The Sports Cruncher's 2015 CFB Week 03 Lines & Market Plays

[thecruncher]

Adding for 1: FLA -3 @ Kentucky

Florida failed to put away ECU in the 4th quarter, but still held them to negative yards rushing on the day. The Florida passing game has been better these first two games than it was last year, and they're still running pretty well.

Kentucky did "upset" South Carolina last week, but it's an upset that my numbers predicted. My numbers predict a comfortable win for Florida this week. Kentucky has been vulnerable on the ground in their 2-0 start -- that's bad news against Florida.

 

[thecruncher]

Adding for 1/2 Unit: NW +3 @ Duke

Both teams smashed cupcakes in shutout fashion last week. QB Sirk for Duke has been pretty good so far, but who has he faced? Nobody. NW's defense has been downright nasty so far with the aforementioned shutout on top of holding Stanford to 6 points and terrible offensive numbers in week #1. NW has the numbers nod and gets the green light for having beaten an actual quality football team.

 

[thecruncher]

Adding for 1/2 Unit: New Mexico +28 @ Arizona State

This line went from it's opener of 24.5 quickly up to 28. That's cool. If it ever gets higher than 28 I'll be a little sad, but I'm fine with the position. ASU did beat UNM by 35 @ Albuquerque last year, we can put that on the table right away and see how much it scares you now that this home and away returns home for the Sun Devils. Still here? Good. Look, neither team has played worth a dog eaten crap in their one game versus an FBS team. Against FCS squads, ASU was tied in the 4th quarter with Cal Poly, who has some offense, but not much defense. For ASU to only have 21 points heading into the 4th quarter is pretty bad. New Mexico destroyed their cupcake in week #1, though yes, it was a weaker cupcake overall. There's a risk that ASU's offense will suddenly remember what it's capable of, and that New Mexico's dangerous running game will be neutered by a much better run defense than they faced against Tulsa last week. There's danger everywhere, but that's why we play the game. We? I mean they. ***Injury note -- UNM RB Gipson is "?" for next week, and he's one of their better backs. Gulp.

 

[thecruncher]

Adding for 1/2 Unit: Nevada +32.5 @ Texas A&M

After these last week's games I'm not sold on TA&M. It was a game against Ball State that they should have dominated but really didn't, in spite of what the scoreboard read. It was a game decided on 3rd downs, where A&M converted 9 of 14 while Ball only converted 2 of 13. Ball was about a yard better per run while A&M was about a yard better per pass. The thing is, Ball mostly ran -- they did it at a greater than 2-1 ratio versus the pass. So A&M knew what was coming, generally, but only did a good job of stopping it on 3rd downs, lol. Nevada will be bringing the same run heavy offense to town. Nevada definitely doesn't have as good of a passing QB as they had in Fajardo last year, but Stewart still makes the runs the offense asks of him. Nevada's defense wasn't good in the loss to Arizona last week, but hey, we've got 32.5 points to work with, right? This line opened at 29 and I think it's a simple case of looking at final scores as to why it's gone up. Not much in the way of important numbers if it goes up, so might as well take it now in case it drops back to 31 or below.

 

[thecruncher]

Adding for 1/2 Unit: Troy +35.5 @ Wisconsin

Well, I teed up one giant dog turd for Wisky last week and they proceeded to smash it off said tee in a scoreless romp. But hey, at least I just juiced out on the game when Wisky was able to get the Over by themselves. Sign of a good Over when one team goes scoreless and you still win, lol. I'm hoping the dog I tee up this time has at least a few teeth in his mouth (and I'll probably be on the Over again). Troy gave new HC Brown his first win with an impressive win against Charleston Southern last week. Wait, don't I usually call FCS (and below) teams cupcakes? Heh -- well, CharSo is an okay team (they only lost by 1 @ Vandy last year) so I'm going to call it an okay+ win for Troy. Troy's offense also did pretty well in the season opener against NC State. Wisky does get RB Clements back after a 2 game time out, which increases the chance that Wisky just wears Troy out and then adds a couple of meaningless scores...but I'll wager that Troy gets 2-3 scores of their own to still cover by 7-8 points. Troy has an experienced QB unlike Miami of Ohio had last week -- that back door is wide open in Camp Randall this week.

