Final top 25 rankings

[SpanglerFan316]

Actually..the various rankings (Baseball America, Collegiate Baseball, etc) are fairly consistant.

Fans, when their team isn't ranked to their liking, many times claim a "bias" by the ranker. That is the answer to why their team isn't ranked higher.

And when many rankers are consistant, than they are all biased. They all favor the BCS teams...no matter that three of the top ranked 11 teams are non BCS or six of the top 25. Those facts just get in the way.

It could be worse...RPI has WSU as #18...or for those that like Boyds Iterative Strength Ratings (ISR)..he has WSU as #26..(I personallly don't like Boyd's index) and think that he is full of hooey.

Why? Because he has the National Champ ranked #25, Georgia as #23...I dunno..it looks fishy to me.

http://www.warrennolan.com/baseball/2008/rpi

Nolan RPI for WSU: #15

http://www.warrennolan.com/football/2007/npi

Nolan NPI for WSU: #11

http://www.boydsworld.com/baseball/rpi/currentrpi.html

Boyd RPI for WSU: #18

http://www.boydsworld.com/baseball/isr/currentisr.html

Boyd ISR for WSU: #26

Can anyone see why I trust Nolan more than Boyd? :D

PS:
Boyd ISR for Fresno State: #25
Boyd RPI for Fresno State: #51
Nolan NPI for Fresno State: #49
Nolan RPI for Fresno State: #50

Fresno State did "come out of nowhere" and low rankings are reasonable.

[SpanglerFan316]

Hard to argue with the rankings. I do have to wonder about OK State being at #16 and above other regional winners.

If that is not a "joke", then he should have rated WSU higher because we beat the great OSU team. (I hope they (OSU players & coaches) have nightmares (about playing WSU). :lol: )

[billybud]

I should like the Nolan NPI...it does have Miami as #1 and and North Carolina at #2, with FSU at #3...But..it seems heavily loaded towards winning percentage

He has Oral Roberts (with an SOS of 137) at #5. Sure, their winning percentage is good (#5 at .7869..right behind the first four)...but it's not how much you win, it's also how tough are your opponents.

The teams placing #1 through #3 in winning percentage also had schedules ranked top 10 inj SOS...

WSU's winning percentage in Nolan is .7258 vs Oral Roberts' . 7869...

BUT..the Shockers played a #45 ranked schedule vs Oral's #137 ranked.

It isn't just how much did you win...it's also WHO did you beat.

Example, Rice is ranked lower than Oral Roberts...because their winning % is a tad lower than Oral R's. I have a suspicion that Rice (SOS #12), playing Oral Roberts' schedule, would have a much higher winning percentage.

I call BS on Nolans MO

[shockandawe08]

SpanglerFan316,

No slight taken. I just wasn't on the same page. I admit to taking some perverse pleasure at being above Okie State, no matter what the rankings are. :yes:

[vbird53]

No matter how you slice it, WSU averaged in the 10-16 range in the final rankings, and I don't think anyone could argue that.

Were we top 8 (obviously no. we didn't go to Omaha)?

Were we lower than 16 (no, we went to a Super, and played reasonably well, at a tough place to play)?

12 seems like a pretty good final number for us.

[billybud]

So you like Nolan's NPI?

Can anyone see why I trust Nolan more than Boyd?

For the life of me...I don't see Nolan's power ranking as being accurate...

He has Canisius (yeah, who?) as #8 nationally, Oral Robert's at #5...Coastal Carolina #7.......

I just don't see it.

[SpanglerFan316]

Re: So you like Nolan's NPI?

Can anyone see why I trust Nolan more than Boyd?

For the life of me...I don't see Nolan's power ranking as being accurate...

He has Canisius (yeah, who?) as #8 nationally, Oral Robert's at #5...Coastal Carolina #7.......

I just don't see it.

I throw out the silly teams (like Canisius) on Nolan's list and only look at the "serious" teams. I find that this is a fairly resaonable predictor of NCAA tourney games. It's not perfect but it gives you an idea. I don't have this confidence in Boyd. This is just my personal opinion, of course.

