Week 6 Musings

Not a bad week last week, going 8-5 to bring the season total back above .500 (35-33-2....51.4%). Still not covering the juice, but I'll take it at this point. Among the 5 losses were a couple of head scratchers(Tulane and VT come to mind quickly) but those things happen. 8-2 on the also rans as well, so if you threw a couple bucks on some of those games, chances are you did ok. A couple highlights from last week: 1. Illinois wins but fails to cover. This was a best of both worlds scenario. Obviously, I was rooting fo the Illini, but I also held a NW +10 ticket, so it was nice to see an exciting 3 point win. 2. The SMU +13 @TCU bet was one of my favorites in a long time, so I was obviously glad that one came in. This one was a HEAVY public favorite. I love winning while knowing at the same time that a bunch of degenerates are burning their tickets in anger. By the way, speaking of temper tantrums, I might be brewing up a little hatred for a previously nondescript(to me) guy. TCU coach Gary Patterson, a guy who's been having his knob slobbed uncontrollably for the past several years by a panting national college football media, has decided that he is NOT happy about how that loss to SMU went down. He's bitching about refs, he's mad at June Jones, and he's mad at SMU in general. TCU has now lost 2 games this year, which is more than they lost in the past two years combined, and Gary Patterson will have you know that it is certainly not his fault, and he sees no reason for the knob slobbing to stop. Here's a link to the story, he comes off as a total dickface: http://espn.go.com/dallas/ncf/story/_/id/7064059/smu-mustangs-coach-june-jones-tcu-horned-frogs-coach-gary-patterson-misconstrued-compliment

This is a little late, but I feel I should say this in the wake of all the terrible uniforms we've been subjected to in recent years and months, and also here in October where everything in the world is pink. (Ed note; I understand the importance of breast cancer awareness, but do the leaders of that movement have dirty pictures of every CEO, sports commissioner or power broker in the country?? I'm waiting for the flag's colors to change from red white and blue to pink, pink and pink.) Having said that, I have to say that there are some nice developments in on the uniform front. 1. I am a fan of white helmets. This year, I have seen a bunch of teams going to white helmets, if not all the time, at least some of the time. Indiana used one, Kentucky has used one(a great departure back to the Tim Couch/Hefty Lefty days) and most recently, Cal had one tonight, which I thought looked pretty good.
2. The previous worst uniforms in the NFL, the Buffalo Bills 3 tone blue jerseys with dark blue pants have been shitcanned and replaced with the vintage unis from the Joe Ferguson era: White helmets with the Blue Buffalo. Not the red docile Buffalo, but the charging one. HUGE improvement. Kudos to the Bills.

Last thing: One shocking development of this year is that Home Run Hire Turner Gill has not yet completed his domination of the Big 12 at Kansas. I'm sure it's only a matter of time, since he IS the original no brainer Home Run Hire. It appears that the major problem for Kansas this year has been their defense. They've had a bit of a slow start..they rank 120th in total defense, rush defense and pass defense depending on the category. Just a blip on the radar screen I'm sure. My guess is they'll get it figured out, and we'll see major improvement. How can they not? Home Run Hire is there. I guess we'll have to wait and see. Their remaining schedule is as follows: @Oklahoma St, Oklahoma, Kansas St, @Texas, @Iowa St, Baylor, Texas A&M, and Missouri. I'm sure they'll improve against that bunch.

On to this week:


