Poll: Who Can Beat the Crimson Tide?
by kleph on May 5, 2010 6:58 AM CDT
in Football
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PrintIn case you missed it, Spencer Hall over at Every Day Should Be Saturday posted an interesting open letter from a Gator fan to Alabama fans arguing that then 2010 football season is not going to be as rosy as we are making it right now in the soothing wake of the National Championship.
Spencer argues that new talent can't replace lost experience, performance from the veterans won't be constant, the bizarre unexplainable down games will happen and the fact is there is someone on the slate who is living just to take us down and take us down hard.
The warning is against the sins of complacency and entitlement that are as inevitable as they will be crippling. Coach Saban has this covered with the team but we fans are left at the mercies of our own rapidly increasing expectations. And it doesn't help matters that the prognosticators are already lining up to whisper all those wonderful things in our ears we have yearned to hear for so so long.
Because there's an inescapable truth at the heart of this: with two undefeated regular seasons and a 14-game win streak, the stakes get higher every notch in the "W" column. And escaping the SEC West - much less the conferenece - unscathed in any single season is unlikely enough but to do it three years in a row is simply unfathomable.
The practical question that it elicits is "Who?" Who is out there between Sept. 4 and Nov. 26 that will take down this juggernaut of a team? So our poll asks, which team - if any - on the 2010 slate will be the one to break Alabama's win streak?
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I didn't see San Jose State...
Beat Auburn? CHECK. 12-0 regular season? CHECK. Beat the #1 Gators for the SECCG? CHECK. Ingram wins the Heisman? CHECK. Tide defeats the Longhorns for the BCS Championship? CHECK!
You wouldn't have included Luoisiana Monroe a few of years ago either.
Just sayin Bama can’t look past anyone.
Beat Auburn? CHECK. 12-0 regular season? CHECK. Beat the #1 Gators for the SECCG? CHECK. Ingram wins the Heisman? CHECK. Tide defeats the Longhorns for the BCS Championship? CHECK!
let me put it this way...
if we lose to either of those two teams… we’ve got a lot worse problems on our hands than post-national-championship letdown.
Roll 'Bama Roll: The Champagne of 'Bama Blogs.
What about GA State?!?!!
"You stay bought into it when you see your opponent sucking air and physically failing and you're still fit and ready and you know you own his ass."- Corey Reamer speaking about Coach Cochran
I agree with the line of thinking...
That because we’ve gone undefeated in the SEC the past two years, we ‘re just bound to get a loss this time around. But to me, even if we lose one game does not mean we’re not playing for the SEC championship. I think our loss (if it happens) comes at Arkansas. I’m not sure that Arkansas will challenge for the SECW, but I do think they can finish second in the SECW. Their offense will be raring to go, and I think their defense will be better. I say they beat us more because the game is in Fayetteville, not because they will be better than us.
i very much agree...
a loss, or even two, doesn’t necessarily preclude making to the sec championship or even being eliminated from the national championship picture. we’ve had the luxury of controlling our own destiny two years running. to assume we’re not going to need the chips to fall our way at some point in terms of post-season play is being unrealistic.
Roll 'Bama Roll: The Champagne of 'Bama Blogs.
If they can beat us
they’re probably contending for the SEC championship…
"Let's go be champions, boys!" - Greg McElroy
(Formerly SugarBowl93)
by RememberTheRoseBowl on May 5, 2010 9:30 AM CDT up reply actions
Re: 'gone undefeated in the SEC the past two years'
Obviously, this refers to the regular season and excludes the championship game. My question: is this a common way of looking at league play by your fan base, that the championship game is post-season and thus segregated?
"So while while I may be douchy, I’m not rusty."
Personally, I definitely do not consider
the SEC CG to be part of the regular season. I think that’s pretty standard even outside the Bama fanbase, though I guess I could be wrong.
Would you exclude the championship game
in characterizing a season as undefeated?
"So while while I may be douchy, I’m not rusty."
It seems...
