I'm pretty sure I posted these on facebook and twitter, but not on the blog. Which means I didnt have a chance to analyze them.
I'd like to go through a few of them that I have circled with the distinction being "extreme interest." That means, ones that I can already tell I am going to want to bet on. Im going to go through this chronologically, but there should be more early on in the season, and by the end of the season, none, for obvious reasons (shit changes).
Looking at all the early spreads, we can also figure out what Vegas thinks about a few teams, which is worth more than anything you'll ever hear on ESPN. Lets jump in the deep end here:
Week 1:
I like Georgia and LSU right away. As the article indicates, UGA is a team that is getting some sharp love early on. Phil Steele came out and proclaimed UGA to be the SEC East favorite, which may be surprising to some who had South Carolina pegged as the favorite. UGA had a pretty unlucky year last year with several close losses, all the while playing with a freshman QB (albeit a good one). But the team started 1-4 and finished 6-7. They have 12 starters back. And best of all, the game is in Atlanta.
Here's the thing. I like to try and figure out who the sharps are betting on, and follow them. Why? Because theyre the sharps. It would be like following what an insider trader is doing in the stock market. Or, conversely, think of it this way. You know the 60 year old guy you meet at the bar who has nothing better to do than to talk to you about football and pull out a computer printed sheet of his weekly NFL survivor pool that leaves the bar every 20 minutes to smoke a cigarette and by half time of the 4 PM EST NFL games is so drunk he is hitting on a waitress 1/3 his age? I try to do the opposite of that guy.
Also, I try to do the opposite of anything Bill Simmons does.
Picture Joe Public in Las Vegas in June and July. Joe Public goes to Vegas. Joe Public plays blackjack. Joe Public plays in a $180 Caesar's Hold Em tournament, and usually doesnt know when it is his turn or that his hand is shaking when he throws chips into the middle of the table. Joe Public may go to the sportsbook and bet on a 3 - 11 team MLB parlay, the team to eventually win the World Series, and the team to win the Super Bowl and BCS title.
THAT IS IT.
Joe Public does not go to Vegas to bet on Georgia in the first week of the season. They want to bet on their hometown team or a team they think has a good chance to win the title at 20+ - 1 odds to win the title in the hopes of "hitting it big." They dont bet on individual games the same way they would if they were visiting Las Vegas in October.
Therefore, when the line moves from Boise State -6 to Boise State -1.5, it is obvious that the sharps are the ones on Georgia. The eventual outcome of this is obvious too. In 4 weeks, when Joe Public starts to look at the Week 1 games in NCAA, they will first see that Boise is playing Georgia. They will seeBoise, who went 12-1 last year, "always wins an early game against a BCS team" (even though they lost to UGA by 100000 points in 2005), is always involved in the national title race, against an underachieving UGA team, with their coach on the hot seat, who lost to UCF last year, and insert any other illogical irrelevant argument here, and will bet HEAVILY on Boise. Therefore, as is always the case, Las Vegas wins. Just make sure you're on the side of the sharps.
To a lesser extent, I like LSU against Oregon in Week 1. If a game moves off a "key" number, such as 3, it is significant. *** The idea here is that some numbers are more important than others. You can guess that 3, 7, 10, 14, are all key numbers, while 4, 5, 12, are not. Simmons calls the non important numbers 'the vegas zone,' but no one else does. So if the game is on a key number such as Oregon -3, and it moves to Oregon -2, there must have been significant action to move it off a key number, despite it moving only one point.
Theres a very good chance that LSU was just as good as Oregon last year, despite them going "only" 11-2 and playing in the Cotton Bowl while Oregon was the runner up. Whats always important early on is returning starters, and LSU returns 15 while Oregon returns 11. LSU also has a better defense, which usually wins out early in the year. I feel like this could be a Joe PUblic game as well, as many will be quick to pick Oregon as "only" a 2 point favorite when they all realize that the Ducks played in the title game last year.
