The following graphic uses Sagarin ratings, which is nice since its not only a synthesis of multiple formulas and rationales for rating teams, and also continues to rate down into the FCS ranks, so its complete for this purpose.

Basically I have chosen a sample of teams, in this case the SEC and Big Ten playoff contenders plus Notre Dame and I have ordered the 12 games each school plays by the Sagarin rating to evaluate each teams hardest game vs every other teams hardest game, all the way down through each teams easiest game vs every other teams easiest game. So we have 12 tiers with the first being the hardest game on each teams schedule and the last tier being the easiest

If a number is deepest blue, it means that this game is the easiest game on this tier, if it is deepest red it is the hardest game on this tier, and if it is white, it means that it is at the median difficulty.

Here is the result for y'all's analysis... (you may need to click to enlarge)

Love it. I thinks this puts the right lens on it. And it's pretty much exactly what my "gut" would've told me.

Our schedule has definitely been on the easier end by SEC standards. Our hardest games are easier than average, while our easier games are harder than average. Which translates to: we've played challenging opponents week in and week out, though not many elite opponents.

Ohio State and Indiana's schedule has been straight garbage.

The other SEC teams have mostly played harder schedules than us - but with losses.

why is A&M vs MU #21 blue and Bama vs MU #21 Red?

agracer said:

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why is A&M vs MU #21 blue and Bama vs MU #21 Red?

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Because MU was Bama's 6th hardest opponent, which is a high ranking for a team's 6th hardest opponent. But MU was our 4th hardest opponent, which is a low ranking for a team's 4th hardest opponent.

Chart flaw: if you have a couple top caliber opponents, then everything below is disproportionality compared to lesser teams.

Hypothetical team A faces #1, 3, & 25 would show more red than hypothetical team B who faces #2, 4, & 5.

agracer said:

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why is A&M vs MU #21 blue and Bama vs MU #21 Red?

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learn to read

Get Off My Lawn said:

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Chart flaw: if you have a couple top caliber opponents, then everything below is disproportionality compared to lesser teams.

Hypothetical team A faces #1, 3, & 25 would show more red than hypothetical team B who faces #2, 4, & 5.

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Its not a flaw, that would just be a different visualization.

I do like how sip (and media) math works though. Whomever they beat, they selectively use the higher ranking of their opponent at time of the game or season end. For the Aggies, they use the lower of the two.

JJxvi said:

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Get Off My Lawn said:

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Chart flaw: if you have a couple top caliber opponents, then everything below is disproportionality compared to lesser teams.

Hypothetical team A faces #1, 3, & 25 would show more red than hypothetical team B who faces #2, 4, & 5.

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It's not a flaw, that would just be a different visualization.

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All it shows is the skewing of your competition comparisons in relation to a select number of other teams.

OK has a deep list of moderate difficulty games and thus builds up to red. ND's cupcakes are less cupcakey than others so they pick up red. sip starts out with a couple good opponents so subsequent moderate difficulty opponents show as red, too.

Novel charts are often novel for a reason.

Don't sleep on Samford.

Get Off My Lawn said:

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Chart feature: if you have a couple top caliber opponents, then everything below is disproportionality compared to lesser teams.

Hypothetical team A faces #1, 3, & 25 would show more red than hypothetical team B who faces #2, 4, & 5.

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FIFY

Though to your point, there would be very minor differences in the coloration in the first two and significant difference in the third.

Get Off My Lawn said:

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JJxvi said:

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Get Off My Lawn said:

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Chart flaw: if you have a couple top caliber opponents, then everything below is disproportionality compared to lesser teams.

Hypothetical team A faces #1, 3, & 25 would show more red than hypothetical team B who faces #2, 4, & 5.

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It's not a flaw, that would just be a different visualization.

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All it shows is the skewing of your competition comparisons in relation to a select number of other teams.

OK has a deep list of moderate difficulty games and thus builds up to red. ND's cupcakes are less cupcakey than others so they pick up red. sip starts out with a couple good opponents so subsequent moderate difficulty opponents show as red, too.

Novel charts are often novel for a reason.

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It's just visualizing where team's schedules are deep and where they're not. No one is forcing you to add up the number of red squares and declare that team to have the hardest strength of schedule.

