About 10 days ago the Associated Press released its annual edition of the preseason top 25 Poll in college football. Not surprisingly, defending national champion Florida claimed the No. 1 spot. In fact, the Gators made history by receiving 96.7 percent of the first place votes, breaking USC's 95.4 percent in 2007.
So what did the Gators do to achieve the preseason No. 1 ranking in such dominant fashion; why did so many voters select Florida as their number one? Well, last season they lost only one game and defeated Oklahoma in the BCS National Championship Game. It also returns a Heisman Trophy winner in senior quarterback Tim Tebow. And the authority in college football recruiting, rivals.com, ranked Florida's incoming class No. 4 in the country. AP voters would surely point out these reasons as to why they believe Florida is the best team entering the 2009 season.
But what has Florida done on the field in 2009 to deserve a No. 1 ranking? Nothing; not one of those aforementioned reasons represents anything Florida has accomplished on the field this season, which is why formulating preseason rankings every year for college football is absurd.
Taking away nothing from Florida, all of its accomplishments in 2008 should be irrelevant to its rankings in 2009. Winning a national title is a great feat and offers many rewards, but affecting its ranking next season should not be one of them.
Rivals.com is fun to look at, but it is also the same site that rated Wisconsin quarterback Dustin Sherer, the player who just lost his starting job to two quarterbacks who have combined to start zero games in their careers, higher than Heisman runner-up Colt McCoy.
If someone wants to use these reasons for preseason predictions, that's fine. In reality, it is pretty clear Florida should be most people's favorite coming into 2009, but it is not fair to use these reasons for the preseason AP poll. The preseason AP poll has too much of an impact on the later AP polls, which in turn affect the BCS Rankings, which of course determine who plays for the National Championship.
The problem with these preseason rankings is they create an unlevel playing field, especially in a sport where your chances to succeed are basically entirely determined by rankings.
Now that Florida has attained the top position in the AP poll, in all likelihood if it runs the table this season it will finish at the top of the poll. But if No. 7 Virginia Tech accomplishes the same task, it'll likely still be behind the Gators in the rankings only because Florida began the season ahead of them, for, once again, accomplishing nothing.
And now a team such as Wisconsin, which begins the season not only outside the Top 25, but without a single vote, has a much steeper mountain to climb to a high ranking than it did the last two years when it began its season with lofty preseason rankings.
Instead of the using preseason rankings, the AP poll, along with the other major one, the USA Today/Coaches' poll, should wait five weeks before releasing the initial season rankings.
Releasing a preseason poll rates teams across the nation before anyone has played a game. Week one polls are nearly just as arbitrary, judging teams across the nation after just one performance.
If the voters waited five weeks before reviewing each team, they could judge a team based on some sort of body of work on the field, instead of capricious decisions both before and too early in the season. Then, once each team has put forth a string of multiple performances, the polls could begin to conduct weekly polls.
If preseason rankings must be determined, it is pretty understandable Florida will be at the summit. But the existence of preseason rankings with Florida's placement at the top gives the Gators an unwarranted advantage over the rest of the nation heading into the 2009 season.
