Happy Monday, everyone. Heading into the first of what will be two bye weeks this season, Alabama is ranked #1, the spot that Nick Saban probably least wants them to be at this point in the season, and has joined Clemson with the best odds (9/4) to win it all. The advanced metrics bear that out as well, as SP+ has Alabama in the number one spot just slightly ahead of Ohio State, the only other team that ranks top ten in both offense and defense.
Yes, you read that correctly.
For all of the hand-wringing about the garbage time defense, Saban’s calling card has been exactly what we thought it would be: far from his best but still plenty good enough at #8 overall.