2023 College Football/Playoffs (on the field)

[I'mWithDan]

I mean, as most of us have said all year long, there was no elite team in CFB this year. With that said, Michigan showed they were the best team this year. Would Georgia have won if they made it? Maybe. If the Big Ten got rid of their fucking divisions years ago like they should have, would things have changed in a rematch in Indy? Maybe. But at the end of the day they went 15-0, so it is what it is. The stars really aligned for them this year; I could not imagine this team winning in the 2015-2020 period where Bama and Clemson had elite teams every single year. Plus OSU and LSU in 2019 (jesus christ was that year ridiculous, talk about bad luck).

When people look back at the 4 team CFP era, these are the Champions that will stand out above the rest (in no order):

2020 Bama
2019 LSU
2016 Clemson
2021-2022 Georgia (really only because they went back-to-back)

2015 Bama and 2018 Clemson as Honorable Mentions only because their schools had better teams in the previously mentioned seasons.

But really, it was an era mostly dominated by Bama and Clemson. And then Georgia going back-to-back. It's actually kinda funny though that the Big Ten snuck in there in the first year (OSU) and the final year (Michigan), each defeating two of Saban's weakest teams at Bama (Blake Sims and Jalen Milroe, I mean, lol).

Anyway, I've always thought comparing or ranking Championship teams is kinda goofy. Like who really cares? All that matters is that you were the best team that year. I don't give two shits where people rank 2002 or 2014 OSU amongst Championship teams. Similarly I couldn't care less where people rank the 2016 Cavs amongst NBA Champions.

TL;DR - Nobody outside of Michigan is going to confuse this team with some of the best in the era, let alone of all-time. But it doesn't matter.

I think this is a great post. Agree with all the overarching points.

With that said, let’s just all agree…..

A ranking system that says 2021 and 2022 Georgia were the 12th and 14th best teams of the CFP era is a system, that quite frankly, should be put in a boat and sunk to the deepest depths of the ocean floor.

EDIT: I had to Google 2014 TCU as I had no recollection of them. They didn’t even make the playoff. The deepest depths of the ocean floor may not be enough. Might have to check which galaxy this ranking system should be sent to.

 

[Ohio]

EDIT: I had to Google 2014 TCU as I had no recollection of them. They didn’t even make the playoff. The deepest depths of the ocean floor may not be enough. Might have to check which galaxy this ranking system should be sent to.

Well, you've accidentally just highlighted the biggest problem of the 4 team CFP era - it almost never included the 4 best teams.

TCU was really, really damn good that year. They were one of the 4 best teams. But...Florida State happened to be undefeated in a shitty ACC (does this ring a bell?) so they were included by default instead.

TCU/Oregon would have been a much, much more competitive semis than FSU/Oregon was that year. TCU would have even had an decent chance of pulling an upset in that game, IMO.

That being said, they didn't do enough to deserve such a high ranking amongst the CFP era greats.

 

[I'mWithDan]

Do I get to take my NCAA victory lap yet or do I still need to wait?

I’m not sure the Buckeye Twitter verse is prepared to read the NCAA president saying this.

Baker said Tuesday night while speaking to a small group of reporters at the NCAA convention. "At the end of the day, no one believes at this point that Michigan didn't win the national title fair and square. So I think we did the right thing."

NCAA prez: Michigan earned title 'fair and square'

NCAA president Charlie Baker said Michigan's football national title was earned "fair and square," despite an ongoing investigation into sign-stealing.

www.espn.com

 

[Ohio]

Do I get to take my NCAA victory lap yet or do I still need to wait?

I’m not sure the Buckeye Twitter verse is prepared to read the NCAA president saying this.

Baker said Tuesday night while speaking to a small group of reporters at the NCAA convention. "At the end of the day, no one believes at this point that Michigan didn't win the national title fair and square. So I think we did the right thing."