Miami -3.5 on the opening Monday seems like a big trap. Miami, with all its history, should be attractive to joe public as they play a team that replaces their coach and only lost to Miami by 6 in the Orange Bowl last year (covering the 8). What people will of course forget is that Miami themselves has a new Head Coach. This is the only game on Monday night too. Whenever that happens, there is even more action on a team, and all the more likely a trap occurs.
Week 2
The Mizzou ASU game will be interesting. Thats all I have to say. Every day I flip flop on my outlook on ASU. I dont think theyll be as great as everyone says they are going to be, but that doesnt mean they wont be good...(considering I was the only person who liked them last year).
Alabama -9 at Penn State may be the right number after all. I would have thought sharps would have bet this down to about 7.5, but they didnt. I still feel as if the public will be all over Alabama (who will be ranked 1 or 2), but it shows that there is still respect for Penn State and their home field. 9 is a ton of points too.
MSU +1 @ Auburn. MSU played AUburn as close as anyone last year (I took MSU and followed the game on my phone in class on a Thursday night. I lost the bet, but got an A in the class, go figure). I talked about MSU on this blog earlier. They are interesting because they return 16 starters from a 9 win team. Any other world this would be enough to rank the team in the top 10 in every preseason poll (for close examples: FSU returns 16 from a 10 win team in an easier conference, and A&M returns 18 from a 9 win team in a worse conference. Each of those teams is getting much more love than MSU). But, Miss State plays in the SEC west. Their schedule features no less than 5 swing games.
None of this should affect them being better than Auburn, however. Auburn figures to be poor this year. Why? Because their over under is set at 6. BEcause of movement in this game. Because of movement in the UGA game. Because of the movement in the Clemson game. BEcause of the movement against So Carolina Because they return SIX starters.
But, does the public know this? Sure they know Auburn is down, but "they wont lose to Miss State." Not so fast. Basically everyone in Las Vegas is betting against Auburn this year. They figure to still receive financial backing from Joe Public, as they DID win the title last yera.
Air Force +1.5 TCU. This is my favorite game on the board. First the line movement of 5 points. Re-read all the stuff I wrote about how public wouldnt bet on a UGA Boise game. Now, imagine them betting on TCU Air Force..... Who bet that line down? Thats right, the sharps.
Air Force is considered one of the most underrated teams this year. They return 14 starters while TCU only returns 8. BUt of course, Mr. Public will rememeber that TCU won something called the Rose Bowl last year.
I think the fact that ND went from +2 to -3 is a misprint. Otherwise that doesnt bode well for the Irish. Michigan figures to be improved this year as well. They are at home and have won 2 straight years. If it moved 5 points, across the zero-line, and now features Michigan as an underdog at home against a rival, then I am sorry, but I have to lean Michigan.
The OU -3.5 FSU week 3 sounds about right. ND -6 against MSU seems a little high, as nine of the last eleven have been decided by single digits, and the home team is just 3-7 in last 10.
Going beyond this would be dumb, as so many things will change. Notably, public perception. BUt I can point out a few things here.
- How are TCU, AM, AF related? AF is basically even against TCU. SMU is +17 early against A&M, and SMU is +12 against TCU. So A&M is a bit better than TCU. But is TCU bad, and that is why they're only a bit better than AF? Or is AF that good? In other words, are these teams are ranked in the teens and twenties? Or is AM's early ranking in the top 10 valid, and AF is legit a top 15 team? The fact that AM is a big -6 against Okie State tells me that maybe AF is for real.
- Stanford is going to be a disappointment. They are only +1 at home vs Oregon (while LSU is +2 at a neutral). Their line moved down at home against ND. Theyre only -2 at USC. All of these lines are oddly low. While they were playing as well as anyone LAST YEAR, they only return 11 starters, and only 1 offensive lineman.
I know I wrote this disjointed. If you were a media analyst, you would say that the disjointed writing reflects the euphoria and excitement one has when first viewing betting lines for a week. Your pupils move up and down the board, looking at yellow and green lights in an attempt to decipher hundreds of numbers in 5 minutes. Somehow, someway, you memorize every line in 5 minutes, after looking at each thing once. If you said that's why my blog was written so poorly, I would agree.
What else do you see from the early lines that jumps out at you?
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