Kirby Lee-Imagn Images
By Chris Marler
Every Friday I do this article, and I try to make sure of one thing: making sure the tone of it is right.
I don’t want it to be preachy. I want it to be a funny and lighthearted rant with no real hot takes or actual angst behind it. Lewis Black. Not the sky is falling and everything is awful.
This Friday is a little different admittedly. This one’s a little more preachy. Why? Preseason polls. More specifically the irrational anger people have towards preseason polls. Even more specifically, the irrational and misguided blame they put on the polls for the outcome of the season.
“We need to get rid of preseason polls.”
“They have too much weight on the outcome of the season.”
“We don’t know enough about the teams yet.”
You know what college football needs? And, I mean what it needs way more than abolishing preseason polls? To stop changing every single thing about the sport. This is year 156 of college football. Last I checked it was pretty dang good, marketable, and entertaining for the first 150 of those. Then in 2020 we lost our minds as a country because of COVID. That applied to the powers that be in college football as well.
We made sweeping changes to everything in the sport. Not gradually either. All at once.
Now the most unintentionally ironic change imaginable is being talked about: national media complaining about Preseason Polls like the AP Top 25 and how we should do away with it. The national media is complaining about that? Oh buddy, just wait til you hear who is actually voting in that AP Top 25.
We don’t need another change in this beautifully chaotic and flawed sport.
We need the people in charge of it and most involved in it to do better. Be Better. Do better. Take it seriously.
Last year 13 of the 25 teams in the preseason AP Poll finished unranked. For anyone who isn’t great at math, that’s over half. How? How is that possible?
The AP Poll is composed of 62 voters from across the country. That’s 62 individual sports writers a part of the national media. Let me let you in on a secret and give you a peel behind the onion.
No one thinks their opinion matters more or is more accurate than media members. That is not a finger pointing accusation. It’s a self-reflective, non-projecting assessment of the situation. I’m not excluded from that sentiment either.
People are going to be wrong. Inherent biases will persist, predictions will age like warm milk, and hot takes will turn cold at the drop of a hat. That’s not the issue. The issue is not taking it seriously.
There are 62 people that vote in the AP Poll. Those 62 people need to find ways to objectively approach their job, and do so with an attitude that it actually matters. A friendly reminder that this part of the job literally only needs your focus once a week. That’s it.
So for once, instead of making yet another change in the tradition and familiarity that is rapidly decaying in our sport, just be better. Do better. Please.
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