While it is great to boast about lofty rankings (which really don't mean anything) at the beginning of the season, precedence showed us last year that reality played out far differently than the hype it created.

After the first few cupcake games (face it Penn St was not that strong last year and Florida?) the press dubbed us men against boys - the players drank the press' cool-aid and whammo!!! - we made Garcia, Jefferson and some other QBs look better than they really were and lost 3 games in the process.

So to all of you worrying about the preseason rankings, please let it go. If for nothing else look at historical cases of preseason rankings vs. the actual champion since the BCS began. It's happened ONCE in '99. Now I may be wrong as I did limited research but this is what I found out (and I welcome anyone to confirm or deny):

Yr.     Preseason #1     Actual BCS Champion

'98    OSU                      Tenn

'99    FSU                       FSU - CHECK

'00    NEB                      OKLA

'01    FLA                       Miami

'02    OKLA                    OSU

'03    OKLA                    LSU

'04    SCAL                    SCAL - NOT SO FAST - VACATED you CHEATERS

'05    SCAL                    TEX

'06    NDAME                FLA - I can't believe Notre Dame got the preseason #1 but whatever

'07    SCAL                    LSU

'08    OSU                      FLA

'09    FLA                       Yea Alabama Crimson Tide!!!

'10    ALA                       Nightmare on Elm Street

So as you see, a preseason #1 gets you about a 7.6% (and no I'm not counting a vacated win bc cheating shouldn't infuence stats (especially if caught!!).

IMO, get something in the low teens or in the top ten and work your tail off. The better the media and everyone else disrespects you, the hungrier the players seem to get to prove them wrong.