Speaker 1: Stats. Let's talk about stats. Ben Kretl and his team
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Cougar Sports stats.
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Speaker 3: Let's talk about stats in this segment with our favorite
Vitrio retinal surgeon, our favorite optalmologist, big byu fan man
of metrics.
Speaker 2: We got Jeff Fuller on the line. Jeff, how that heck?
Speaker 4: Are you doing great? Ben? How's it going?
Speaker 2: Hey, I'm doing fantastic.
Speaker 3: Appreciate you joining me for a Let's talk about stats segment.
Look I love seeing Jeff Fuller take to Twitter and
begin pontificating about numbers, analytics, metrics. Uh that uh that
people need to know about rite many of your tweets,
When of your opinions have gone viral over the years
and you continue to put out great content and I
keep on retweeting it.
Speaker 2: Uh, what have you delved into recently? Jeff? What's got
your Uh? What's is there a be in your bonnet
at all?
Speaker 3: About any of the stuff that's occurred this b YU
college football season?
Speaker 4: Oh? Are you? Are you kidding me? Is water wet? Is?
Is there a dog in Georgia? Is the Pope Catholic? Then?
I guess we shouldn't talk about about Catholic in the
recent Notre Dame situation. But little little source spot there,
But yeah, of course, I mean there's some stuff over
the last you know, two seas seasons that boy, I'm
I'm I'm gonna, you know, keep keep spouting from the
small platform that I have as much as possible. But
I mean, what's happened to BYU just being left out
of discussion last year? And even you know when clearly
not just a bubble team but probably the most resume
definitely the most resume were the Bubble team this year
just completely left off graphics, just not discussed on podcast shows,
you know, with with national podcasters when you're talking about
you know, the ESPN podcasts or their shows, when you're
talking about Josh Pate or Ari Wasserman, Andy Staple, you know,
some of those, some of those shows that these guys
that are the talking heads and sort of drive a
lot of the narratives. I mean, just completely like, oh, well,
why why would we talk about b YU. They can
they can play their way into the playoffs. It's like,
are you getting eleven and one BYU? And this is
one of the things that sort of hit the most
is that I did an analysis you know that I
saw other people sort of picked this up afterwards, some
other BYU stats people, and then Shihan Jayleraja I think
I'm saying that name right. He picked it up and
put it in his article a few days after I
tweeted this out. But if you look back at all
one loss teams from power conferences over the last thirty years,
I went back to a peoples. I think some others
have taken it back even further and have confirmed that
it's even for there has never been a Power conference
one loss team at the end of the regular season
ranked worse than ten in the nation. And BYU with
eleventh at eleven and one only loss to a top
five team, Texas Tech, the strength of schedule around thirty
ish in the nation. You know, jump just jump back.
Last year, Indiana wasn't getting a lot of respect. Oh,
they haven't played anyone, you know, yeah, they were eleven
and one, but they haven't played anyone. You know, though
in the time they did, they got they really got
smoked by Ohio State. But you know, sort of similar
to what BYU was being said about about Texas Tech.
What what do you think Indiana's strength of schedule was
last year? It was eighty fourth eighty fourth, Okay, BYU's
was about thirty ish. We're talking about two different you know,
resumes completely as far as strength of schedule and strength
of resume. Then you know, strength of record, I guess
is the resume metric. And then just going back, I mean,
even Boise State last year was a one lost team,
was ranked higher than BYU in the final final College
Football playoff poll before conference championship weekend. So even Boise
State had you know, more respect from the MIDI A
one lost Boise State than by you did in a
power conference. And you know, you just I've been you know,
people say, oh, you know, there's this persecute persecution complex.
All these all these Mormons that think they're always you know,
the worlds have to get them, and everything's unfair and
they're just you know, they just like to whine and
they're just you know, got this persecution complex. I mean,
is it a persecusing complex? If it's real? I mean, well,
what do they say, I'm only paranoid because everyone's against me.
And you know, you go back and you look. Brett
Brett McMurphy looked at all the ap poles since twenty
fourteen and he ranked all the most underrated teams in
the history of the A people since that time, you know,
the last eleven years number one, b YU. I've done
a longer analysis, going back twenty five years, fifty or
seventy five years, at every time interval over over all
the time intervals. Guess who pops up is the most
underrated team in ap pol. You know it's b Yu.
