Monday's Poll Watch returns with a glimpse into the peculiarities of the AP Top 25 ballots and ballot voter data. We scan these ballots to look for interesting patterns and what they may say about the college football landscape as the season progresses.
Ohio State Holds at No. 2
Ohio State held at No. 2 despite Clemson and Washington's conference championship wins and Ohio State's absence from the weekend's schedule. Ohio State's lead at No. 2 shrunk as Clemson and Washington rose up the rankings. However, the difference is a meager 12 points.
Consider Brent Axe and Bill Landis' ballots as the typical Ohio State movements in this week's AP Poll. Both Axe and Landis had Ohio State at No. 2 last week, but dropped Ohio State to No. 4 this week. Absent Ohio State's appearance in a conference championship game, Clemson and Washington (or Penn State in Landis' case) leapfrogged Ohio State as the Buckeyes fell to No. 4.
In both cases, Ohio State remained nominally a playoff team for the AP voter. Only Graham Watson offers a curious departure here. He slid the Buckeyes from last week's No. 2 to this week's No. 5 in his ballot. His ballot, curiously, has Penn State at No. 2, Washington at No. 3, and Clemson at No. 4. If it were to his discretion, the Fiesta Bowl would pit the Huskies against the Nittany Lions.
Is Washington a Playoff Team?
Given how the season unfolded down the stretch, I'm kind of surprised this is an argument. If we believe that non-conference champion Ohio State is the No. 2 (or No. 3 in the playoff; same "diff") and is the Big Ten's only representative in the field, then Washington seems like the only logical last addition to the field. Clemson is in and has a solid résumé to its name. Washington does not have the same kind of résumé, but it shares an underlying attribute with the other non-Alabama teams: just one loss. Oklahoma has the more impressive schedule, but has the second loss. The same holds for Michigan and Penn State.
Any other year (i.e. a one-loss Big XII champion) and I'd field arguments about Washington's status as playoff team. This year, Washington as playoff team is what you get. The Huskies deserve it too.
The playoff committee won't say because it releases only the committee's consensus. We won't know for sure the extent of the intra-committee dissent over Washington but we can get a sense of the AP's dissent from the individual-level data.
| Voter | Washington Rank | "Playoff Field" |
|---|---|---|
| Bill Landis | 5 | Alabama, Clemson, Penn State, Ohio State |
| Gary Horowitz | 5 | Alabama, Ohio State, Clemson, Penn State |
| Kirk Bohls | 5 | Alabama, Penn State, Ohio State, Clemson |
| Matt McCoy | 5 | Alabama, Ohio State, Clemson, Michigan |
| David Briggs | 6 | Alabama, Ohio State, Clemson, Michigan |
| Ed Daigneault | 6 | Alabama, Ohio State, Clemson, Penn State |
| Jason Galloway | 6 | Alabama, Ohio State, Clemson, Penn State |
| Jeff Miller | 6 | Alabama, Clemson, Ohio State, Michigan |
| Joe Dubin | 6 | Alabama, Ohio State, Clemson, Penn State |
| Mike Barber | 6 | Alabama, Ohio State, Clemson, Michigan |
| Rob Long | 6 | Alabama, Clemson, Ohio State, Penn State |
| Garland Gillen | 7 | Alabama, Ohio State, Clemson, USC |
| Scott Wolf | 7 | Alabama, Ohio State, Clemson, Michigan |
Consider the table to the right, which lists all of Washington's votes outside the top four. This happens to be 13 of the 61 AP voters. It lists Washington's rank on their ballot as well as their nominal "playoff field" if the composition of this year's playoff were to their discretion.
The underlying theme here is these voters who don't think Washington belongs in the playoff think another Big Ten representative belongs in its place. Seven of these 13 voters opted for Penn State. Five wanted Michigan in the field of four.
I would be remiss of me to not single out Garland Gillen for thinking USC, a 9-3 team that did not win its division, deserves the No. 4 spot and a rematch with Alabama. You know what they say about insanity; it's doing the same thing and expecting it to not end 52-6 again.
Which Voters Stand at Odds Most with the Playoff Committee?
If 2016 seemed weird, the final rankings were kind of banal, all things considered. The AP consensus for the top 10 almost perfectly matches the playoff committee's top 10. They only disagree about Clemson and Ohio State's relative ranking.
Most voters' top ten squares well with the playoff committee's top ten. However, there are a few voters who balked at both the AP consensus and the playoff committee's consensus in their ballots. These are their top tens.
| Team | AP | CFP | Andy Greder | Garland Gillen | Josh Kendall | Sam McKewon |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Alabama | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 |
| Ohio State | 2 | 3 | 2 | 2 | 3 | 2 |
| Clemson | 3 | 2 | 7 | 3 | 5 | 5 |
| Washington | 4 | 4 | 4 | 7 | 4 | 3 |
| Penn State | 5 | 5 | 5 | 6 | 2 | 7 |
| Michigan | 6 | 6 | 6 | 5 | 9 | 6 |
| Oklahoma | 7 | 7 | 3 | 8 | 8 | 8 |
| Wisconsin | 8 | 8 | 8 | 10 | 7 | 9 |
| USC | 9 | 9 | 13 | 4 | 6 | 4 |
| Florida State | 10 | 10 | 11 | 11 | 11 | 10 |
Note I'm selecting on top tens whose individual observations travel the furthest from the playoff committee's consensus. There's still otherwise a lot of conformity here. Alabama is everyone's No. 1, and with good reason. Further, even these ballots that diverge the most from the playoff committee basically agree on Florida State.
The biggest sources of contention appear to be Clemson and USC. Clemson, the playoff committee's No. 2 team, appears at No. 5 on two ballots, and even at No. 7 on Garland Gillen's ballot. It's odd that what otherwise looked like the second most defensible pick of the playoff is most responsible for why these ballots stand at odds with the playoff's committee consensus.
Elsewhere, USC is a source of disagreement for different reasons. Andy Greder isn't buying Trojans as top ten team. Gillen, Kendall, and McKewon, however, are thinking the Trojans are a playoff-caliber team. Gillen and McKewon even have the Trojans in their field of four! Again, insanity is doing the same thing and expecting it to not end 52-6 again.
Other Peculiar Observations
- Six voters have Michigan in their top four and Eric Hansen even has Michigan at No. 3. I'm not sure if that's any consolation to Michigan fans.
- Western Michigan has six No. 8 votes, though a low-vote of No. 20 from Ed Johnson.
- The smallest distance between Western Michigan and Michigan in any ballot is two points. That appears on ballots cast by Pete DiPrimio and Scott Hamilton. DiPrimio has Michigan at No. 6 and Western Michigan at No. 8. Hamilton has Michigan at No. 7 and Western Michigan at No. 9.
- No. 16 Stanford is the highest-ranked team to not appear on a given ballot. Adam Zucker is responsible for the exclusion.
- Michael Bonner has Boise State at No. 15.
