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Nineteen teams left, so OU and OkSU, I think, and Texas/A&M/Baylor.

#19 Baylor Bears

#4 in Big XII

I think you’d find some very confused Baylor fans if you could go back to the end of the 2015 season, coming off their fourth Top 13 finish in five years, with a pair of BCS/New Years Six bowl wins, and two Big XII titles, with a series of explosive offenses that going into 2020 they’d be replacing their departed coach (who isn’t Art Briles), who departed for the NFL after taking the Bears from 1-11 to a top 5 ranking in two seasons, but were replacing him with one of the best defensive coordinators in the country, to help maintain the defensive excellence of the prior year.  But that’s where we are.  The job Matt Rhule did to salvage the Baylor program which looked headed back to the dumpster they were in prior to Briles’ arrival.  He certainly did not leave behind an easy job for Dave Aranda, who has to basically rebuild the Bear defense from scratch following the departure of eight graduated seniors, and a pair of early NFL draft entrants.  This following a year where Baylor’s defense was #18 in SP+, highest in school history, only twice ever finishing top 40.  They had years under Briles where the offense/defense splits were #2/#100 and #4/#86.  How well can Aranda maintain with just one returning starter, and the fourth least returning production in the nation?  The one returning starter is leading tackler Terrel Bernard, who seems like more of a product of his surrounding pieces then a guy ready to step up and be the star.  He could be flanked by a pair of redshirt freshmen in Matt Jones and Jalen Pitre, who saw limited action last year, but not enough to burn their redshirts.  The defensive line gets some instant impact from Arkansas State transfer William Bradley-King, who was first team All-Sun Belt honors last year, and 14.5 sacks over his past two seasons.  He might instantly be Baylor’s best defensive linemen, but those are Texas tackles he’s trying to beat now, not Texas State.  They’ll have to hope the offense is at least somewhat better, primarily based off of improvement on the offensive line, and a senior quarterback.  Last year the offensive line ranked in the bottom 30 of the FBS in sack rate and stuff rate; meaning they couldn’t keep Charlie Brewer upright, and they got pushed backwards far too often on run plays.  With four returning starters, including guard Xavier Newman-Johnson, some improvement is expected.  As long as the line can actually give Charlie Brewer some time, after allowing the most sacks and the highest sack rate in the Big XII a year ago, he needs to raise his game as a senior, with less help around him after the graduations of JaMychal Hasty and Denzel Mims.  Baylor was fortunate that John Lovett, who actually had better numbers than Hasty, even if he didn’t ooze with talent as Hasty did, decided to return for his senior year, to give Baylor one proven running back.  And while Mims was the star receiver last year, the Bears might boast a better starting pair this year, in Tyquan Thornton and R.J. Sneed, who combined for 87 receptions, 1219 yards, and 8 touchdowns last year.  Brewer’s 7th place finish in the Big XII in Total QBR is largely due to the sacks.  He was fourth in pure passer rating, and removing sacks from all quarterbacks, he moves up to third in QBR behind only Jalen Hurts and Sam Ehlinger, ahead of Brock Purdy.  Running the show is Larry Fedora, whose tenure at North Carolina, both on and off the field, ended poorly.  But remember he ran Mike Gundy’s early outstanding offenses, and within the last decade has been the head coach for the best team in school history at one program (2011 Southern Miss) and the best team in over two decades at another (2015 North Carolina).

	KEY PLAYERS
QB	Charlie Brewer, Senior
WR	Tyquan Thornton, Junior
G	Xavier Newman-Johnson, Senior
	.
DE	William Bradley-King, Senior
LB	Terrel Bernard, Junior
CB	Raleigh Texada, Senior

The latter is already taken.

Re #19 Baylor: I wish that Matt Rhule had failed miserably in Waco and that Baylor was now shopping itself around to see which G5 conference would be willing to take a chance on it.
The Earth cannot swallow Baylor University soon enough.
In the words of Leo Tolstoy, "God Knows the Truth, but Waits."

It is tOSU, OSU2 and OSU3.