NCAA prez: Michigan earned title 'fair and square'

NCAA president Charlie Baker said Michigan's football national title was earned "fair and square," despite an ongoing investigation into sign-stealing.

www.espn.com

Think you may be missing some of the context, here. He's defending that the NCAA warned the Big Ten about the scandal and saying that warning legitimized what happened after it.

Basically, he's taking a victory lap for warning us about your cheating

Not sure there's anything more to read into it than that, but I think I know what you're getting at...even before this statement I haven't though anything from this season was getting vacated without a direct connection to Harbaugh and/or the coordinators for awhile now. So...

 

[I'mWithDan]

Think you may be missing some of the context, here. He's defending that the NCAA warned the Big Ten about the scandal and saying that warning legitimized what happened after it.

Basically, he's taking a victory lap for warning us about your cheating

Not sure there's anything more to read into it than that, but I think I know what you're getting at...even before this statement I haven't though anything from this season was getting vacated without a direct connection to Harbaugh and/or the coordinators for awhile now. So...

Baker is a pretty smart guy with political ties. I know a trial balloon when I see one.

That is all I was pointing out. He’s making a pretty unexpected statement on the legitimacy of a title, when a lot of people were still clutching to this hope. Just caught me off guard it would be made prior to the investigation concluding.

 

[smalls1129]

Talk about political talk...At the end of the day, no one believes at this point...is a fancy way of saying congrats and so far so good. If anything for some reason he didn't slam the door though....

Full disclosure I also do not believe anything will happen in regards to the results of the games.

 

[Benway]

Let's just clean the slate. New year, new everybody is 0-0.

 

[Stark]

Oh this year's Michigan team is nowhere near a top-5 team in the CFP four team era. Honestly, probably not even close.

But they were the best when it mattered this year and now khaki boy has a title for his alma matter. Have to acknowledge that. That team never shrunk or choked.

Anybody calling '23 Michigan an all-timer team is an idiot.

 

[Chris]

Not an all timer but in a field with no mega elite team it sure was the perfect year for them to peak the way they did. They won it without their QB even having to do shit. Dayum.

 

[I'mWithDan]

Not an all timer but in a field with no mega elite team it sure was the perfect year for them to peak the way they did. They won it without their QB even having to do shit. Dayum.

It’s an interesting analytical conversation no one wants to have. Just the gap between fan perception and the analytical performance of the team in something like SP+. There is a pretty wide gap there based on several responses.

I think I saw the stat that no CFP team had gone an entire season without giving up more than 30 points in atleast one game. Michigan never gave up more than 24 and only gave up 20 three times. Which is insane in this modern era of passing offense. A week ago, they were retro actively giving Penix the Heisman.

In the two playoff games, they gave up 33 total points and only 589 yards on 137 plays….a minuscule 4.29 yards per play. Held Alabama to their lowest yardage output in 5 years I think it was. Even with an OT period.

More the story of this Michigan team. In the modern spread era, they are one of the best defenses I have ever personally watched…..both schematically and how each individual player performed. As you intimated, they went 15-0 and basically only needed their QB to make 10 really high leverage plays all season. Had McCarthy actually performed at a 1st round QB level, they might have won every game by 21.

I’d personally place them more in that 4-5 range in some ranking list, as they lacked the QB play of the top teams. But their defense was, at worst, as good as any I have watched in the CFP era.

 

[Ohio]

More the story of this Michigan team. In the modern spread era, they are one of the best defenses I have ever personally watched…..both schematically and how each individual player performed. As you intimated, they went 15-0 and basically only needed their QB to make 10 really high leverage plays all season. Had McCarthy actually performed at a 1st round QB level, they might have won every game by 21.

I’d personally place them more in that 4-5 range in some ranking list, as they lacked the QB play of the top teams. But their defense was, at worst, as good as any I have watched in the CFP era.

I agree with most of this. I think Jessie Minter is one of the best defensive minds in football right now as well. That dude should be getting a shitload of interviews this offseason.

