Mumme Poll Ballot: Week 12

If you haven't submitted your Mumme Poll ballot yet, get to it.

After you have, let me know how yours compares to mine...

The Top Five

1.) Alabama.

2.) Texas.

3.) TCU.

4.) Florida.

5.) Cincinnati.

The top four teams on this list played pushovers last week, winning by a combined margin of 203-33. Cincy barely escaped with a three-point win over a decent West Virginia team. Essentially, there was nothing to be impressed by or worthy of discussion in the top five.

The Next Seven

6.) Georgia Tech. Paul Johnson spent the week off thinking of new ways to embarrass Willie Martinez.

7.) Boise State. Utah State was even with the Broncos at 14 apiece with 4:47 left in the second quarter. Then Boise State reeled off 21 points before the half. That's good.

8.) Oregon. It took two overtimes to beat Arizona, but a win is a win, and the Ducks will face their in-state rival this weekend for a berth in the Rose Bowl.

9.) Pittsburgh. They also had the week off before finishing up with West Virginia and Cincinnati. But since they haven't clearly proven they are no good yet, I'm sort of forced to give them the benefit of the doubt.

10.) Clemson. The loss to Maryland in utterly inexplicable, but their other two defeats are to top six teams, which is more than I can say for Ohio State, which continues to look every bit like what SEC fans think Big Ten teams look like.

11.) Oregon State. Their three losses were to Cincinnati (a top five team) and Arizona (an above average team) early in the year and at USC by six. They've won four straight in impressive fashion. I like 'em.

12.) Ohio State. Here by default, or as Homer Simpson calls it: "The two sweetest words in the English language… De-Fault! De-Fault!"

Just Missed the Cut

13.) Iowa. I'll say this: if I'm an SEC team, and I know I'll be in one of the 106 bowl games that pits SEC vs. Big Ten, Iowa is the one team I don't want to face.

14.) Oklahoma State. They may deserve to be higher, but who have they beaten? Georgia? Um, not so impressive. They lost to the only two high quality opponents on their slate and without Dez Bryant they aren't the top-10 team they might have been to start the year.

15.) Ole Miss. Without expectations, they're not a bad team. If Jevan Snead could come close to resembling the QB he was last year, they'd be very dangerous.

It seems to me at this point, there is a very clear line of demarcation between the top eight and the rest of the list. If we had an eight team playoff, I'd be OK having money on almost any of those top eight, with the possible exception of Boise State. (And that's only because I don't know if Boise State is good or not rather that an assumption that they couldn't hang with the rest.)

Nine through 11, to me, are late-bloomers with potential. Ole Miss fits that bill, too. But we can't ignore what happened earlier in the year just because they're playing so well now.

The bottom of the list is really anyone's guess. You can make plenty of arguments for or against, but the bottom line is this: Those teams are all fatally flawed somewhere, and 12th place is just the 11th loser.