I've been using, and constantly tweaking, a power ranking formula for the past few years to help me in my office pool. Basically I wanted to help myself look past the record and reputation of a team and place a little more value on the strength of their opponents. Using a formula that is probably approaching BCS complexity sheer ridiculousness and inaccuracies, I share it here for your amusement as well as collective scorn and ridicule. -------------------- Last week's rank - (#) 1 Washington Redskins (1) I was shocked 2 weeks ago when they came up 2nd in my power rankings, but they've proven that my formula is smarter than me the last two weeks as they went on the road in the toughest division in football and beat the Cowboys and Eagles. 2 Tennessee Titans (3) The Titans could go 14-2 this season and still be the 8th best team in the league, they have by far the easiest schedule right now. Their opponents so far are a combined 6-17. Of their remaining opponents, only Chicago (3-2) and Pittsburgh (4-1) are over 500. 3 Carolina Panthers (7) Impressive shutout against a KC team that as bad as they are were coming off a huge upset of Denver. 4 New York Giants (6) As a Dolphin fan, I love the defending Super Bowl champs and everyone on their roster. But call me when they play and beat a real team. After dominating and subsequently waking up #1 Washington in week 1, the Giants have been steamrolling over 3 teams with a combined record of 1-12. And the next 2 weeks is Cleveland and San Francisco, they aren't moving up this list. 5 Denver Broncos (10) Good rebound win against the Bucs 6 Arizona Cardinals (18) This was the biggest move this week. Cardinals are up 12 spots, I'm not entirely sure why other than schedule. They've played only one sub-500 team so far, and they did beat the undefeated Bills. But I still wouldn't rank them quite this high. 7 Dallas Cowboys (5) Barely beating the Bengals at home is not impressing anyone. 8 Tampa Bay Buccaneers (4) I'm surprised to see them above 4-1 Buffalo and Pittsburgh, but they have had a tougher schedule than those teams. 9 Pittsburgh Steelers (9) I was disappointed in my formula for ranking this team this high last week, after finally beating a halfway decent team in the Jaguars, I'm okay with this ranking. 10 Buffalo Bills (2) When you are undefeated by beating up on SEA, OAK, and STL, with one semi-impressive win against JAX, you lose 1 game to the Cardinals and you drop 8 spots. 11 New England Patriots (17) 12 Chicago Bears (12) 13 Miami Dolphins (21) Nothing surprises me more than this. Please remember this is purely mathematical, I'm not being a homer with this ranking. The Patriots rebounding against the 49ers helped elevate Miami's week 3 victory against them, and beating another half way decent team helped too. I'd love to see Miami earn this spot by beating Houston on Sunday to get to 3-2. 14 Atlanta Falcons (20) 15 Minnesota Vikings (22) 16 Philadelphia Eagles (11) 17 New York Jets (16) 18 New Orleans Saints (8) 19 Baltimore Ravens (15) 20 Jacksonville Jaguars (14) 21 San Diego Chargers (13) 22 Indianapolis Colts (28) 23 Green Bay Packers (19) 24 Kansas City Chiefs (24) 25 San Francisco 49ers (23) 26 Oakland Raiders (25) 27 Seattle Seahawks (26) 28 Cleveland Browns (27) 29 Cincinnatti Bengals (30) 30 Houston Texans (29) 31 St. Louis Rams (31) 32 Detroit Lions (32)
Until beaten the Giants are the top team. Giants beat the Skins already. They will beat them again. Dallas is overrated and will implode thanks to Cry Baby Owens.
Yeah, got to go with the Giants at # 1. They are truly deep everywhere. They lose someone, and just plug in another guy and don't miss a beat. And they are still second fiddle here to the Farve jets, which I think fuels the Giants.
Can't argue with it really. I would put the Giants one or two though, despite the weak strength of schedule. Great work again His'n, enjoy these.
I have no argument with that. But I rely on my formula to keep me from overestimating, or underestimating a team. Going 3-0 against teams that are a combined 1-12 is not impressive at all. I'm not saying the Giants don't have it in them, they just haven't been tested yet. I'm not going to bet on the Giants to win against one of these top 10 teams when they haven't beaten one yet. In fact I can almost count on the Giants to be heavy favorites in one of those games, making it easier to pick the underdog.
I've sent a few PMs explaining it, it is convoluted since I've been adding and modifying this for a few years now using formulas in excel, but I'll try to break it down. ------------ Wins = 1-3 points depending on the record of the beaten team, and this is always in flux as the team beaten in week 1 improves and their winning % changes throughout the season. Losses= From no negative points for losing to an undefeated team to -1.4 for losing to a team with as low as a .063 winning % (1-15) Covering the spread = .25 points. (based on cbs.sporstline's office pool which is where I bet) In order to reflect a team's more recent games as the season goes on I also add the total wins team B had when team A beat them to a cumulative victory point total for team A, which is then divided by the total games played by team A. The Redskins currently lead with 9.88 points. 1.4 for beating the Saints 1.92 for beating the Cardinals 2.56 for beating the Cowboys 1.4 for beating the Eagles And no negative points since their only loss came against the undefeated Giants. 1 total point for covering the spread 4 times so far. They have 8 cumulative victory points divided by 5 games played for 1.6 points. 1 point for beating the 1-0 Saints in week 2 2 points for beating the 2-0 Cardinals in week 3 3 points for beating the 3-0 Cowboys in week 4 2 points for beating the 2-2 Eagles in week 5 1.4+1.92+2.56+1.4+1+1.6=9.88 Second place Tennessee has 8.15 points and last place Detroit has -3.0. I'll try to include these point totals as I post future week's rankings.