 

[SanduskyCav]

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[I'mWithDan]

I agree with most of this. I think Jessie Minter is one of the best defensive minds in football right now as well. That dude should be getting a shitload of interviews this offseason.

Yeah. Minter will be really interesting. All indications are he has NFL aspirations. So he may go the way Mike McDonald did. Parlaying his just elite run of CFB performance in to an NFL DC gig. It sounds less likely he’d jump to a lower level college job, even an HC. If Harbaugh leaves, it would be shocking if Minter didn’t go with him…..just from what has been said.

If Minter does go, Michigan insiders have said it’s likely they would keep that NFL to college pipeline going and elevate one of the Ravens upcoming defensive staffers in to a DC opportunity. Guess it’s pretty nice to have an NFL brother feeding you coaching talent.

 

[TheLand1287]

You are speaking as if this is the end of the 2021 season or something.

We are in the midst of a 3 year stretch where Michigan is 40-3 overall, 27-1 in conference, 3 consecutive B1G titles, 3 consecutive CFP appearances, A national championship…..is that not better than any 3 year run OSU has had during their golden years?

This is why you are being called unserious. Distilling down that level of sustained success in to singular attributes or calling it lightening in a bottle, is just hilariously misguided. Sorry if you feel like that is condescending putting it in to those terms.



Hey, hey, hey. Sorry I was a little hard on the guy parachuting in to the thread playing message board police.

I’ve experienced more trophies than losses since Covid. I feel like I’m almost too experienced with success at this point.

All I did was use an objective measure to anchor their place in history. An objective measure that many people consider the gold standard in the analytical ranking era. He didn’t like it because there wasn’t an argument to be had. He just came in here regurgitating talking points and then trying to call me condescending, when he’s continuing to try to stand on subjective ideas that SP+ accounts for…..like it being opponent adjusted…..but I get it, not everyone loves analytics.

"Parachuting into the thread playing message board police." Sorry, next time I'll ask you if it's ok to post just because I'm not a familiar face in this thread. I wasn't policing shit. I was just agreeing with others sentiments that you've done a 180 on how you've interacted with people in this particular side of RCF since Michigan/Harbough finally won some big games, which apparently struck a nerve, and offered a different perspective on their recent success. However, because it didn't conform to yours, it was merely a "talking point". I also gave Michigan their flowers for winning it all, although those parts got ignored. I have nothing against analytics at all, but you want to call me unserious while using an entire argument that this Michigan team is Mt Rushmore worthy because SP+... well damn, didn't realize Bill Connolly walked on water. One can follow analytics and use analytics while also watch the actual games and see with their own eyes.

If you want to believe this Michigan team was all time worthy, go for it. All that matters is what happens that particular year and this year they won. However, this team would probably be 4th best in 2019 behind LSU, Clemson, and OSU who were all two dimensional teams. This Michigan team wasn't better than the majority of the Alabama, Georgia, or Clemson teams of the CFP era that won it all. Even your SP+ rankings you stand behind tell us that for some of those years (although they seem to hate Clemson). 2023-24 Michigan was a very good team. Fact is they played a dogshit schedule until mid November. Their best wins were against an offensively flawed OSU team at home (won by 6), one of the worst Alabama teams since 2009 (won by 7 in OT), and Washington.

All year long the top 4 teams were consistently Michigan, Ohio St, Georgia, Florida State. They beat OSU in a close one at home. Florida St lost their starting QB and got left out. Georgia lost to Alabama. Analytics tell us that one was a fluke, but that's why we play the games. So, Michigan got a CFP that had #7 Texas and #8 Alabama hop into the top 4. In the 9 previous years combined of the CFP no one lower than #6 jumped into the top 4 going into the final weekend. This year that record was broken not once but twice. I don't know what's so controversial in saying that Michigan had a great team, took care of the teams in front of them, and are a worthy champion by that measure while also bringing up they got to avoid the teams who were at the top of the rankings all year and had a nice draw in the CFP. Both can be true.

 

[bushwick_bill]

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