Week 3 CBSSports.com Blogpoll Ballot – Extreme Adjustment Edition
Posted by NoleCC
Let me preface this ballot with a pre-explanation. I watched a ton of football this weekend with FSU on the road, and I’ve adjusted my ballot accordingly based on what we know after Week 3. It’s a form of resume balloting mixed with my own special brand of reasoning. I encourage all of you to comment and help me adjust it by Tuesday night.
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| Rank | Team | Delta |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Alabama |  1 |
| 2 | Texas | 2 |
| 3 | Florida |  2 |
| 4 | Boise State | 3 |
| 5 | Miami (Florida) | 17 |
| 6 | California | |
| 7 | LSU | 3 |
| 8 | Mississippi | 3 |
| 9 | Penn State | 4 |
| 10 | Virginia Tech | 3 |
| 11 | Auburn | |
| 12 | Southern Cal | 9 |
| 13 | Oklahoma | 1 |
| 14 | Georgia Tech | 6 |
| 15 | Kansas | 4 |
| 16 | Cincinnati | 7 |
| 17 | Ohio State | 1 |
| 18 | North Carolina | 6 |
| 19 | Florida State | |
| 20 | Georgia | 2 |
| 21 | Brigham Young | 12 |
| 22 | TCU | 8 |
| 23 | Michigan | 2 |
| 24 | UCLA | |
| 25 | Oklahoma State | 5 |
| Last week’s ballot | ||
The Drop Outs
Is Oregon better than I think, or is Utah worse? After losing to the Ducks yesterday, I’m tossing Utah out of the poll. Oregon State probably didn’t deserve the credit I was giving them, and Cincinnati is probably better than I was giving them credit for, so the Beavers exit stage left. Texas Tech put up a good effort against Texas, but for now they’ll have to be kicked out of the Top 25.
The Cream
My new #1 after watching a Percy Harvin-less Florida? Alabama, but only because I don’t have the balls to put the Canes at #1. Frankly the Canes have the best 2 games out there, but I can’t bring myself to do it yet. If they manage 4-0 this month, they will gladly have my #1 vote. Alabama has a lackluster game last week, but came roaring back on the SEC Network Game Of The Week yesterday. They are talented, and suddenly Florida looks very vulnerable to me thanks to a Monte Kiffin led Tennessee defense. If Tennessee had something other than a tackling dummy at quarterback, they might have won yesterday’s game. Either way Florida lost a lot of luster for me. Texas moves up 1 spot over them, for a hard fought victory over Texas Tech, who I thought was a better team than most had them coming into yesterday’s game.
Let’s get to #4 and #5 now. I watched the Boise State game Friday night in it’s entirety. I think the Broncos can score with anyone in the nation, sort of like BYU. However, the Broncos can play a little bit of defense, unlike BYU. The victory over Oregon carries some weight again after Oregon (in some of the most ugly vomit colored olive gray something or other uniforms I’ve seen) slapped around Utah yesterday. I’m convinced that the Broncos could survive an ACC, Big Ten, Pac 10 and Big East schedule at this point, so they get my vote accordingly. I think they wouldn’t make it out of the SEC alive or the Big XII, but at this point most schools don’t. Now, #5 Miami. Like I said earlier, I would rank them #1 if I had more balls, but I can’t do it yet. 4-0 gets them my #1 vote, but for now they are #2. The 38-34 victory at FSU looks better thanks to FSU’s performance in BYU last night, and the victory over ranked Georgia Tech (supposedly an ACC Title contender) was a blowout.
This week I’ll expand the cream to include the rest of the Top 10 since we have some more info. California sits tight at #6 with a solid road victory over Minnesota and an emerging Heisman Candidate. LSU looks a lot better with a road victory over Washington, who put USC to rest yesterday. Ole Miss moves up because Penn State is unimpressive to me, yet again. The Big 10 continues to not impress me, because they always look slow and they never beat down opponents they should cream. Virginia Tech cracks the Top 10, with a horribly unimpressive win over Nebraska. I believe their reign is short lived, thanks to the upcoming game with the Canes.
The Rest
Welcome to the plethora of teams I really can’t figure out where to put. Auburn leads the pack at #11, because they found a way to score points so far this season. Southern Cal and Georgia Tech are big droppers, since neither looked very good this weekend. Oklahoma drops 1 after winning a game, because I don’t want to rank them over Southern Cal. Maybe readers can help me out with that one. Kansas and Cincinnati get some love from me. Kansas has some nifty wide receivers out there for those of you that haven’t been paying attention. Ohio State is a victim of other teams doing well, so they drop one spot in the reset. North Carolina looked better to me yesterday, but is 6 spots too much to increase them? If so, how do I rank them behind a 1 loss FSU team? Florida State shows up in the poll again at #19 after the blowout victory over BYU last night. That was a fun game to watch, and the Cougars dropped like a rock in my poll to number 21. I’d rank the Noles higher, but there’s still that Jacksonville State game I’m holding against them. TCU is unimpressive to me, so they dropped. Michigan took care of business and racked up some points on Eastern Michigan in the end. UCLA joins the poll thanks to being 3-0 and having a victory over a better than I thought Tennessee team. Oklahoma State stays in the Top 25 because T. Boone Pickens paid me off.
