ARLINGTON, TEXAS - DECEMBER 29: Khalid Kareem #53 of the Notre Dame Fighting Irish looks on from the bench during the College Football Playoff Semifinal Goodyear Cotton Bowl Classic at AT&T Stadium on December 29, 2018 in Arlington, Texas. (Photo by Tim Warner/Getty Images)

Notre Dame football fell two spots after the semifinal loss to Clemson.

The final AP Poll was released this morning and the Notre Dame football team finished No. 5.

Not that it really matters in the whole scheme of things, but that’s absolute garbage and a clear display of the pettiness of AP voters and media in general. The Notre Dame hate is real, people.

After watching Notre Dame’s defense hang with Clemson until injuries piled up, how can you watch Alabama get steamrolled by Clemson and think less of the Irish? Notre Dame lost by 27. Bama lost by 28 — and looked worse against the Tigers.

Furthermore, how can you slot Oklahoma — the team that lost to Alabama in the semifinal and finished the season with two losses — above Notre Dame? Who does that? Who thinks that?

Well, the great thing about the AP Poll is that you can easily go to the individual ballots to see how everyone voted. For the most part, every voter had Notre Dame somewhere between No. 2 and No. 6.

I’ll allow it and hear all arguments for those rankings.

But then there are the voters who clearly went into the voting process with an agenda and ignored what they saw with their own eyes last week and last night. These voters all had Notre Dame at either No. 8 or No. 9, which was ultimately what dropped the Irish behind a two-loss Oklahoma team who didn’t go any deeper than the Irish did. Those voters are as follows:

Garry Smits, The Florida Times-Union (No. 9)

Jerry DiPaola, Pittsburgh Tribune-Review (No. 8)

John Bednarowski, Marietta Daily Journal (No. 8)

Kirk Bohls, Austin American-Statesman (No. 9)

Michael Vega, The Boston Globe (No. 8)

You can click their names to find each of their Twitter pages.

Hey, if these guys can be haters, I can be a homer. Notre Dame hate and disrespect is real. There’s not much we can do about it. It’s how people are raised. Until the Irish run the table and win the whole thing, you’ll always have a crowd of people laughing and cheering at every setback — merited or not.