…the confusion here stems from CaliforniaTide’s comment that we’ve gone undefeated in the SEC the last two years. Simply put: we haven’t. I’m guessing that what he was referring to is the fact that we have had two consecutive undefeated regular seasons, and that the probability is that that won’t happen again this season. None of us are trying to pretend we didn’t lose the SECCG, or our bowl game, in 2008.
"High standards come from passion within...." --Coach Nick Saban
by NiceLittleSaturday on May 5, 2010 3:28 PM CDT up reply actions
the definition i'm using is undefeated regular seasons.
that feat is a massive achievement on the part of any program. florida did it last year and the loss in the SECCG does nothing to mar the accomplishment. to do it twice in a row is phenomenal. and three times… highly unlikely.
Roll 'Bama Roll: The Champagne of 'Bama Blogs.
It may not "mar the accomplishment"...
…but it sure is a downer….
"High standards come from passion within...." --Coach Nick Saban
by NiceLittleSaturday on May 5, 2010 3:43 PM CDT up reply actions
now imagine one busting this bad-ass regular season win streak...
Roll 'Bama Roll: The Champagne of 'Bama Blogs.
That...
…would/will not be nearly the downer losing the SECCG would be….
"High standards come from passion within...." --Coach Nick Saban
by NiceLittleSaturday on May 5, 2010 8:49 PM CDT up reply actions
i think i had a 36 hour hangover
and my dog done r-u-n-n o-f-t
The beauty of The Process is that you have never arrived, so you get to continue being perpetually awesome... -Espyonage
my hair!
"You know, we had a lot of fun tonight. But there's nothing funny about vapor lock! It's the third most common cause of cars stalling. So please, take care of your car and get it checked!" -Joe Namath
i dont want FOP damnit!
i’m a Dapper Dan man…
The beauty of The Process is that you have never arrived, so you get to continue being perpetually awesome... -Espyonage
And stay out of Woolworths!
"You know, we had a lot of fun tonight. But there's nothing funny about vapor lock! It's the third most common cause of cars stalling. So please, take care of your car and get it checked!" -Joe Namath
do you think he meant this Woolworth?
or all of em?
The beauty of The Process is that you have never arrived, so you get to continue being perpetually awesome... -Espyonage
Gotch, both
Not trying to put words in your mouth either or do some elaborate setup. My question, which you’ve both helped to answer, was about characterization. Not having a championship game of our own, and being party to the absurd league policy of co-champions with no official tie-break, we’ve suffered the supremely annoying buckeye characterization of ‘consecutive league championships.’ Despite the beats we gave them in 05 and 08, because of losses to meatchicken and iowa, they were granted official co-champion status by the league and, in extensia, license to freely cite themselves as consecutive champions. Something I’ve insisted I would not do if we ever lose head-to-head to the other ‘co-champion.’
"So while while I may be douchy, I’m not rusty."
exactly
and keep in mind, we can’t predict who the opponents of the SEC CG and the Bowl/National Championship game will be so it was a necessary exclusion for the purposes of the poll. (although the forgone conclusion is that it will be florida who we meet in the regular season and who is running a distance second to “nobody”)
Roll 'Bama Roll: The Champagne of 'Bama Blogs.
Ahhh... thanks for clarifying.
I’ve seen others say that we were “undefeated in the SEC” in ‘08, but no I don’t think that’s valid. Undefeated regular season is different.
I voted for Arkansas as well...
….but I love that “we’re going undefeated” has run away with the vote. Good times are back again….
Roll Bama Roll - The Champagne of Bama Blogs.
If we get by Arky and UF
running the table is a very big possibility. But we just can’t look past AU either.
"You stay bought into it when you see your opponent sucking air and physically failing and you're still fit and ready and you know you own his ass."- Corey Reamer speaking about Coach Cochran
Or we might end up with another moral loss.