1. Texas +10.5 v Oklahoma: The prevailing wisdom here is that Texas is too young in the skill positions to avoid turnovers and as a result, the Horns have little chance in this game. Well, if they turn the ball over a ton, that will be true. However, if I look at a game and conclude that I have the better team and I'm getting 10.5 points, I'm jumping on it. Oklahoma has been good, no doubt about that. They scored about 9 TDs in 37 seconds against poor Ball State last week, and they look darn impressive at times. But I still don't see how you can justify making them a DD favorite in this game. Texas has settled back in as an elite defense..actually, numbers wise they didn't really drop off last year, everything just collapsed around them. Oklahoma has struggled to run the ball against good defenses with their walk on running back, and I think that will continue this week. Texas is also ranked 5th against the pass, although they haven't faced any world beaters. On the flip side, Oklahoma has only the 46th ranked defense in the country in yards per play, while Texas has settled in well since they politely told Garrett Gilbert to get lost. New OC Bryan Harsin, previously Boise's OC, has had a very positive effect on the team. Oklahoma has given up some yards..this is not a dominating defense in my opinion. Missouri gashed them for 500+ yards and had 2 guys go for 100+ on the ground, so I'm sure Harsin will figure out a way to exploit them, just like he did for Boise in the famous Statue of Liberty game back in the '05 Fiesta Bowl when he was the OC there. This game is a complete tossup and I'd not be surprised if Texas wins outright as long as Case Mc Coy doesn't shit the bed. I wouldn't expect that, given his pedigree. Obviously, I feel getting 10.5 is a major bargain.

2. Bowling Green +10 @Western Michigan: Not a fan of these MAC games, but I see value in this one. Both of these offenses have been very successful, especially with their passing games. Bowling Green is 28th in passer rating, WMU is 32nd. Both have not been pushovers in pass defense either. BG is actually ranked 16th against the pass nationally, but that number is skewed by their game with Morgan St in which they only gave up 39 yards on 28 pass attempts(!!!). They've also played against West Virginia, Idaho , Wyoming and Miami(OH) though, all of which have competent passing games. The difference between these two teams, however is the running game. WMU can't run to save their lives..they hardly even try. They also can't stop the run, ranking 109th nationally in ypc against. BG has had one of their backs top 100 yards in every game but 1 this year, even in their demolition by West Virginia in the rain last week. The result of that game plus WMU's nice performance so far this year against BCS squads has made this line as big as it is, but I think these two teams are evenly matched, and that's being nice to WMU given their running game deficiencies. Also remember that BG has handled both Idaho and Miami(OH) on the road this year. I'll take the 10.

3. @LSU -13 v Florida: Having watched Florida in the second half against Alabama, it's pretty clear to me that they are not at the level of the elites in the SEC. Will Muschamp is going to run around and deliver some vein popping screams here and there, but for the time being, it doesn't look like they are going to have much success moving the ball. One way or another, Florida is going to have a Freshman QB at the helm this weekend, and that does not bode well against this defense. LSU's defensive line has 4 playmakers on it and they are almost as fast as those little scatbacks Florida has running around back there. I thoroughly expect LSU to score at least once on defense, and Tyrann Matthieu, nicknamed "The Honey Badger" will probably score on either defense or special teams as well. The call him The Honey Badger because he's as tenacious as this guy: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ua3M1O-WQrM.
Offensively, I think LSU is getting better, as they have uncovered a couple of playmakers at WR, and they have a bunch of tough runners behind an elite offensive line. It's a day game, luckily for Florida, but it's national TV and the place will be looking for blood. They'll be jacked up for Florida like they always are, except this time, Florida won't be anywhere near the offensive threat one would expect. LSU will be looking to make a statement. Hopefully, Less doesn't have too much of an effect.

4. Southern Miss +2 @Navy: Navy isn't a good favorite, and they aren't an especially good home team either. I love Navy, but they are best suited for an underdog role. In this instance, Southern Miss has been very good against the run, ranked 10th nationally in ypc. That doesn't necessarily mean that Navy won't be able to have some success, because they probably will, but we won't see Navy being able to just pound the fullback on them. On the other hand, Navy's defense has not been good this year, having been gashed on the ground and they are always very shaky against the pass. Under Fedora, USM has always had good balance, so Navy will not be able to key on any one area. USM has the clear edge in almost every category when these teams line up, so I'll take a couple points and expect the outright win.