Is OK's schedule harder because they played 9 top 31 teams?

Or sips' schedule harder because they played 5 top 15 teams? Btw, you said the sips start out with "a couple" good opponents. No, they have 5 opponents in the top 15 - that's why their top is red. After that, it's a dropoff to neutral or blue because the rest of their schedule is average to below average difficulty.

These are exactly the kind of nuanced discussions that happen when debating schedule difficulty. This is just putting a visual to it.

Bill Superman said:

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Don't sleep on Samford.

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Good advise - I plan on being awake and watching the game!

OU and Ole Miss' schedules are crazy - in the same conference!

OU plays 9 teams that are a good as South Carolina or better, while Ole Miss plays 4 as good as South Carolina or better.

Learn to communicate.

Still not adding up to me. How is MU blue for us and red for Bama? It's the same opponent for both teams.

agracer said:

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Learn to communicate.

Still not adding up to me. How is MU blue for us and red for Bama? It's the same opponent for both teams.

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I know you're responding to the OP, but did you see my response? Let me know what part of this explanation doesn't make sense, and maybe we can help:

"Because MU was Bama's 6th hardest opponent, which is a high ranking for a team's 6th hardest opponent. But MU was our 4th hardest opponent, which is a low ranking for a team's 4th hardest opponent."

Gigemags382 said:

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agracer said:

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Learn to communicate.

Still not adding up to me. How is MU blue for us and red for Bama? It's the same opponent for both teams.

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I know you're responding to the OP, but did you see my response? Let me know what part of this explanation doesn't make sense, and maybe we can help:

"Because MU was Bama's 6th hardest opponent, which is a high ranking for a team's 6th hardest opponent. But MU was our 4th hardest opponent, which is a low ranking for a team's 4th hardest opponent."

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Ok, I see what you mean now. I was reading the columns, not rows.

Thanks

Get Off My Lawn said:

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All it shows is the skewing of your competition comparisons in relation to a select number of other teams.

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Sweet! Thats pretty much exactly what I wanted to see…

Another way to say it. The coloration is based upon how that team compares with others on that same horizontal line. The two examples you're talking about have that team on a different horizontal line.

Texas will be in the best position of any 3 loss team to make the playoff. Don't tell me there's no chance, just read what I said. It's a fact. If ND loses, t.u. would have to be top 10. If ND wins, they would have to be top 9.

...and South Carolina is who you don't wanna sleep on.

Not bad, but try using 1 / rank with a single color scale where red = 1 and blue = 0. That would emphasize difference in high ranks but not lower ones.

agracer said:

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why is A&M vs MU #21 blue and Bama vs MU #21 Red?

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The colors are a comparison of the strength of the opponent across each horizontal bar.

MU is on A&M's 4th bar while they are on Bama's 6th bar. Each bar is graded separately.


Bar 1 includes a range from 1 (Deep Red) to 9 (Deep Blue)
Bar 2 includes a range from 4 (Deep Red) to 16 (Deep Blue)
Bar 12 includes a range from 99 (Deep Red) to 245 (Deep Blue)

Get Off My Lawn said:

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JJxvi said:

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Get Off My Lawn said:

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Chart flaw: if you have a couple top caliber opponents, then everything below is disproportionality compared to lesser teams.

Hypothetical team A faces #1, 3, & 25 would show more red than hypothetical team B who faces #2, 4, & 5.

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It's not a flaw, that would just be a different visualization.

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All it shows is the skewing of your competition comparisons in relation to a select number of other teams.

OK has a deep list of moderate difficulty games and thus builds up to red. ND's cupcakes are less cupcakey than others so they pick up red. sip starts out with a couple good opponents so subsequent moderate difficulty opponents show as red, too.

Novel charts are often novel for a reason.

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What chart are you looking at? Notre Dame's column is mostly deep blue and probably the 4th easiest schedule using this metric. Ohio State's schedule is the easiest of this group of teams and then it can be argued which of Indiana and Ole Miss has the 2nd easiest schedule.

