...AND, what about the "wooden spoon"? Who gets the first draft pick?

Six teams have a shot at the worst record in the NFL: Tennessee, Oakland, Jacksonville, and Tampa all have 2-12 records, with the New York Jets and Washington one game up at 3-11. 

Projecting the last two games, the key may be the Tennessee at Jacksonville debacle this Thursday night - talk about a bad game. This season has shown that teams simply are not ready to play on Thursday nights, and the game is either a blowout (with one unprepared team) or a sludge match (with two). Add to that two BAD teams to begin with, and look out, America! You've been warned!

Regardless, the winner of that game probably takes themselves out of contention, because they'll each be heavy underdogs against division heavyweights Indy and Houston in week 17, even with extra time to prepare. Meanwhile, Oakland will be the underdog week 17 at Denver UNLESS they rest everybody for the playoff run (possible), but they'd still lose in more likelihood. This week's game, hosting Buffalo, may be more winnable. And Tampa Bay has two games that are at home, but against teams that need to win for their own playoff ambitions (Green Bay, New Orleans). All other things equal, we'd bet on the Buccaneers being the most likely to finish 2-14. But, if Tennessee loses both games, they ARE the #1 pick.

Looking at the new FOLLOWING FOOTBALL tier rankings...

...our Top 4 are Alabama, Mississippi St, Florida St, and Oregon. As we noted Saturday, we're not likely to punish a team for losing by the amount expected (the Vegas spread was seven; they lost by five), especially on the road against another Tier A school. Sure, we'll move the Tide above them, but was the Seminoles' performance against an unranked, Tier G Miami squad more impressive? No. Certainly, we're much less impressed with TCU's debacle at Kansas than anything the Bulldogs did in Tuscaloosa. If you thought they'd lose at Alabama, and they do, no worse than expected - how can you punish that? To us, this is a classic case of the loss being more impressive than TCU's win.

...We made some adjustments based on some external rankings this week, in particular Peter Wolfe and Jeff Sagarin's work, but also looking through the Massey Index we linked to last week as well. If there were virtual ties within a tier, for example, we'd often turn to those sources for a second opinion (sorting out the middle of the ACC North, for example), but on a few occasions a consensus of opinions different from ours made us re-evaluate our rankings. The most blatant example was Western Kentucky, whom we had within three tiers of the bottom all year but whom every list we consulted had up in the 80's or so. Given their recent body of work (they're up to .500 now) and those opinions, we concurred and moved them up to tier O, number 88 on your radio dial...

...Looking at the list with conferences attached (yes, that's what the lower case letters after the overall record are!), a fairly clear pattern emerges: The SEC gets the benefit of the doubt if there's an extra loss on the record, particularly the West, over the closely regarded Pac-12, Big-12, and Big-10. The ACC is probably not quite as well regarded, or schools like Duke would be higher. Then there's a bit of a gap, because it takes about a two-game better record for a school from the Mountain West or the old Big East, the AAC, to match a school from one of the Power 5. (#37 is Maryland at 6-4; #38 is Boise St at 8-2.) Then, you drop down to the MAC, Conference USA, and the Sun Belt, all of whom lie essentially in a second division as it is (and the MW/AAC are fighting to stay above that). That's why Marshall sits in #25 with a 10-0 record: the schools in that "division" can't run with the "big boys" because they can't play the big boys. Rankings are determined first and foremost by one simple question: if these two teams played on a neutral field, who would win? The winner is ranked higher, the loser lower. Marshall's beaten everyone it's played...but would it beat any of the 24 teams above it? Arizona? Duke? Notre Dame? Oklahoma? It might even be generous to say that they'd beat the teams immediately below it...Utah? Clemson? Louisville? Miami-FL? We'd love to see them against West Virginia, given their proximity! 

...In fact, here's an interesting tidbit: The "strength of schedule" parameter for FCS defending champion North Dakota St is actually HIGHER than that of FBS Marshall! It's hard to argue that they're playing opponents that are comparable to what even Florida St is facing, much less the SEC!

...These tiers make for some strange bedfellows! Seeing Texas moving all the way up to #40, right below...East Carolina? And finding 6-4 Nevada at #59, right between North Carolina St (6-5) and North Carolina (5-5)! 

