Blogpoll: I'm Gonna Make it Through This Year if it Kills Me

Rank	Team	Delta
1	Ohio State	--
2	Michigan	--
3	Auburn	1
4	Florida	1
5	Tennessee	1
6	Notre Dame	1
7	Southern Cal	4
8	Texas	--
9	California	1
10	Louisville	1
11	Boise State	3
12	West Virginia	3
13	Boston College	1
14	Wisconsin	2
15	Arkansas	6
16	Rutgers	1
17	Texas A&M	2
18	Georgia Tech	6
19	LSU	1
20	Oklahoma	2
21	Wake Forest	4
22	Virginia Tech	4
23	Clemson	10
24	Oregon	3
25	Tulsa	1
Dropped Out: Missouri (#20), Nebraska (#23).

And down goes Southern Cal! Many of you are probably wondering if I was disappointed when Oregon State deflected the game-sealing two point conversion at the line of scrimmage, effectively killing Notre Dame's (albeit cosmically imperceptible) chances to weasel their way into the BCS championship game with a win over an undefeated USC. Your question would have been answered immediately, when I stripped down to my underwear and ran around Milwaukee Avenue clanging pots and pans together and singing "Me and Bobby McGee" in a hoarse falsetto.


It kind of looked like this, only drunker, paler, and nakeder.

So... right. Long story short, you can't really control your primordial impulses when you're watching a football, no matter what sinewy logic dictates otherwise. Our slim-as-hell title hopes might have drowned hand in unlovable hand with the Trojans, but I'm a tough kid, really. On a personal note, Southern Cal has only lost three games since 2003, and on both of those previous two losses, I totally got lucky later that night. Did the streak continue? Sadly, you my loyal readers will never know.

Ultimately, it's a positive thing that this insane streak of invulnerability came to a conclusion, as the closer the Trojans ascended toward football Nirvana, the more irreversible their hold on the power in the league became. Maybe this show of human vulnerability will be able to tip the scales in the long-term a tiny bit. Still, a hell of a run for the Trojans and a polite doff of the cap to their outstanding success.

So, now what to do with these now-mortal Trojans in the rankings? Well, gather round and listen to my breakdown:

One and two. Obvs. Die, bastards.

Next up, the wheel of death in the SEC. Florida, Auburn, and Tennessee are all pretty damn good, and are close enough to one another to deserve a sequential ranking in accordance to who beat whom. Where are the Big East banditos and Texas? Keep reading...

Welcome to the one-loss cafe, Southern Cal. Texas, Notre Dame, USC, and Cal are hanging out in "Top 10 Purgatory", stuffed in the lower half of the Top 10 on the strength of some wins against quality competition smashed up agains the maddening dissonance of crushing losses. Southern Cal is kind of the odd man out in the group, since their loss was to unranked Oregon State while the other teams dropped their games to higher-ranked teams. Shuffle these around how you want, frankly I don't care. Any argument you can make against one of these teams (for example, calling me out for being a homer ranking ND quite a bit higher than I presume the rest of the blogpoll will) can be made against the rest. Embarassingly close games to inferior competition? USC's last three wins were razor-thin against the middle to lower-middle of the Pac 10. Humiliation in a big game? Yo, California and Texas. It's a grab bag, and I feel justified putting the Irish on the top of the pack because I feel they'd fare well in a game against any of the rest. We'll see in a few weeks if I'm an idiot for thinking that or not when they hash it out on the field.


Pull up a stool and make yourself comfortable. You're on the outside looking in, kiddo.

Bye, Arkansas. Why the hell are you playing 1-AA Southeast Missouri State and Sun Belt bottom feeder Louisiana-Monroe in the middle of November. Shame on you. Go to bed without dessert. Beat Tennessee and LSU and we'll talk.

...and some crap I threw together. A hearty Wilkommen to the Golden Hurricane of Tulsa. Gots to show that mid-major love.