On every right-hand team page in the magazine, I list that teams’ current home power ratings. These home ratings go from a low of two points to a high of six points. I have nine sets of power ratings, and this is the adjustment I give to the home team. As I have mentioned in previous blogs the home teams in the FBS win about 64% of their games.
Most of my home field edges are based on performance on the field at home. I also have to factor in what type of environment each team plays in front of. There are three different factors that I put into my computer equation. The first would be size of the stadium that a team plays in. The Big House in Michigan seats 107,601 which can be pretty intimidating for players used to playing in smaller stadiums. The smallest home field belonged to Hawaii last year with a capacity of 9,500 but that will expand to 23,000 this year.
The second factor and a little more important is actual attendance. Now, we have all seen games on TV or been to games where the announced attendance seems way off as they could have gone by tickets sold rather than actual people in the seats. Last year five teams played in front of an average attendance of 100,000 or more and the top 3 were all in the Big Ten with Michigan, Penn State and Ohio State. The next three on the list LSU, Tennessee and Texas. At the bottom of the list was FIU with an announced average attendance of 6,895. Naturally all the teams at the bottom of the list are Group of Five Schools The lowest rated Power 5 team was Duke at 24,506.
The final category that I look at concerning attendance is percentage of capacity. Before I started my College Football magazine, I actually used to follow other sports than football! I would go to a Cleveland Indians game in Cleveland Stadium. I was there the night they filmed the scenes for Major League and the 80,000 seat stadium was almost full as it was a Marathon Oil giveaway night where you got free tickets with every fill up. I also went to the old Cleveland Stadium when there was an announced crowd of 8,000 but you could count by hand the roughly 1,000 people on hand in the cavernous stadium. A large full stadium is a huge plus but when a stadium is over half empty it does not generate anywhere near the home field edge.
Fourteen teams this past year played in front of average crowds that met or exceeded capacity and they were Appalachian St, TCU, Oregon St, Michigan, Hawaii, Kansas St, Old Dominion, Oregon, Utah, Penn State, Baylor, Texas, Georgia and Iowa. Temple playing in the Philadelphia Eagles Lincoln Financial Field had just 25.6% capacity.
Here are the attendance numbers for each team and I have ranked them by actual attendance.
Remember you can get 4 months of Phil Steele Plus FREE ($80 value) when you sign up for my VIP bundle. You get the magazine before it hits the bookstores, the digital magazine for FREE, 4 weeks of my Inside the Pressbox newsletter for FREE, and my FCS magazine for FREE as well. Over $200 for just $34 right now. CLICK HERE FOR DETAILS. VIP members get the magazine before anyone else, and they are mailed on the FIFO basis so the first to sign up for the offer get the magazine shipped first. We are still on DAY ONE shipments if you sign up right now. CLICK HERE TO ORDER. If you wait, you may get day TWO or day 3 and in future months the price will go up and the bonus offers will decrease so the deal is the best right now.
If you want to know my final home field edge ratings you will have to pick up a 2023 magazine or remind me on Twitter @philsteele042 and I will put up a blog in late July/early August after the magazine has been out for over a month.
