[FarmBoy]

I don't; it's circular logic.

To be fair, at this point of the season, all rankings require a lot of circular logic and assumptions about pre-season strength and quality. If I were lord of college football, I would disallow teams to be ranked until they've played at least 4 FBS opponents.

Who cares? The AP poll is utterly meaningless masturbation now.

Unless you believe the football playoff committee is influenced by the media noise, which I do. If TV broadcasts are using the AP rankings to promote games, then the committee will take note when teams play and beat "top 25 teams". Hopefully they're relying on advanced statistics as well, but given human nature, I don't doubt the committee members will be psychologically affected by the numbers next to the team names.

[FarmBoy]

I don't; it's circular logic.

To be fair, at this point of the season, all rankings require a lot of circular logic and assumptions about pre-season strength and quality. If I were lord of college football, I would disallow teams to be ranked until they've played at least 4 FBS opponents.

Who cares? The AP poll is utterly meaningless masturbation now.

Unless you believe the football playoff committee is influenced by the media noise, which I do. If TV broadcasts are using the AP rankings to promote games, then the committee will take note when teams play and beat "top 25 teams". Hopefully they're relying on advanced statistics as well, but given human nature, I don't doubt the committee members will be psychologically affected by the numbers next to the team names.