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The AP announced its Top 100 football programs of all time Tuesday. Alabama fans are already crying foul.
The Crimson Tide came in at No. 4 in the poll behind Ohio State, Oklahoma and Notre Dame, this despite the fact that ‘Bama has more AP-recognized national championships (10) than any other institution on the list.
The list is formulaic in nature, not subjective, so it’s impossible to argue with the results. In the 80-year history of the rankings, teams were given one point for making an appearance in the poll, one point for being ranked No. 1 and then 10 points for every national title — AP only, no self-proclaimed champs.
The Tide have been in the poll on 745 occasions, or 67.5 percent of the time for eight decades. They have been ranked No. 1 in the country 74 times. In both categories, they trail the Buckeyes, Sooners and Irish.
The formula would have to be altered drastically to vault the program from Tuscaloosa into the top spot.
However, the logic behind the AP’s original formula was to reward programs that have been both consistent over the years and singularly great along the way. Today’s championship-or-bust philosophy doesn’t apply.
If you instead gave one point for a poll appearance, two for a No. 1 ranking and five for a title, Alabama actually falls to No. 5 behind USC — the top three remains the same. If you go to a 1-5-10 point system or even 1-10-25, putting outlier achievements over steady success, the Crimson Tide still remain fifth.
A 1-10-100 system only gets the Tide to No. 3 behind Notre Dame and Oklahoma. If the AP’s scales were to be slanted toward rings even more heavily, then week-to-week and year-to-year winning gets underweighted.
Florida is the only other program from the SEC to make the coveted Top 10, finishing 10th.
While the Gators have been No. 1 on 41 occasions, that wasn’t good enough to place them ahead of Nebraska, Michigan, Texas or Florida State. Looking up at the Seminoles won’t make many people happy in Gainesville.
The conference is well represented just a little further down the list, with LSU at No. 11, Tennessee at No. 14, Georgia at No. 15, Auburn at No. 16 and then Texas A&M at No. 18 — the Aggies accumulated most of their points as members of another league, of course. They didn’t play in the SEC until the 2012 campaign.
The only other conference member to make the Top 25 overall was Arkansas, which is 21st. The Razorbacks have never won a national championship, but they were No. 1 in the land one glorious time.
Vanderbilt is the league’s weakest wink. The Commodores rank a lowly 89th between East Carolina and Yale.
John Crist is the senior writer for Saturday Down South, a member of the FWAA and a voter for the Heisman Trophy. Send him an e-mail, like him on Facebook or follow him on Twitter.
John Crist is an award-winning contributor to Saturday Down South.
