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Baylor 2nd in Big 12 Preseason Media Poll

The Bears received 9 first-place votes to finish second in the poll for the first time in program history. Oklahoma received 47 to take the top spot.

By Mark C. Moore
Jerome Miron-USA TODAY Sports

Baylor fans are currently celebrating on the one hand, scorning on the other, the results from this year's preseason Big 12 media poll, which put the Bears second in the league behind Oklahoma.  The full results below.

I can't say that I expected Oklahoma to get >5x our number of first place votes, but for the most part, this is about what I expected.  Oklahoma and Baylor are clearly the class of the league based on what we know right now, with Kansas State, led by the Dark Wizard, following behind as a dark horse of sorts.  I will say that I think #4 for Texas is just too high unless you believe they've already solved the biggest possible problem a team can have: not having any idea who its QB will probably be.  I'd probably put Texas Tech in that spot rather than Texas.  Those that have followed the blog regularly know that I prefer a tier system in this sort of situation, and if I had to rank the teams thusly, Texas wouldn't be on the second tier.  Let's go ahead and do that:

Tier 1: Oklahoma, Baylor
Tier 2: Kansas State
Tier 3: Oklahoma State, Texas Tech, TCU, Texas
Tier 4: West Virginia, Iowa State
Tier 5: Kansas

I could probably be talked out of most of that with enough time.  Really, I like Kansas State more than any of the teams below them, just not as much as OU or Baylor.  I have a tremendous amount of confidence in Oklahoma State's coaching staff to fill their holes, but they have a ton of them.  Texas Tech's season will depend on Davis Webb's maturation and how their defense plays, since it's all on the QB in the Air Raid system.  TCU will be implementing a new offense with a new QB regardless who it is, and Texas will be doing the same on offense and defense while also trying to figure out who their QB will be.  The last three could either be lumped together or separated without too many people getting pissed off, I think.

It should probably be noted that a team finishing first in this poll hasn't won the conference in quite a while.

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