Ohio State entered the 2014 season ranked 5th in the country.
Before you allow but preseason polls are bad, actually to escape from the part of your frontal lobe where you house all of your scorching takes - let's talk about why these rankings are uniquely important to how college football in particular colors in the stories of its chapters.
Preseason and even early season-slotting may not impact postseason destinations but they still matter because this sport is played by teens and young adults who make the trivial indispensable. Rankings are also exploited by coaches who play polls to their competitive advantage, portraying themselves and their adversaries on opposites sides of an imaginary overrated/underrated line.