Only comparing the listed 11 teams and the metric shown, i would rank the difficulty of schedule - only looking at the color gradients and not caluclating any math - as follows:

1) Oklahoma
2) Texas
3) Alabama / Georgia
4) Georgia / Alabama ---> Georgia has less overall blue but Alabama has more deep red
5) Vanderbilt
6) Texas A&M
7) Oregon
8) Notre Dame
9) Ole Miss
10) Indiana
11) Ohio State

The only school that doesn't meet my pre-conceived perceptual bias Ole Miss.

JJxvi said:

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The following graphic uses Sagarin ratings, which is nice since its not only a synthesis of multiple formulas and rationales for rating teams, and also continues to rate down into the FCS ranks, so its complete for this purpose.

Basically I have chosen a sample of teams, in this case the SEC and Big Ten playoff contenders plus Notre Dame and I have ordered the 12 games each school plays by the Sagarin rating to evaluate each teams hardest game vs every other teams hardest game, all the way down through each teams easiest game vs every other teams easiest game. So we have 12 tiers with the first being the hardest game on each teams schedule and the last tier being the easiest

If a number is deepest blue, it means that this game is the easiest game on this tier, if it is deepest red it is the hardest game on this tier, and if it is white, it means that it is at the median difficulty.

Here is the result for y'all's analysis... (you may need to click to enlarge)

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This is nice, but just add up all the ranks in each column. The lowest number has the hardes SoS.

Why the samford hate

agracer said:

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why is A&M vs MU #21 blue and Bama vs MU #21 Red?

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Because A&M is 10 miles better than Bama this year.

Zackdh9 said:

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Why the samford hate

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Because Jimbo. Thats why.

Zackdh9 said:

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Why the samford hate

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more like derision

The conf champs that are not currently in the top 12 would take tu's 3-loss team's place in the playoffs.

t.u. is not getting in with 3 losses.

A&M has played 9 top 50 teams, whereas Indiana has played only 4. Yes, they had some blow-out games, but those were against weak teams.

agracer said:

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Learn to communicate.

Still not adding up to me. How is MU blue for us and red for Bama? It's the same opponent for both teams.

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Just FYI, that post was supposed to have the winky face, but I guess I messed that up, and I didnt answer because I assumed you'd get it from the post explaining above mine.

infinity ag said:

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JJxvi said:

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The following graphic uses Sagarin ratings, which is nice since its not only a synthesis of multiple formulas and rationales for rating teams, and also continues to rate down into the FCS ranks, so its complete for this purpose.

Basically I have chosen a sample of teams, in this case the SEC and Big Ten playoff contenders plus Notre Dame and I have ordered the 12 games each school plays by the Sagarin rating to evaluate each teams hardest game vs every other teams hardest game, all the way down through each teams easiest game vs every other teams easiest game. So we have 12 tiers with the first being the hardest game on each teams schedule and the last tier being the easiest

If a number is deepest blue, it means that this game is the easiest game on this tier, if it is deepest red it is the hardest game on this tier, and if it is white, it means that it is at the median difficulty.

Here is the result for y'all's analysis... (you may need to click to enlarge)

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This is nice, but just add up all the ranks in each column. The lowest number has the hardes SoS.

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I disagree with that, particularly when evaluating these particular teams. What really matters is how these schedules affect the number of wins and losses independently of that teams own quality.

If a team you played 12 games against number 51 through 62, their number would be 678.

If another team played 1-6 and also 107-112, then their number would also be 678.

However, all of these teams would go 12-0 vs the first schedule and almost all would go 8-4 to 10-2 against the latter schedule. The second schedule is 2-4 units harder when measured in expected losses for these teams.

Texas' schedule is by far the toughest in this array. Their problem is they are one of only two teams in here to lose to a team in the 30's.

If you're evaluating only wins and losses (ie you arent looking at margins in Miss St and Kentucky games, etc) then Texas and Alabama's records are virtually identical. Both lost to a ****ty team that a team in this list should not be losing to and Texas just has harder games and therefore lost to Ohio State at this point.

agracer said:

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The conf champs that are not currently in the top 12 would take tu's 3-loss team's place in the playoffs.

t.u. is not getting in with 3 losses.

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...and you went ahead and said exactly what I asked you not to say. Just couldn't help yourself, I reckon.