It pops up again and again. I did basketball you know,
I've pweted something out a week or two ago. You know, basketball,
most underrated team in the last fifty years in basketball
comparing pre season rankings to postseason you know where you
finish in the AP poll in basketball, no other team
is more underrated than b YU. It was tied with
Texas Tech for that one. But you know, one one
sport could be sort of a statistical you know, someone's
got to be the most underrated, right, But if you
take it to a second sport, and it's also there,
if you take it, you know, not just to AP pole.
If you look at college football playoff rankings, if you
take it over any time period you want to look,
and it's the same team popping up time and time
and time again. You know that there. It's it's clear
that whether it's contents just you know, hate or bias,
or whether there's just subconscious there's something notable there and
it's not right. And I do not trust a committee,
the committee idea for deciding the playoffs. They'd have to
end or if there's a committee, they have to publish
the metrics that matter, and they have to you know,
and they have to you know, rank the teams if
they're using metrics, and you know, maybe they can say, well,
metrics are fifty or seventy five percent of it, and
then we'll apply the eye test and our other arguments
for the rest. You know, at least give us where
the teams are sort of slotted, sort of like the
sorting tool of the net ranking for the for the
basketball tournament. At least we know an idea of where
people are slotted. And b Yu is just totally totally
left out of that discussion. And I've talked long enough.
Speaker 3: But well, no, I think one of the tweeks that
I retweeted too, you know, we try to get as
many data points right, as many objective data points as possible.
And one of the things I discussed with great Yormark
was I felt like the committee was too human based,
too subjective, and when we were going to see kind
of a melding between algorithm metrics objective with the.
Speaker 2: Human element and how will that be weighted?
Speaker 3: And like he felt like they were moving in that direction,
but it still didn't seem that way this go around. Well,
they ever, they waited it except for BYU. Right, BA
was never involved. So the other component right at Parker Fleming.
We've had him on the show a lot. He says,
I need to do a lot more on this, but
he's got a stat wins above what an average team
would be expected to have against your schedule. Indiana at
number one point plus seven to one, Georgia at six
six point seventy five. Ohiouse Ate at six point three
to one, Texas am at six point one to three,
and then b Yu at number five five point six four.
I think you timed in on this and said everyone's
going ballistic over number thirteen, getting it getting in on
this list. That last CFP spot, number thirteen was Miami
at plus four point twenty nine. Well number five, b Y,
you can't even make ESPN's bubble graphics.
Speaker 2: It's really insane.
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, I looked at that, at that metric that
the stats of war Parking Fliming guy put out, and
I know you've you've had interactions with him. Producer some
great stuff, produces some interesting stuff. But number one through
ten and in this metric of this wins above you
know what an average team would be expected to make.
All ten of them are in the playoffs, except number
five is DYU and then number eleven is Notre Dame.
Number twelve is Vanderbuilt, then number thirteen is Miami. Miami
got in the playoffs. You know, Texas isn't on here,
Utahs fourteen, Michigan sixteen, Tulane was sixteen, today Lane a
playoff team. You know, they even made this young top
and then James Madison was nineteen. So we've got the
two G five teams pop up as the you know,
top twenty in this metric. So it seems to be
a pretty good sorting metric to sort of predict who
should be in the playoffs, except for BYU, who's number
five and is not nowhere near you know, make you know,
nowhere near seated there, let alone even in the bubble
discussion for a lot of the graphics. I mean, you know,
people tell me I'll just get over it, and you know,
by he's got to get on the stage and prove
it on the stage. And it's like, well, I agree,
we could make our case a lot better. But it's
why why did it rules for BYU?
Speaker 3: Okay, minus Alabama because they got to the SEC championship
and earlier in the year they had baked into their
resume that they beat Georgia on the road. I understand
all that you're an Alabama guy, right, so you maybe
that maybe may ring true to you Alabama getting in
even though they got blown out in a similar fashion
to that of BYU in their.
Speaker 2: SEC championship game.
Speaker 3: BYU lost by twenty two the first go round and
then how many did they lose by?
Speaker 2: What was it like thirty four to seven? And in
the second go round?
Speaker 4: Yeah it was twenty twenty four. This second time four nine,
second down no twenty seven, twenty seven the second seven
yet four seven?
