How many teams in the country this season would beat both Alabama and Michigan State? Probably zero. Maybe one.
At the start of the season, most reasonable fans here (which is probably only about 5% of the total) were expecting improvement. In other words, expecting 9 or 10 wins. That was completely reasonable based on the information we had at that time. We didn't know Michigan State was this good so we counted that as a win. But go back to August, and tell the reasonable fans then that Michigan State would be a top five team, and that King, Harris, Chaney and Bolden would be out for the season, and that expectation of 10 wins obviously goes down to 7 or 8. If you don't see that, as knowledgeable as you are, then you aren't part of the 5%.