Good information / points. In all honesty, I think your last one about the "eye test" is very important. The good news is we have already established ourselves in the Top 10(even if we don't look like a Top 10 team) as it is much more difficult to work your way up into that category than stay there.

Otherwise I would offer...

+We have to get healthier and in particular on the defensive side of the ball in addition to no more injuries to star players.

+To that point, the offense is going to need to take some chances and the proverbial "open it up" in order to help the defense. This ancient approach to offense by Cristobal in which every opponent this season has been able to neutralize in some form or another, simply can sustain the team and an injury riddled defense.

+Blowout wins would be nice but Cristobal simply doesn't try to do that. I think it is a MAJOR FLAW in his mindset but he doesn't coach to "put teams away" and "blow them away." He just doesn't so the team never plays to do that either.

+There are many variables remaining on what needs to happen in terms of who beats who to help the Ducks but for me the biggest obstacle the Ducks face is...Mario Cristobal because again as per your last point, Oregon just doesn't look good right now in the context of being a playoff caliber team.

Games of particular interest this week:

In conference:
Stanford at ASU.  ASU wins and we don't have to worry about the head-to-head tiebreaker with Stanford, if we win out.

Oregon State at WSU.  Ideally, OSU wins at least until the ASU game, so that the Civil War (or whatever they call it now) is a quality win for us.

B1G
Maryland at Ohio State.  This one could be dangerous.  Maryland had a bad game against Iowa but they are better than that and will want to prove it.  For obvious reasons it is to our benefit for Ohio State to keep winning.  If they do have to lose one game, this one wouldn't be a bad one, though.

Penn State at Iowa.  Best chance for Iowa to end up with more than one loss is to lose this and lose in the B1G championship.  PSU has more chances to pick up losses.  Without knowing future results, I think PSU winning helps us more.

Michigan @ Nebraska.  Come on, Frostie, get it together.

B12
Oklahoma vs Texas.  Texas winning would be one step closer to no undefeated B12 team, which would help us.

SEC
Arkansas @ Ole Miss.  I don't think Ole Miss is a threat to make the playoffs.  Arkansas might be if they manage to beat Ole Miss, Auburn, and Alabama.  Alabama would still take a playoff spot and so would the SEC winner.  Best that Arkansas get another loss somewhere.  This would be as good a place as any.

Georgia at Auburn.  Probably too much to hope but an Auburn win would eliminate the threat of unbeaten Bama vs unbeaten UGA in the SEC championship with both automatically in the playoffs.  Makes me sick to say it but go Auburn.

LSU @ Kentucky.  If UCLA's win over LSU is to gain any credibility for the PAC and us, LSU needs to win some games like this.

Bama@aTm.  We can dream.

ACC/ND
ND@Va Tech.  The more losses ND has, the less impressive Cincy's win over them is.  Braxton is unbeaten in home games as the starter.  This is his chance to win one for the Ducks.
 

At this point with all of the injuries, Moorehead presumably out for a while, and the current play calling I'm more concerned with simply winning games versus what else is going on. 

Without some improvements the Ducks very well could lose again.

I'm hoping the ASU game will bring out the best in the Ducks like it did against the Buckeyes. I caught a little bit of last nights game and they looked really good. 

Ok, all the caveats.  We have to win out from here, we are failing the eye test, all that.  

But Iowa got busted up by Purdue today.  The Beavs gave Purdue a better game than that.  Iowa now surely has to win out to make the playoffs, so it increases the chance of the B1G only sending one team.  If we keep winning, even if we win ugly all the way, our chances look a lot better.

Georgia beating Kentucky helps, too.  That knocks UK out of contention -- if it had gone the other way, both UK and Georgia would have been in the playoff hunt.  There's now only one scenario that puts in two SEC teams, probably -- Bama wins out, UGA wins out until the SEC championship game and then loses to Bama. 

LSU beating Florida helped us a little.  And Fresno State, despite a subpar performance from Haener, shut out a pretty decent Wyoming team on the road, and kept themselves in the hunt for the MWC championship and a top 25 ranking.

All in all, not a bad day for us so far, if we decide to start playing like a Top Ten team again.  We still could use some chaos in the B12.

Not sure we got a lot of style points last weekend but as long as we keep putting games in the W column we're in the hunt for a playoff spot.  So unless/until we lose again, I'll keep following this stuff.  There's a lot of games this weekend that could have a bearing on our chances:

PAC
WSU @ ASU.  If we win out and ASU wins out until the P12 championship, they'll count as a quality win for us in the championship game.  Sorry Cougs.

