Danny Kanell posts new rankings and they're a slap in the face to Alabama

Former Florida State QB turned college football talking head Danny Kanell loves to ruffle the feathers of fans of SEC programs. He's spent years fighting against the perceived "SEC bias" and swings hard the other way to try and balance it out.

Kanell posts a weekly "ranking" on social media that means about as much as a screen door on a submarine. In his weekly ranking, Kanell has Alabama four spots lower than they are ranked in both the AP and Coaches Polls:

Kanell's reasoning is that both BYU and Georgia Tech are undefeated, ignoring that the Cougars are ranked 49th in ESPN's strength of schedule metric and the Yellow Jackets are 83rd.

He then has Alabama below fellow one-loss teams Oregon and Miami because, well, that's harder to discern other than the fact that Kanell is just a hater. It's as simple as that, really. Kanell cites the "quality of loss" in the replies to his tweet, but ignores the quality of wins. Alabama's loss is worse than both Oregon's and Miami's, but the Crimson Tide also has four wins over ranked opponents and has played the fourth toughest schedule in the country. The Ducks and Hurricanes rank 37th and 36th in strength of schedule, respectively.

Of course Kanell further soured on Alabama because of the Tide's close win over South Carolina over the weekend. That conveniently ignores the gauntlet that Alabama went through before traveling to Columbia, in which Kalen DeBoer's team defeated four straight ranked opponents. It also ignores that Oregon didn't exactly set the world on fire in a 21-7 home win over listless Wisconsin this weekend.

Kannel knows all that, of course. He does these things for attention, and it worked because he got some from us.

Alabama is ranked correctly in the rankings that actually matter

Alabama is the highest-ranked one-loss team in the polls that matter, the AP and Coaches, and is likely to be the highest-ranked one-loss team next week when the first College Football Playoff rankings are released.

That's how it should be. You can understandably keep undefeated Ohio State, Indiana, and Texas A&M ahead of the Crimson Tide, but there's no real argument for anyone else. All schedules are not made the same, and all records are not the same. BYU and Georgia Tech are undefeated, but neither would be undefeated against Alabama's schedule. Or Ohio State's or Indiana's or Texas A&M's.

Alabama has withstood a gauntlet of a schedule, winning seven consecutive games since the season-opening loss to Florida State. Those seven included four in a row against ranked SEC opponents.

It's been an impressive run, and one that deserves recognition. It's not much of a surprise that they aren't going to get that from Danny Kanell.