#18 Texas A&M Aggies

#6 in SEC

I was a little too bullish on the Aggies last year, putting them at #4.  Even acknowledging that, 2019 was a failure by even the most modest realistic projections for Texas A&M, finishing 7-5, and being largely uncompetitive against the big dogs on their schedule, finishing with a 50-7 loss to LSU in Death Valley.  I’ll split the difference this year, and slot them squarely in the rankings, but out of the national or SEC title hunt.  RIght off the bat, the schedule is a lot easier, trading Clemson for Colorado as the marquee non-conference opponent, and Georgia for Vanderbilt as the divisional crossover.  Plus moving Alabama from early October to late November allows the Aggies to build up some more momentum.  It would take a fairly massive upset to be any worse than 6-0 headed to Jordan-Hare on October 17.  Survive that one, and Texas A&M really should be rolling into Tuscaloosa at 10-0.  All in all, aside from those trips to Auburn and Alabama, plus a home game against LSU to close, Texas A&M’s toughest game is…?  At Mississippi State?  Avoid upsets, win just one of your big three games, and it’s a 10-2 season, that should calm some of the fans.  The skill positions are so deep that five running backs and four receivers entered the transfer portal, and yet that doesn’t even make a ding.  One of those is Jashaun Corbin, the starting running back entering the year, who suffered a season ending injury in the second game, opening the door for freshman Isaiah Spiller, who more than seized the opportunity, and Corbin saw the writing on the wall.  Granted Corbin’s sample size was small, but Spiller averaged a full yard and a half more per carry.  He might not have even been the biggest impact freshman on the offense though, with tight end Jalen Wydermyer taking that honor, with 447 yards, and a team leading six touchdown receptions.  While Quartney Davis opted out of his senior year, leading receiver Jhamon Ausbon didn’t, as looks to be one of the SEC’s most dangerous guys on the outside in 2020.  Kellen Mond caught tons of flack last year for regressing from his sophomore campaign.  The truth is, he didn’t.  His yards per attempt were slightly down, but his completion percentage was slightly up.  He had a little bit less downfield success, but his touchdown and interception numbers were almost the same as 2018.  The problem was it was expected Mond would take a big step forward, and he didn’t.  A lot of these quarterbacks enter college so ready to go now, but the flip side to that, is there are less areas for them to improve in.  I just don’t think we as fans have allowed our expectations to adjust accordingly.  Just because a guy can start as an underclassman, doesn’t mean he automatically has the same trajectory quarterbacks always did.  The back seven, particularly the secondary, should be very good, with freshman safety Demani Richardson putting his name on the board of someone to watch this year.  That won’t matter if the Aggies continue to be unable to get after quarterbacks.  When the best two quarterbacks in the nation played in your division, that meant the secondary, no matter how talented, was toast.  They averaged just 2.4 sacks per game, and their best lineman, Justin Madubuike, who led the team with 5.5, departed early.  But the positive development was the integration of another freshman, DeMarvin Leal, late in the year.  Texas A&M averaged nearly a sack a game more over the final quarter of the season, including 4 in their bowl win over Oklahoma State.

	KEY PLAYERS
QB	Kellen Mond, Senior
WR	Jhamon Ausbon, Senior
TE	Jalen Wydermyer, Sophomore
	.
LB	Buddy Johnson, Senior
CB	Myles Jones, Senior
S	Demani Richardson, Sophomore

#17 Texas Longhorns

#3 in Big XII

The Longhorns were unable to build upon a Big XII Championship appearance and Sugar Bowl win in 2018, their best season since their 2009 BCS Championship Game loss to Alabama, failing to even return to the conference title game.  Tom Herman replaced both coordinators, usually not the move of a coach with a lot of leash left.  The Alamo Bowl results against Utah, on both sides of the ball, were very promising.  But they were the prior year against Georgia as well, and both time Texas was facing a team that saw their College Football Playoff hopes dashed in their conference title game.  They do have a senior quarterback in Sam Ehlinger, who, going into the year, appears to be the best quarterback in the Big XII.  He was second in the conference in QBR last year, behind the departed Jalen Hurts.  The Longhorns haven’t been able to claim the conference’s top quarterback since Colt McCoy in 2009.  They’ve had the worst quarterback play in the league many times since then.  He’ll have to find a new go to receiver with the loss of Devin Duvernay and his 106 receptions, third most nationally, and most on the team by 70.  His #2, Collin Johnson, is also gone.  There is plenty of unproven, highly rated, talent, including Michigan transfer Tarik Black, who was the best receiver on the Wolverines roster...in the rare instance he was healthy.  If he’s healthy, which is a big if, he might be the best option.  The hope is that they won’t have to pass the ball that often with the running options they have.  Keaontay Ingram had a big sophomore year, averaging nearly 6 yards per carry on 144 carries, and pairing him with 5-star true freshman Bijan Robinson, the #1 rated running back recruit in the nation.  You mix in the fairly mobile Sam Ehlinger and Tom Herman might actually have flashbacks to his 2014 Ohio State offense when he had both Zeke Elliott and Curtis Samuel to pair in the backfield with J.T. Barrett.  He brought in Chris Ash, who he coached with at Ohio State to coordinate the defense, and particularly to fix the secondary.  The Longhorns were solid against the run, but lousy everywhere else.  Granted Utah didn’t have the most explosive offense in the world, but the way Texas shut them down in the Alamo Bowl, and showed they do have the talent.  Nine starters return, but Ash, whose specialty is the secondary, and will also coach the safeties, has to get the pass defense squared away.  Texas ranked 9th in the conference in both opponents completion percentage and yards per attempt allowed.  LSU seemed to take Texas’ DBU claim (and custom shirts) personally, passing for 471 yards against Texas’ secondary, with three different receivers having over 120 yards.  But it’s not like the Tigers were alone, Texas gave up more big passing plays than any team in the country.  It’s not as though the pass defense issues were limited to the secondary though, with the Longhorns only generating a 5.31% sack rate, #90 nationally, and only better in the Big XII than Kansas.  I’m more optimistic that will be rectified, thanks to linebacker Joseph Ossai, the best player on the defense, and fellow linebacker Ayodele Adeoye, who has the highest ceiling.  They need much better play from the line though.

	KEY PLAYERS
QB	Sam Ehlinger, Senior
T	Samuel Cosmi, Junior
K	Cameron Dicker, Junior
	.
LB	Joseph Ossai, Junior
LB	Ayodele Adeoye, Sophomore
CB	D'Shawn Jamison, Junior

So, the SEC is now Auburn, Florida, LSU, Georgia, and Alabama, perhaps in that order .... 5/16ths of the list.

Last year four of the ELA top five were SEC, and the other one was Clemson.