Speaker 3: Okay, So was there anybody else in the college football
playoff that lost by that amount to another college football
playoff team or a lesser team? Did anyone else lose
by a same similar margin to that of BYU that
got in?
Speaker 4: I mean, Alabama the first week of the year lost
by is it eighteen or twenty two to Florida State,
a team that didn't then ranked. And you know that's
what's so frustrating. Ye. Yes, I'm a Dama fan and
I live on seventeen.
Speaker 3: It was a closer game, you know what I mean?
I mean it's closer game.
Speaker 4: Yeah, well a little bit. But if you if you
watch the games. You know that that game wasn't it
was terribly close. Yeah, And you know, I know a
lot of the a lot of people just sort of
look at the box scores and the final scores. But
what's frustrating is just here in Alabama, people have watched
this team that honestly is peaked mid season. You know,
they had you know, ESPN talks about, oh, they had
a stretch of four four straight ranked wins. Well, two
of those teams didn't end up being ranked by the
end of the season, but they still get credit for that.
But but the fans here, most people are like, man,
I don't think we deserve to be in the playoff.
I don't want to watch this team in the playoff.
They they're looking worse week to week, and so you know,
it's just so frustrating just seeing sort of both sides
of the coin and where BYU fans would kill for
the opportunity to be there. You know, DAMA fans are like,
I don't I don't want. I don't want this team
on the national stage because they feel they've been falling
off towards the end of the year. And you know,
I think if you look at the results that sort
of bears out.
Speaker 3: So let me ask you this, This is a philosophical
thing we debated.
Speaker 2: Look, I think the committee was trying to do B.
Speaker 3: Why you was solid by lining up Notre Dame with
with b YU and the pop touch bawl? Had that happened, right,
how much anguish would BYU fans be having a post
post final committee decision? Do you think if they go
to the pop touch bawl against Notre Dame the first
two teams out?
Speaker 2: Like, how how disgruntled are we?
Speaker 4: I'm I mean I'm still still very Yeah, I mean yeah, absolutely,
And the committee wasn't trying to do anything there. I mean,
the committee doesn't care one lock about the bulls. After
the college football it was.
Speaker 3: Acc associated with a big twelve FO so that they
were able to to make that work because Notre Dame
was contracted out with the a SEC.
Speaker 4: Yeah, but the College Football Playoff Committee doesn't make that.
Speaker 2: College You're right, You're right.
Speaker 3: So Okay, let's say, B, why you got in? What
were they would have been probably a number ten seed? Right,
they would have got that ten seed? Okay, Texas A
and M. How would be why you far against Texas
A and M in your opinion.
Speaker 4: I mean, Texas A and M is the least tested
of the SEC teams. They played one team that had
that finished in the top half of the SEC final
standings and they lost to that team. That was the
Texas is the only team they played in the SEC
that finished in the top half of the standings, and
they got beat pretty handily. So they had a very
interesting draw. Yeah, they have the Notre Dame win early
in the season, and people argue whether that should have
been win with the hold at the end and the
mixed missed extra point and everything. But they you know,
they really drew an inside straight on the easy side
of the SEC schedule. When they played a better team Texas,
they lost pretty handily, So you know, they they may
be a little bit of a paper tiger. I mean,
they've they've got talent, they got a better coach now
than they've had in a while with Elco. I think
Dyu performs pretty well. I mean, they have one of
those explosive offenses that you know can can come out
of nowhere, So it really depends on how well the
defense would hold up.
Speaker 2: But I mean and M's strength of record was fifth.
B Yu's ninth.
Speaker 3: Their FPI was tenth, BYU was sixteenth strength of schedule
and M was eighteenth.
Speaker 2: BYU is twenty third. This is all per ESPN.
Speaker 3: Right, Sagarin had BYU at number twenty four, Texas am
at number eight.
Speaker 1: ESPN.
Speaker 2: Okay, you don't like Sagur.
Speaker 3: That's why I'm giving you all the date, these these
these spots, right, because I'm giving you as many of
these because I go through them all right, I'm going
into Massie, you know, I try to see exactly and
how they're weighted, and just to try to get a
visual of what BYU is because in my opinion, BYU
is in that very uh like they're a great team.
Speaker 2: They're in that.
Speaker 3: Six to about seventeen rank. I think right around there
where they that's where they're at. I don't think they're
an elite team. I just don't.
