Mandel's argument why UM's schedule has been tougher than Wash or TAMU's

Submitted by superstringer on
In Stewart Mandel's weekly mailbag, he explained why he jumped us from #7 to #3 in his rankings.  While he gets a lot of crap around here, I think he tries to be pretty thoughtful and objective.  And this is a pretty compelling argument that we have played a commendable schedule and beaten some pretty good teams, and in fact has played a more difficult schedule than UW or TAMU.  The relevant excerpt:
 
Hey Stewart: What in the world is going on with your Top 10 rankings? Michigan goes from No. 7 to No. 3 on a bye week, jumping both Washington and Texas A&M who also had byes? Did the change of heart come from (a) Hate mail flowing in from the Michigan faithful, (b) Wisconsin looking pretty awesome despite losing to Ohio State or (c) A belief that A&M will get dismantled by the Tide and Washington will come down to earth eventually?
 
-- Carter Bayne, St. Paul, Minnesota
 
It came from the fact I blew up the previous week’s rankings and started from scratch (which I should really do every week), and in doing that reevaluated every team’s resume based on what we know now. Given that, Michigan’s 45-28 win over Colorado back in Week 3 that I mostly dismissed at the time is now a 45-28 win over a 5-2, fringe Top 25 opponent. Penn State, who was 2-2 at the time Michigan smashed it 49-10, is now 4-2. And Wisconsin, whom the Wolverines beat 14-7, gave Ohio State an even tougher game.
 
So while Washington has been dominant, Michigan has the same record against a much tougher schedule. Texas A&M’s has been arguably tougher than the Wolverines’, but its big win over Tennessee a week earlier lost some value when the Vols turned around and lost 49-10 to Alabama. And UCLA, which was ranked when the Aggies beat them in overtime in Week 1, is now 3-4. Throw in Clemson’s struggles at home against NC State, and that’s how Michigan “jumped” four spots on a bye week.
 
The full article:
 
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lhglrkwg

October 19th, 2016 at 1:37 PM ^

Every great team has a "they found a way to win game". I think ours was vs a good Colorado outfit. Clemson has had like 4 of those ganes bow though. They just don't look very good. Instead of "finding a way to win" it looks more and more like it's just a matter of time till they lose to a bad team

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ShruteBeetFarms

October 19th, 2016 at 2:01 PM ^

I hate this comment when it applies to the other team's kicker missing an easy game winning field goal. Clemson did not find a way for the NC State kicker to miss the game winner.

With that said, it can be applied if Clemson had the last possession of the regularly timed game and drove the ball down the field to score. Then it seems fit to say they they found a way to win the game. 

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ldevon1

October 19th, 2016 at 1:12 PM ^

The only thing that matters is when we best TOSU and win the B1G we will be the #1 or #2 ranked team in the playoff format, playing either the ACC champ or the PAC 12 champ in the 1st round. 

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Voltron Blue

October 19th, 2016 at 1:23 PM ^

Another factor he could have mentioned is that, while both Michigan and Washington were dominant against their common opponent (Rutgers), Michigan was MUCH more dominant.  

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WolverineHistorian

October 19th, 2016 at 2:06 PM ^

Looking up the stats, Rutgers got 21 first downs and had 304 yards of offense which was just 76 yards less than Washington had for total offense.

Leviano was 24/40 for 168 yards. Grant had 9 receptions for 56 yards and scored Rutgers only touchdown in the 4th quarter. Despite their numbers, they only scored 13 points because they lost 2 fumbles and Laviano threw a pick.



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stephenrjking

October 19th, 2016 at 1:51 PM ^

As fun as it is to parse the minutiae of contrasts between blowouts, I think it's hard to evaluate teams who both blew out a common opponent based on who blew them out a bit better. Matchups, injuries, and a team's mental state all play into this. For example, Washington was stretching its legs for its first game against a full-strength Rutgers team, where Michigan was playing a team that was mentally shattered by the end of the first quarter. I think we are better than Washington by some measure, but not because we beat Rutgers better than they did.

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TrueBlue2003

October 19th, 2016 at 6:26 PM ^

at least, not according to ESPN box score which has Rutgers with 304 yards and UW with 380. Rutgers did have 21 first downs to UW 17, but UW had a Punt Ret TD and Kick Return TD.  So if you score so efficiently that you don't need many first downs or don't even need to put your offense on the field, and win by 35, it was domination.  I am surprised how many yards UW gave up considering it was in Seattle.