Leave some comments and I’ll adjust the poll if you have some sound reasoning. I’ll especially take all the help I can get at 11-25.
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The Fredster on 
tye on 
First off…
WTH got into the Noles all of the sudden? Good grief…
Way to show those elderly mormon fellas how we do it down in FL…
On to your blog poll…
I’m only going to address your comment on the Gates simply because that was pretty much the only game I saw yesterday due to travel to and from Hogtown…
Gators took what was given to them…
I think everybody forgot (not me) that while Lane Kiffin is truly a bozo; as shown by some of his post game comments; his pops is one of the best defensive coaches/schemers/playcallers in the business on any level today and arguably one of the best ever…
Monte sat in a two deep zone the entire game then focused on the perimeter up front while doing a superb job diguising his blitzes and called a hell of a ball game…
So Addazio simply used what we’ve all been waiting for the entire Meyer era…
A stout running game between the tackles…
While TT was still the leading rusher, Moody, Demps & Rainey all averaged over 7 yards a carry and Demps even scored on a 7 yard carry with a fever of 101 degrees…
With the two deep and the game never in question, why would Addazio need to have TT throw the ball needlesly into that for the purpose of fan satisfaction?
Nope, instead let them sit outside the box send a linebacker or two and grind it out…
UF showed yesterday that using the SAME plan that was used by others in previous seasons (Auburn 2007, Miss 2008) to stop this offense probably won’t work this year because if you try to take away the deep ball and the outside space the Gators will simply pound it down your throat instead in old school SEC fashion…
And even then you’re still going to have to score TDs to the tune of at least three or four…
Not simply kick 5 or 6 field goals…
Which is no easy task even with the terrible Gator tackling yesterday…
Just my two cents, bub…
GH… I think you have some valid points… regarding the poll, I think for this week, anyway, the Gator are where they should be. It’ll change next week I’m sure. lol.
My only counterpoint to your point about pounding it old school SEC style is that when the Gators run up against a team that can defend like that, but also score points, unlike Tennessee, they might be in trouble.
Agreed NoleCC…
Which is why the TEN missed tackles are a huge concern to me…
L. Kiffin’s lack of confidence and fear of the UF secondary was largely obvious and so concerning to him that he didn’t even want to gamble up and make an attempt at scoring quick in an effort to tighten up the game quickly and actually make a run at winning it possibly…
Instead he continued to just gash UF here and there by running Hardesty and eating up the clock at the expense of playing to win…
UT played to keep it close and not get blown out especially in the 4th…
As I said before, you are going to have to take the chances and really test this UF defense if you want a shot at beating them…
Playing to keep it close won’t put you in a position to escape with a W…
And to wrap it up…
You don’t want a team to be peaking and necessarily playing perfect football at this point in the season…
This is the time where you want to have things to coach up in practice going into the next week…
Forgot to add…
That we saw what this UF team can do when their back is pushed up against the wall in both the SEC CG vs. Bammer and the BCS CG vs. the Okies…
They respond well to a dogfight and I just don’t see that changing…
oops…
Forgot to put my info in…
That was me above…
gatorhippy
If what you believe about TT throwing more touchdowns to please the fans is true, then why was it so important for TT to throw and rush to run up the scores at the previous games with less challenging opponents? You might want to consider that the Volunteers gave the Gators more to think about and put a little doubt in their future????
While it might have seemed that way, Luvie, TT didin’t play past midway through the second quarter in the opener and played less than a three quarters against Troy…
Brantley guided the offense for the majority of the opener and practically the entire second half of the Troy game…
And to add to that…
Clueless Gator fans are have been questioning the play calling from this game and it was quite obvious that the majority of them bit into the fat spread laid out by Vegas…
However, there a chunk of plays that were called to take look at tossing the ball downfield but it wasn’t there due to the zone look from UT and instead saw TT being forced to read down to his outlet receiver or audibling out to a different play…
Instead, some fans would have rather had TT not look off those guys and instead throw into that deep zone in a gamble for their own personal delusions and vendettas with Thompson not even playing and Hernandez hampered with the flu that caused him to be quarintined and out of practice since Wednesday…
I actually welcome the fact that the Vols raised some questions and hopefully grounded some of the Gator & opponent fan expectations in thinking that UF was just going to run through the schedule blowing everyone up…
The win from this past weekend provided plenty to coach up going into the remainder of the SEC schedule…
And wins that you have something to coach from are the best kind, Luvie…
gatorhippy
Since I would never watch an entire Gator game with the exception of playing FSU or for a National Title, I appreciate the information about TT not being the almighty presence in the games. One would never know this by the reporting on all of the major networks! I often wonder what TT’s fellow team-mates really think about the one man show! Did you see the shorts on all of the channels this weekend? TT screaming in the huddle or walking to mid-field with his coach or the press conference featuring TT’s comments following the close game with Tenn! I know a win is a win is a win and National Championships are all that counts!
gatorhippy
One more thing! Did you notice that there were no band comments? The Chiefs did not travel to BYU and more importantly, the Noles gave everyone “Something to Talk About”!
LMAO! I did notice that…
Again, great win this week for the Noles!!!
Congrats!!