There were a few corrections this week that made the ballot unusually fluid; I had some teams overvalued and undervalued and now is as good a time as any to fix that. So the direction of certain teams might not make a lot of sense. I know there are going to be some complaints, so let's get to defending this thing.
1 Alabama
2 Florida
3 TCU
4 Texas
5 Georgia Tech
This is where, even in Week 11, it's useful to remind ourselves that a resume ballot is about the final product and not the current snapshot in time. TCU's toughest stretch is behind it, with only a game at Wyoming and against New Mexico to go. Texas still has Kansas, at Texas A&M and the Big XII Championship Game. While that might not be the most challenging slate in the world, it's still better than what TCU is going up against. So if both teams win out, the Longhorns will probably end up No. 2 after the SEC Championship Game. Same thing with Georgia Tech at No. 5; I generally reward a BCS team for going undefeated throughout the regular season, something that Cincinnati has not done yet. Once they complete things, I would expect the Bearcats to end up ahead of the Yellow Jackets.
6 Cincinnati
7 Boise State
8 Oregon
9 Pittsburgh
10 Ohio State
I'm still not sure what finally persuaded me to move Boise State ahead of Oregon, but I hope it pleases everyone concerned with head-to-head but only if we think both teams are good. Pittsburgh and Ohio State are, I think, good teams. This is a painful admission for someone like myself who enjoys good bowl games, especially in the case of the Buckeyes, but you have to give them credit for winning most of their games. You don't have to give them credit for having lost to Purdue, which is why they are where they are.
11 Iowa
12 Stanford
13 LSU
14 Clemson
15 Virginia Tech
This where things get tricky because teams who actually won might move down because of the increasing values of the resume of other teams. That's just the way things work on this kind of ballot. Iowa is still a pretty good team whose knack for lucky bounces has turned around. Stanford defeated the Pac-10 onetime dynasty and has a pretty good resume even outside of that win. LSU has to defeat Louisiana Tech by more than it did and preferrably without giving the Bulldogs their first lead in 105 years. I hate Clemson. Virginia Tech is still not going to win the ACC, but the Hokies did what you're supposed to do when you face Maryland.
16 Oklahoma State
17 Oregon State
18 Miami
19 Rutgers
20 Nebraska
Oklahoma State and Oregon State both added respectable wins this week, which is enough when the people ahead of you are doing stupid things like losing to North Carolina, everyone's favorite bipolar football team. Oh, hello Miami. Rutgers put a nice win on the board by waxing South Florida, which apparently switches players with North Carolina every year around Week 7. Nebraska: Because of the half-dozen teams in the Big XII North, one of them has to be good.
21 Penn State
22 Wisconsin
23 Boston College
24 Southern Cal
25 Cal
Some men look at the bottom their BlogPoll Ballots and say "Why?" I look at the last five teams on mine and say "Why not?" So, sure, let's put Penn State and Wisconsin on here for having pretty records against fairly ordinary schedules when you take away the teams to which they lost. Boston College is there for no real reason other than there are no better candidates. Really; find me one and I'll consider it. I almost eliminated Southern Cal before I even started putting the ballot together, but I decided that was too harsh for two bad games. Cal is in at No. 25 ahead of a few teams that are basically interchangeable.