There are a million ways to rank and evaluate teams throughout the year in college football. Whether it’s based on overall record, recruiting, returning talent, or strength of schedule, fans are never lacking of different ways in which they can view their team, comparing them to others and assessing the future possibilities.
In today’s era of college football, we have the transfer portal rankings as well. There are so many different rankings, all holding a unique weight and importance, that it can eventually make your head spin. However, there is one set of rankings that I tend to give a bit more credence to in the offseason than others. Those are ESPN’s SP+ rankings, brought to us by Bill Connelly.
If you are unfamiliar with the SP+ rankings, it’s not too complicated. They are based on the following: Returning production — how many players from last year’s roster are still on the team; Recent recruiting — how the last few classes of recruiting stack up, with more weight placed on the most recent signees; Recent history — quite simply, how good has the team been over the past 2-4 years. More weight has also been placed on the transfer portal in the past couple of years, and the amount of production that each team is expecting to receive from incoming players via the portal.
As you can see, a lot goes into these rankings, and they offer a concise view of how teams stack up in each college football season. So how are the Ducks viewed according to SP+? Take a look: