Evaluating the OTP Preseason Poll

Evaluation is a good thing. Assessment makes for better performance the next time around. So in the efforts of full disclosure, it's time to evaluate the OTP Preseason Rankings of 2008 against this week's final AP poll of the 2008 season.

The awful facts...

Team	Preseason OTP Rank	Final AP Rank
Florida	1	1
USC	2	5
Georgia	3	16
Oklahoma	4	2
Ohio State	5	10
Missouri	6	25
LSU	7	NR
West Virginia	8	NR
Clemson	9	NR
Auburn	10	NR
Texas	11	3
Arizona State	12	NR
Wisconsin	13	NR
Tennessee	14	NR
Virginia Tech	15	21
Texas Tech	16	8
Kansas	17	NR
BYU	18	17
Illinois	19	NR
Penn State	20	6
Oregon	21	15
South Florida	22	NR
Wake Forest	23	NR
Rutgers	24	NR
Ball State	25	23

So what does all this tell us?

Where We Succeeded:

• Kudos to us for picking Florida #1. Even the Florida bloggers thought we were crazy.
• Kudos to us for picking Ball State #25. We were one of the first not named Jason Whitlock to champion the Cardinals as a Top 25 team.
• 13 of our preseason Top 25 finished in the final Top 25. Not fantastic by any means, but over 50%.
  

Where We Failed:

• 7 of our Top 14 failed to make the final Top 25. We were not alone in this fact, and fingers can be pointed to Auburn, Clemson, West Virginia, Tennessee, Arizona State, Wisconsin, and LSU for a year of suckery that totally took a #2 all over most preseason polls.
• Ranking teams we should have known better way higher than we should have. We're looking at you Georgia, Missouri, and Ohio State.
• Undervaluing teams from the non-BCS conferences, though I'm not sure anyone could have seen Utah, TCU, or Boise State coming the way they did.

All things considered, I am a firm believer that our preseason poll was just as good as any other site's and most AP voters as well. Regardless, RV and myself will dedicate ourselves to putting out a quality product for you next summer... even better than the 08 edition.

How did your poll shape up?