Preseason #1 in College Football

Tomorrow the preseason polls come out. And with that we have the first cause of cognitive biases and perception biases. As the season approaches, writers will write articles supporting the top teams and talking them up and poo-pooing the lower ranked teams. And so the cycle of a small decision by a coach to pick one team over another in a meaningless poll will feed expectations and support poorly formed opinions which will snowball over the coming weeks until the top teams have become once-a-decade goliaths set on a collision course.

If those teams make it six weeks it will turn into a once-a-century battle royale the likes of which we haven't seen since, well, a few years ago.

And a quick prediction I have relates to what I read about OU. Sam Bradford came back after winning a Heisman trophy last year. However, he has lost four starting offensive lineman. And that will hurt him significantly. I simply don't believe that the line will be as good and that will lead to a worse offensive performance on his part and a greater possibility of injury.

BCS Championship Game Analysis part 2

I've been continuing to think the BCS national championship game and the hype leading up to it.  

The over/under was seventy points and I'm beginning to think that it was ridiculously high for the game.  

To score seventy points in the game, each team would have to score 35 points (average).  The most the gators gave up all season was 31; the second most was 21.

To score so many points (like the 49 they hung on the Georgia Bulldogs, the 56 they hung on South Carolina) you have to not just win, but dominate both sides of the ball.  In the South Carolina game Florida jumped out to a quick 21 point lead.  It took them FOUR OFFENSIVE PLAYS and went for a total of 31 YARDS!  

They returned a pick for a score, a pick to the 1 yard line, and recovered a turnover at the twenty six yard line and then scored one pass later.  

So to rack up so many points you have to have an effective offense (the Gators had a drive of one play, 80 yards rushing for a score) and a dominant defense that not only stops the other team, but takes the ball away to get massive gains in field position.  

Urban Meyer is notorious for emphasizing field position and winning the field position battle.  That means getting maximum yards on kick returns and kickoffs, punts and punt returns, and pinning the opponent back.  Well if you can execute and win those battles but force turnovers, you can score a ton of points, more than is the true difference in skill just because you have such better opportunities.  

OU and Bob Stoops I'm sure do the same thing when they decimated Texas Tech.  

But when two teams like that play each other then everything cancels out.  There is no huge advantage in field position for one team over the other.  No team is getting a big field position advantage and also forcing their opponents into three and outs.  

So why would it be high scoring??