2014 NCAA NCSS Rankings: Week 6

One last post for the month of September.

Conference play is starting en masse now, and teams are starting to get into the meat of their schedule. You know, other than the handful of SEC teams that shamefully have FCS games still coming up on the slate. You know who you are...

For now, we're just looking at what non-conference games happen to be on the slate. For the most part, the rankings of the conferences as they have been in past weeks will remain mostly unchanged. There are independents playing games still, which will throw a monkey wrench into some places here and there.

You can view last week's NCSS rankings here. Here's a look at the upcoming week. The only comments made on each conference are about non-conference games (in-conference games and byes are not mentioned as they don't impact NCSS).

2014 MLB Awards

What a summer it's been. There was a fair amount of parity in Major League Baseball, and it's nice to not have a New York or Boston team in the playoffs (so the East Coast bias can go away for one October). As a Cubs fan, I expected nothing this season. But they overachieved in the first year under Rick Renteria, and we got to see glimpses of the future. I look forward to next April/May when Kris Bryant gets his call.

But for 2014, no teams lost 100 games, and nobody won 100 games; it's the first time since 2007 that this has happened. It took until September 15th for the first playoff spot to be claimed, as the Angels rode a hot second half to a berth. The next day, the first divisions were claimed as Baltimore and Washington got to crack open some champagne. By the start of the final week, only half the spots were claimed. It made for a fun final week.

This season, I only got to one big league game, as my wife kidnapped me to go to Wrigley. This marks the only the second year (the other was 2008) that the Cubs had a sub-.500 record at games I attended, and the first time they went winless. I also didn't get to see Javy Baez in person. Next year, baby.

So with 2014's regular season in the books, it's time for me to hand out awards. For the most part, my votes have concurred with the official results in years past. I'd be willing to bet they'd do so again this year. Let's take a look.

2014 NCAA Playoff Points Rankings: Week 5

September football is in the books in the college ranks. Several undefeated teams still stand, as is the norm at this level, but a few fell this week. That will mean some major movement in the playoff points rankings for the week.

As a refresher, the Death to the BCS Playoffs are built in the form of a seeded 16-team bracket, where the ten conference champions automatically given berths, and the rest of the field is filled out with at-large berths. At present, 17 teams remain undefeated, so we're just a hair over the threshold. However, the Power conferences all have at least one unbeaten foe, and Marshall out of Conference USA is also undefeated, which means four bids automatically have to go to teams that have already lost games. That means four teams get screwed. I want to minimize the chances of that happening. So hopefully, next week's edition can see the first version of a potential bracket.

For the purposes of most of this post however, I'm going by conference to see how they are doing in relation to each other in terms of wins and Playoff Points. At the end I'll try to look through who the best teams are, plus you can look over the information yourself as well. For reference, here's last week's rankings. Let's see how the weekend changed the conference landscape. All numbers are rounded to the nearest hundredth.

COAS Pigskin Pick 'Em Week 4

The eve of Week 4 is upon us, and with it, another post for the COAS Pigskin Pick 'Em contest. This week though, the byes have begun. Six teams are off this week, so we only have 13 games to cover this week.

We had a historical moment last week as well. Through two seasons, there had never been a sweep among differentiated games between our featured pickers. In Week 2, I swept those three games. Last week, Adam got revenge and swept all four of our contested games. As such, he has retaken the lead. But with so much time left in the season, that can flip back on its head.

It's definitely possible this week, as Adam and I see our biggest disparity yet. We disagree on a whopping eight of the 13 games on this week's slate. Let's see which games we actually find common ground on.

2014 NCAA NCSS Rankings: Week 5

With fall officially underway, we're fully into the football season. Every team has played at least a couple games so far, so we have a fair amount of data to compare non-conference slates. But each week, I need to keep tabs on this to check for any weird developments, like if Florida or Idaho are somehow able to add a 12th game given that their Week 1 contest got cancelled.

If we look back at last week's report, we had a pretty solid week of non-conference scheduling that included some flipping around of positions. Will the MAC keep its hold on the top spot? Or will Conference USA reclaim it? Can the SEC move out of the NCSS basement? Let's do the math. Remember, all numbers are rounded to the nearest hundredth.

2014 NCAA Playoff Points Rankings: Week 4

Some great games and a few upsets over the weekend mean it's time to update the playoff picture for December. Week 4 provided some thrills, along with a bit of bad football that I happened to catch at various times.

With another week in the books, we have more information for the Playoff Points metric. The half dozen winless teams will continue to throw things off a bit, as their wins aren't helping the cause of any teams yet. Of course, other wins will loom pretty big now, and possibly more so as the season goes along.

Included towards the end of this week's post, I'll have a list of teams that I've deemed ineligible for the Death to the BCS Playoffs. A few teams might get a turnaround depending on their schedule later, but a couple I've already deemed out. You probably know one of them if you're a regular reader of COAS.

But enough about the negative. Let's delve into the current Playoff Points situation. If you need a refresher on how this metric works, I've got a summary in the Week 1 post. You can refer back to last week's rankings here.

COAS Pigskin Pick 'Em Week 3

We're onto Week 3 of the NFL season, and it's been a very weird season so far. There's a four-way tie for first in the NFC North, and the Buffalo Bills are the only 2-0 team in the AFC East. Obviously, this is a small sample size and proves why we need those 16 games to determine the best teams in a given season.

I think Adam and I forgot this last week. We had a first in this contest's history: we differed on three games, and I got all three of them. But we combined to go 4-9 on our groupthink games. Some of it was overreaction to Week 1, others of it was the parity of the NFL being on full display.

Overall, I'm tied for first, as three-year contestant Mark Murphy had a monster week despite forgetting his Thursday night pick. He has that going for him, as well as the fact that he's an Internet celebrity now. Fun times in the COAS Pigskin Pick 'Em Contest!

On another fun note, I'm pleased to announce that I am the new NFC North reporter for UKEndzone, a UK-based football site discussing both the professional and college games. I'm thrilled to join their team. You can read my first piece for them here, and I'll be sure to share more of my work as it becomes available!

Even with this new gig, I'm not abandoning COAS. I'm having too much fun. So we're going onto the third week of picks against the spread. This week, Adam and I concur on 12 of the 16 games, so he's got a chance to retake the lead again. Let's get to it.