Speaker 2: I think the top five teams.
Speaker 3: That are our leader probably Ohio State, Indiana Tech, Georgia,
and I think Oregan's right there knocking on the door
to be an elite team.
Speaker 2: I really do.
Speaker 4: I think that's the correct assumption, you know what I mean.
Speaker 3: Like that's kind of where I'm at. A and M
was eighth per sp plus. Collectively, they're septh and offense,
twenty first and defense, and then eighty first on special teams.
My personal opinion is, I get where you're going. I
think we're out matched even versus Texas A and M.
Like I wonder, like from a pr standpoint, not like
a profitability or not like I want to be where
you get over the hump. But at the end of
the day, I also think, do you believe how a
team finishes, you know, matters going into the offseason.
Speaker 2: Do you think getting a win over at Georgia.
Speaker 3: Tech a twenty second team, twenty second team, best team
in the country would be more beneficial than by you
losing by you know, fourteen to twenty one points versus
Texas A and M.
Speaker 2: And the college football.
Speaker 4: Playoff, oh no, take the playoffs. Playoff loss every day
of the week and twice on Sunday until.
Speaker 2: You got to the playoff. It's kind of the tournament thing.
Speaker 4: Sure, you you get the yeah, you get the buzz,
you get the sort of the notch on your belt,
you get the the buy in that hey we can
you know you've broken through the glass ceiling. And I
think maybe in any other given year. You know, if
if a team that you don't think is going to
do great, maybe you're like like the Alabama fans here,
uh maybe maybe don't want to see this team, you know,
not not do as well as they are fearing. Uh.
But yeah for b YU, yeah, you got to break
that class ceiling. And even if you get uh, you know,
you don't get beat. And I think that's where you know,
fans just don't want to hear it from you know,
their their co workers or people on social media. So
you just got to ignore that stuff. The average person
who you know, they respect, uh, they respect programs too,
who get there. I mean uh so, I mean you
don't want to TCU versus Georgia kind of total blowout.
But you know people talk about that, but they also
forget that TCU beat Michigan to get there. They want
a playoff game, uh to get there. Uh. And then
sort of the the other side of the coin is
that a lot of these powerful teams got there and
got embarrassed. Last year. I mean, Indiana got blown out
by Notre Dame in the playoff game. Oregon got blown
out by Ohio State in the playoff game. Where are
those two teams now this year, you know, those are
two of the five teams you just mentioned that are elite.
They were able to parlay that, you know, elevated status
of being in the playoff, even though they didn't perform
well in the playoffs, they were able to parlay that
into increased respect. Uh and you know, great transfer portal classes.
Speaker 2: So yeah, you just got to get there.
Speaker 3: I think when when the when the Dominoes finally felt
like and they evaluated who they got in last year,
to me that what they did is a reactionary cause
or reactionary uh, just just kind of this motive of
why they did what they did this year. I think
they reflect on last year. Boys State got their their
their booties beat belt a boot s MU did not
was not competitive last year.
Speaker 2: I think they look at.
Speaker 3: Those two situations and they're like, we overseeded Boise and
we probably should have left s m U out. We
want a more competitive playoff. The more competitive playoff will
come from five SEC teams. Let's do something different than
we did last year. I think it's almost that basic.
And then they had to find a way to get
an ACC team in there.
Speaker 4: I mean, but the playoff, I mean they're not being
if what you're saying is true, I mean, did they
not watch the games? I mean, I think Indiana and
Tennessee and Oregon performed every bit as bad as SMU
or Boise State, did you know you can say, I
mean that there were a lot of and you know,
people say, well, we want to have the most competitive games,
and that's why we're going to put in the best teams.
Maybe not the most deserving teams, that we want to
put in the best teams. And it's like some of the.
Speaker 2: R tennant Tennessee got destroyed.
Speaker 3: Some people say the Ohio State team was was you know,
I don't know they're seeding right, Yeah, you know, we
know how good Ohio State is from a resource depot.
They like Tennessee was. You know, like I said, it
goes back to like my elite and then great teams.
Like I think in any given year you probably have
like five elite teams, right, Like we know that Clemson
was not an elite team. Last year they were, they
were a great team, and Texas was kind of in
Texas to me last year was kind of like Oregon
this year, like depending on the day, they're like great
or they're they look elite, right depending on their game
plan where they're playing is at home away neutral type
of deal. So I don't know, it's intriguing to me.
