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Fansided

Iowa football: ESPN swings and misses in college football player rankings

By Andrew Wade

MINNEAPOLIS, MN - OCTOBER 06: A.J. Epenesa #94 of the Iowa Hawkeyes tackles Mohamed Ibrahim #24 of the Minnesota Golden Gophers during the first quarter of the game on October 6, 2018 at TCF Bank Stadium in Minneapolis, Minnesota. (Photo by Hannah Foslien/Getty Images)
MINNEAPOLIS, MN - OCTOBER 06: A.J. Epenesa #94 of the Iowa Hawkeyes tackles Mohamed Ibrahim #24 of the Minnesota Golden Gophers during the first quarter of the game on October 6, 2018 at TCF Bank Stadium in Minneapolis, Minnesota. (Photo by Hannah Foslien/Getty Images) /
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ESPN released their top-50 college football players list, but they drastically underrated the play of Iowa football player AJ Epenesa in ranking him 41st.

Just a few weeks away from the start of the college football season and more importantly, the start of the Iowa football season, ESPN released their top-50 college football players list. Theoretically, we could give them a good job, nice try, but this list doesn’t even warrant a participation trophy.

The reason being is they left one of the best players in college football out of not just the top-10 but the top-40 players.

After scanning through the list to find where Iowa football player AJ Epenesa was ranked, I quickly scrolled back up to see if I missed something about these rankings that would explain why Epenesa was so low. Maybe it was an award that was based partially off previous production (which even then wouldn’t explain it but at least you could possibly argue the lack of starts).

Turns out, I have no idea what they were thinking because their criteria doesn’t quite match the results given. Here’s a key quote from the article that should basically give them a basis for ranking AJ Epenesa high on this list.

"Keep in mind that this is a projection of what players will do in 2019 and not necessarily a career achievement award of what they’ve done to this point."

Non-Iowa football fans might be poking fun saying I’m a homer here, but Epenesa is widely regarded as a top-10 NFL Draft prospect in next year’s draft by nearly every media outlet.

If we’re talking about production, after notching 10.5 sacks as a part-time player, Epenesa could make a serious run at the Iowa football team’s sack record.

And what really upsets me about this list is these players being ranked ahead of Epenesa (these are just a few of the many that I think Epenesa should be ranked ahead of):

  • Jalen Hurts – He might be solid at Oklahoma because Lincoln Riley is an offensive genius, but this guy is a running back playing quarterback.
  • Derrick Brown – No offense to the Auburn Defensive Tackle, but he had 25 total tackles last season.
  • Jaylen Waddle – He’s not even the best wide receiver on his own team.
  • Shea Patterson – Folks want to get on Nate Stanley’s case, but Patterson came into college with a lot more hype and has less production to show for it.

Although this list means nothing in the grand scheme of things, I would expect better from the “experts” on their analysis.

Next. Hawks down two running backs in 2019. dark

To put AJ Epenesa at 41st is criminal.