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#3DownNation
Ok changed my mind as I so often do.
1* TOR / HAM over 47.5 -110
There's a reason this total is high for a preseason game. As I've mentioned earlier both these teams have solid offences with questionable defences coming into the season. Looking at the depth charts, I see a lot of offensive starters and a lot of defensive newcomers as both teams need to find pieces to fill the holes on that side of the ball.
On the Argos side, Kelly is out for a bit yet but they will start Grey Cup MOP Nick Arbuckle who is very capable and will be throwing to a bevy of starting receivers. He will give way to Cameron Dukes who, while not setting the world on fire in his 9 starts LY, at least has experience and an ability to scramble and improvise and is trying to bone up his downfield passing attack in order to find a career as a qb here. Rookie Tucker Horn out of some Div III school I've never heard of will be on mop up duty.
For the Ti-cats, Mitchell will get the start, followed by promising 3rd year qb (and semcon favourite) Taylor Powell. They will be butressed by the full strating lineup on offence including a stacked and very deep receiving corps. Having Kenny Lawler, TIm White, Shamar Bridges, Kiondre Smith & Drew Wolitarsky on the field at the same time is going to give opposing defenses fits. They have 3rd string receivers who could be starting for other teams. Looking back on the Ti-cats past 3 preseason openers, they have gone over this number all 3 times (53, 49, 48) as Scott Milanovich likes to open the taps a bit in this spot. Last year he had Mitchell and Powell throw a combined 30 pass attempts in the preseason opener (also at home) and I tend to think that happens again here. The clincher for me was Milanovich himself stating this week that he'd like to put some more emphasis on playing aggressive football in the preseason in order to be ready for when the games count. The cats have had slow starts for the past few seasons and he seems to be looking to change that. He furthermore stated that his offensive starting lineup is mostly set so the emphasis will be on the offence developing chemistry rather than finding new faces to plug holes and that he planned to give his starters "more playing time than normal" in order to do that. He knows that this defence will be a work in progress and if the team is to start the season strong, it will be by scoring enough to keep them in games until the defence comes around.
Its pretty rare for me to take a preseason over but I think this spot and those comments warrant it. I also leaned to Hamilton -120 but I think the over is a slightly better play.
1* TOR / HAM over 47.5 -110
There's a reason this total is high for a preseason game. As I've mentioned earlier both these teams have solid offences with questionable defences coming into the season. Looking at the depth charts, I see a lot of offensive starters and a lot of defensive newcomers as both teams need to find pieces to fill the holes on that side of the ball.
On the Argos side, Kelly is out for a bit yet but they will start Grey Cup MOP Nick Arbuckle who is very capable and will be throwing to a bevy of starting receivers. He will give way to Cameron Dukes who, while not setting the world on fire in his 9 starts LY, at least has experience and an ability to scramble and improvise and is trying to bone up his downfield passing attack in order to find a career as a qb here. Rookie Tucker Horn out of some Div III school I've never heard of will be on mop up duty.
For the Ti-cats, Mitchell will get the start, followed by promising 3rd year qb (and semcon favourite) Taylor Powell. They will be butressed by the full strating lineup on offence including a stacked and very deep receiving corps. Having Kenny Lawler, TIm White, Shamar Bridges, Kiondre Smith & Drew Wolitarsky on the field at the same time is going to give opposing defenses fits. They have 3rd string receivers who could be starting for other teams. Looking back on the Ti-cats past 3 preseason openers, they have gone over this number all 3 times (53, 49, 48) as Scott Milanovich likes to open the taps a bit in this spot. Last year he had Mitchell and Powell throw a combined 30 pass attempts in the preseason opener (also at home) and I tend to think that happens again here. The clincher for me was Milanovich himself stating this week that he'd like to put some more emphasis on playing aggressive football in the preseason in order to be ready for when the games count. The cats have had slow starts for the past few seasons and he seems to be looking to change that. He furthermore stated that his offensive starting lineup is mostly set so the emphasis will be on the offence developing chemistry rather than finding new faces to plug holes and that he planned to give his starters "more playing time than normal" in order to do that. He knows that this defence will be a work in progress and if the team is to start the season strong, it will be by scoring enough to keep them in games until the defence comes around.
Its pretty rare for me to take a preseason over but I think this spot and those comments warrant it. I also leaned to Hamilton -120 but I think the over is a slightly better play.
