Comments on: Ovinton J'Anthony Mayo – The New 'Juice' at USC

By: Blake Murphy

Blake Murphy — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 00:24:29 +0000

I agree with both of you! I just grabbed a source at random, my bad and I apologize! I love the Pac-10. Sheesh.

By: Pennycook

Pennycook — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 23:10:50 +0000

I agree with Kevin, there is no way the Pac-10 is only the 4th best conference in the nation. The expected number of seeds to rank the conferences is not a good way at all. If you look at Bracketology is predicting that they’ll get 6 teams in right now. That is 60% of the conference. By far the best % in the nation.

By: Blake Murphy

Blake Murphy — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 20:42:21 +0000

Also, I wanted to point out to anyone else that Kevin and I are friends so the ‘asshole’ and puke comments are all love. I’m fine with criticism like this.

By: Blake Murphy

Blake Murphy — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 20:25:49 +0000

Kev, I used ESPN’s expected number of seeds to rank the conferences, not RPI. No East Coast bias on my part, the Pac-10 is my favorite conference and UCLA is my favorite team.

Also, the way you worded that, you’re an asshole Kevin, haha. Way to puke last night.

You’re right that I should have sourced my ranking (I didn’t do it randomly, I used Bubble Watch, as I said), but I contend I’m still a top-3 writer on this site.

By: Kevin Laughren

Kevin Laughren — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 19:23:27 +0000

I didn’t mean to remain anonymous above, although I’m sure the last comment would give me away to most of you.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 19:19:38 +0000

Fourth-best conference in the country? Please!

The Pac-10 is unfortunate enough to house Oregon State (266th in RPI is by 50 places the worst in the BCS), but don’t hold them against an otherwise stellar conference. If you were to base your ranking on RPI (2nd), RPI without last place (1st), or RPI without first or last place (1st), I’m sure youd come to a different conclusion.

The Pac-10 is by far the hardest conference to play in this season, given that 8 out of 9 possible opponents can beat any team on any night (if you saw Cal hold UCLA down deep into the 2nd half on Saturday you’ll appreciate What I’m saying). Take for example its number of teams with five top-50 wins (4, tied for 1st with the 16-team Big East), or even more staggering, 7 out of 10 teams with four top-50 wins (tied with the Big East again) and you have a conference that is remarkably deep.

I realize that I’m only adding to the credibility of your article by strengthening your argument in favour of O.J. shining through stiff competition, but something needed to be said. Statistics are subject to selection bias, but I would have liked to see you select SOME metric for this ranking other than counting the number of teams on the AP top 25. I’m arbitrarily declaring you the 4th best writer on this site.

…If ‘zona doesn’t dance I’m holding you and Dick Vitale personally responsible because of your East Coast love-in.