The de facto preseason Big Ten poll is here and Nebraska is...
...probably where you'd expect if you've been following along this offseason.
Has anyone ever stopped to thank the Big Ten for opting out of the preseason polling game in 2011? For refusing to run the rat race of organizing a process where a group of people—coaches, media, maybe even both—dared to project that one Big Ten team might be the best while another might be the worst?
Of course no one has because preseason media and coaches polls and all-conference teams never harmed anyone. The Big Ten’s decision to end that process in 2011, ahead of Nebraska’s first year in the league, remains one of its most pinky-in-the-air decisions, which is saying something for a conference that views itself as the most refined roughneck at the roadhouse that college athletics has become, a roadhouse made rowdier because the Big Ten so ruthlessly expanded over the past 15 years.
Among the FBS conferences, only the Big Ten has said “we’re above all that.” Has it provided the conference any benefit? Hard to see one, but it presumably has provided a benefit to the Cleveland Plain-Dealer, the newspaper that had the foresight to recognize that there’s a lot of interest in preseason polls and all-conference teams and took up the mantle of organizing one when the Big Ten wouldn’t.1
The Plain-Dealer, more specifically cleveland.com, released its de facto Big Ten poll Monday. Nebraska landed about where you’d expect it to land if you’ve been following along all offseason, but that doesn’t mean there weren’t discussion-worthy items within it. First, the poll, then some thoughts.
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