MAC Blogger Poll

In response to the MAC Media Poll, the Bull Run Blog set up a blogger poll for the MAC.  We had 11 blogs participate, as you can see below.  (The tables I cribbed without permission or remorse from the EMU Eagles blog, which is new on the scene.  Didn't see any reason to type this all in myself).

Blog (Listed alphabetically)	Focus
Bull Run	Buffalo
Eastern Michigan Eagles	Eastern Michigan
Falcon Blog	Bowling Green
Fire Up Chips	Central Michigan
Hustle Belt	MAC
Lets go Rockets	Toledo
Over The Pylon	Ball State
Rasor on the Zips	Akron
Red and Black Attack	Northern Illinois
Temple Football Forever	Temple
The MAC Daily	MAC
VanDelay	MAC

You can see the predictions below.  They are predictions.    One thing I will note is that I think the balance of power is shifting more toward divisional parity.  I think that as you move down the rankings, you can see that the teams are pretty even...Kent at 3rd should be pretty similar to CMU at third in the West, and so on.

MAC East	Pts	Div	Conf	Bowl	High	Low
Temple	97	10	8	11	1st	2nd
Ohio	89	2	1	9	1st	3rd
Kent	64	0	0	4	2nd	7th
BG	55	0	0	1	3rd	5th
BUF	44	0	0	0	2nd	6th
Akron	11	0	0	0	5th	7th
Miami	10	0	0	0	5th	7th
MAC West	Pts	Div	Conf	Bowl	High	Low
NIU	95	9	3	12	1st	2nd
TOL	73	2	0	4	1st	5th
CMU	62	0	0	3	2nd	4th
WMU	58	1	0	3	1st	5th
BSU	29	0	0	1	2nd	6th
EMU	2	0	0	0	5th	6th

(Full data, along with more analysis is available from Bull Run.)

The EMU blog correctly identifies, however, that what is really interesting is the difference betweenthe bloggers and the Media.  In fact, they are pretty minimal.  The one thing that leaps out to me is that the MSM has faith that Miami will show improvement this year, while we in the blogging community are less sure.  In fact, Miami and Akron are more or less equal in our eyes.  Also, the bloggers like Toledo better--in fact, two bloggers out of 11 thought they would win the division.

East Blog Poll	East Media Day	West Blog Poll	West Media Day
1 Temple(10) 97	1 Temple(17) 137	1 NIU (9) 95	1 NIU (15) 115
2 Ohio(2) 89	2 Ohio(3) 116	2 Toledo (2) 73	2 CMU(3) 83
3 Kent 64	3 Kent 94	3 CMU 62	3 WMU (2) 77
4 BGSU 55	4 BGSU 74	4 WMU (1) 58	4 Toledo 75
5 Buffalo 44	5 Miami 53	5 Ball State 29	5 Ball State 50
6 Akron 11	6 Buffalo 48	6 EMU 2	6 EMU 20
7 Miami 10	7 Akron 38

For the record, my picks were as follows (to be expounded on in a future post).

East

1. Temple
2. Kent
3. OU
4. BG
5. Buffalo
6. Miami
7. Akron

West

1. WMU
2. NIU
3. UT
4. CMU
5. BSU
6. EMU

I think Temple will win the MAC...and I picked Temple, Kent, NIU and WMU to make bowls. Yes, Kent in a bowl game.

The apocalypse will be occurring shortly thereafter, so short everything.

Again, I'll explain myself at a later date, but for today, I think it is good to see that the blogs and the MSM don't differ all that much, which means, more than likely, we will all be equally wrong.