Greg McElroy fights for Baylor to get more respect after release of Preseason AP Poll

Baylor was one of the first teams to miss out on the ranking yesterday at the release of the Preseason AP Poll. ESPN’s Greg McElroy didn’t understand that slight snub of the Bears based on how they came out of last season and into this one.

On ‘Always College Football’ on Monday, McElroy reacted to the Preseason Top-25 which dropped yesterday morning. After going through the teams who made the cut, McElroy noted four teams, whether disrespected or slept on, who missed the rating, including Baylor who technically came in at No. 28 based on the results from the Associated Press.

“Another team that I think was pretty disrespected was Baylor – a team that won their final six games of the regular season last year after a 2-4 start,” said McElroy.

“Man, Baylor not in the Top-25, to me, was surprising, especially with how things finished.”

For reference, McElroy ranked Baylor five spots higher at No. 23 in his own Preseason Top-25, making them the third-best team in the Big 12 for him behind Arizona State and Utah. Joel Klatt at FOX Sports also had them at No. 23 while On3’s Brett McMurphy had them just off his ballot at No. 27. Instead, officially per the AP, the Bears are at No. 28, which has them as the fifth-best team in the Big 12 after Arizona State, Kansas State, and Iowa State as well as Utah with them just ahead of them as far as teams who missed the cut as the Utes received just a dozen more votes at No. 27.

Again, McElory based this opinion on how Baylor finished last season, finishing 6-0 in the regular season before losing to LSU in the Texas Bowl to close at 8-5 overall for their second-best record under Dave Aranda. He saw other teams get the end-of-season bump in making the ranking, so he wondered why the Bears didn’t?

“I mean, you look at a team like Florida that’s ranked 15th, and then you look at a team like Baylor? Both finished really, really well and yet Florida is at 15, with a ridiculously difficult schedule, and Baylor is at 28 when, frankly, there’s a lot of similarities between those two teams,” McElroy noted.

Baylor also brings back some of the most production and experience, both in the conference and across the country, this season. That’s especially so offensively with starters back all around, namely QB Sawyer Robertson and RB Bryson Washington as noted by McElroy.

“They have a quarterback in Sawyer Robertson emerge,” said McElroy. “They also have a dynamic running back in Bryson Washington, who’s amazing…They like their depth at (running back).”

Baylor just missed out on the AP’s Preseason Top-25 this week. However, the Bears are still in position to earn a number by their name over the course of the upcoming season, especially early on with some of the games they’ll play to start.