 

[thecruncher]

Week #2 and YTD results (except I haven't tallied week #1 points against the closing market, yet). Had a terrible week #1, mostly because of a bad run of 2nd half plays. Murdered the closing lines by 93 points overall, only being wrong on firing too soon on a KSU-UTSA middle play, 1 point on New Mexico State (an impulse play where my numbers showed no value, lol) and Georgia by 1.5 points when the line came down on game day. Other than that just a few half points against and the rest a landslide. Each play made was an average of 2 points better (1.5 median) than the closing line. All that and it didn't add up to much profit on regular sides and totals, though it still made a difference on at least one play I noticed (didn't check them all).

 

[thecruncher]

Adding for 1/2 Unit: Texas +7 vs CAL

I'll surrender my handicapper's license if this line goes higher than 7. I think the truth of these two teams lies somewhere between the poles of perception, 'nigh unto Neverland. Wait, what?

 

[thecruncher]

Adding for 1/2 Unit: Auburn +7.5 @ LSU
Adding for 1/2 Unit: Louisville +5.5 vs Clemson

Thoughts tomorrow.

 

[thecruncher]

Let me tell you about how my numbers are made this week. Each game a team has played against an FBS opponent has the stats from that game used to replace the first three games of stats from last year, with the rest of last year's stats counted as if we were in the final week of last season. So, if a team has played two FBS opponent's that's 6 games worth of stats from those 2 games plus the stats from their final 6 games last season. What I'm seeing to a certain degree is that the market is valuing these one or two games from this season even more than I am, which is why I'm taking several dogs this week who haven't played particularly well so far this year. Clearly you want to get a gauge of how far ahead or behind a team is compared to their last season's play as quickly as you can, I'm just not sure how quickly you should discount last seasons stats. I'm trying to balance this, but it's an odd week for me looking at the lines, for sure, as next week probably will be as well. Last week I was pretty much spot on predicting the market, this week it's not shaping up to happen like that, at least as far as sides are concerned. By week #5 my numbers will have transitioned to almost completely using just this year's stats.

 

[thecruncher]

Final score for my lines versus the closing market last week. Pretty good.

 

[thecruncher]

Adding for 1/2 Unit: Washington -5.5 vs Utah State

Showing value on this one and the line is starting to move up.

 

[thecruncher]

Adding for 1/2 Unit: UGA -17 vs SCAR

South Carolina had a bottom team run defense last year, and they haven't shown any real improvement for that unit yet this year. They gave up 6.5 ypc to UNC and 5.4 to UK. You think that is going to come at all close to working against one of the top 3 rushing attacks in college football...on the road? The shortest of short answers -- no. Georgia has shredded two run defenses that were average in week 1 and better than average in week 2. On top of that, starting SCAR QB is out with a separated shoulder. His Junior replacement put up okay numbers against Kentucky, but on only 10 throws. And it's a revenge game for Georgia. Just a tough, tough spot for SCAR here. This one has all the pieces for a jenga collapse by SCAR.

 

[thecruncher]

Adding for 1 Unit: CLEM @ LOU Under 54

 

[thecruncher]

1/2 Unit: AKR @ MINN Under 48.5

 

[thecruncher]

1 Unit: NIU @ OSU Over 64.5

 

[thecruncher]

1 Unit: Troy @ WIS Under 58.5

 

[thecruncher]

1 Unit: NW @ Duke Under 49.5

 

[thecruncher]

1/2 Unit: Rice @ UNT Under 57

 

[thecruncher]

1/2 Unit: SCAR @ UGA Over 54

 

[thecruncher]

1 Unit: ECU @ Navy Over 60