I'm wrong all the time.
by PeteHoliday on May 5, 2010 8:45 AM CDT up reply actions 1 recs
It's amazing how
those moral losses just didn’t seem to affect the outcome of last season like the moral victories that the barn got did for them. I wonder why that is…
"Let's go be champions, boys!" - Greg McElroy
(Formerly SugarBowl93)
by RememberTheRoseBowl on May 5, 2010 9:31 AM CDT up reply actions
The BCS formula needs to be updated.
I'm wrong all the time.
by PeteHoliday on May 5, 2010 12:53 PM CDT up reply actions 1 recs
man those are the worst...
wait..no there not.
"You stay bought into it when you see your opponent sucking air and physically failing and you're still fit and ready and you know you own his ass."- Corey Reamer speaking about Coach Cochran
that's funny...
…it never occurred to me there was another side to the “moral victory” equation.
Because I believe this is the only type of loss we’ll suffer this season, I voted “undefeated”.
by Queen of the Universe on May 5, 2010 11:33 AM CDT up reply actions
Keep in mind the ancestors of this author wrote similar pieces in the summer following our championship parades in 1925, 1964, and 1978.
"Sympathy has expired Longhorns" WallaceWade04
by The Voice of Reason on May 5, 2010 8:22 AM CDT reply actions
That gator that is.
"Sympathy has expired Longhorns" WallaceWade04
by The Voice of Reason on May 5, 2010 8:23 AM CDT up reply actions
and the point was valid...
alabama tied stanford in the 1926 rose bowl and went on to a dismal 5-4 record in 1927/
alabama lost to texas in the 1965 orange bowl. and then lost to georgia in the 1965 season opener. (and then, famously, ran the table in ’66 but was denied the championship)
alabama lost to USC in 1978.
the point here is that there is a natural tendancy for expectations to increase in the wake of success… often to the point where it becomes untethered from the reality of the situation. this is why coach saban is so adamant about the fact the 2010 squad is not defending anything. they are starting from scratch.
nowhere in spencer’s piece is he saying any of this will preclude alabama from garnering another sec or national championship. but, rather, getting there is going to be much much more difficult and the inevitable setback will sting so much worse than they did back when we were expecting mediocrity by mid-october.
Roll 'Bama Roll: The Champagne of 'Bama Blogs.
the thing is
as a Bama fan i’ve pretty much always held 10 wins and an SEC title as the standard for an acceptable season. so any losses we’ve taken, in any season, have always hurt.
losing to LSU in 05’ on that BS PI call late in the game? that frickin hurt. same with the collapse in 07.
orson/spencer is a good guy and a great writer, but he’s a gator, not a Bama fan, he just wouldn’t know.
The beauty of The Process is that you have never arrived, so you get to continue being perpetually awesome... -Espyonage
my point is that we won championships the following year regardless....1926, 1965, and 1979
"Sympathy has expired Longhorns" WallaceWade04
by The Voice of Reason on May 5, 2010 8:43 AM CDT reply actions
and i agree...
but the idea this team, any team, is invulnerable is nonsensical. and the poll up there is indicating there a heck of a lot of folks that think just that. and that is exactly the point spencer is trying to make in his article.
Roll 'Bama Roll: The Champagne of 'Bama Blogs.
sure...
…but if we’re being honest, I believe we’re going to run the table every season, even in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary (see the desert years between 1992 and 2008)
To me, realism is for other team’s fans.
by Queen of the Universe on May 5, 2010 11:43 AM CDT up reply actions 4 recs
you dear, deserve a Rec...
RBR's King of Hip-Hop...
by SpockJenkins on May 5, 2010 12:11 PM CDT up reply actions
Completely agree.
But I won’t even admit this is not realism. We are going to win every game from here to eternity.
And I don’t question it. I don’t even think about questions. In fact, just to be safe I don’t even think.
by crimsontsunami on May 5, 2010 1:31 PM CDT up reply actions
You have...
…a career in politics, my friend….
"High standards come from passion within...." --Coach Nick Saban
by NiceLittleSaturday on May 5, 2010 3:21 PM CDT up reply actions
hey if your gut tells you something
why bother consulting your brain? thats just a waste of resources you could put towards hating auburn.
