Ohio State is the McDonald’s of college football. It’s a familiar brand name whose current status is based more on memory than on merit.
That the Buckeyes are still No. 1 in both major polls is a tribute to laziness and lockstep, to the curious but common notion that last year’s champion must be defeated before it can be demoted.
There’s no other way to evaluate the quality of Ohio State’s victories or the strength of its schedule and conclude that the Buckeyes are the nation’s best team. Not after an uneven opener at Virginia Tech and certainly not after last Saturday’s 20-13 flub-fest against Northern Illinois.
Nor is there any way to justify rankings that reward previous success and perceived potential instead of game-day performance except to award past champions with a benefit of the doubt that sometimes suggests the willing suspension of disbelief.
It might not seem like that big a deal now that the polls have receded in significance with the advent of college football’s four-team playoff, but the playoff selection committee does not cast its votes in an information vacuum. Cachet still counts. Much more than it should.
Some of us learned that lesson in placing too much emphasis on Florida’s past and too little on Teddy Bridgewater’s present in the 2013 Sugar Bowl, but it’s generally a good idea to look past the uniforms to see the athletes underneath. And it’s almost always better to judge a team by the way it’s actually performing instead of its advance billing.
Continue Reading: Sullivan | Rankings should be earned, not inherited
