See Where Your Team Falls On The College Football Grid Of Shame
So the number one source for college football insight, the Wall Street Journal, came out with its ultimate college football ranking system. No, it’s not a poll–God knows we have enough of those. Instead, the WSJ chose a grid system, one similar to the political spectrum grid your high school government teacher may have shown you. The points run from the X-axis of “Weakling” to “Powerhouse” (simple enough) to the Y-axis of “Embarrassing” to “Admirable” (weirdly subjective).
Where to start? Well, Stanford tops the list in terms of both criteria. Makes sense–Stanford is a prestigious school, and its football team kicked ass in the Pac-whatever-we’re-calling-it for a while. No qualms there. So let’s look at just the powerhouses: Alabama, OU, Texas, Ohio State, Auburn, Oregon, USC, and a couple others. Okay, sure, I’ll buy that.
Where does the admirable or embarrassing factor come in? It seems like it would naturally fall into the category of how certain schools are perceived, but if that’s the case, how in fuck’s name is Arizona State more admirable than Vanderbilt? Well, let’s take the “methodology” stated:
“Teams’ off-the-field rating is a somewhat subjective ranking of six elements: four-year Academic Progress Rate; recent history of major NCAA violations and probation; percentage of athletic-department revenues subsidized by student fees and state support; number of players arrested in the off-season; attendance at last season’s games; and overall ‘ick’ factor.”
Okay, sure, Wall Street Journal. Keep telling me that based on your metrics, the two Arizona schools that are notorious for more student arrests and naked boobs than all other schools combined are “admirable.” Interestingly enough, only three of the teams you have in your upper right quadrant have won national championships in the last 25 years. I don’t know what that says about the state of college football, but I’m willing to bet you don’t know, either.
[via Wall Street Journal]
Go. Damn. Vawls.
10 years ago at 1:31 pmLearn to count, Knox. Teams in the upper right quadrant with National Championships in the last 25 years: Auburn, Michigan & Nebraska were co-champs in 1997 (pre BCS), Florida, Texas, Ohio State, LSU, Washington (co-champs w/ Miami in 1991), and Georgia Tech (co-champs w/ Colorado in 1990). That makes 9. Five if you don’t count pre-BCS co-champs.
10 years ago at 1:31 pmLoyalty to God, SEC, and UT. If you have a problem, suck it. Go Vawls.
10 years ago at 2:13 pmI’m not sure what this has to do with anything.
10 years ago at 2:17 pmMe either.
10 years ago at 4:12 pmPretty sure auburn wasn’t a co-champ in ’97
10 years ago at 7:43 pmNotre Dame is a powerhouse?
10 years ago at 1:40 pmGeorgia Tech’s uninteresting placement reflects accurately on our uninteresting team.
10 years ago at 2:09 pmAt a fellow GT student, watching the Wofford game nearly made me puke at halftime.
10 years ago at 2:32 pmHold your puke till November 29th
10 years ago at 3:22 pmThat loss is a given. Don’t remind me.
10 years ago at 6:35 pmThe MAC should get a little more credit
10 years ago at 2:49 pmDisgraceful that the service academies isn’t ranked as most admirable, much less one in the embarrassing side.
10 years ago at 4:02 pmClemson?
10 years ago at 5:09 pmEverything is fact-based except the “ick” factor which is basically public perception. The profitability of the program, quality of academics, attendance, and graduation percentage are the fact-based factors. Michigan and Notre Dame football makes a shitload of money for their schools, they both have quality academics and high graduation rates, but EVERYONE fucking hates both teams and their rankings reflect it. Wisconsin, Clemson, and Stanford are good schools with high profitability and graduation percentage, but don’t have a bad public perception. Wisconsin gets overshadowed by everyone’s hatred toward Michigan, Ohio St, and Notre Dame. Stanford gets overshadowed by hatred toward Oregon and USC, and Clemson is a deep south team not in the SEC, making them irrelevant to most people in the region.
10 years ago at 1:24 amKansas fired the best coach they’ve ever had, replaced him with Turner Gill because lol, then fired him and hired Charlie Weis because LOL. Charlie Weis is so terrible even Will Mischamp looked at him and went “get the fuck out”. They sell their tickets on groupon and they’ve gone 9-39 since 2010.
How they are not in the very bottom left hand corner of this graph is an puzzle even Stephen Hawking can’t figure out
10 years ago at 5:23 pmThey had to fire Mangino due to the charges that were brought upon him. If they went public the legal repercussions would be too much and the University was going to have a LOT more to deal with. Racism and injuries aren’t a good look. I agree, Turner Gill was a complete joke but Weis is better than what we had. He recruited some good players but injuries will plague us this season. I guess the reason we’re up in the admirable section is because of the 2008 Orange bowl and the 2008 national championship (one of two schools to ever do such a thing.) We also never stop trying, which can be a bad thing at times. Hopefully this season will be better. I honestly expected to see us on the lower left side..
10 years ago at 12:41 amNorthwestern?
10 years ago at 5:43 pmWhat school is top left, left of Wake?
10 years ago at 6:09 pm