🏈 American College Football Coaches review findings on Coaches Poll...

[TerryP]

I don't know how many of you are aware of it, I've only casually been looking for the results, but the USA Today has had a review (3 months long) of how the coaches poll is conducted, ways to improve it, how accurate it is, etc.

While those results will be released during the meetings next week, it'll likely be a little longer before we see any of the findings considering the AFCA will consult with USA Today and the BCS officials before making these results public.

Personally, I think there is a lot of room for improvement in all of the polls. It seems logical to me that coaches from one conference should be restricted in some manner on how they vote for other teams in their conference. It also seems like the overall voters should require some sort of overhaul so there is an equal representation of teams/conferences.

Just arbitrarily, let's take Texas and see a little about how their votes went last season and keep in mind this is before they played Ohio State in the Bowl game.

Texas coach Mack Brown kept his Longhorns in second place in the last vote of the regular season for USA Today.


Brown’s ballot — 1. Florida; 2. Texas; 3. Oklahoma; 4. Alabama; 5. Penn State.


The Longhorns received four first-place votes. They were from North Texas’ Todd Dodge, Iowa State’s Gene Chizik, UCLA’s Rick Neuheisel and Texas-El Paso’s Mike Price.


Dodge played for the Longhorns and Chizik was UT’s defensive coordinator from 2005-06.


Texas was no lower than fifth on anyone’s ballot.


And here’s who voted Texas fifth — Texas Tech’s Mike Leach, Baylor’s Art Briles, Rutgers’ Greg Schiano and Michigan State’s Mark Dantonio.


Leach and Briles each voted the Sooners No. 1.


The Longhorns were second on 15 ballots, including those cast by Dick Tomey, Mike Bellotti, Turner Gill, Dan Hawkins, Gary Pinkel and Jim Tressel.

First of all, you have to ask yourself why on earth does Mike Price have a vote that impacts the the BCS games when his own conference isn't a part of the BCS conferences?

North Texas has a voter?

I consistantly see this time of year people using pre-season polls as the butt of their jokes. Hell, with the fodder provided by polls that count, why bother?

 

[Kirk Van de Graaff]

Does all 119 ( or however many there are) division 1 coaches vote?

 

[TerryP]

Does all 119 ( or however many there are) division 1 coaches vote?

No.

Saban doesn't vote and I doubt he'd vote if asked to participate. I'm not sure how it's going to shake out this year. As example, Fulmer had a vote last year as did Tommy Bowden and Tubs. All three aren't coaching this season as well all know (unless something changes on those lines which I don't expect).

Hell, Neil Callaway has a vote.

 

[rolltide1969]

No.

Saban doesn't vote and I doubt he'd vote if asked to participate. I'm not sure how it's going to shake out this year. As example, Fulmer had a vote last year as did Tommy Bowden and Tubs. All three aren't coaching this season as well all know (unless something changes on those lines which I don't expect).

Hell, Neil Callaway has a vote.

LOL @ Neil Callaway

 

[planomateo]

i think this is from last year (http://www.usatoday.com/sports/college/football/usatpoll.htm)