...Towards the bottom, in our attempt to keep our six-team tiers consistent (for a change, right?), we ended up with a "Bottom Two" - Georgia St and SMU. Despite the Mustangs' winless record, Georgia St is rated below them in many of the computer systems we looked through. Nevertheless, only a true #128 could lose the game Saturday the way they lost it - giving up a near-legendary twenty-one play drive over the course of the last six minutes of the game, including three fourth down conversions with the game on the line, and letting the opponent you've held scoreless for 3 1/2 quarters score the touchdown they had to score in the last six seconds to win. Amazing. (Admittedly, Idaho is close, though - losing to Tier T Troy, at home, by 17 points, when they'd been favored going in. That's impressive.)

Week 9 - the Basement Tiers (P through U, not that "P-U" is implied...)

Here are the lowest six tiers for Week 9, our "bottom 37", if you will...

Tier P: Colorado (2-7), Indiana (3-5), Ohio (4-5), Purdue (3-6), South Florida (3-6), and Alabama-Birmingham (5-4).

Tier Q: Buffalo (3-5), Florida International (3-6), Iowa St (2-6), South Alabama (5-3), Vanderbilt (3-6), and Wake Forest (2-6).

Tier R: Four-win Akron, three-win Appalachian St, Ball St, and Southern Miss, and two-win Army and Kansas.

Tier S is the other grouping with seven teams this week, including the following two and three win teams from the Group of Five conferences: Hawaii, New Mexico, Old Dominion, Tulane, UNLV, UTSA, and Western Kentucky.

The "Bottom Twelve" begins with Tier T, which features the following familiar names: Eastern Michigan (2-7), Miami of Ohio (2-8), North Texas (2-6), Tulsa (1-7), U Conn (2-6), and U Mass (2-7).

And finally, the "Bottom Six" (aka Tier U), the same six as last week: Georgia St (1-8), Idaho (1-7), Kent St (1-7), New Mexico St (2-7, but wins against other Bottom Six teams), Troy (1-8), and the only winless team in the Football Bowl Subdivision, SMU (0-7).

Here's the definition of a BOTTOM SIX team!

The Idaho Vandals, down 37-28 to Arkansas St (at home, mind you) with seven minutes to go in the game, has the ball on their own 25, first and ten, with a chance to make a drive and a statement. Here's their drive chart for this pivotal drive:

1st and 10 on the 25: False start, five yard penalty.
1st and 15 on the 20: Offensive holding, ten yard penalty, replay first down.
1st and 25 on the 10: Offensive holding (again), half the distance, replay first down.
1st and 30 on the 5: Jerrel Brown runs for 3 yards, fumbles, recovered by Ark St.

Needless to say, the Red Wolves scored two plays later and won 44-28. Sad.

Week 8 College Tiers - all 128 teams have been leveled!

That's right! Our extensive Following Football tiering system has divided the 128 FBS teams into twenty tiers of six or seven members (as always, we refuse to specifically rank teams until the end of the season), for your viewing and arguing pleasure! We start with the bottom five tiers, in the Basement Levels:

Tier U (aka, the Bottom Six):
No changes here from last week, and we still include four Sun Belt Conference also-rans in Georgia State, Idaho, New Mexico St, and Troy; along with MAC bottom-feeder Kent St and our lone remaining winless team, from the American Athletic Conference (used to be the Big East), the SMU Mustangs.

Tier T (aka the rest of the Bottom 13):
Also very similar to last week, with one-win Tulsa and UConn from the AAC, and two-win teams Appalachian St (Sun Belt), New Mexico (Mountain West), North Texas (Conference USA), and the two MAC entries, Miami-OH and UMass.

Tier S:
Ball St (3-5, 2-2 MAC), Eastern Michigan (2-6, 1-3 MAC), Hawaii (2-6, 1-2 MW), Old Dominion (3-5, 1-4 Sun), UNLV (2-6, 1-3 MW), and UT-San Antonio (2-6, 1-3 C-USA).

Tier R:
The fourth level from the bottom (if you like, call them rankings #104-109) contains Akron (4-4, 2-2 MAC), Army (2-5 as independent), Iowa St (2-5, 0-4 Big 12), Kansas (2-5, 0-4 Big 12), Tulane (2-5, 1-2 AAC), and Western Kentucky (3-4, 1-3 Sun).