[William]

Re: So you like Nolan's NPI?

Can anyone see why I trust Nolan more than Boyd?

For the life of me...I don't see Nolan's power ranking as being accurate...

He has Canisius (yeah, who?) as #8 nationally, Oral Robert's at #5...Coastal Carolina #7.......

I just don't see it.

I throw out the silly teams (like Canisius) on Nolan's list and only look at the "serious" teams. I find that this is a fairly resaonable predictor of NCAA tourney games. It's not perfect but it gives you an idea. I don't have this confidence in Boyd. This is just my personal opinion, of course.

You throw out the silly teams, that is classic!!!!!
MOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

[SpanglerFan316]

William
Junior WuShock

Joined: 12 Apr 2007
Posts: 390
Location: your kitchen

William: You're not doing a good enough job washing the dishes. If you can't do a good job, you need to leave my kitchen. :D

[billybud]

LOL..I'm with Willie on this one...

You tout a guys system?...yet you pick and choose which teams it applies to....I agree, William, that is a hoot!

If the "system" ranks poorly for some teams and not for others, it probably has faulty logic and thus is not very usable.

[SpanglerFan316]

The problem with using just winning percentages is the SOS argument (i.e. who did you play and who did you beat). If this SOS argument is flawed, then where are you?

Are SOS rankings flawed? I would argue that they are.

Look at Fresno State's SOS: Nolan 54 Boyd 21
Look at Georgia's SOS: Nolan 7 Boyd 35
How can these be so far apart? Did Boyd "tweek" his numbers to make his system look better?

Look at the SEC East teams' SOS: (Nolan, then Boyd)
Georgia (7,35), Florida (4,48 ), Kentucky (65,84), Vanderbilt (46,72), South Carolina (18,68 ), Tennessee (55,75)
Look at the SEC West and ACC teams. How valid are their SOS rankings if they hardly play OOC schedules? (Feel free to argue here; home games against weak teams or games "in the family" (e.g. ACC vs. SEC) inflate the SOS ranking of all ACC and SEC teams.)

In statistics, one always looks at "outliers" (e.g. Canisius) with a grain of salt; usually one throws these out before doing a statistical analysis. My point was that if one only considered the 64 NCAA tourney teams and considered the Nolan and Boyd ranking of these teams, I would have more confidence in Nolan. I have done no formal analysis on the predictive values of these two rating systems and my confidence in Nolan might be wrong. Who knows?

[billybud]

Heck...Nolan doesn't bother with SOS...Canesius playing a bunch of nobodies is better than Rice...LOL.

Crazy stuff and not worth the time to peruse.

[SpanglerFan316]

Heck...Nolan doesn't bother with SOS

If Nolan doesn't bother with SOS, then what is this column titled "Strength of Schedule" on http://www.warrennolan.com/baseball/2008/rpi? Are you talking about the NPI? RPI?

Canesius playing a bunch of nobodies is better than Rice...LOL.
Crazy stuff

Canesius is certainly not better than Rice. To suggest this is, I agree, crazy. Any algorithm can be (i.e. has the possibility of being) wrong.

and not worth the time to peruse.

If Nolan's ranking gives better head-to-head predictions than Boyd, then it is certainly " worth the time to peruse."

[SpanglerFan316]

billybud: Where is the reaction to my "the SEC (or ACC or Big12 or ...) is overrated" comment? ;-) :D :lol:

[billybud]

I don't really have a reaction...especially about other than the ACC.

Everybody has an opinion...

FSU, Miami, and North Carolina all came out of the regionals and super regionals...they were better than their competition, on the field. I don't know about over rated, but I do know that the ACC teams did make it to the final eight in a play off format.

Lots of teams didn't win, and there are lots of excuses....
:cry:

Re Nolan's NPI...if you look, all the teams are ranked solely on their winning percentage...SOS may be listed for information purposes but there does not appear to be a mathmatical adjustment...there appears to be no algorithimn..just a straight line ranking on winning percentage...useless.