What do all 8 CFB Blue Bloods have in common?

Submitted by Human Torpedo on January 17th, 2024 at 5:29 PM

We've been asking ourselves the question throughout history: What makes a program a blueblood? The answers we've come up with have been very arbitrary and subjective

Now I think I've found a nice standard measuring after Michigan won this national title. There are a mere two criteria to meet that I think are very fair:

If you spent any major amount of time in a conference you must have at least 30 conference titles in your history AND you must have 3 wire service AP and/or Coaches' Poll national titles

This criteria as of now in the current membership of the Football Bowl Subdivision is mutually exclusive to bluebloods: all 8 traditional ones (Michigan, OSU, Bama, USC, Oklahoma, ND, Texas, Nebraska) have now achieve this standard and nobody else in FBS has

This is a very fun debate to have and I understand my argument is not the final absolute say on the matter, so I'd love to hear your input on this 

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San Diego Mick

January 18th, 2024 at 12:21 AM ^

A&M has never been a Blue blood,  they've had some nice seasons but nothing remotely close to any sustained success.

I feel like over the last 50 years, FSU, Georgia, LSU and Washington have had a lot of success and Oregon over the last 30 years, I think those schools will be in the group moving forward. PSU too, I guess.

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NittanyFan

January 17th, 2024 at 6:56 PM ^

I can't think of an exact baseball analogy (Don Mattingly?  Jeff Kent?  Orel Hershiser, his 1988 equal to a PSU title year?), but IMO PSU is remarkable in their consistency at a fairly high level, but UNremarkable in that they don't really have the grand slam MNC seasons that often.

They also don't change people very often.  Throw out Bill O'Brien, who can fairly be considered a outlier because of very unusual program circumstances, and their head coaches from 1930-2023 have spent 19, 1, 16, 46, and 10 years as the head coach.  Throw out the 1, and every one of those coaches is a college HoF coach.

And the 1 is Joe Bednek - who was an PSU assistant before and then requested to move back to being an PSU assistant .  Overall he spent 24 years at PSU, he was there a long time too.

E.g., --- very consistent, at a fairly high level, low variation, very steady, but rarely an outlier to the high side.

The "Hall of Very Good."  But that's not a blue blood IMO.

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* I'm assuming - and I think I'll be correct on this - that James Franklin WILL someday make the college football HoF as a coach. 

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Eng1980

January 17th, 2024 at 7:11 PM ^

You left out the story of President Nixon inadvertently awarding the championship to Texas in spite of PSU's undefeated season.  PSU turned down a bid to face Texas in the Cotton Bowl due to segregation issues.  PSU was ahead in the polls until Nixon called to congratulate Texas.

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NittanyFan

January 17th, 2024 at 7:29 PM ^

Those are 2 separate things:

  • PSU cancelled a late 1946 game at Miami FLA because of segregation issues (state of Florida saying that blacks couldn't play in the game).  One year later, PSU then got invited to the Cotton Bowl to play SMU: it threatened to be the same thing but Dallas officials relented after the PSU team said "all of us or none of us."  It was the first ever de-segregated Cotton Bowl.
  • In 1969, Texas and PSU both went undefeated, playing in different bowls (Cotton for Texas, Orange for PSU).  Texas was the unanimous National Champ.  I wasn't alive then, but just looking at schedules and scores, it strikes me as the right decision.  PSU's schedules improved notably in the 1970s and 1980s (in 1982, when they won a MNC, they arguably had the nation's strongest schedule).  But their 1960s schedules were weak - Texas deserved it over PSU.

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Newton Gimmick

January 17th, 2024 at 8:20 PM ^

The 1994 team deserved at least a split national championship though.  That the voters screwed that up shouldn't decide blueblood status or not. 

I tend to think PSU is a fringe blueblood, maybe in the Georgia/Tennessee tier (but at the top of that tier).  They are now above Nebraska in wins and win percentage and have sustained success in the Big 10 (whereas Nebraska hasn't).

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M-Dog

January 17th, 2024 at 8:47 PM ^

TBH, Penn State deserved a split NC in 1994 as much as we deserved a split NC in 1997.

A true Blue Blood is not just "of the moment."  It is historical excellence over time.  Recency bias should be controlled.

Penn State is a true Blue Blood historically. 

(It was fun on New Years Day to be reminded that while Michigan played in the first Rose Bowl in 1902, Penn State played in the first Rose Bowl in the actual Rose Bowl stadium in 1923.)

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NittanyFan

January 17th, 2024 at 9:09 PM ^

I'll forever believe that Nebraska and Michigan both have a right to claim the 1997 Title.  It's not either team's fault they didn't play each other.

But Nebraska fans.  If anyone makes that SAME argument as regards 1994, they blow a gasket!  Yeesh.

I agree --- the program most historically similar to PSU is Tennessee.

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Wolverine 73

January 18th, 2024 at 9:09 AM ^

1969?  That was the year Ohio State had the greatest team ever assembled, Woody’s “super sophomores” were juniors and rolled through the season destroying everyone!  They were easily No. 1.  Oh, wait, is that the year they had to play Michigan in their last game after running up the score the previous year? Maybe they lost that game, opening the door for Texas . . . 

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Amazinblu

January 17th, 2024 at 5:41 PM ^

IIRC - Penn State was independent for a very long time - and, technically, perhaps a Big East member for a few years.

But - 30 conference titles?   I doubt they‘re anywhere close to that.  How many B1G titles do they have while being in the conference for 30’ish seasons?

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BlueRy

January 17th, 2024 at 5:40 PM ^

Recency bias makes Nebraska feel like an outlier despite your objective criteria. So I took a quick look at their record over time. Sheesh, that decision to fire Pelini really didn’t age well…

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RAH

January 17th, 2024 at 10:07 PM ^

They were definitely overconfident. I remember reading some of their blogs when they were admitted to the Big 10. They were complaining that they were stuck in the the Western Division instead of with the big boys in the East. 

I knew they were delusional then but I just checked to verify that. In the 10 years prior to their application to the Big 10 there was no year when at least one of the Western Division teams was ranked higher than Nebraska. 

However, they really were a major national power for a long time prior to their slump. 

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