The First Blog Poll is out. My ballot is posted here.
To me the Blog Poll is interesting because of the statistical analysis that Brian from MgoBlog puts together surrounding the data (the links above show what I'm talking about). I bombed Stats 200 at UGA despite it being an open book exam class, but I do understand the high level point he's making.
Each week he publishes things like:
1. The teams with the highest standard deviation. In other words, the teams that people have the widest variance of opinions on. This week it's Auburn, Florida and Purdue.
2. The voter with the most absurdly out of the ordinary ballot. This week, the dude that has Louisville #3, Cal #8 and Boise #9 fits that bill.
3. Voter with the Highest and Lowest Bias rating. When we submit our votes, Brian logs our "home team". Those that hold their team in unusually high or low regard get called out.
Why are those 3 things interesting? Because the voters with the most absurd ballots get called out on as many as 50 different blogs which are viewed by around 1 million folks a month for their controversial picks, and they have to defend their picks to continue voting.
This is the way the AP and the Coaches Polls should work. We as fans should be able to see which voters have the biggest biases. Which teams the voters have the least concensus opinions. Which teams are getting dinged in an unsually negative fashion by which voters. Is there a West Coast bias? How much so? Does the Mid-west really control the AP Poll? How biased are they?
The process and the ballots should be transparent! With tranparency and visibility comes greater accountability. With greater accountability comes a better ballot.
One of the things that the Blog Poll guys have talked about is a Monday listing of all the games that you watched. That way site visitors and other voters will know how knowledgable you really are on the game. I'm a fan of this idea. It's yet another thing that Harris, AP and Coach's poll voters should be required to submit.
Anyway, for those that didn't click above the Blog Poll top 25 is pasted here:
Rank Team
1 Southern Cal (47)
2 Texas (1)
3 Tennessee
4 Michigan
5 Louisiana State
6 Miami (Florida)
7 Oklahoma
8 Virginia Tech
9 Ohio State
10 Iowa
11 Florida
12 Louisville
13 Georgia
14 Florida State
15 Auburn
16 Texas A&M
17 Purdue
18 Cal
19 Boise State
20 Arizona State
21 Texas Tech
22 Alabama
23 Boston College
24 Pittsburgh
25 Virginia
Kickoff is just a few short days away.
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2 comments:
We can do all the standard deviation we want to do with the AP Poll- EVERYONE RELEASES THEIR RANKINGS EACH AND EVERY WEEK!!!! We can do the research and the number crunching ourselves if we want to. You willing to take on that task???
Hello? Accountability is there. The voters release their ballots each and every week like the previous guy said. How can you say that the AP Poll does not have accountability? At the end of the season, the coaches and the Harris poll people will release theirs. There is accountability there as well. I don't think this has any accountability at all. After all, this poll is a bunch of amateurs making dumb picks based on which schools they like best for the most part...
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