The 2017 college football season is right around the corner and these are the most overrated teams heading into the new campaign.
The 2017 college football season is only a few weeks away. We are already beginning to be flooded with preseason rankings.
However, here are the teams that will prove themselves overrated this college football season:
Honorable Mention: Louisville
Lamar Jackson fell apart at the end of the season, leaving Heisman voters wishing they could get their votes back. He’s a good kid, elite athlete, but he is not elite enough of a passer to lead this team to an ACC title. The Cardinals will likely get to 10 wins due to a non-conference schedule that would make Washington blush.
Now onto the real list.
Please stop trying to sell me on LSU being able to unseat Bama for the SEC West crown. Not happening. Not even if its quarterback, Jalen Hurts, gets hurt.
The Tigers have to get out of the “run and punt” style of offense they had under Les Miles and step in at least a 2010 offense. LSU’s offense has not been bold, daring or innovative in the last 10 years.
In my mind, I like the idea of Ed Orgeron as head coach, but if I’m judging from the last time he was in charge without the interim tag (Ole Miss), I realize things could go badly.
Derrius Guice might be the nation’s best running back, but so was Leonard Fournette last year. You cannot win the SEC by playing defense and running the ball. As usual, the Tigers are stacked with talent on defense with Arden Key (LB) and Donte Jackson (CB) leading the way.
Unfortunately, the SEC is Alabama, and everybody else and LSU is everybody else. Last year, the Tigers finished 8-4. They will likely finish with an identical record this year unless new offensive coordinator Matt Canada can get an explosive passing game going with QB Danny Etling.
Tom Herman is in, Charlie Strong is out. Texas is back. Texas is a top-10 team. Slow all the way down. The expectations that burnt orange fans and some in the media have are completely out of whack.
Realistically, eclipsing the five wins from last year shouldn’t be too difficult with very winnable games against Maryland, San Jose St, Iowa St and Kansas on the schedule.
Despite not winning enough games, Strong did leave Herman a stable of good recruits. Both 2015 and 2016 finished with top-10 classes.
The fact that Texas returns 37-of-44 starters and has talent is why expectations are high. But depth is an issue, especially on the offensive line. You already know, if you can’t protect your quarterback, you can’t play football. I really hope Shane Buechele’s parents took out an insurance policy on him. He may be running for his life a lot this season. All-American Connor Williams can’t block everyone by himself.
There is good news, though. If Herman can keep his QB upright, the Longhorns have playmakers in Collin Johnson and Devin Duvernay at wide receiver. Todd Orlando is the new defensive coordinator and there’s nowhere to go but up from the last two years of Swiss cheese D.
This Florida Gators team looks so much better than it really is. Their season opener is against the also-overrated Michigan Wolverines. If Florida wins that game, the unrealistic expectations are only going to spiral out of control.
I get it, they won the SEC East the last two consecutive years and that’s is a “big deal” but is it really when you are nowhere close to Alabama?
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Unless Jim McElwain got a Steve Spurier offensive blood transfusion, expect to see another season of non-explosive offensive football. The Gators finished 100th in scoring in 2015 and 107th in 2016. This Florida team will be offensively underwhelming again.
The fact the Gators can win with such poor offense a huge testament to their defense. I could name a handful of defensive players that will keep them in games, but I won’t. This team could very well win the SEC East or they could finish with six losses, but if a tree falls in the forest and no one is there to hear it did it really happen?
Side note: Jim McElwain has no sense of humor for how he handled the whole shark picture incident.
Back to back years overrated — this is becoming a trend. This team does not have does not have a chance to win the national championship. How can people reasonably expect this happens?
Michigan only returns five starters, and only one of those on defense. True and redshirt freshmen will be filling many of the holes left vacated by graduation and players leaving early for the NFL draft.
The freshmen are part of back-to-back top-six recruiting classes. Truth be told, Michigan is the third or fourth best team in the Big Ten behind Penn State, Ohio State and maybe Wisconsin. Aside from games against Penn State and Ohio State, this schedule looks like a snoozer.
George, what about Florida Week 1 and the Wisconsin game? What about it? Sounds like 13-10 ballgames with teams below average offenses masquerading as top-10 defensive juggernauts. Wilton Speight is a decent quarterback, but he is probably not one of the top 25 quarterbacks in college football. That means the coaches can’t depend on him being special to win games.
There is good news, Wolverines fans. Jim Harbaugh is your coach. If anyone can grind out a 10-win season on the backs of Wilton Speight and running back Chris Evans, it’s the khaki man. Reality is more like 9-3 or 8-4.
The Huskies’ non-conference games with Rutgers, Montana and Fresno State is somehow weaker than last year’s schedule. To make their schedule even easier, Washington plays Oregon, Washington State and Utah all at home, and avoids USC altogether.
I believe Chris Petersen is a great coach. I believe Washington will have a good running game with Myles Gaskin and Lavon Coleman. I believe defensive coordinator Pete Kwiatowski will be able to field a formidable defense despite losing Budda Baker, Sidney Jones, Kevin King and Elijah Qualls to the NFL.
But they will not be battle-tested and will probably lose a game because I do not believe in Jake Browning. How could I say that? He threw for 3,430 yards and 43 touchdowns last year. Browning was carried by the Huskies’ defense.
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They created easy scoring opportunities from short fields. He did not impress in games vs. Arizona, Utah, USC, Colorado and Alabama. Even if Washington does finish undefeated, expect to hear grumblings about leaving them out of the top four.