AP Preseason Rankings Are Holding up Well

Every August, the Associated Press releases its preseason college football rankings.  In most years, this is simply a glorified beauty contest of America’s most familiar (and media hyped) college football teams.  The most popular “brands” nearly always show up on this list a week or two before the start of the season.  Once each team has played one or two games against worthy competitors, the “pretenders” will drop like flies from the AP rankings. This year, though, has been a bit of an outlier. After the first four games of the college football season, the initial AP Preseason rankings are still holding up remarkably well! Only seven of the original top 25 teams have fallen out of the elite AP voters’ group after the opening month of play. I will post my first SwampSwamiSports.com College Football Top 25 rankings beginning after next weekend’s games.  I prefer to wait until September ends so that we have more data to evaluate each team’s best win of the season. Before we do that next week, let’s analyze how well the initial AP preseason Top 25 has fared through the first month of competition.  The preseason prognostication by the AP is on the left side with the ranking for the week ending September 23, 2023 on the right: #1 – Georgia (4-0) – Still #1 – The two-time defending national champions may have the easiest schedule in major college football this season.   The Dawgs won’t play a ranked team until the weekend of October 28 (Florida – currently #22). After that, UGa plays Mizzou (#23), Ole Miss (#20), and Tennessee (#21).  By that time, it is quite unlikely that more than two of those four teams will be ranked.  Georgia’s easy schedule may come back to bite them later this year if they haven’t beaten a tough opponent. #2 – Michigan (4-0) – Still #2 – Coach John Harbaugh is now back with the team after his four-game suspension through “cupcake season”. Just like Georgia, the Wolverines play weak competition this year.   The first ranked opponent will be Penn State (currently #6) on November 11 (that’s right – November!).  P.U. #3 – Ohio State (4-0) – Now #4 – Ohio State scored on the final play of the game against a legitimate opponent (Notre Dame) last Saturday night in South Bend.  Afterwards, we learned that the Irish had only ten defenders on the field when Ohio State’s running back scored from one yard out.   And WHO has the luck of the Irish?