The beauty of The Process is that you have never arrived, so you get to continue being perpetually awesome... -Espyonage
by tempebamafan on May 5, 2010 4:11 PM CDT up reply actions 3 recs
My thoughts exactly...
If I were able to think, of course.
by crimsontsunami on May 5, 2010 10:06 PM CDT up reply actions
that's reaching, I think.
I wasn’t aware that selecting “we will run the table” meant the same thing as “no one can possibly defeat us”. I selected a prediction. That’s far different from asserting inevitability.
University of Tennessee : Where Schadenfreude Happens
Well, it sure as Hell won't be Ole Miss.
I’m not exactly sure how we’re going to score points this year.
Red Cup Rebellion - Changing the Culture of Ole Miss Athletics
Take a picture, trick.
by The Ghost of Jay Cutler on May 5, 2010 8:52 AM CDT reply actions
Aw, c'mon, Ghost Jay!
If it’s any consolation, the game won’t be half as fun in Tuscaloosa as it would be in the Grove. And I mean that. Plus you get a bye week before us . . . and you’ve got to score points on La-La!
Never quit. It is the easiest cop-out in the world.
It is odd
I guess the skeptic in me believes Alabama is going to lose a game, but when I try and objectively think about which team we will lose to, I cannot think of one.
That's how I feel
Because I don’t really think any of those teams on the poll will be BETTER than us. I just think one of them could pull out a win on us. I picked Arky because they should have a good passing game and our secondary will probably be at their weakest early in the season.
"You know, we had a lot of fun tonight. But there's nothing funny about vapor lock! It's the third most common cause of cars stalling. So please, take care of your car and get it checked!" -Joe Namath
That's
likely because you assume the level of performance will at least be equal to that of 2009, and that’s no certainty. The fact of the matter is we just don’t know what will happen in 2010. Will McElroy show any progress? How will our o-line fair without Mike Johnson? Will Trent and Mark be able to stay healthy? Will Julio finally break out? Just so many questions and that’s just the offense. We’ll just have to wait and see what happens. But hey, that’s what makes this so damn fun.
"A demagogue is one who preaches doctrines he knows to be untrue to men he knows to be idiots." -H. L. Mencken
and you didn't even mention the defense.
"You stay bought into it when you see your opponent sucking air and physically failing and you're still fit and ready and you know you own his ass."- Corey Reamer speaking about Coach Cochran
an Addams family website....
"High standards come from passion within...." --Coach Nick Saban
by NiceLittleSaturday on May 5, 2010 3:22 PM CDT up reply actions
on crack....
"You stay bought into it when you see your opponent sucking air and physically failing and you're still fit and ready and you know you own his ass."- Corey Reamer speaking about Coach Cochran
Are you a dealer?
It's not what you've done but what you are doing that matters.
And the roses in this grand ol' stadium are once again Crimson. - Eli Gold, CTSN Broadcast of the BCS Championship Game at the Rose Bowl, 1-7-2010
by AlabamaJammer on May 5, 2010 4:15 PM CDT up reply actions
I doubt it's Florida
We’re getting them early enough that Brantley won’t be up to speed by then. If I had to choose one, It’s either Arkansas or LSU. Either the hogs get us in a shootout, or LSU gets super hyped up and knocks us off.
49er and ATL Hawks fan since '86, Braves fan since '90, Bama fan since birth.
I wonder if people could bet the field, would half of the voters still think that we would go undefeated. I think that it’s also a bit unfair to exclude the BCS championship opponent from the list. All but the craziest opponent would probably have that as a sub-touchdown line.
tennessee has a whopping zero votes
do you suggest anyone seriously believes san jose state has a better chance of beating us than the vols?
but the actual reason i excluded them was to eliminate the joke votes – either by our partisans or by visiting foes casting votes.
Roll 'Bama Roll: The Champagne of 'Bama Blogs.
I honestly do.
