Dominance Ranking, Week 5

Interesting stat.

Mind if we delve a little further? Let’s look at the Strength of Schedule of games already played (plucked from the Sagarin rankings, including 245 teams in FBS and FCS)

Rk Team SOS
1 Utah 137
2 TCU 78
3 Oregon 57
4 Alabama 26
5 Boise St. 38
5 Nebraska 134
7 Ohio St. 99
8 San Diego St. 160
9 Missouri 112
10 Arizona 51
11 Iowa 65
12 Nevada 90
13 Florida St. 50
13 Stanford 24
15 Baylor 118

Now, taken in that context, we see a different picture. Oregon, Alabama and Boise all have played quality competition, yet still hold on to their dominance stats. Utah, and to a lesser extent TCU, have played easier schedules with which to pad the stats.

(Oh, you also might want to tweak your methodology. When counting points in this manner, you should award averages for teams with the same score. You award Oregon 15 points for defense, when Oregon is tied for 15th with three other teams. With that calculation into effect, Oregon, Penn St., Boise St. and Miami all get 16.5 points each… and Alabama is actually a half-point ahead of Oregon.)

Maybe later, we can probe the stats further once we get out of Bayesian schedule comparisons.

Nah.

The DOminance ranking incorporates strength of schedule. Good teams do to bad teams what Utah does— score tons, and prevent scores. Of course Utah wouldn’t do that if it played Alabama, Oregon, Boise, and TCU in the first four weeks. Nobody would.

Keep in mind, this is only week 5, and a lot of teams are just beginning to play solid competition.

You’ll be interested in the season-ending dominance ranking, and all-decade ranking, available at the Wimple’s old site:
http://wimplefrogs.blogspot.com

This is a pretty hollow stat. The only thing you have to do to become the most dominant team in the country is play a bunch of sorry opponents (see the top of the list). If you want this to be meaningful you have to use adjusted stats which involve how well a team does against another team’s averages. And you can’t include FCS opponents because their averages are against other FCS teams. But keep up the hard work if you like justification for placing TCU ahead of Bama.

It’s only week 5, buddy. Calm down; ’Bama has played cupcakes like everybody else, too.
Like I said (did you read it?) this is a stat that grows into relevance; it needs a few more weeks to really be something.

But, right now, TCU had blown its opponents out more than ‘Bama has. Oregon State, SMU, and Baylor aren’t bad competition, either. Not as good as Arky, Penn State, and Florida— but there are very few teams that have had their toughest games first.