of gridiron distinction by those inside the solipsistic cocoon of the self-congratulatory SEC echo chamber.
As though empirical evidence is akin to fossil records and climate change data, it's as if no one in the evangelical South is capable of copping to the evidence at hand. In the 2010-11 bowl season, for instance, the SEC posted a .500 record (5-5), same as the then Pac-10 and MAC, slightly worse than the Big East (4-2), and slightly better than the ACC (4-5). Those results moved the wonks at statistical aggregator SportsRatings to report, "In the end, no conference really dominated the bowl season, with most leagues overperforming [Big Ten] or underperforming [SEC] only marginally against expectations."
Despite this underwhelming performance, however, the 2011 preseason table was set up once again to facilitate an SEC title run based on an utterly manufactured and bogus perception of strength.
The chicanery is only getting worse. The most bald-faced example of poll rigging occurred in 2011 when the Pac-12's then number-three-ranked Oregon Ducks lost a September game in Dallas to then number-four-ranked LSU by a score of 40-27. Following the defeat, the Ducks dropped 10 spaces in the polls, to number 13.
With the demotion, Oregon's championship hopes were essentially obliterated from the first week of the season.
Fine. This is the way it goes in a college football's "every game counts" season.
When the SEC's then #2 Alabama Crimson Tide lost at home to #1 LSU in November, however, it dropped only one space in the polls, to number three.
I was in the stadium for that 2011 alleged "game of the century" between LSU and Alabama, traveling to Tuscaloosa and paying out the ass for a scalped ticket because I was eager to see how mighty legends of the SEC take care of business at home.
It turned out to be a tough night for Alabama fans. The home team eked out only two field goals while converting on just three of eleven third-down opportunities and passing for a Pee Wee football-style 91 yards on nine total completions.
While LSU fans celebrated their 9-6 win in The Houndstooth Sports Bar after the game, I watched as pundits on ESPN went right to work setting up expectations of an LSU-Alabama title game rematch, virtually ignoring the Tide's dismal performance. The original "E" in ESPN stood for "entertainment," after all. Sports have always been a secondary concern.
Within two weeks, just-beaten Alabama had been scooted back up to number two behind top-ranked LSU, and yet another SEC team (Arkansas) had been quickly installed at number three, thus ensuring that no matter what happened next, the SEC would be guaranteed a national title. The system of propaganda reached its torrid, circle-jerk climax with the 2012 BCS title game between LSU and Alabama.
Computer programmers have a term for formulas that rely on flawed or biased original data: GIGO. Garbage in, garbage out. Relying as it does on a garbage premise from the get-go, the entire BCS formula is incapable of producing anything other than garbage results. This will become even more true, not less so, with the additional variables introduced by a four-team playoff.
My overall argument here is not that the SEC sucks. Clearly, it does not.
My argument is simply that if you look at results on the field -- not guesswork from writers, network suits, and BCS computers -- teams from the major conferences, and some schools from smaller conferences, are actually a lot more evenly matched than most fans believe.
Despite being approximately equal to other conferences in most quantifiable categories, the SEC and other southern schools are unfairly presented with championship opportunities and favors on what is far from a level playing field.
The SEC is better than other conferences at media manipulation and pretending that fiction is fact and fact is fiction. But as a top-to-bottom conference it is not better at football. The numbers bear that out.
Just for the heck of it I did a quick tally of the number of current NFL players by college program. These are the schools with 20+ players in the NFL. Most are those you'd expect. But some, like Maryland, Iowa, Pitt, Cal and Illinois are higher than I thought they'd be. I believe Miami has topped the list for several years straight now, but I'll bet USC passes them very soon as the Canes have not been turning out as many draft picks as they did in the early-mid 2000's.
Here's some other data showing that things are usually factored in the SEC's favor for the BCS title (though that hasn't been the case for every team that's made it):
Not to mention most bowl games are played in SEC territory, so it's usually visiting teams in a hostile environment.
Two of the four BCS venues are in the southeast. And considering the southeast dominates college football both in talent and teams it's not over representative. It's not like other conference like the ACC don't have plenty of pull in the southeast either.
Shocked Florida State lost. 3, 4, and 5 all lost today. That's pretty crazy.
I'm surprised FSU lost to NC St., but I figured they'd drop a few sooner or later. That team isn't "back" as so many analysts try to claim. They have a LONG way to go to get back to the level they were at pre early-2000's.
Two of the four BCS venues are in the southeast. And considering the southeast dominates college football both in talent and teams it's not over representative. It's not like other conference like the ACC don't have plenty of pull in the southeast either.
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