Utah ahead of BYU?

So the latest USA Today coaches poll places BYU at #24 and Utah at #18. This just goes to show you how pointless preseason polls are. Rather than argue why BYU should be higher (which I actually don't believe), I would like to argue that Utah is severely over ranked. Here are the rankings of the bottom ten including last year's schedule:

15. Georgia Tech ... 9-4 ... 559 ... 22

16. Boise State ... 12-1 ... 542 ... 13

17. TCU ... 11-2 ... 461 ... 7

18. Utah ... 13-0 ... 404 ... 4

19. Florida State ... 9-4 ... 371 ... 23

20. North Carolina ... 8-5 ... 293 ... nr

21. Iowa ... 9-4 ... 257 ... 20

22. Nebraska ... 9-4 ... 236 ... nr

23. Notre Dame ... 7-6 ... 194 ... nr

24. Brigham Young ... 10-3 ... 178 ... 21

25. Oregon State ... 9-4 ... 165 ... 19

So throw out last year's Utah team. These polls are about performance this year. Of course this is a coaches poll, so some of these guys may have very little to go off of except last year's schedule. The MWC coaches poll placed Utah in third overall in the conference behind BYU. So the coaches of our own conference who know Utah best don't even think Utah should be ranked so high. Why do I care? Am I just on some vitriolic rant out of blind hatred for the Utes? Partly, but these rankings do matter. Utah has a fairly soft schedule until late in the year. Oregon in week 3 could be a real challenge, but other than that they should win their first 9 games. But in college football, it's not just your performance week to week, but your overall position in the rankings. It is rare for teams to make giant leaps by winning a big game. It is also rare for a team to move down in the rankings for winning a game, even if their performance was unimpressive. By starting at #18 and winning game after game, the Utes could find themselves very highly ranked. This is especially true when on considers the hype and excitement surrounding the team following last year's Sugar bowl.

The whole preseason ranking idea is ridiculous. It is very similar to a race in which everyone has a different starting place. No one knows this better than BYU who benefited greatly from strong preseason hype, an overly high preseason ranking, and a soft beginning schedule. There is no way BYU should have climbed as high as #7 last year, and no way they should have ended the year anywhere in the top 25.

I propose that no rankings be released until week 4 at the very earliest. This will give everyone a chance to see what team's are made of before they can be biased by the rankings. Under the current system, wins and losses have a greater impact than they should. Better to look at a team's overall performance. This will be easier to do by waiting later in the season to release the official rankings. This is already the way the current BCS rankings are done. Several weeks into the season, the first rankings come out. But because the other polls are a factor in determining the BCS rankings, it is little help.

Finally, let me officially express my confidence that Utah is ranked far to highly, and their performance on the field will indicate that. There is no reason for a team missing as many crucial pieces as last year's team should be ranked so highly. Many of their strongest assets from last year are now missing. They don't even know who their quarterback is going to be! I imagine a team with a very good defense and little to no offense. Utah has had abysmal quarterback in the past (I know I used to be a fan), and it could happen again. Lucky for them, a few meaningless wins will go far considering their inflated #18 ranking.