Remember the entitlement mentality and the ease with which the #1 team in the country could look past little ol’ San Jose St.
SJS is the classic “NOBODY” that can will itself to win THE BIGGEST GAME IN THEIR SCHOOL’S HISTORY.
Likely? HELL no.
Possible? More so than any of us are willing to admit.
Beat Auburn? CHECK. 12-0 regular season? CHECK. Beat the #1 Gators for the SECCG? CHECK. Ingram wins the Heisman? CHECK. Tide defeats the Longhorns for the BCS Championship? CHECK!
you made the assertion...
it’s up to you to back it up. all i’ll note is whatever weaknesses this team may have it’s nothing like michigan in 2007.
Roll 'Bama Roll: The Champagne of 'Bama Blogs.
I would've put more money...
On Appalachian State beating Michigan in Michigan than I would on San Jose State beating Alabama in Alabama.
It just won’t happen.
by CaliforniaTide on May 6, 2010 7:50 AM CDT up reply actions
I'll just say it...
…it’s not possible.
"High standards come from passion within...." --Coach Nick Saban
by NiceLittleSaturday on May 6, 2010 3:46 PM CDT up reply actions
Simple probability...
states that each year, even each game, is an independent event (barring injuries of course). We shouldn’t lose just because “it’s hard” to have 3 undefeated seasons in a row. i bet this time last year we were all worrying about who would finally take us down in the regular season, and we were all worrying about how we would replace the lost experience at qb, rb, etc. But lo and behold, we went undefeated.
I look at each team on our schedule and I think, why should this team be able to beat us? Every team on that schedule we should beat, so i argue…Why not another undefeated season?
you have it backwards...
the odds dictate that a loss or two in a season is what is probable. the argument here isn’t that since we’ve had two undefeated seasons we’re not likely to do so again. rather it’s we’ve beat the odds for two straight years and that’s not something which can continue indefinitely.
or to put it differently, every coin flip is a random event. and every next flip is completely unrelated to the one prior. but hitting a long run of heads or tails is extremely unlikely. obviously a football game isn’t a random event, but the law of averages reaches out and whips everyone’s ass eventually. at some point in the future the unholy mix of variables that makes football contest is going to come together in the other guys’ favor.
Roll 'Bama Roll: The Champagne of 'Bama Blogs.
all i was trying to say really is that just because we already have two undefeated seasons, it doesn’t mean that it has to be hard to do it again. take auburn’s streak against us for 7 years straight as an example. every time they played us, the worry for them was “we have beaten them so many times before, we are certainly due for a loss.” but as we all saw, they beat us continuously year after year until that glorious beatdown. so a team can never be “due” a loss just because it was won so many.
And with your coinflip argument, it seems like you are arguing that over the long-term, every team should have a .500 winning average, which clearyly is unture, and each team has an equal shot at winning any game. which i do believe that any team can win on any given day, the odds will be stacked in our favor every time we play any team, so what are the odds really?
yea i guess someday we will lose a game, but it doesn’t have to be this year, or the next, or the next, or the next just because we have won too many damn games.
by CrimsonTide229 on May 5, 2010 12:33 PM CDT up reply actions
no, i'm saying you can't beat the law of averages forever...
which is not the same as insisting we won’t be undefeated in the regular season because we were the last two years. both 2008 and 2009 were unbelievably rare events where everything came together perfectly. this year starts out just as improbably as each one of those did. conversely, you seem to be arguing that this is like the the (fallacious) argument for playing the lottery: “somebody has to win.” because,no. nobody will necessarily pull off this feat in any given year.
one reason i am down the idea alabama is likely to make it through this season unscathed is because i summarily reject the assertion that holds the crimson tide’s success is incumbent upon a wider trend of weakness across the conference. the quality of on-the-field talent and competitiveness is at an extremely high level across the sec (although there’s a pretty impressive gap between the haves and the have-nots) and no team is going to enjoy success over the field for an indefinite period of time.
Roll 'Bama Roll: The Champagne of 'Bama Blogs.
