However, in their projection of how the SEC East pans out, they predict Tennessee to come in 3rd BEHIND the Gators and Dawgs.
Don't these mags have proofreaders?
Polls should not be released until the 3rd week of the season, IMHO.
The whole idea of teams playing the season to compensate for preseason polls is absurd.
True, but there are so many college teams that nobody gets to see all of them play, so a lot of the rankings go as much by reputation as performance, especially once you get out of a sportswriter's geographic area of interest and the top five. If a guy normally covers the Pac 10, for example, he'll vote in the national poll, but may not see five SEC teams play all year, and then against PAC 10 opponents. So when he comes to vote, he may not know the difference between the Gators and the Seminoles, but he knows one of them Flurida teams wuz good.
"One of the other sports rags had Tennessee ranked higher than Florida or Georgia in its pre-season poll (can't remember which one, I've got a stack of em at home)...However, in their projection of how the SEC East pans out, they predict Tennessee to come in 3rd BEHIND the Gators and Dawgs....Don't these mags have proofreaders?"
But they're right! What always happens is Tennessee loses to those teams, then creeps up the polls the rest of the season until Georgia and Florida lose to ranked opponents, when Tennessee slides ahead of them by playing Vandy and Kentucky. Masterful scheduling on Tn's part. Unfortunately, it's also indicative of the hole in the BCS--it's biased towards end-of-season games as more important than early games.