Week 8 Recap + Week 9 Best Bets

I’m joining my Crew in Las Vegas (gawd I loathe that town) this weekend, so will be betting the games where it all started! Did you know back in the early days of sports betting they did not use a point spread? It’s true! I won’t get into the discussion here, but if you would like to know more about who may have started the point spread and when and where, read this informative article.

Last week I included a discussion of the PAC12 likely conference playoff contenders. There can only be two, and we are down to only a single team – Oregon Ducks – that remain undefeated. The other squads rounding out the top four are UCLA, Utah and USC, each with one loss. If the Ducks can remain undefeated (spoiler alert – they won’t, some squad will knock them off), they will be an absolute certainty to play in the championship. UCLA will host USC November 12 and one of these squads must lose. As for Utah, they play at Oregon November 19. One-loss Utah must win the rest of their games AND beat the Ducks in Autzen. As surmised last week, the conference playoff contenders will highly likely come down to mathematical tiebreakers of who beat whom. Anyway, take all this into account in your handicapping and betting.

So, how did we do last week? Let’s take a look…

Syracuse +13.5 – Covered

Akron +18.5 – Covered

Duke +9.0 – Covered and won straight up

Bowling Green +8.0 – Covered and won straight up

Buffalo +7.5 – Covered and won straight up

Rice ML -135 – Won by a single point in Overtime, covering the Moneyline bet

Ole Miss ML -120 – Stunk it up and lost

Hawai’i +5.5 – Covered

Mississippi State +22.5 – Lost, did not cover

Colorado +23.5 – Lost, did not cover

Ole Miss +1.5 – I’m an idiot, essentially bet this game twice, still lost

Texas AM -3.0 – Lost…Jimbo Fisher’s buyout this year is somewhere around $85,000.000 (Not kidding!)

UTEP +4.0 – Covered and won straight up

Final Week 8 Results – 8 Wins 5 Losses = 3 Net Wins

Cumulative Wins through Week 8 – 6 Units + 3 Units = 9 Units won for the season, so far. Not bad. If anyone has been tailing, you have a handy little profit, and it didn’t cost you a dime!

Week 9 Picks

Alright, let’s keep this party rolling.

Frankly, I do not like a lot of the current lines. By this time in the season, the oddsmakers have a very good bead on the squads and are hanging sharper lines. I’m mostly going to wait until I get to Vegas to make the rest of my bets. The ONLY bets I have made thus far are:

140 Syracuse Moneyline -135 hosting the Fightin Irish

141 Michigan State +23.0

155 Rutgers +14.0

160 Iowa State +1.5

194 Hawai’i +10.5

Peace Out