Playoff projections can make a Duck fan crazy, best ignored for now

Every 15 minutes or so another one comes out, a bracket predicting the seeding of the College Football Playoff, with the Oregon Ducks projected anywhere from No. 6 to No. 10 to ending the season at the Sun Bowl.

Duck fans have seen worse, and at this point all the predictions of glory or despair ought to be given no more than the side-eye.

It comes to this: If Oregon takes care of business Saturday against USC in Autzen Stadium, they are alive for every ambitious goal they set at the first team meeting in January, except repeating as Big Ten Champions. They could even gain the No. 5-seed with a little help from their friends, Chaos and Parity.

The twin scourges of college football predictability still have ample opportunity to upset Greg Sankey's vision of utopia, seven or eight SEC teams in the final 12. Right now six from the conference where it just means more are in the field, though No. 12 Vanderbilt is in line to be bumped by Miami, Utah or the highest-ranked Group of Five team, Tulane, North Texas or the stalwart Midshipmen of the American Conference.

For Oregon it's a game of ignoring the noise and focusing on USC, their 8-2, No. 16-ranked opponent on Saturday, 12:30 p.m. PT from Autzen Stadium on CBS. The projections dire or optimistic have no real value without two more wins.

Staples' bracket above illustrates the predicament. Oklahoma's 23-21 upset win at Alabama put the Ducks in a weird no-man's-land where they are slotted below Alabama AND the Sooners, potentially relegated to an away game in Tuscaloosa as the No. 9-seed. This would be a Voltaire alternate universe, the worst of all possible worlds.

Dice are yet to be cast. Oklahoma hosts Missouri on Saturday, fighting for a backdoor playoff spot of their own. Miami travels to Virginia Tech. Tennesse fans hoist cocktails in Gainesville. A weekend later is rivalry week, where the Aggies invade Austin and the Bulldogs tussle with the Yellow Jackets.

As Rose Byrne said in "This Is Where I Leave You," "Anything can happen. Anything usually does."

The Ducks might get help at the Iron Bowl or The Big House. Championship Week will shuffle the deck one last time while they get to sit home with white cheddar popcorn and a big glass of chocolate milk. But neither the best-case scenario or the worst one have a shred of meaning unless they solve the USC passing attack and pound out yardage against a shaky Trojan defensive front.

Oregon is a 10.5-point favorite at home in Autzen Stadium for Senior Day, up a field goal from two days ago. FPI and the various arbiters of such things give them an 87 percent chance to make the playoff. It goes to zero if they give away the football, give up too many big plays and lose to USC.

The playoff talk is exhausting, and the leading experts don't even agree with each other. By now, Duck fans want more of this and less of all that.

Making the playoffs starts with a strong running game and limiting big plays by an explosive Trojan offense. The rest is just noise. By Week 13, College Football is a cacophony.