Here for the Wins

They don’t want the best teams there. They never have. There are flaws around every corner of the selection process. Look a little deeper at St. Mary’s for example. Top 5 in team batting average. Their #1 starter is top 25 in terms of ERA. That’s ridiculous that the #1 overall gets that for their opener. Nice that we get a Holy Cross though. And I just watched a bit of Illinois State. Yet they’re #3 in Tallahassee. Finished 3rd in a conference/region that has never done much in the tourney. And I haven’t gotten to Schloss’s point that every conference plays 3 games series. Yet we do that differently here.

Cozart time in the 7th.

We should get those guys that have given up 16 to Troy. Maybe those that gave up to Northeastern. Welcome to college baseball.

Winning a conference title is not an automatic qualifier for all champs. See Duke. Why would those other schools schedule Tech? All 3 of those would likely be underdogs. Let’s use Duke as a comp. Do you know why Miami got the nod over them for a CFP invite? It was not conference results. You know cause Duke won the ACC. Had Duke been undefeated in non-conference they were in the CFP. Their schedule was pretty weak but the incentive to dumb down their schedule is present. It is also ridiculous to expect Tech to be the only team to have 12 P4 teams on their schedule then win a championship game. We absolutely know that it’s impossible for a team to get up for every game of season. That’s why the SEC had a late season cupcake. The list of teams incentivized to dumb down their schedule exceeds those that benefited. Vandy may be one that can look back and say we should have upgraded but keep in mind their odds of winning would decrease had they upped the non-con. Maybe Miami but they also hardly left home. Texas, Notre Dame, Duke are teams that fell short that could have had different outcomes by scheduling weaker teams under their own control. You could reason that Tech, Ole Miss and one of James Madison or Tulane (another difficult non-con loss means they’re likely out) were reinforced to not make their schedules more difficult. A&M got limited benefit from beating Notre Dame. Indianas scheduling efforts reinforced theirs. Sark commented. You know Tech would respond. Tech was talking up scheduling Texas since news broke that Texas was going SEC so it’s not as though it’s a new thing. Everybody knows including Tech we weren’t going to adjust to accommodate here. In the end, neither team has an incentive to schedule more difficult games.

25% is pretty high I’d think. It was a manual count but think 8 #2 seeds lost with 3 more two seeds tied or losing.

It was the right play. I doubt they’ll do it out of fear, but they need to beat HC with anyone but Flora. They aren’t beating us with whatever they threw today versus Volantis. We gave up double digits in exactly 3 games all season so if they give up 11 to us, they aren’t beating us. Beat HC. We beat Tarleton. They are in the same spot as if they won game 1 and lost game 2 except maybe they have Flora fresh.

There’s likely gamesmanship going on here. They know full well Texas wasn’t going to cancel. It was a virtual certainty that Tech would respond when Sark commented. Tech was in a very different place in 2017/2018. The whole college football world was as well. I was merely pointing out that Techs non-conference for this upcoming season was set in motion long ago so any critique of it should consider that. Same for Texas. CDC said we’d honor previous commitments. He was less committed to grand schedules for the future. That makes sense for all teams.

What is his brothers role at the school? He can be a real pain in the butt with Kiffin. He was a frosh against us while missing his top WR. He competed as a frosh in a big game. That’s a big deal. I think a J Daniels type season is in the cards.

They scheduled Oregon State back in 2018 as a PAC 12 school not as 2-10 school with no home. They scheduled the ACU series in 2017. SHSU was added as a replacement, which is why we played them, wasn’t it? Replacing CSU, a team we recently had on the schedule. So they are honoring their deals.

He ain’t going 122 today, and it’s unlikely they’ll be here in two days.

Yeah, I don’t think are eager to add either. Presumably they play in the Big 12 championship game. So that’s another game. What is the actual incentive to play a more difficult game? It’s also a two way street. What’s the incentive for anyone else to play them? And when I say anyone, it has to be a team that moves the needle. There are multiple Big 10 teams that don’t. The SEC teams can default to the “it just means more” of the SEC schedule. The ACC is largely more of the same. Miami/Clemson/FSU have their SEC rivals.

Isn’t that what you inferred? So we’re all kinda on the same plane, right? The first thing on anyone’s mind when talking about outcomes should be the dynamics surrounding the game regarding the timing of the game and the environment. Few, if any, major programs were away from home for 3 and 4 consecutive games. Those were those games. So as I’ve referenced several times in my days, those four games represent the entirety of Old Miss and Miami away from home schedule for the full year. It doesn’t absolve poor play, but it does matter.

Yet the Buckeyes struggled with Texas. At home.

I’m not a Lakers fan or a Kobe fan. I was mostly giving you a hard time though - thinking I’m being humorous. I had the Celtics too, but I’ve grown to have a greater appreciation for Bird. The Lakers back then were loaded with high profile collegiate guys. The Celtics less so. Then Shaq was pretty unique and his play was a bit more personal. I always have reservations about high volume shooters. At the local high school I see that a bit now. It’s to the detriment of the team in this case because everyone else has limited reps and confidence.

Joey and Cody.

I’m thinking Dominique Wilkins in a Lakers uniform.

Probably akin to about 44.7% career FG.

But are they scared?

If HC is not the worst team we’ve played, they are very close. Incarnate Word and TAMUCC are the only two with worse RPIs. HC is 201. TAMUCC is 202. UIW is 220. Tarleton is not a strong 3 seed. But, yes they could win. It is possible that we have the most difficult second game draw in the entire tourney.

Completely unnecessary for the ref to go anywhere. You are correct.

This is kinda funny. Tech is creating attention. Maybe even drawing some eyeballs to their games. And timely since in the last week this board discussed viewership and how that’d make a difference in negotiations for breaking away from the NCAA and creating a 40 team league. Coincidence?

Quite mean. But I wouldn’t be disappointed.

Smart move. Will it pay off?

Whippin butt and taking names

I’d like to hear more of the specifics. Strength of record should be well down the list of considerations. It’s more difficult to do, but that can be manipulated. The strength of schedule is far more appropriate, but I’m guessing that needs tweaking. It’d be appropriate for teams only playing 4 games away from home should be dinged for that. And when you play 42 days away from home, those 3rd and 4th games are more difficult than they otherwise would be if they were the 1st and 2nd (last game of a trip). And whatever morons couldn’t figure out margin of victory years ago sure shouldn’t be consulted now. Winning by 28 is far more impressive than winning by 1 and should be incorporated. But, no two late TDs to win by 28 is not the same as leading by 28 heading into the 4th. We have stats that remove garbage time. That can be modeled here and include caps of some sort too. I am not certain where you the draw the line, but Travis out as QB at FSU is enough to leave them out several years ago. But when Dallas Wilson plays his first game and it’s against our backup CB, that is a factor. I don’t think he or Brown played versus Ole Miss at Ole Miss. That was tight late. I don’t expect that thought to be modeled, but I would hope that the committee would delve that deep into things. The Aggies tackling the interior pass rusher for ND on the last play shouldn’t be forgotten either I do not believe the committee has a great grasp on games because I’d wager they’re too busy glad handing and focusing on their programs to give tons of attention elsewhere. Hell, I don’t think are a ton of people that have a great understanding, but there’s a lot more people that take in more live action and have better insight than they do.