Appalachian State thread

[OrangeAfroMan]

The quality of high school football in Alabama is better than any other state IMHO (quantity is a whole other animal though).  If AL were twice as big, it would be viewed as every bit the giant GA, TX, and FL are.

Never heard that.  I've always thought of Louisiana being the best pound-for-pound talent pool.  With FL being the best of the big 3.  

[rolltidefan]

The quality of high school football in Alabama is better than any other state IMHO (quantity is a whole other animal though).  If AL were twice as big, it would be viewed as every bit the giant GA, TX, and FL are.

not sure it's the best, but it's good. la and miss are good as well for smaller states, and of course everyone knows ga and fl.

Never heard that.  I've always thought of Louisiana being the best pound-for-pound talent pool.  With FL being the best of the big 3.  

as of 2016 nfl season, la had the most per capita, with bama right on heals. i tabulated this based on numbers from quick googles searches of nfl players by state (which popped up a 2016 season link) and then searched a 2016 pop by state link. i rounded pop to nearest 1000.

		2016
		nfl players	pop (1000)	per cap
1	Louisiana	63		4682		1.346%
2	Alabama	60		4863		1.234%
3	South Carolina	48		4961		0.968%
4	Georgia	97		10310		0.941%
5	Florida	193		20612		0.936%
6	Mississippi	27		2989		0.903%
7	Ohio	80		11614		0.689%
8	California	187		29250		0.639%
9	Texas	160		27863		0.574%
10	New Jersey	50		8944		0.559%
11	Pennsylvania	66		12784		0.516%
12	Tennessee	34		6651		0.511%
13	Virginia	43		8412		0.511%
14	Wisconsin	27		5779		0.467%
15	Maryland	28		6016		0.465%
16	Michigan	46		9928		0.463%
17	Missouri	27		6093		0.443%
18	North Carolina	42		10147		0.414%
19	Illinois	38		12802		0.297%
20	New York	36		19745		0.182%

[Hawkinole]

This year App State will likely go undefeated from here on out, will likely win the Sunbelt, and be in the running for a NY6 bowl game.

App State is the 2nd youngest team in CFB.  They will continue to get better, and will be a very scary team next year.

Oh -- and they play Wisconsin in 2020.

They should demand a rematch for their bowl game. I would guess a rematch would draw a lot of national interest. I would guess Penn State would not be interested.

[OrangeAfroMan]

not sure it's the best, but it's good. la and miss are good as well for smaller states, and of course everyone knows ga and fl. as of 2016 nfl season, la had the most per capita, with bama right on heals. i tabulated this based on numbers from quick googles searches of nfl players by state (which popped up a 2016 season link) and then searched a 2016 pop by state link. i rounded pop to nearest 1000.


      

		2016
		nfl players	pop (1000)	per cap
1	Louisiana	63		4682		1.346%
2	Alabama	60		4863		1.234%
3	South Carolina	48		4961		0.968%
4	Georgia	97		10310		0.941%
5	Florida	193		20612		0.936%
6	Mississippi	27		2989		0.903%
7	Ohio	80		11614		0.689%
8	California	187		29250		0.639%
9	Texas	160		27863		0.574%
10	New Jersey	50		8944		0.559%
11	Pennsylvania	66		12784		0.516%
12	Tennessee	34		6651		0.511%
13	Virginia	43		8412		0.511%
14	Wisconsin	27		5779		0.467%
15	Maryland	28		6016		0.465%
16	Michigan	46		9928		0.463%
17	Missouri	27		6093		0.443%
18	North Carolina	42		10147		0.414%
19	Illinois	38		12802		0.297%
20	New York	36		19745		0.182%

Cool, I was right on both counts.  
I love when FL shows up TX and CA.

[FearlessF]

yup, in the late 80's early 90's Florida, Miami and FSU were gonna rule College football forever because of the number of elite recruits in the state

[FearlessF]

today there's not a single team from Florida, Texas, or Cali in the 4 team playoff

[OrangeAfroMan]

Boise's SOS since moving from the Big West to the WAC in 2000/2001:
96th
113
112
72
103
86
105
95
97
71
74
114
76
67
105
70
69

Are these not high school schedules?  What's preventing Appy St. from winning lots of games against crap slates like these?  I honestly don't know.