5. Air Force +14 @ Notre Dame: Surprisingly, these two teams have not played each other since 2007. After dispatching an apparently overmatched Purdue team last week, the national consensus on Notre Dame is that they are now settled in and ready to run off 7 in a row on the way to a BCS game. In comes AirForce, with the 3rd ranked offense in the country, thanks mostly to their option attack. As everyone knows, I consider Navy or Air Force as a double digit underdog virtually an auto play, and this one is no different. Air Force will shorten the number of possessions because of their nature, making it hard for a 2 TD favorite to cover. In addition, making the case that ND has just magically figured out how to hold on to the ball is nonsense. If they turn it over once or twice, the question is going to change from whether or not they cover to whether or not they win. This would be a game that the Notre Dame teams of the past 4 years or so figure out a way to lose. If they take care of business and handle this solid Air Force team easily, maybe they are on their way to great things. But given their penchant for turnovers, boneheaded play and blown coverages in the secondary(and Air Force has already thrown 6 TD passes this year), I doubt it.

6. Iowa +4 @ Penn State: Awful Announcing has slacked, so I'm not sure who's doing what game, but I think one way or the other I am stuck with Black Death(otherwise known as Matt Millen) poisoning my team. He might be here, but he almost certainly will be on one of the big ABC/ESPN games, all of which I have a strong opinion on. As far as this game, Iowa has owned Penn State. Ferentz is 8-1 against Penn State in his last 9 games, and the past couple years, they've handled Penn State with no problem, beating the spread by more than 2 scores in both cases. Statistically, the teams match up pretty evenly. Both teams' defenses should have the better of things, but we'll see what Penn State's pass defense does with Iowa, because this will be by far the best pass offense they've faced. Iowa's Achilles heel has been pass defense, but Penn State has shown zero ability to exploit that, regardless of which one of those clowns they trot out there at QB. Basically, I'll take more than a FG in what appears likely to be a very low scoring game with the better passing game and the coach that's dominated play in this series.

7. @Houston -11 v East Carolina: This line has moved a couple of points over the past couple of days, but I still feel it's got a lot of value. This is a very interesting game. Last year, the book on ECU was that they were absolutely helpless on defense, but the new Texas Tech style offense kept them in games because they stayed on the field by dinking and dunking people to death. This year, coming into the North Carolina game last week, the ECU world was turned on it's head, because they were ranked in the bottom fifth in offense, but their defense was looking ok. Now things are changing. Last week, they piled up a bunch of yards at home against UNC, if not all that many points(20), but fell back into the doldrums defensively, surrendering 11.5 yards per pass attempt(!!). In their only previous game away from home, they gave up 56 to South Carolina, which was a bit deceiving, but shit, they still found a way to give up 56 freakin points. Now they have to go to Houston and face that wildman Case Keenum. The last time they faced him in Houston, (as a 10 point dog, mind you)with a better defense under a much better staff(Skip Holtz), they gave up 619 yards and 41 points. Houston is much better defensively at home, and since Keenum has been at the helm full time, they are 8-1 ATS at home. ECU will have to do more than accumulate yards to stay in this one.

8. @Texas Tech +9.5 v Texas A&M: Texas Tech has been pretty woeful on defense this year, so it seems likely that A&M should be able to move the ball on them, but I just can't see A&M, in their current state rising up and taking care of business like this in Lubbock. Tech, as usual is throwing the ball effectively, this time under QB Seth Doege. A&M is burning oil in their secondary, ranked 91st after getting torched in the second half for the second week in a row. This is a night game in Lubbock, and Tech has been handled 2 years in a row by the Aggies. There is no doubt that we'll see a max effort from the Red Raiders and their fans in what will probably be the Aggies swan song in Lubbock for a long time. If Sherman sacks up and squeezes a dominant effort in what has historically been a hellhole for A&M, I'll tip my hat. Actually, I'll do that if he wins the game.

9. @Baylor -15 v Iowa St: Baylor got a wakeup call from what had thus far been the Robert Griffin deification tour, as they dropped a toughie to KSt last weekend in Manhattan. Now they return home to play a pedestrian Iowa St squad who has suddenly begun to show their warts, especially defensively. Coming into the K St game, Griffin had famously thrown more TD passes than incompletions. Even after that game, it's 18 TDs to 20 incompletions. In order to hang in this one, Iowa State is going to have to put up points, and Baylor has been surprisingly good defensively this year. I don't think this one will be close.

