Curious why the team that won the conference in '19 with a freshman QB who perhaps will continue to develop, is not the team to beat in the east? Did they lose all their skill players on offense?
They lost little on Offense, but they lost a fair amount on Defense. Certainly they will be in the running for this year. If you look at a couple of sources, while they won the MACC, they were not the best team in the MAC.
https://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/28497018... Connelly's final SP+ for last year has the best teams in the MAC as:
Ohio +3.7
Buffalo -2.4
CMU -4.4
Ball State -4.5
WMU -4.9
EMU -8.6
Miami -9.2
https://www.usatoday.com/sports/ncaaf/sagarin/2019/confer... /
Sagarin has it (using his Predictor ratings):
Buffalo 65.79
Ohio 65.60
WMU 65.48
Ball State 61.37
Miami 60.79
https://www.masseyratings.com/ranks?s=cf From Massey we have some composite ratings:
Buffalo 61
Miami, OH 74
Ohio 77
WMU 79
Kent 82
CMU 88
So, pick your poison. None have Miami as the top team. I tend to look more at numbers from Bill Connelly, and from PFF. Here's PFF's ratings of college quarterbacks last year.
https://www.pff.com/news/college-pff-rankings-starting-qu... Gabbert comes in at #100, middle of the MAC. Of course, a lot of QBs make their biggest improvement from their first year to their second. We shall see how it goes.
Also, from PFF, the Offensive line grades: Miami at 88, Ohio way down at 39
https://www.pff.com/news/college-football-ranking-all-130... If you look at the stats from last year, Miami's offense sucked:
https://getsomemaction.com/stats.aspx?path=football&year=... Meanwhile, Ohio's offense was the best in the MAC, but their defense let them down at critical times, and cost several games (Marshall, NIU, WMU). Ohio's defense mostly returns, all but Hagan, Popp, and Cole Baker. If they can use their experience to dominate, Ohio will be very good, but if not, it could be a long season.