Beavs @ Cal.  Cal won't count as a quality win for us no matter what.  Beavs might.  Go Beavs.

UCLA @ Utah.  It's probably in our interests for UCLA to win out and turn last week's win into a quality win.

B12
Texas at Baylor.  Baylor could be a threat to take a spot if they win out, especially if they got Ok St in the B12 championship and avenged their only loss.  It would be nice to see Texas knock them out of the picture.

Texas Tech @ Oklahoma.  Meh.  Oklahoma will undoubtedly trail in the second half and come back and win a close one against a mediocre team because that's who they are this year.  (Oklahoma fans would say the same about us, I suppose.) Would be nice if they tripped up for once.

B1G
Penn State @ Ohio State.  This is an interesting one.  You'd think Ohio State winning everything would help us and it would.  But if they lost this, and then won out, they'd still be B1G champions, but definitely behind us.  I'm not sure I want them to lose this, but it would be better than them losing to a Michigan school, I think.

Michigan @ Michigan State.  It's hard to know who to root for here.  It's in our interests for both of these teams to pick up at least 2 losses, and both have to play Ohio State and Penn State after this game.  

Iowa @ Wisconsin.  Iowa is still a threat to take a spot if they win out and, if they beat an undefeated Michigan or Michigan State in the B1G championship, both would probably take playoff spots.  It's in our interests for Iowa to lose this game.

SEC
Georgia vs Florida.  We can hope, stranger things have happened.  If Florida wins this it makes it very, very hard for two SEC teams to make the playoffs.

Ole Miss @ Auburn.  Could Ole Miss join the playoff discussion?  Yes.  If Alabama loses again (say, @Auburn) and Ole Miss wins the SEC West and beats an unbeaten Georgia, you'd have two SEC teams in, even without Alabama.  It would be healthy for Ole Miss to pick up another loss.

Kentucky @ Miss St.  Another loss for Kentucky, just to be safe, would be good.

Other:
SMU @ Houston and UNC @ Notre Dame.  I think Houston winning, and I know UNC winning, would weaken Cincy's resume.  SMU winning would move them up in the rankings and give Cincy a second top 20 opponent.  Of course, if UNC wins, that would be a big blow to Cincy's resume.

Fresno State @ SDSU.  Definitely in our interests for Fresno State to win this one.

oldretiredguy wrote:

Man, I'm glad you're keeping track of all this
 

LOL.  It changes nothing whether we root for these teams or not, of course.  I just find the "what-ifs" fun and interesting.

Every week I just look through that week's games and how they impact on the handful of contenders.

I agree, if we play well from here, win out, and win some style points along the way, it will be hard to keep us out.  But say if Oklahoma and Michigan stay undefeated, they would deserve to be ahead of us because their conferences are much tougher this year.  And if Alabama wins out and beats an undefeated Georgia in the SEC championship, they would both be ahead of us, too.  And Cincy's schedule is weak but it's hard to argue that the PAC is any better than the American this year.  It was a really bad year for the PAC to be so awful in non-conference games, it really does mean we need some help.

But every year there's a lot of chaos, and it's hard to believe this year will be any different.  If we win out, I'm pretty sure we'll be in the playoffs, probably as a 4 seed, and have to face a dominant UGA.  I don't think I like our offense against that defense, but our D could keep it close, and who knows what happens in any single game?  They barely beat a mediocre Clemson team, after all.

Ok, for those who care about other teams, it was a pretty good day for our chances.

1. Two one-loss SEC teams, Kentucky and Ole Miss, took their second loss.  The path for two SEC teams is getting very narrow:  A) Alabama wins out and beats an undefeated UGA in the SEC championship B) Auburn wins out and beats an undefeated UGA in the SEC championship.  In the latter case Auburn would have a pretty strong resume despite two losses.

2. Though there's mixed feelings on this one, Ohio State keeps making our headline win look better and better.

3. Fresno State made our second best win look better by going on the road to knock off undefeated SDSU.  They should be ranked this week, and hopefully the rest of the year.

4. Iowa lost.  That means there won't be a playoff team from the B1G West, and there might be a relatively weak opponent for the East champ in their championship game.

5. SMU lost to Houston.  That weakens Cincy's strength of schedule.

Unfortunately, almost every game in the PAC went in the wrong direction for us.  It's looking more and more likely that we won't have any PAC opponents ranked at the end of the year.  And we're likely to have to play Utah twice, rather than get ASU in the PAC title game.