As a person who posts college football and other plays on the regular. One of the emotionally tough things to do on a Sunday morning is face the music when you have had a terrible day, be honest with yourself, update your record and move forward. Not only have you lost a bunch of money, but you have done it in a manner that everyone can see and it is a major blow to the ego. With that said, here I am. I will discuss some of the losses now .. discussing them all would take a very long time (but it looks like i did it). By my count 10-16 for the week. ouch.
Wyoming -3 -- Already discussed this loss but basically they were dominated. had a chance to cover late due to two defensive scores but they were outgained by somewhere in the 200 yard area. Grade F
Oklahoma State - 30 first downs to Baylor's 20 and were only outgained by 30 yards or so. This bet had a very key play mid to late fourth quarter. Trailing 28-24, with first and ten on the baylor 14, Justice Hill ran it up the middle for 13 yards to the baylor 1 when he fumbled and baylor recovered. It's ok though because baylor has to go 99 yards to cover. The bears do by converting a third and goal from the 15 where the Cowboys inexplicably gave up the goal line while trying to defend the underneath stuff. i don't get it. Then with 13 seconds left okstate spikes the ball at the baylor 15. Whew. Send in the kicker. Wait .. he isn't sending in the kicker. what is he doing? He is running another play for no reason. The qb gets sacked and time runs out. I will give this one a solid B. I could handle the fumble at the 1 and the 99 yard td drive a lot better than a coach not understanding math. Let me explain it to him .. if you score the td on the next play you STILL have to get the onside and throw a hail mary. Anyway, having watched the game and looking over the boxscore I feel a B is the grade here.
Florida 7 and Under - This was a disappointing handicap. Yardage was 498 to 402. So from an under perspective it was a bad play in that respect in my view. There were also plenty of points left on the field, mostly by Tennessee. The hard part of this to me was that the halftime score was 21-3 and I have one of the best defenses in the country (allegedly). There didn't seem to be enough time to lose the plus 7 even if the wheels fell off the wagon. Well, the wheels fell off the wagon, the gators scored a TD in the second half and still didn't cover as they gave up 35 second half pts. I have mixed emotions here ... on the one hand the yardage differential doesn't dictate this was a bad play, the halftime score makes losing this bet borderline bad beat but on the other hand, I would lay 6.5 next week with the vols if they were to play again. They are better than Florida. I will go Cminus on the side and Dminus on the total.
Indiana -7 and under and Indiana -4.5 2h - Total .. combined for 963 yards so the total was a bad play at mid to high forties. Indiana had a 611 to 352 yardage advantage over wake forest but managed to lose straight up anyway. I actually got lucky with Indiana to even cover the 2h spread as they needed a late td where qb threw it up for grabs to do that. When my dogs get outgained like this you see 57-6 type of scores. My favorite cannot even cover a td. Frustrating but at the same time, the over the total was a bad play and the indiana 2h was an undeserving winner in some respects so it wasn't all bad luck. 0 road turnovers for wake forest. 5 home turnovers for indiana. That will sink the ship every time. Total Grade F, Side Grade Aminus, 2h Side Grade C
mtsu -5.5 - Grade F. They didn't deserve to win let alone cover in this game, which they didn't. Outgained 622 to 553. Goal line stand at the end of the game to win. Team is just starting to slow this year. First halves are really hurting them. Down 20-7 at halftime they stormed back for the undeserved straight up win. Latech threw it 59 times. Of note for totals going forward. Grade F
ECU and Over Grade C for side, C for total - ECU did it again. They kept driving the field and failing to score. It was incredible. Anyway VT had 2 more first downs and 18 more yards of offense than ECU but somehow won 54-17. Again ... I want you to thank about the Indiana yardage differential and that final score. Ugh. frustrating. With that said, VT was in control of this game very early and that does play into some of the yardage stats. Also, at some point you have to wonder if the ECU red zone issues are not just coincidental .. it is three weeks of it already. Only roughly 900 yards or so, so I gave the total a C. It was a no sweat somehow but not sure it was as correct a play as the final score shows.
Bowling Green - I think I began posting here in 2006 or thereabouts. I don't think I have ever had a score quite like this. Taking Bowling Green on the road plus 17 to Memphis was basically a bet saying "BGSU, prove to me that you are this horrible". Unfortunately BGSU took the challenge to heart. 635 to 294 yardage advantage and quite frankly, Memphis coasted the fourth qtr or it would have been worse. Again look at the Indiana yardage differential against Wake forest .... fairly similar but they lost outright .. here it was .. wait for it .. 77 to 3. Obviously this was an F grade but we did learn something about BGSU even if not Memphis.
LSU -3 - Grade F - Auburn was the better football team all night. Outgained LSU by 50 yards or so. There was never a moment after the first quarter where I felt LSU was going to win and cover in this game. 14 first downs. I did chuckle when they hoisted the WR on their shoulders after the loss, thinking it was a win.
usc utah under - Already discussed. Grade F. I over rated both defenses by quite a bit, particularly Utah's.
