The Latest NFL Poll

So, I was thinking, as I'm sometimes prone to do, why is there no national poll for the best NFL team at any given time? The original college football ranking system was created so that a national champion could be crowned, without having everyone play each other. But then, college basketball got in on the fun, and then created a national championship tournament on top of it.

So, the ultimate answer is that there is no good answer. And that is precisely why we are here today.

Everybody and their uncle is doing a "NFL Power Ranking", so I thought that it would be interesting to see how that all pans out, on a week-by-week basis, pretending that each individual was voting in a national poll. Additionally, since being "ranked" should be somewhat exclusive, I thought it only fair to include the top 15 teams as being ranked. So, I compiled a list of people who do weekly power rankings, who rankings I will use to create a weekly poll regarding the top 15 teams in the country at professional, American rules, outdoor football.

So, let's look at who will be on our panel for the year (the panel is primarily comprised of who I could find keeping up-to-date power rankings, and not so much their actual national reputation for being either informed or incisive):

Mike Sando, John Clayton, Paul Kuharsky and James Walker of ESPN
Don Banks and Peter King of SI
Pete Prisco of CBS Sportsline
Adam Caplan of Fox Sports
USA Today
Mike Florio of Pro Football Talk
Pro Football Weekly
Pete Moran of Buffalo Sports Daily
Jeff (?) Zarbano of WEEI in Boston
Mike (?) Vensel of the Baltimore Sun
Adam (?) Fentress of The Oregonian
Bill (?) Ciskie of AOL Fan House
The Sporting News
Gary (?) Matzek of WTMJ in Milwaukee
DC Pro Sports Report Blog
National Football Post
SB Nation.com
ColdHardFootballFacts.com
Gil Braindt, Mike Lombardi, Joe Theismann, Pat Kirwan, Sam Wyche, Vic Carucci, Jason (?) LaCanfora and Bill (?) Brooks of NFL.com

If there's a "?" after their first name, it's because I don't really remember their first name, guessed, and may have been wrong.

So, that's 30 people who are either relatively reputable writers for national publications, or write for a variety of local "outlets". I did my best to be geographically neutral, and ended up with Boston, Buffalo, Washington, Baltimore, Milwaukee and Oregon. So, it didn't work out all that well, but it's other people's fault for not posting fucking power rankings.

Ok. So, here are the rankings for after Week 1 (first place votes in parens), total points, win-loss, last week:
1. New Orleans Saints (22) 440 pts, 1-0, 1
2. Green Bay Packers (6) 404 pts, 1-0, 4
3. Baltimore Ravens (2) 379 pts, 1-0, 5
4. New England Patriots 361 pts, 1-0, 9
5. Houston Texans, 272 pts, 1-0, NR
6. Indianapolis Colts, 260 pts, 0-1, 2
7. Minnesota Vikings, 224 pts, 0-1, 6
8. Pittsburgh Steelers, 214 pts, 1-0, 13
9-t. New York Jets, 159 pts, 0-1, 7
9-t. Tennessee Titans, 167 pts, 1-0, NR
11. Dallas Cowboys, 165 pts, 0-1, 3
12. New York Giants, 157 pts, 1-0, NR
13. San Diego Chargers, 114 pts, 0-1, 8
14-t. Miami Dolphins, 82 pts, 1-0, 15
14-t. Washington Redskins, 82 pts, 1-0, NR

Others receiving votes: Atlanta 37, Cincinnati 35, Seattle 18, Philadelphia 17, Kansas City 3, Arizona 1, Jacksonville 1

So, I think that it ends up being kind of interesting. Sure, after so many well-received teams lost, and the Saints won, it's easy for them to be at the top. But, I think that will change once they lose a game. Plus, someone, somewhere, thinks that Jags are the 15th best team in the league, and a lot of people think Seattle is better than Philly. If not for these composite rankings, you'd never know.

Now, I went back and went through all the pre-season rankings, but couldn't find them for the NFL people or a couple others in the group. Either way, here's how things looked before last week:

1. New Orleans (12), 282 pts
2. Indianapolis (5), 273 pts
3. Dallas, 230 pts
4. Green Bay (1), 222 pts
5. Baltimore (1), 204 pts
6. Minnesota, 201 pts
7. New York Jets (1), 181 pts
8. San Diego, 170 pts
9. New England, 143 pts
10. Atlanta, 107 pts
11. Cincinnati, 104 pts
12. Philadelphia, 53 pts
13-t. Pittsburgh, 45 pts
13-t. San Francisco 45 pts
15. Miami, 42 pts

Others receiving votes: Houston 36, New York Giants 21, Tennessee 19, Arizona 17, Carolina 3, Washington 2

So, there you go. An interesting list, I think, and one that gives some interesting indications about how people are feeling. I think I'll keep doing it each week, simply out of curiosity, but I will say that, in my opinion, no one has the right to rank Jacksonville in the top-15 for beating fucking Denver.

OK. That's all. I don't have a better way to close out this post, so, goodbye.