Thursday, July 29, 2010

Tudor's Take: Preseason ACC predictions often mean little

Yep, readers, you’re right again.

Preseason ACC football predictions by the media have been fairly worthless of late.
That fact was pointed out to me in numerous messages Thursday from ACC fans who remembered that just a year ago, the summer media poll had Florida State finishing first in the Atlantic Division and Virginia Tech first in the Coastal.

At season’s end, Georgia Tech defeated Clemson in the league championship. Both were picked for divisional No. 2 spots in the summer poll. FSU wound up third in the Atlantic and Virginia Tech second in the Coastal.

Similar off-target picks have occurred regularly since the ACC first began the summer poll in 1976.

Since the ACC went to divisional play in 2005, the poll has been generally on target once. That was in ’05, when FSU (Atlantic) and Virginia Tech (Coastal) were picked first, finished that way and ended with the Seminoles winning the first league title game (as picked).

Otherwise, there has not been a perfecta. In 2006, it turned out to be a regular mess with preseason divisional favorites FSU and Miami finishing fifth and fourth, respectively.

This year’s favorites, by wide margins, are FSU and Virginia Tech, with the Hokies a solid pick to win the title game.

North Carolina, a likely preseason top-20 (or higher) national pick, came in fourth in the Coastal vote.

The media summer vote was substantially more accurate in the days before the ACC expanded to 12.

From 1976 through 2004, the summer poll favorite finished first or tied for first 19 times.

Granted, most of those votes were no-brainers for FSU, which was picked first and finished first or in a first-place tie 11 times from the school’s first season in the conference (1992) through 2003.

But some of the summer votes were surprisingly on the mark -- N.C. State in 1979, UNC in ’80 and Maryland in ’85.

There were big misreads in 1986 (Maryland pick No. 1, finished No. 5), 1992 (Clemson picked No. 2 behind FSU, finished No. 7) and 2002 (Virginia picked No. 8, finished tied for second).

On individual awards, records are less complete.

A year ago, Georgia Tech running back Jonathan Dwyer was the summer choice for player of the year by a close margin over Clemson runner/returner C.J.Spiller.

In the postseason vote, Spiller won easily with Yellow Jacket quarterback Joshua Nesbitt finishing second in the voting.

- Caulton Tudor

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

UNC-Cheats! Bottomline.

Anonymous said...

How can Coach Davis play any of the players in question? This is NOT the Carolina way! Unacceptable!

Anonymous said...

No way "Stacks" Blake isn't fired by the Administration at UNC. That is one shady individual. The emperor truly has no clothes in Chapel Hill.

Anonymous said...

The UNC 2010 Football Billboard on I-40/85 in Graham had "CHEATERS SUCK" plastered in royal blue paint this morning. They've already put up a new one.

Looks like Duke fans hate UNC more than State fans!

Anonymous said...

Wow. Looks like the same guy is pretending to be a bunch of different commenters. Low-class NC State fans jealous of UNC's success as usual. How about those 4 drug dealers on NC State's team getting the charges dropped on a 'technicality'? How about no suspensions for any of them? I guess that pig farmer money goes far with judges.

Devil said...

Wow, an article that divulges how inaccurate preseason predictions are. That's some hard-hitting journalism right there!!!!

Why don't you "journalists" channel all that energy into finding out what's really going on over in Chapel Hill instead of laying low and only "reporting" what's in the public domain. What are you afraid you'll find?

Anonymous said...

Big Marv and Blake Santa have ruined UNC-CH's reputation. Once the NCAA rules, UNC will be the deemed the most corrupt program in the nation. Far more serious than Reggie @ USC. Cheers!

Anonymous said...

LOL! Yes, the most corrupt program now belongs to Cheat Davis. Thankfully, this will be the gift that keeps giving for YEARS to come. RIP UNC-CH football.

Anonymous said...

"Cheat Davis?" Oh come on guys...he was just "being naive."

How are you naive after you have already been through one major, college football scandal at University of Miami. The spin UNC's PR dept. has put on this thing is shameful and insulting to everyone - UNC fans, State, Duke, etc...

Bama made their player ineligible upon first whiff of this. UNC is STILL waiting to suspend even the first player. IT STARTED AT UNC and trickled out, not the other way around.