App st akron under - I developed some concerns with this play late in the week. I felt after watching the hurricanes attack through the air against app st and after watching the akron attack vs Marshall that there was an outside chance that Akron could throw the ball with success in this game, particularly given the spot. And if Akron could do that with success, App St would be forced to answer with scores and the total would be in jeopardy. Unfortunately that is what happened here as the zips threw for 363. Over 1000 yards in the game so suffice it to say this was a bad play. Grade F
Charlotte -This was a push but wanted to throw it in here to show you one of the most deceiving finals of a weekend that had a lot of them (at least double the deceiving score tally of any other week this year). Temple had 1 more first down than Charlotte. Temple had just 78 more yards than Charlotte. Charlotte scored the covering TD middle of the fourth quarter and proceeded to miss the extra point. That was the difference between winning and pushing for me. i believe at least one of my friends had 28.5 but I think several had 27.5, for which that really stung. Anyway, this was obviously a good play that I would make again. Had the over too which cashed relatively easily with 936 yards in the game. side Grade A Total Grade Bplus. This was just one of the many odd games and the missed extra point was the beginning of a three hour stretch where everything imaginable went wrong for me. I didn't know it at the time but the 3:30 eastern start times were a nightmare like I have rarely experienced. Anyway, on a day of horrible capping, I had this one correct.
ga southern wmich under - This game was aggravating. There was 777 yards in the game. That's it. There were 80 points. Sorry, that is just silly. And what made it more silly was how the points were being generated. Ga Southern was passing a lot more than usual. I realize this is a relatively meaningless out of conference game but it really hurt the total. My thinking heading into the game was that Ga Southern would struggle with their bread and butter rushing game. They did. Wmich held them to 202 yards rushing, which had i known prior to the start of the game, I would have doubled my wager. Moreover, Gasouthern held Wmich to 137 on the ground. The problem was that Ga Southern hit a few long TD passes, had an interception returned for a TD, had a kickoff returned for a TD and a fumble deep in their own end. Just 41 first downs too. Three scoring plays on Gasouthern pass attempts. i cannot cap that for this game. Strange game ... going back and forth between giving it a B or a C so I will go with Cplus... just a strange game and probably the game I found most frustrating for a first half (I knew the total was toast by halftime so didn't follow most of the 2h).
ull tulane under - tied at 16 at end of regulation so had two tds to spare heading into overtime vs the number. defenses were tired by that point and it went td td ... game had 688 TOTAL yards which will be one of, if not the lowest yardage outputs of the day yesterday. There were 164 yards in the overtime periods. I am no mathematician but I think that means there were 524 TOTAL yards in the regulation game. Pretty sure this was my best bet of the weekend and I still managed to lose. I would also throw this in as a very deceiving score for those who track such things. Grade Aplus
FSU USF under - I lost track of the game when half a minute in there were 14 pts already. I just keep falling for the FSU defense is good trap. They aren't, at least without their best defender. 1,100 yards and never had a chance. I will say that FSU defense did settle in as the game went along but this was not a good investment and I am positive it was negative EV. Grade F
Notre Dame 2h - I admit this was a bad decision based on the flow of play in the game. Let me explain what I mean by that. In the flow of the Indiana vs Wake forest game (my other posted halftime, and you didn't want my unposted yesterday), every indication at halftime was that Indiana was dominating the game. They trailed and so between dominating and trailing, the expectation is pretty good they will make a game of it. As that one turned out, Indiana backers had to get fortunate at the end to win that but the bet was good. With Notre Dame, the first half was one where the flow of the game showed Duke and Notre Dame basically playing as equals (if not Duke playing slightly better than the irish). But down 7 at the half and a 10.5 line meant that in most scenarios, I have a ND ml ticket. There are the chances it lands 3 or Duke goes for two after they get within 1 late in the game but most times, my fate resides with whether ND wins the game straight up. I considered a loss to Duke in this game as one of the worst in the storied history of the ND program so I thought a light switch would be turned on and it simply wasn't. It wasn't because ND's DL got dominated at the line of scrimmage and their secondary cannot cover .. and then they cannot tackle after the guy catches it. This was a bad bet. Grade F. Grats to Duke btw. They played with great heart, were the better team and deserved to win.
There. I think I faced the music on all of my posted losses. I also had a rather large investment on Tulsa at a really good number which lost and lost another 1.2 units or so on halftimes that I just didn't have time to post. So it was one of the worst days of cfb that I have had since I started posting here.
Some other quick comments regarding getting fortunate since when I post the unfortunate losses within the grouping above it makes it seem like all the fortune is bad when it isn't....
NW Neb - This game should have flown over the total and I would consider the total points outcome a deceiving final score (as well as the neb vs nw part as nebraska could do whatever they wanted). Neb fumbled twice at the goal line, NW kicker was awful, the under had officiating help (to the point I noticed with an under ticket and even predicted to a friend that a flag would come in to protect the total late .. .. i think within a play or two). Anyway, just wanted to mention this was a fortunate win.
Ball State was a coin flip and they covered for their backers. That was a fortunate win.
So it does go both ways a little.
Apologies to anyone who might have tailed. I didn't do a very good job of handicapping this past week as it turns out.