Compare to a random-ass team pulled out of a hat.....Iowa.  Let's look at their SOS in the same time-frame:
38
41
30
16
20
52
77....jesus, Hawkeyes, wtf?
58
50
45
40
48
47
68
55
49
3rd
So I'm gonna go ahead and call those SOS numbers embarrassing for Iowa.  Maybe it's having ISU as a rival, I don't know, but those are pretty gross numbers.  
You don't think Iowa has some hardware if they traded schedules with Boise?  I know they're apples and oranges, but still.  Any defense of the Broncos or support for the Broncos has a big, brick wall in the way - and it's SOS.

[OrangeAfroMan]

yup, in the late 80's early 90's Florida, Miami and FSU were gonna rule College football forever because of the number of elite recruits in the state

A - the state of FL supplies the entire country with their skill position talent, and
B - I guess the current state of affairs is why they pay coaches all that money

[FearlessF]

A - ed Zachery, why not keep the best recruits at home?

B - money doesn't buy recruits.  Well,............. it shouldn't.  Should have paid more to get Frost.

[Brutus Buckeye]

today there's not a single team from Florida, Texas, or Cali in the 4 team playoff

All of the major programs in those top three recruiting states already have a loss, two weeks in.
Texas and aTm, USC and UCLA, Florida, FSU and Miami. 
I bet it's been a while since THAT has happened. 

[bayareabadger]

Boise's SOS since moving from the Big West to the WAC in 2000/2001:
96th
113
112
72
103
86
105
95
97
71
74
114
76
67
105
70
69

Are these not high school schedules?  What's preventing Appy St. from winning lots of games against crap slates like these?  I honestly don't know.

Compare to a random-ass team pulled out of a hat.....Iowa.  Let's look at their SOS in the same time-frame:
38
41
30
16
20
52
77....jesus, Hawkeyes, wtf?
58
50
45
40
48
47
68
55
49
3rd
So I'm gonna go ahead and call those SOS numbers embarrassing for Iowa.  Maybe it's having ISU as a rival, I don't know, but those are pretty gross numbers.  
You don't think Iowa has some hardware if they traded schedules with Boise?  I know they're apples and oranges, but still.  Any defense of the Broncos or support for the Broncos has a big, brick wall in the way - and it's SOS.

Let's run through this 
A. Those are college schedules. Until one of them says something like 500th, they're college schedules. Florida did not host a high school a few weeks back. It hosted a damn college.
B. This does not mean those are robust schedules by any measure. It reflects the basic unbalances of the sport. It reflects that FBS is really a two-class system, with a lot of variance within. 
C. Calling those schedules embarrassing for Iowa is a good piece of context-less hot takery. If you give me some sort of nuance beyond, loogit them numbers, I'll read something into it. If not, I'll assume it's shooting from the hip.
D. App State will win lots of game against non-P5 teams. That's who it's allowed to play.
E. The schedule flip game is always just an avenue to say what we want. Most counter factuals are bad. I dunno if Iowa would have hardware. I've seen it lose to NIU and a great FCS team. It's the same silly game of "if team X were in Conference Y" and then we say whatever our worldview supports.
F. You're playing this game that schools have some kind of control over their schedules. They don't. Historically, they've controlled, what? One third or one fourth of the schedule depending on a historical rivalry. And even that you have limited control of because of the sports ups and downs. Lets say a team controls three games because of a historical rivalry, and it picks Western Carolina, Southern Miss and a 4-win UCF team. Then let's say they schedule Western Kentucky, Troy and FAU the next year. That's how you get back-to-back Top-5 schedules. 
G. The final question is this defense or support of Boise. What it, and this is just an idea, we assume Boise is a perfectly good football programs maximizing a situation that puts a cap on what it is? Not that it's some fraud. But that it's simply a program that because of the structures of the sport has little way to escape the kids table. Boise doesn't WANT to have a MWC schedule. But no one's offering anything else. SOS is a nice crutch, a sort of washing of the hands of a simple truth: The sport is built to ensure more than half the teams in FBS have no path to compete at the highest level. Boise could have a dang NFL team, and it couldn't change its situation. (Interestingly, the team with the worst SOS in the NFC last year won the Super Bowl, so perhaps, maybe just maybe, a team with poor SOS can actually be worth something)

[847badgerfan]

Boise would join the PAC in a heartbeat but it would never be offered.


If they were to join today though, my gut tells me they would immediately be in the upper division out there. It's a good program, much like Utah was before the PAC came calling.

[Entropy]

Never heard that.  I've always thought of Louisiana being the best pound-for-pound talent pool.  With FL being the best of the big 3.  

Mississippi and Louisiana would have been my guesses at 1 and 2 for pound for pound talent pool

[Brutus Buckeye]

The Utes actually had a pretty rough transition to the Pac 12, nonCon games vs Michigan not withstanding.