I just don’t believe the law of averages applies here, just because we aren’t talking random events. You are caught up in the so-called “gambler’s fallacy,” which says that a losing team is due a win, or inversely, that a winning team is due a loss. And no i’m not saying that somebody has to go undefeated, but rather that there is no reason we shouldn’t. If you think about it, what is so improbable about this season? We know who we are, we know who we are facing, and I expect to beat every team on that schedule because i know we ARE better.
but i do agree that as talent switches hands, the greater the chance for a loss become. and the outcome of a game does become increasingly difficult to predict. bit right now, i still believe we have the best talent and we should win every game. so i think another undefeated season isn’t that unfathomable
by CrimsonTide229 on May 5, 2010 12:58 PM CDT up reply actions
what is improbable...?
facing a damned strong penn state squad we’ve not played in decades the second game of the season.
heading into fayeteville against one of the few men in the conference who can create an offense to match saban’s defense and who has a quarterback to execute it.
going into death valley and facing 94,000 screaming coon asses bent for blood and avenging two years of relatively close losses with a team coming off a bye week.
none of these is an assured win. not one.
Roll 'Bama Roll: The Champagne of 'Bama Blogs.
by kleph on May 5, 2010 1:04 PM CDT up reply actions 1 recs
ok now we are talking completely different things here. no win is assured, but i sure as hell believe that we should beat all of these teams. i believe that we are better than every team on the schedule. Im not saying we shouldn’t be nervous about these teams, because i sure as hell am and expect a fight from every team we play.
intangibles certainly play a factor, game-planning certainly plays a factor, and im just as nervous as anyone. but when i take it all in, i certainly think we are better than every team out there. If we lose its no ones fault but our own, and i hope our squad goes out and whips ass on every play to get another titie!
by CrimsonTide229 on May 5, 2010 1:44 PM CDT up reply actions
those are good examples of tough games where we can expect a real dog fight
but i still think that 1: PSU will be breaking in a new QB (he’s replacing a 4 year starter), our O is going to be so stout we can run it 50 times and still win going away…
2: mallet is a good qb but cant throw from his back. courtney upshaw and dant’a hightower will force TO’s by way of living in the arky backfield.
3: someone is over looking florida. but it’s okay because as Phil Steele pointed out the other day on his blog, they return somewhere close to 20 % of their offensive production from last year. simply put, they lost every important skill position guy on O. (to contrast Bama returns 89.5% of their offensive production from last year)
4: les miles is a moron and will be trying to save his job while the program crumbles around him come november. an early loss to auburn sets the dominoes in motion. 2010 is miles’ last year in red stick.
5: nebraska is who i expect we’ll be playing on january 10. they return something like 95% of their O production from last year, and supposedly they losta butt load of starts on O line last year due to injury. so they have like 9 guys who started a half dozen games who are returning. roy helu aint that bad. and “Bo Pelini” is kinda ll you need to say about their D. Nebraska gives us a tough game, but we still win thanks to having so many weapons on O. Julio, Maze, Gibson, TR, Lacy, Heisman Trophy Winner Mark Ingram.
The beauty of The Process is that you have never arrived, so you get to continue being perpetually awesome... -Espyonage
PSU breaking in a new QB...
I’ve heard that before…not that I expect them to win or anything, but wasn’t that the objection everyone was using about us last year? I know little about PSU’s situation, but if a new QB is the only flaw, we’re in for a fight no matter how good our O is.
"Let's go be champions, boys!" - Greg McElroy
(Formerly SugarBowl93)
by RememberTheRoseBowl on May 5, 2010 10:11 PM CDT up reply actions 1 recs
The coin landed on tails for 17 damn years,
I think we can get a few heads in a row to even things out, no?
"Yeah, it's Tennessee, that's the way it is sometimes." - Corey Zickefoose, Pulitzer Prize winner and robbery victim
"This is not the end. This is the beginning." - The Great and Powerful Saban
by Thomas Walker Esq on May 5, 2010 4:21 PM CDT via mobile up reply actions
You never know....
