Perhaps the BEST B1G Forum anywhere, here at College Football Fan Site, CFB51!!!

so, I rolled through Fox Sports College Football page..............


http://www.foxsports.com/college-football

...and?
Well first they separate out their news and videos. Their front page has 26 videos listed with only 7 of them being towards the SEC, a scant 27%. :imp:
SEC - 7
B1G - 4
B12 - 4
ACC - 4
P12 - 4
Heisman - 1
ND - 1
South Florida - 1


Fox has a vested interest in the P12, B12 and B1G, if they took an ESPN bias stance I would expect 60%+ of their coverage to consist of their property. Instead they have 12 of 26 (46%) And they have 54% dedicated to the rest.

That's your comeback?  "60% of all articles on ESPN focus on the SEC, but 1 of them has negative tone towards the Vandy, therefore "We" must be wrong and there is not an ESPN media bias towards the SEC."


Yah that's some weak sauce there.

If one of the top stories was a Buckeye getting arrested, we wouldn't be saying "Wow, ESPN is has the Big 10 leading the site. Big time" OSU fans would take it as a slight. It seems like weird methodology to count reports about an athlete's heinous crime as part of a bias for the conference.

But you seem to want some stronger sauce.

I looked at some point this morning and four of their top 23 stories were about the SEC, before you hit the SEC network video dump. If it is your opinion that spots 20-50 on a website's content list are highly telling, you want to find something wrong. Because of the structure of TV, they will have more SEC video available. That will manifest somewhere on the site. This is the way of the world.

I'm not even arguing there's no "bias" because that's an imprecise word. Will ESPN have more SEC on it's site? Naturally. It has 24 hours a day of SEC programming available and just canned half its writing staff. Does that in turn mean the network you're watching is rooting against the big ten on the field? Probably not.

One...out...of...thirty...

"Christ, it's like I am playing cards with my brothers kids or somethin'. You nerve-wracking soms of bitches!!" ~Tombstone 1993

I'll concede, you're right. ESPN only has 29 positive articles out of 49 on the front page about the SEC. A measly 59% of their front page is dedicated to the the conference they own.

Those 29 are positive? It's interesting, it doesn't seem like you know that. Is Saban saying odd things to reporters positive? I've no idea.

But lets play with percentages. At the moment, one of the first 20 stories/video spots on the site are SEC-centric. If you want to be generous, a video of nice stiff arms has an LSU RB on the front. I don't count this, but whatever. So 5-10 percent of the top 20 stories are SEC. Then it goes SEC bonkers.

If you've worked on websites, you know people don't read very far. The chance more than 1-2 in 100 get to story No. 20 is very low. They chance they read the gobs of SEC at the bottom are stupendously low. That's probably filler. So yes, ESPN indeed does have SEC filler. One might ask, if the thumb sat so heavily on the scale, why would they bury all that content they're pushing?

The shape of their content is actually kind of interesting, as it's the single column everyone is going to, but the weekend lead was a QB package with like six elements. The flow of it doesn't work all that well.

The Big Ten has four top ten preseason ranked teams.

They do?  In which ranking?  Here's the preseason AP:

1. Alabama (52)
2. Ohio State (3)
3. Florida State (4)
4. USC (2)
5. Clemson
6. Penn State
7. Oklahoma
8. Washington
9. Wisconsin
10. Oklahoma State
11. Michigan
12. Auburn
13. LSU
14. Stanford
15. Georgia
16. Louisville
17. Florida
18. Miami (FL)
19. South Florida
20. Kansas State
21. Virginia Tech
22. West Virginia
23. Texas
24. Washington State
25. Tennessee

So in the Top 10, the B1G has three, B12 has two, ACC has two, PAC has two, and SEC has only one.

In the overall Top 25,

SEC: 6
B12: 5
ACC: 5
B1G: 4
PAC: 4
AAC: 1


I think the conferences are quite a bit closer than many of you seem to believe.  Just like in the old SEC-dominated era, at its best the gap between it and the next best just wasn't that large.

if you've read anything i've tried to say about it, i agree with you. it's closer than most think, and each P5 has an argument (except BigVII, imHo, but.... could be they end up the best by season's end, too- it's how these things seem to work)

Why omit the B12?  The B12 has more AP top 25 teams than the PAC and the B1G.  I don't necessarily agree with all of the AP rankings, but the AP poll has traditionally served as the poll with the greatest chance at being objective, and I believe it's a fairly representative national sample.

it's just my opinion, and worth only that.  UTa has the biggest upside- and I think they'll surprise this season. WVU is about where they'll be by season's end, again by my reckoning.  OU I just can't invest in no matter QB's or returning starters- a new coach and one so young is bound to make a few mistakes... oSu has one helluva single dimension, but... it's only one dimension in the end... KState is a great big UNK to me.  I'm thinking, as asinine as it sounds, if there was more to them we'd have heard more.. that kinda defines 'dark horse', but i just don't think they have it in them to be a real contender. 

I mean sure, it's just opinion.

I wouldn't personally have Texas ranked in the top 25, or even the top 40, but there's a perception that Texas has enough talent, and that Tom Herman is a good enough coach to take advantage of that talent, and finish 8-4ish, which tends to be about right for the bottom of the Top 25.

But we can speculate like that on any team.  LSU's got a new head coach and I don't think they're going to be 13-worthy.  And (no offense intended) I don't think Tennessee is top-25 worthy. 

let me qualify that "where they think they'll finish" comment....

"did the voter take into account the ranked teams schedule?"... if so.... the poll is bogus.  a poll (not a power ranking) is either/or- they can't pull (what i often accuse women of doing) 'savage tactics' and fluidly float between two standards... they are either 'ranked right here right now future notwithstanding', or, they're "well, they might be as good as teamX, but they stand a better chance of winning out".   a poll like the coaches or the AP attempts to crowd source opinion, but to my knowledge they fail to demand a standard be upheld (finish or now)...

Bama may very well be the best right now and may be projected to finish undefeated... tOSU may very well be the second best, but I'd wager they've a harder row than Bama (and i would suggest that's why they're second)... I figure USCw and Washington wouldn't be ranked in the top 15 w/o the cleared schedules.

I reckon this post will piss a lot of folks off, but it's just how i see it.