It really is like how how far out should we
How how many teams should we expand to? Do you
think in order to you know, like maintain brands, conferences,
you know that happiness and have a couple of cinderellas, Right, Like,
what do we need to get to with some bye
weeks as well? We would start the calendar a little
bit earlier, maybe get rid of conference championship games, right,
if we need to just get rid of conference championship
games and we can play another conference game there, we
can we can play maybe a couple more conference games
if you start the calendar a little bit sooner with
your non conference play.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I think you know their expansion is imminent. Apparently
the question is it sounds like sixteen is sort of
the next step that most people are agreeing upon, and
you know, then, I you know, five plus eleven is
what's being discussed right now. It's five plus seven, you know,
five automatics plus seven at largest, five plus eleven would
just expand the large field by by four more. I
just don't trust that commit I honestly believe it was
if it was a sixteen team playoff this year at
VYU Utah would be ranked, you know, the first two
teams outside outside of I mean, that's the cynic in
me that that they've just seen what they've done in
the last two years, and it seems like they figure
out a way to do it. So I don't I
don't trust the committee. And initially I hated the idea
of the Big Ten with these multiple automatic qualifiers, this
four you know, initially it was four four two two
one five or something like that for the sixteen team playoff,
and then they expanded it, well, let's do four four
four four, so all the power conferences get four automatics
and then you know there's still you know, maybe two
spots for G five champions and then still like five
or six at large spots I think for a twenty
four team playoff, which I know sounds huge, and I
initially just push back and hate that idea, but I
you know, the committee has made me a bullie. We're
in that plan, a plan that I don't like because
I don't trust the committee. And if conferences can sell
and you talk about, you know, conference championships going away
with that plan, you know, you could still have your
conference championships for the Power four and they you know,
the top two teams automatically get in, uh, those those spots.
But then you maybe have two play in games where
you know, number three plays number six and number five
plays number four in your in your conference, and whoever
wins those playing games, you know, they get a home
game maybe on that same weekend, and that you know,
under the interest. And he initially I hated the idea,
but I mean seeing what the committee's done in the
last couple of years to b YU and certain other teams,
you know, I just anything that will take hower away
from a very subjective committee that won't tell us the rules,
that'll say, well, strength of record matters now because this team.
We want to get this team in, but oh, the
test applies more to this team. And did you see
how gutsy they were, you know, going fourth down or
did you see how their offensive line played? It's like,
what what are you talking about? These these are completely
random subjective things. Why are you quote you know, the
committee and the show and everything. They just need to
have less and less power, and anything we can do
to get that committee is going to be better for
college football. In my opinion.
Speaker 3: The college football cartel, the cabal, the oly goppoly, the
monopoly on the sport.
Speaker 2: It continues.
Speaker 3: They don't like look BYU once upon a time, That's
why they don't like them. Eighty four baby, the by
was able.
Speaker 2: To circumvent the cartel. That you're like, no, never again.
When we let that happen, they still haven't paid their pennance.
Speaker 3: It's you know, they they're not getting in no IF's answer,
but about it. No, I do think from a legacy standpoint,
like okay, like we we've had top twenty five for
a right, we always talked about the top twenty five.
Obviously you can't have twenty five in the in the
in the college football playoff, but it'd be nice to
include as many of the big brands as possible, even
if they end up being one and done right or
you have multiple playing games like that with like these
you know fifteen to the twenty five area, right, Like,
I don't know, there needs to be those playing games
to keep relevancy and we need need Cinderella's Joel Klatz
an idiot. He doesn't want any Cinderella. What an absurdity,
what a pompous prick. No offense, nove. He's a smart man,
but that was not a smart thing to say, in
my opinion.
Speaker 2: So anyways, I gotta let you go, Jeff.
Speaker 3: But always a pleasure, always a blessing, talking ball with you,
love talking stats with you, a great conversation today.
Speaker 4: Brother, Appreciate the time, and you have great day. Go
koogs and I go.
Speaker 2: There you go.
Speaker 3: That's Jeff Fuller, our local or our favorite Vitrio retinal
surgeon live from Alabama, always talking metrics with him.
Speaker 2: Guys, the season to be given.
Speaker 3: Because we have been given much, we too must give. ESPN,
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