"High standards come from passion within...." --Coach Nick Saban
by NiceLittleSaturday on May 5, 2010 8:54 PM CDT up reply actions
Probability doesn’t dictate that games are independent. That the games are independent of one another is an assumption you have to make in order to make any sort of sense of the probabilities.
I'm wrong all the time.
i knew pete couldn't resist getting in on the action...
kool-aid is on me for the other 356 of my friends
"You have to create 6 seconds of hell each play..."
Coach Nick Saban
I need a little more self-control
But people making authoritative-sounding statements about fields like statistics and probability that are so obviously wrong is one of my pet peeves.
I'm wrong all the time.
he also likes...
…when people type “words words words” to make the word minimums :)
by Queen of the Universe on May 5, 2010 5:49 PM CDT up reply actions
i got tired of typing "words words words" so here are the lyrics to the school fight song...
The beauty of The Process is that you have never arrived, so you get to continue being perpetually awesome... -Espyonage
by tempebamafan on May 5, 2010 6:20 PM CDT up reply actions 1 recs
If I had a 1000 at bats
against Roger Clemens, what are the odds I would collect at least one base hit?
www.totteringworld.com
Excellent...
…‘cause that dude’s arm would be wasted after the first couple hundred throws….
"High standards come from passion within...." --Coach Nick Saban
by NiceLittleSaturday on May 6, 2010 3:47 PM CDT up reply actions
right
Football games (or the probabilities of the outcomes of football games) are more than likely not independent events because of the psychological and physical toll they put on players. But the effects are so complicated that you might as well consider them independent. A win might help you in the next game by giving you confidence and experience, or it might make you overconfident and detract from your performance.
If anything, I’d say we are more likely to run the table this year than we were last year. But it’s still a long shot.
What you're seeing is team spirit. It's like the Holy Spirit, but more powerful.
-Hank Hill
But the effects are so complicated that you might as well consider them independent.
On one hand, I agree because if you don’t assume they’re independent, you’d spend the rest of your life trying to settle the dependencies.
On the other hand, the notion that things with complicated or subtle relationships should be assumed to have no relationship whatsoever is pretty silly for anything but back-of-the-napkin guesswork.
I'm wrong all the time.
On the other hand, the notion that things with complicated or subtle relationships should be assumed to have no relationship whatsoever is pretty silly for anything but back-of-the-napkin guesswork.
maybe in general, but I don’t think it’s silly in this particular case. If the effect of something on probability is as likely to be positive as it is negative, then you might as well disregard it. And with such a chaotic system as football, you could make a decent case for taking that approach.
What you're seeing is team spirit. It's like the Holy Spirit, but more powerful.
-Hank Hill
Ahhh...
the Kool Aid tastes good today. I’m taking a full dose of optimism and voting for the 3-peat!
Voted for Tennessee
because somebody had to.
Longest Atlanta Falcons winning-seasons streak: 2008 - current
The Falcoholic · Blog · Twitter
no they didn't
"You know, we had a lot of fun tonight. But there's nothing funny about vapor lock! It's the third most common cause of cars stalling. So please, take care of your car and get it checked!" -Joe Namath
we don't
take kindly to tennessee round here.
"You stay bought into it when you see your opponent sucking air and physically failing and you're still fit and ready and you know you own his ass."- Corey Reamer speaking about Coach Cochran
Even with the hate
I could admit in some years that they could beat us.
But this is definitely not one of those years.
"You know, we had a lot of fun tonight. But there's nothing funny about vapor lock! It's the third most common cause of cars stalling. So please, take care of your car and get it checked!" -Joe Namath
The question in your poll of which team WILL beat us
is different than the question in your headline, “who CAN beat us”.
I’d say almost any of those teams COULD beat us. But if you ask me to predict which one will? Yeah, I’m probably going to go for the “none of the above” option. If you ask me which one is MOST LIKELY to, I’d probably say Arkansas.