Tier Q:
Finally (for this post in the Basement Level), there are seven teams - Buffalo (3-5, 1-3 MAC), Florida International (3-5, 2-2 C-USA), South Alabama (5-2, 4-1 Sun), Southern Miss (3-5, 1-3 C-USA), UL-Monroe (3-4, 2-2 Sun), Vanderbilt (2-6, 0-5 SEC), and Wake Forest (2-6, 0-4 ACC).

[Just a reminder - the most important rule of placing teams in tiers is, If the teams played on a neutral field, would they be close? Or would one team definitely win? If there's a significant difference, they should be in different tiers. But that's why South Alabama (at 5-2) can be in the same tier as 2-6 Vanderbilt, winless in the SEC: Wouldn't SA be winless there, too?]

The Tiers have NARROWED for Week 7!

As we reach the halfway point of the season, we're narrowing the tiers again, down to SIX teams per tier. Eventually we'll get down to four, and at season's end we'll submit our final ranking order, from 1-124...but it's premature and unnecessary to do so now.

Tier A hosts the top six school teams as of now: three undefeateds (Mississippi St, Ole Miss, Florida St*) and three teams whose one loss was narrow, on the road, and to a top tier team (Alabama, Notre Dame, TCU). Hard to deny them - almost hard to think there will be ANY unbeatens at season's end except for minor league champ Marshall.

Tier B contains six one-loss power teams, any of whom we could see beating even the Tier A teams on a given day: Auburn, Baylor, Georgia, Michigan St, Ohio St, and Oregon.

Tier C has Arizona, Duke, LSU, Nebraska, USC, and West Virginia. The Wildcats, Blue Devils, and Cornhuskers have one loss each; the others have last twice. But none of the nine losses were what you'd call embarrassing or 'inappropriate' - losing to good teams, no blowouts, and so forth. They'll hold their own against almost anyone, but we'd make them underdogs to the Tier A and B teams in a heartbeat.

When we get down to Tier D, some of these losses are a bit less excusable. These equate to rankings #19-24 in a conventional poll: Arizona St (5-1), East Carolina (5-1), Kansas St (5-1), Oklahoma (5-2), UCLA (5-2), and 5-1 Utah.

Tier E is essentially the equivalent of the fourth tier in last week's divisions, if comparisons are important to you: 5-2 Clemson, Colorado St (6-1), Kentucky (5-2), undefeated Marshall, Minnesota (6-1), and 5-2 Oklahoma St.

Tier F hosts six teams that (while not deserving grades of "F"!) have been disappointments at one level or another, more recently in particular: Georgia Tech (5-2, losers of their last two), Louisville (6-2), Maryland and Missouri (both 5-2), idle 4-2 Penn St, and free-falling Texas A&M, losers of three straight to three Tier A teams! What a killer schedule!

Now we've reached the levels of "receiving token votes" in the conventional polls, but these teams all have successes to boast of this year: Boise St, Miami-FL, Oregon St, Rutgers, Washington, and Wisconsin. All except the U have two losses; the Hurricanes have three. So, that's Tier G.

Tier H changed in drafts several times, but we've settled on Arkansas (4-3 in the toughest division in CFB history), Iowa (5-2), 4-3 Stanford and South Carolina and Utah St and Virginia.

The last level matching up with last week's divisions is Tier I, which features these competent teams: Air Force, Boston College, California, Northern Illinois, Pitt, Virginia Tech.

In the unofficial "tiery-eyed teams in waiting" green room are such teams as Bowling Green, fast-falling BYU, Florida, Houston, Northwestern, Tennessee, Texas, Cincinnati, Indiana, Memphis, North Carolina, North Carolina St, Temple, and Texas Tech.

*If the Tallahassee police and FSU compliance officers truly put justice ahead of football success, do you think the Seminoles would still be undefeated?

And on the flip side, the Bottom Eight becomes the Bottom Six (plus seven more)... The undisputed master of the B6 is the lone winless team left in the FBS, the coachless SMU Mustangs, joined by Georgia St, Idaho, Kent St, New Mexico St, and Troy. "Congratulations" to those clubs, some of whom were so far down that even a win didn't get them out of the basement!

Waiting for entrance to the exclusive club are Appalachian St, Ball St, Eastern Michigan, Miami-OH, North Texas, UConn and UMass. Actually, three of those just escaped the B8, so "waiting" is inappropriate...