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bdneely4

October 19th, 2016 at 3:07 PM ^

This seems to me like Mandel realized he was behind the curve in realizing how good Michigan is and tried to sneak a fast one in during our bye week. If he thought we were #7 after last week it is odd that we would jump 4 spots during our bye week.



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Bi11McGi11

October 19th, 2016 at 3:18 PM ^

Ultimately, the most important thing when it comes to getting into the CFP is to go undefeated. I know there's a chance Michigan still gets in with a tight loss to Ohio. But if Michigan wants to guarantee a spot, they "simply" need to go undefeated. With this defense and the competent offense, they have a solid shot at doing just that.

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AA Forever

October 19th, 2016 at 3:33 PM ^

(To he extent that the human polls factor in) that if we lose to OSU, there will probably be a tendency to vote us out of the top 4, even if we both go in undefeated and the game is very close. Voters may not want to see us potentially matched up against the Buckeyes again, having it in their heads that that matchup has already been decided. Maybe if we grind everyone else into a pulp until then, and a few of the other playoff candidates lose, we can override that.

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Bi11McGi11

October 19th, 2016 at 4:04 PM ^

I want to see the best four teams play for a National Title, period. If Michigan is undefeated by season's end, there is no doubt that they will be viewed that way. If we have one close loss to one of the top four teams in the nation by that time and we don't get in, I'll be pretty shocked honestly. But the success and failure of other teams by that time will also factor in. The CFP system is far from perfect, but I know they're working on improving it every year. We'll see how it all turns out.

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AA Forever

October 19th, 2016 at 4:15 PM ^

OSU and us were both undefeated and ranked 1/2 going into The Game, and we lost on the road by 3 points, in a game that could have gone either way. We probably still should have been regarded as the #2 team based on that result, but we got squeezed out. Probably partly because of too many unimpressive wins on our part, and partly because people did not want a rematch of the same game. With four teams getting into the playoff now, we might still survive a close loss to OSU, but we need to look very good in every other game, and hope that a few other top teams suffer a loss or two.

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Bi11McGi11

October 19th, 2016 at 4:09 PM ^

I really don't think a team's past should be factored in, not when it comes to the CFP anyway. I know it's hard not to at least think about it when ranking, but the comittee should do their darndest to strictly look at this season's performance. We're all human, we're not perfect, but kust because Ohio has had four solid seasons before now shouldn't factor in to their CFP ranking this year. My point is that the winner of this game won't have to worry about a darn thing. They'll be in. Any Power 5 team that goes undefeated theough their regular season and conference championship should be in the CFP. The only time that wouldn't be the case would be if there were multiple undefeated teams, which rarely happens.

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AA Forever

October 19th, 2016 at 3:25 PM ^

They played a very weak NC schedule, to begin with. Rutgers was probably the BEST NC they played...think about that. They looked impressive against Oregon and Stanford, but both of those teams have proven to be not nearly as good as people thought they were when Washington played them. Their only other game was a pretty close shave against a nothing special Arizona team. They're good, certainly...but very beatable...not quite deserving of a top 5 ranking, IMO. If they take care of business against Utah and USC, maybe.

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drzoidburg

October 20th, 2016 at 7:25 AM ^

That's pretty much how i assess things too. Of course, the problem of relying on your opponents to do well can be resolved by facing 2-3 quality OOC games. If one, like Colorado was fully expected to, sucks it up, another may not. If you've got a great team, there should be nothing to fear Obviously though the overriding reason to schedule UCF/Hawaii, Idaho/Portland St, or Prairie View/New Mexico St/UTSA is $$

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GoBlue in IA

October 20th, 2016 at 9:48 AM ^

Rankings are fun for the fans, but are irrelavent provided we keep winning.  

Onward.  Better today than yesterday.  Better tomorrow than today.  Improvement will lead to success.

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TX2AA

October 20th, 2016 at 11:40 AM ^

Poor logic to equate the Tennessee team that played Alabama as the same that played TAMU. They were down 11 to 14 starters or significant players (according to reddit source) prior to Alabama (they were down some even to A&M but if you watched TAMU-Tenn and the number of injured Tenn players, then you knew they were not going to match or be competitive against Alabama.)

Ultimately, it's a little silly to get in a big argument over who should be 4, 5, or 6 when both have some of their best games ahead (State and Ohio State for Michigan; Alabama, LSU, and Ole Miss for TAMU) and they have have both beaten weaker teams (Praire View A&M, Hawaii, Rutgers, heck maybe even Illinois could be in this category) 0 to 40++.

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