So glad college football is back. Also very glad my team didn't almost cough up a game to a massive underdog this year. I guess Danny O'Brien was just trying to be a trendsetter, that's all it was.

EDIT: AP Poll rankings now added to picks section.

THE RANKINGS

And the rest of the Big Ten:

For a primer on what goes into these, see here. Some thoughts

A reminder that these rankings are (mostly) useless in the first few weeks. When you consider that I don't factor in coaching changes, returning players, FCS team differences, etc. ALONG with small sample size stuff, you're going to get some weird results early in the season. Washington is probably not the best team in the nation (or even close). Similarly Oregon State is probably not the worst team in the nation (though losing to FCS teams twice in the last three years is a troubling trend).

A lot of that probably has to do with flaws in my metrics, but teams also develop a lot through the season. 2007 Michigan lost to Appalachian State (HA!) and got murdered against Oregon the following week. Yet, they still ended up with 9 wins and beat Florida (arguably a Top-5 team that year [LINK], despite the four losses). That still blows my mind.

However, you can still get a good start on placing teams in their correct tiers and start detecting season trends (if you know where to start). Last year, I had had Utah State and Texas A&M ranked highly in the early year rankings. If I were smart enough, I would've picked them out sooner as quality candidates. Since it's still the first week, I'm liable to be completely wrong, but for example...

Nebraska, y'all need to do something about your defense. I thought Nebraska got a little too much hate last year on their defense. They weren't great, but they really only gave up a lot of yards against good offenses (Georgia scored 38 pts/gm for example), and they also had the misfortune of breaking the dam against Wisconsin and Ohio State. Again, not great, but more hate than they really deserved.

THAT SAID: I mentioned somewhere that Nebraska giving up 30+ pts to Wyoming would make them pretty much the worst defense in the nation via my amateur numbers. 34 pts later, we have a problem. And unlike certain point totals (cough, Minnesota, cough), those weren't born out of weird special teams stuff. The Cowboys put up 602 yards on 8.1 yds/play, which is in-excuseable for any defense, much less one that used to house Ndamakong Suh. We already have an Indiana in this conference, we don't need another.

Welcome to another season of an over-rated Ohio State. I don't expect this to be reflected in the polls come Tuesday (EDIT: I wrote this on Monday, looks like I was right. I'M SO CLAIRVOYANT, Y'ALL), because the general rule is teams won't move down with anything other than a loss, but a 40-20 game against Buffalo (a team I had 104th coming into the season) is not the kind of performance that the #2 team in the country should put up. (It's not reflective of a 56th ranked team either, but I've already noted that these early season ranking come with a lot of sodium particles. And it's worth noting that both F/+ (12th) and Sagarin (13th) have Ohio State a fair step behind the humanoid minds)

Granted, that score was aided by a pick-six (Michigan State aside, most teams don't really rely on those for their offensive output), and Ohio State shut down the Buffalo run game (2.1 yds/car on the day). I guess you could also point out that Ohio State was up 23-0 before the end of the first quarter. But Buffalo closed the game to within 10 pts halfway through the 2nd quarter, which is leaves plenty of game left for things to go awry for the Buckeyes. At the end of the day, Ohio State is still undefeated and not likely to drop any slots in the polls. So my complaints are likely to fall on deaf ears :)

Bowling Green is your 2013 mid-major darlings. Not to take anything away from Fresno State, which beat a decent Rutgers team. But that was a home game at night, and Fresno State failed to cover their spread anyway. Bowling Green, however, absolutely smacked Tulsa around, and Tulsa is a pretty decent team that should contend for the C-USA crown. Northern Illinois has the BCS bid, and maybe they'll start to look a bit better when they're playing MAC teams as opposed to Iowa, and maybe Bowling Green's performance is just a mirage aided by Tulsa's turnover of players, but right now I'd lean on the Falcons for MAC-tion supremacy. Indiana, you're on notice.

The 1990's Rutgers Memorial Award for Ineptitude is currently headed up by a strong opening take from South Florida, who got destroyed by a thing called McNeese State. Given the rash of FCS upsets the past weekend, this is basically just a list of those teams unlucky enough to fall victim:

#126 - South Florida

#124 - Oregon State

#122 - Connecticut

#118 - Iowa State

#109 - Kansas State

Illinois, you just managed to stay out of the bottom five. Consider yourself lucky in that regard.

THE PICKINGS

WOOF. A reminder that using these in any fashion for wagers will only result in losing you money. I was hoping to be a bit better last week, but it's going to be especially true now. So don't get hopped up about any of the projections here: they are purely for giggles and whimsy.

Lines taken from BetOnline here, as of 2013-09-04. Home teams highlighted in blue.

And the Big Ten. What a crappy week of games.

My Stupid Upset Pick of the Week is Arkansas State (+12.5) over Auburn. Enjoy the week, y'all!