<WARNING - A "boredom"+"rage against CFB bias"-inspired exercise follows>

There are a variety of ranking systems for College football attempting to quantify which team is "best". What "best" means varies from person to person and system to system but generally involves a range of inputs both subjective and objective. How important are recruiting rankings, last years’ performance, conference affiliation, margin of victory? Early losses vs. late losses, injuries, time zones, media affiliations?

Well, I say let’s make it simple and try to answer a very clear question - What has your team accomplished this year? I say "wins/loses matter" but not "margin of victory/loss". I say "who you beat/lose to matters" but not their name or conference affiliation. And, to call a spade "a spade" - FCS match-ups are typically "bye weeks".

The season is like climbing a mountain, everyone starts at the same place. Wins/losses move you up/down - how much depends: (1) on who you beat/lose to, (2) home v away, (3) breaks/byes. This is self-evidently named - Earned Ranking (ER).

Stengths - Removes a very large number of biases that plague the major rankings.

Weaknesses - None of course ;) . However, this is only a measurement of what has been earned this season. Not necessarily who would win a head-to-head contest.

Why? - General dissatisfaction with how the CFB playoff field has been chosen in the past. I’d rather the teams that have earned the most during the season get a chance at the title. Not those that scheduled the easiest path or have the brand name or the media affiliation. Also, this system punishes weak scheduling.

Week 4

A third of the way through the regular season and some teams have made the most of it. Top teams have 4 wins vs FBS opponents. Teams with FCS opponents and early byes suffered. The byes will normalize out later but you can’t win games you don’t schedule or play.

A few highlights

Texas at #1 - that’s what you get with 4 FBS wins, two on the road.

Washington at #2 - also 4 wins again middle-of-the-road FBS teams.

Georgia at #24? Only 3 FBS wins (against below average ER teams) - they haven’t yet earned anything better this year.

Wk 4 Results