The USA TODAY Board of Coaches is made up of 61 head coaches at Division I-A institutions. All are members of the American Football Coaches Association. This season's board: Frank Beamer, Virginia Tech; Mike Bellotti, Oregon; Bret Bielema, Wisconsin; Bobby Bowden, Florida State; Tommy Bowden, Clemson; Art Briles, Baylor; Mack Brown, Texas; Neil Callaway, Alabama-Birmingham; Gene Chizik, Iowa State; Mario Cristobal, Florida International; Sylvester Croom, Mississippi State; Mark Dantonio, Michigan State; Butch Davis, North Carolina; Todd Dodge, North Texas; Randy Edsall, Connecticut; Phillip Fulmer, Tennessee; Jeff Genyk, Eastern Michigan; Turner Gill, Buffalo; Joe Glenn, Wyoming; Todd Graham, Tulsa; Jim Grobe, Wake Forest; Dan Hawkins, Colorado; Pat Hill, Fresno State; Butch Jones, Central Michigan; Steve Kragthorpe, Louisville; Mike Leach, Texas Tech; Jim Leavitt, South Florida; Rocky Long, New Mexico; Bill Lynch, Indiana; Doug Martin, Kent State; Urban Meyer, Florida; Les Miles, LSU; Shane Montgomery, Miami (Ohio); Hal Mumme, New Mexico State; Rick Neuheisel, UCLA; Tom O'Brien, North Carolina State; George O'Leary, Central Florida; Gary Patterson, TCU; Bo Pelini, Nebraska; Chris Petersen, Boise State; Gary Pinkel, Missouri; Mike Price, Texas-El Paso; Mark Richt, Georgia; Mike Riley, Oregon State; Rich Rodriguez, Michigan; Greg Schiano, Rutgers; Howard Schnellenberger, Florida Atlantic; Mark Snyder, Marshall; Frank Solich, Ohio; Steve Spurrier, South Carolina; Rick Stockstill, Middle Tennessee; Jeff Tedford, California; Joe Tiller, Purdue; Bob Toledo, Tulane; Dick Tomey, San Jose State; Jim Tressel, Ohio State; Tommy Tuberville, Auburn; Charlie Weis, Notre Dame; Kyle Whittingham, Utah; Tyrone Willingham, Washington; Ron Zook, Illinois.

 

[252BAMA]

I don't think the polls should be a part of the BCS rankings. They come up with a ranking without the AP poll. They could do so without the coaches poll as well. The past problems with the polls are the reason there is a BCS. Why do they even want the polls as a part of their ranking?

 

[TerryP]

From ESPN today...

PHOENIX -- The results of a three-month review of the USA Today coaches' poll are a secret.
The coaches' final regular-season ballots -- and even the identity of the 61 voters -- may soon be a secret as well.
Those are among several possible changes being considered by the American Football Coaches Association, which has been releasing the final regular-season ballots since 2005 in an effort to bring transparency to the Bowl Championship Series selection process. The coaches' Top 25 accounts for one-third of the BCS standings.
The AFCA asked Gallup to study its poll and make recommendations that will make the poll more accurate and credible. The AFCA's board heard the results of the survey Wednesday but declined to make them public.
The AFCA will meet with USA Today and BCS officials before announcing any changes to the voting process, probably by the end of the month.
"Historically, we have never released the votes," AFCA executive director Grant Teaff said. "When it came up that, OK, it would be better if you did, I think there was acquiescing by the coaches. As to whether it's helped the poll or not, I don't think I can really say. Whether it's hurt it or not, I don't know. The only thing that we can base a decision on, as AFCA, is what the experts say about it.
"We've obviously proven our loyalty to both the BCS and USA Today by releasing those," Teaff said. "But the question is whether that's the correct thing to do or not. Does that give us the way to have the best possible poll we can have?
"There's also a question of, should all voters be anonymous or not?" Teaff said.
Teaff said the survey explored a wide range of questions, including whether 25 is the optimum number of teams, and whether there should be a preseason poll.
"The other question that we had was, should individual coaches be able to vote for their own teams?" Teaff said. "We've always allowed that. We didn't really have a real reason for that, except it just sounded like hey, that should be the right thing to do. So that was a very important question."
One thing that won't change: Teaff said the coaches will still be required to put the winner of the BCS title game atop their final post-bowl ballot.
The coaches' poll is one of three components in the BCS standings, along with the Harris Poll and an average of six computer rankings, with each entity counting for a third of a team's overall score.
The standings help set the BCS title game and also come into play when the other four BCS bowls -- the Fiesta, Rose, Sugar and Orange -- select their participants.
The coaches' poll, which began in 1950, has often been the center of controversy. Critics have noted that voters have a financial stake in the outcome because their conferences benefit from drawing lucrative BCS berths. There are also questions of favoritism toward friends and bias against rivals.
"The perception is that there's a huge bias, and we've never really found that," Teaff said.
AFCA president Dick Tomey, the coach at San Jose State, said he was pleased with the survey results.
"We want the coaches poll to be the very best poll possible," Tomey said. "We got the input from the people that have been doing this the longest, the best in the world, in order to help us understand the best way to do this kind of thing. So we feel very good about the way it turned out."


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