Agreed
If the poll reflected the title of the post, I want to cast multiple votes for PSU, Arky and UF.
Moisture is the essence of wetness.
since you can only choose a single team in the poll
is why i worded it the way i did – which team do you think will be the first to best us on the field? obviously, as nobody has complete certainty of what will transpire, every option is “can” beat us to a degree. but, lets say, to a degree you’d feel comfortable putting a decent wager on.
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that is another crucial distinction
i think there are 4 or 5 games where we have a realistic chance of getting beat. but i dont think any of the games look like we will get beat. and that is why i had to choose “none of the above”.
The beauty of The Process is that you have never arrived, so you get to continue being perpetually awesome... -Espyonage
as far wagers go
i’m betting on us to run the table. we’re getting at least 3 to 1 odds on that, and they look to only go up as more people disect the team and try to make the case for someone else beating us.
The beauty of The Process is that you have never arrived, so you get to continue being perpetually awesome... -Espyonage
Well I wouldn't bet against Alabama in any game!
But I also wouldn’t bet on us running the table. Guess I’m just not much of a betting man.
Anyway, I think your answer would be significantly different if you had phrased it as “which team is most likely to beat us?” You’d still get a few that say “none of the above” but it would only be the true crazies diehards.
honestly, given the response
i really don’t think how it was worded really matters
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The beauty of The Process is that you have never arrived, so you get to continue being perpetually awesome... -Espyonage
by tempebamafan on May 5, 2010 11:51 PM CDT up reply actions
I dont buy into the "were due for an L" theory
if you flip a coin 200 times and it lands on heads every time, its still just a 50/50 shot that it will land on tails the next time you flip it. I honestly believe we have one of the most talented and the best coached team in the country, and as such, if we take it game by game, we ought to run the table. Anything less than an undefeated regular season is, in my opinion, a disappointment this year.
Moisture is the essence of wetness.
i am not saying the team is "due for an L" despite what several commenters seem to think.
each and every year the possibility of a loss is extremely high due to the quality of competition in the SEC – it’s the common state of affairs. getting through two regular seasons without an L is an accomplishment of gargantuan proportions. there are far two many matters in the mix beyond the control of coach saban and the guys on the field. and expecting it to happen once more because it’s happened twice in the past is just shortsighted folly
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expecting it to happen again because it happened twice before is just as illogical as thinking it won’t happen again because it did 2x before.
That being said, it’s more likely not to happen than to happen. I estimated our chances against all opponents this year, and did the math to see what the chances of winning all the games were. I came out to about a 15% chance of running the table.
What you're seeing is team spirit. It's like the Holy Spirit, but more powerful.
-Hank Hill
again, you misunderstand...
i’ve never said i don’t think it will happen because of the past. i’m saying that each and every year it’s a highly unlikely scenario. and there are numerous factors that would lead one to believe this year will be even more difficult than in the most recent two seasons.
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well, I didn’t mean to be accusatory. I was just stating the facts. But I disagree with your statement about this season versus the previous two. In 08 we were coming off what? A 6-6 season including a loss to LA Monroe? I don’t think anyone seriously thought we would run the table. In 09 we were starting a new QB, RB, and we had a rebuilt O line. And we lost some leadership on the defense. Knowing that we did it might be clouding your judgment. Sure, there are questions this year, but no more than the previous years IMO.
What you're seeing is team spirit. It's like the Holy Spirit, but more powerful.
-Hank Hill
I've got...
…a lot more questions this year than last. I had serious doubts last year, but they all centered on the offensive line. This year, I’ve got questions about the secondary and all of our special teams play. I’m not saying we won’t win ’em all…but it definitely looks tougher this year, especially with the increased difficulty our schedule brings….
"High standards come from passion within...." --Coach Nick Saban
by NiceLittleSaturday on May 7, 2010 10:48 PM CDT up reply actions
the poll has now been closed.
and the results are posted here. please feel free to continue the discussion either here or in that thread.
Roll 'Bama Roll: The Champagne of 'Bama Blogs.
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