10. @Nevada -20.5 v UNLV: After a 3 week respite from the road, UNLV goes back to the place they least like to be..which is anywhere in the world other than Las Vegas. They are now 6-26 as a road dog over their last 32, and they don't match up well in this one either. This is Nevada's first home game of the year believe it or not, after having played at Texas Tech, Oregon, San Jose St and Boise. Ouch. Major class drop for the Wolf Pack here, and since Ault took over his second tenure here in 2004 they are 23-11 as a home favorite. So we have 23-11 vs 6-26. I'll go with Nevada, especially since they'll be motivated in their home opener off a tough loss.

11. Colorado +30 @Stanford: I understand Stanford is really good and Colorado has looked pretty bad this year, but this line is pretty ridiculous. 30 points? Despite their record, Colorado has been ok statistically, with a nice ability to run the ball and pass it a bit. They had a late collapse last week, but were beating a pretty good Wazzou team by 10. Stanford has been very fortunate in their games, as they've gotten a bunch of defensive scores and some late front door covers. I also don't think Stanford can give their best effort here...there is no way they are going to be hyped up for a weak opponent 2 weeks in a row at home. Can I ask for 42-14??? Come on. Like Kentucky last week, drop their asses out of the Pac 10 if Colorado can't handle this spread.

12. @Nebraska -11 v Ohio St: Who is going to throw the ball for Ohio State? I can't tell you how bad they suck, and to make matters worse, they had this week circled on the calendar as the game they get their studs back, and now that's not even going to happen, so they have to play with the same stiffs that couldn't get a 1st down in Columbus against Michigan St last week. Nebraska has not been any great shakes themselves on defense this year, but they are going to be spitting nails coming off that embarrassment last week, and now they're getting a chance to redeem themselves at home in front of a prime time national TV audience. Bo Pelini will physically assault them if they don't , so I expect them to be ready. The fans will be behind them too, eager to show the Big Ten what a game in Lincoln is all about. Ohio State might be able to hang defensively for awhile, but after about their 5th consecutive 3 and out, they'll lose hope and get steamrolled. I wouldn't be surprised if this one ends up in the 31-6 range.

13 Washington State +4 @UCLA: I really hesitate to get too caught up on the Wazzou bandwagon, especially when they are on the road 2 weeks in a row, but I can't get past a couple things. WSU is ranked 8th in total offense, UCLA is 103rd. WSU is 10th in passing, UCLA is 100th. UCLA is under enormous pressure to win this one, and they elicit no confidence from their fan base. WAZZOU, surprisingly, has also been pretty good on defense and rate pretty even with UCLA's offense, while they hold an extreme advantage when they have the ball. Given that I get what looks to be the better team, more than a FG and a team trying their best to not implode under extreme pressure, I'll take the Cougs here.

Others: I like Eastern Michigan(+21) to hang with Toledo in what appears to be a terrible spot for the Rockets coming off the beat down of temple. EMU can really run it, and 21 will be a lot to ask Toledo to cover against an improved team that they probably won't give 2 shits about.....Can South Carolina score 21 points against anyone?? We'll see if Connor Shaw can do it but unless they score a couple times on defense against Kentucky, it's going to be hard. I'll take the 21 with Kentucky, assuming their adequate defense hold down So Car and hey at least get a couple field goals....I really liked Wake at +14 when it came out, but that line has been bet down to 10, so I'm not as excited. However, I thin they have a shot at the outright based on how they've played so far, so I will take the 10 points.....NIU's(-16.5) major problem has been their defense, as they can score on anyone. This week they get the 120th ranked offense in the country in kent, so I thinkthey'll roll if they score like they're capable......I have a hunch Mizzou(-4) walks into Manhattan and ends K State's fantasy ride. They have proven themselves as worthy competitiors on the road, having given Arizona State and Oklahoma all they wanted. K State is due for a clunker, and the public is on them heavily as a home dog..... I don't know that Syracuse should be favored on the road against anyone, and Tulane is no exception. The Green Wave(+10) had everything possible go wrong for them last week against Army, increasing this line. I wouldn't be surprised if they won it outright.

That's it for now. have a good one!!