A few takeaways from the committee decisions:
1. It seems pretty clear they did not want to punish any team for playing and losing in a championship game. Each of the teams that lost either barely dropped (VA, Cincinnati, Wisconsin, and Georgia) or stayed ahead of significant teams that are unequivocally better than them (Utah).
2. Their logic for Bama being fifth in the SEC pecking order is pretty clear. LSU clearly was SEC 1. Georgia was East champ and beat Florida and Auburn. Florida beat Auburn and lastly Auburn beat Bama. Furthering their argument for dropping Bama is that Bama didn't beat any currently ranked teams. I don't think the score lines/situations of the games mattered much to them.
My thoughts
1. Utah and Wisconsin should have both dropped behind Alabama and Auburn. Georgia/Florida dropping beneath Bama/Auburn is tough to justify beyond the "eye" test. If that is all that is used Bama is most likely a top 5 team.
2. Penn State wins over Iowa and Michigan are better wins than Bama has (at least according to the rankings) and their loss to Minnesota is worse than Bama and Auburn's losses. Still would be tough to slot them below Bama based on results.
3. Oregon is tough to place rankings wise because of their loss to Auburn, but in the end they are irrelevant to Bama since they were locked into Rose Bowl anyways.
In the end I think while Bama has a legitimate claim to being in the top 10 or 11 at the worst. I also think playing Michigan in the Citrus is far better than possibly playing Memphis in the Cotton, Baylor in the Sugar, or Virginia in the Orange bowl. Basically once NY6 went out the door, Bama ended up in the best possible situation and arguably better than NY6 would have been.