Column: ESPN disrespecting Michigan in its latest FPI rankings

The Michigan Football program enters the 2023 season as high as it has ever been. The Wolverines have beaten their biggest rivals, Ohio State, in consecutive seasons by a combined 37 points. They are defending back-to-back Big Ten Champions. Head coach Jim Harbaugh thinks this is his best team yet and Vegas agrees, ranking Michigan with the 4th best odds to win the National Championship.

So some were shocked to see Michigan ranked #6 in ESPN's latest FPI Rankings.
Where did they come up with this?

I'm not trying to write one of those articles where anything less than being ranked #1 is considered disrespectful. I like data and analytic based arguments. Whether it is in our 'By the Numbers' series where I only let the data make my case. Or even something like my recent ranking of Big Ten Head coaches where I created a formula that required a 21-column spreadsheet. I try to take emotion out of it and let the numbers talk. So when I saw ESPN ranked Michigan at #6 in their latest FPI Rankings, I decided to let their numbers do the talking. They didn't have much to say.

Let's talk about Michigan first. Everything I said about Michigan's accomplishments in the last two seasons doesn't mean much this year. They aren't more likely to beat Ohio State because they won in dominating fashion the last two seasons. But where those results do matter is when you consider what Michigan is bringing back in 2023.

Back in February, Bill Connelly of ESPN ran an article on analyzing college football team's returning production in 2023. He explained why returning production doesn't necessarily guarantee a team will be good, but there is a correlation between teams improving or regressing. According to Connelly, Michigan has the 5th most returning production in 2023 behind Florida State, Kansas, FAU, and Wyoming.

This is eye-opening because Michigan finished 3rd last season in ESPN's SP+ rankings, also provided by Connelly. SP+ is considered one of the best metric-based rankings in college football. More on that in a moment.

Here is what Connely had to say regarding Michigan's returning production;

"It's pretty jarring to see a team that made the CFP one year also rank in the top five in returning production the next. The Wolverines are projected to return quarterback J.J. McCarthy, running back and Heisman hopeful Blake Corum and nine of their 12 defenders with 400-plus snaps. Plus, Jim Harbaugh made deft use of the portal, adding reinforcements to both the linebacking corps and an already-awesome offensive line. Both Ohio State and Penn State enter 2023 with hopes of preventing a third straight Big Ten title for Michigan, but they'll have to clear a really high bar."

A pretty obvious case made by Connely here. Michigan, Big Ten Champions, and College Football Playoff participants return 81% of their production from last season including starting quarterback, Heisman-level running back, and portal additions that upgrade already strong units. That's a formula for a team to not only be good, but to improve.

So it should have come as no surprise when Connely released his SP+ rankings on ESPN for 2023 he had Michigan ranked third behind Georgia and Ohio State. Yes, we could argue Michigan deserves to be above Ohio State, but the margin between the two in his rankings is razor-thin. We can nitpick whether Ohio State will have the best offense in 2023 with a new quarterback with Connely making the assumption they can.

What we see in ESPN's FPI rankings however is no razor-thin margin or room to nitpick. Where Connolly says Michigan is essentially tied with Ohio State, ESPN's FPI says Michigan is nowhere near the Buckeyes. That isn't the craziest part.

Ohio State comes in at #1, projected to win 11.8 games. Michigan comes in at #6 projected to win 10 games. What's shocking is the gap in rating. Michigan is 10.1 behind Ohio State. In fact, ESPN says the 20th-ranked Wisconsin Badgers are closer to Michigan than Michigan is to Ohio State. Despite SP+ favoring Michigan in each of its games, FPI says the Wolverines only have a 4.3% chance to go undefeated, while the Buckeyes have a 34.3% chance to finish 12-0. Let's move past the rivals for a moment and talk about what is in front of the Wolverines.

Texas! While the Longhorns were improved at 8-5 last year and are expected to take a jump in Steve Sarkisian's third year, in what world are you ranking them above Michigan? Connelly says Texas is 19th in returning production and ranks them 9th in his SP+ rankings. The Longhorns lose their star running back Bijan Robinson, but return most of the offense including their quarterback. Michigan returns Corum and Donovan Edwards, and also has their quarterback returning.

Connoly has Texas in a tier that includes LSU, also ranked above Michigan in FPI for some reason, as well as Oregon, USC, Florida State, and Clemson. I am not here to dog on Texas, I do think they have a chance to win the Big 12 this year and get to the College Football Playoff but ESPN can not make a data argument for having them ahead of Michigan. And they don't, there is no data. In fact, in another metric ESPN makes the exact opposite argument with actual numbers to back it up.

In the summer of 2022, ESPN released their FPI rankings that had the usual suspects at the top Alabama, Ohio State, Georgia, and Clemson. Michigan was 7th in that ranking with Notre Dame and Texas ahead of them. With a gap of 11.7, ESPN said Michigan was closer to teams outside the top 25 than they were to Ohio State. Of course, Michigan finished undefeated with a 45-23 win in Columbus, while Notre Dame won 9 games and Texas won 8.

Look, ESPN wants to say Ohio State is ahead of Michigan by a razor-thin margin, we can debate that. But that is in the context of them being one of the top 3 teams in the nation and one of the favorites to win the National Championship. You want to say they are 6th behind Texas and closer to Wisconsin than they are to Ohio State, well, not only am I going to say that's disrespectful I am going to say you are embarrassing yourself. Posting the FPI rankings with numbers you call data, but no data argument is absurd. Making the same mistakes you made last year? That's insanity.

ESPN, maybe just let Bill Connoly handle the analytic rankings from here on out.

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