bullish/bearish teams

[gojetsgomoxies]

this is some degree a "stream of consciousness" blog for myself.. thought i would put some teams in here as bullish or bearish as i read different sites


bullish: CAL......CFN is big on this pick. my recollection is alot of starters back on offense and wilcox is doing wonders with the defense (might not have been reflected for all of last year)

bullish: rutgers............ can't remember exact rationalebu

bullish: nebraska.. obvious

bearish: WSU... not sure the exact rationale but seem a couple of respected sites pretty sure about this. losing a dominant program QB.

bearish: hawaii... lost program QB and bunch of other multi-year starters and all-MWC types.

will have some others. and hopefully some more meat on these picks

[reigle9]

good thread, i just posted lines

honestly, have done 0 research yet (and don't care what sites say) so im just going off vague memories of last year and what they return

i like wvu early, big grier fan and sills returned to light it up

believe wisconsin returns a ton on offense and always have a solid D despite no big names

cal: think i lost every time i bet against them last year, i could see them returning a lot

rutgers: never any reason to go full rutgers

neb: yeah frost will probably turn it around quickly, BIG is TOUGH though

wsu: falk was nothing special, their problem is the back-up killed himself leaving them with nobody, i believe they got a transfer though

hawaii: they were already terrible last year, another team i had wrong and lost almost every time i bet them

[BigdaddyQH]

What people forget the most is the one thing that they have total access to. That is the schedule. The schedule can make or break you. Let's look at Cal. Many people are wondering if they will win 6 games and become bowl eligible this season, after a near miss last season. Well Cal hosts conference games against Oregon, UCLA, Washington, Stanford, and Colorado. UCLA and Colorado are must wins for Cal. Washington and Stanford are probable losses. Oregon is a question mark. Cal goes to Arizona, Washington State, Oregon State, and USC. USC is a loss. Arizona and Wazzu are toss ups. Oregon State is a must win. Cal has a lock win at home against non-con foe Idaho State. The big question is this. They host North Carolina and go to BYU. These two schools had poor seasons last year, but the Pac 12 had a terrible bowl season. So the bottom line is this. Cal must win 2 out of 3 non-con games and take care of business at home. If not, they will not win 6 games because they are not good enough to depend on away wins to get them there.

[gojetsgomoxies]

my interest is more what teams to ATS-back early and mid-season instead of win totals.

i will note that 2 of the top 3 ATS coaches (FAU, fresno) were 1st year.... 1st year coaches used to be fade material overall (and the occasional great first year coach just made fading most others even better)......... wonder if the internet has somehow changed this relationship....


i think phil steele was 3rd year coach bullish, but i'm wondering if it should be 2nd year coach now.

[BigdaddyQH]

I do not think that first year Coaches make that big of a difference. Both FAU and Fresno had terrible years before last season. The difference is this. FAU was 3-9 S/U 2/9 ATS in 2016 and improved to 11-3 S/U and 10-3-1 ATS last season. Fresno was much different. In 2016 Fresno was a terrible 1-11 ATS, but were 7-4 ATS. Certainly nothing to be ashamed of on the ATS side of things. Fresno State improved to 10-4 S/U last season, and 9-2-2 ATS. Florida Atlantic returned 17 starters and Fresno State returned 16 starters (10 on offense) last season. Both played in non-group of 5 conferences. Those reasons must be considered, as well as some of the huge lines they covered, but still lost outright. Fresno State lost 41-10 to Alabama and 48-16 to Washington, but covered the ridiculously high spreads.

[gojetsgomoxies]

i perused phil steele's spring guide (free within his blog) and here are some insights i got from his returning starters.

my notation is F for offense, D for defense. Q and nQ for returning QB or not....... and if the special sit is from defense i don't reference the QB situation

alabama 3D (3 returning starters on D)
arkansas 17R (17 total Returning starters), nQ
florida 19R Q
georgia 5D
LSU 10R... forgot to check QB
MissSt 17R Q
TAM 16R Q
i realize i missed Ole Miss which showed alot of returning starters but huge flux there.

Indiana 3D
MCS 19R Q
Purdue 4D
Wisc 4D
BC 10F Q
FSU 4D
Louis 4D
NCS 3D
Pitt 4F. forgot QB
ASU 4D
Col 10R 4F QB
Washington 17R Q
Kansas 19R Q
Army 3F NQ
Conn 2D
navy 9R Q
CSU 9R nq
HW 9R NQ
Ustate 18R Q
CMU 10R nQ
FIU 4D
So Miss 9R Q
UTSA 10R nQ

[reigle9]

Good preliminary stuff before the mag comes out.

Florida should have big gains.

Didn't realize miss st had so much returning. Fitzgerald is a heisman play for me when the time comes.

Indiana will be down. D was real good last year.

Mcs msu? Really outperformed expectations last year, expect them to have a big year. Msu should be shut down considering they did what psu was accused of and didn't do, multiplied by a billion, but no legend fb coach so nobody cares.

Toss out wisc d numbers.

Louisville could be bad not returning much d and losing j Jackson.

Ncst had a big time d, should be down.

Pitt is in trouble.

Can't belive uw was so much returning. Should be good but lost top rb, wr, and vea.

Army always has turnover. Same with navy, think their qb is good.

Think csu had a lot of experience last year, should be down.

Fiu was very experienced last year.

This is all off the top of my head typing from my phone.

[gojetsgomoxies]

college football news previews all the teams...

https://collegefootballnews.com/2018/03/2018-spring-college-football-rankings-lookaheads-no-1-to-130/3

[BigdaddyQH]

Florida is a great GOY wager. I took them +3 1/2 at home against LSU and +15 in Jacksonville vs Georgia. I am also looking at the Florida-FSU game. Florida is +7 now. I would like 8. Florida is a very good sleeper.

[gojetsgomoxies]

got athlon and S&S last days...

some teams that i think are coming together to have good years (by their standards): boise, missouri, california, nevada, buffalo......

[gojetsgomoxies]

collegefootballnews.com looked at the win totals in vegas for 4 of the 5 big conferences (i didn't see ACC analyzed by them)

most were 1 game or less difference between CFN prediction and vegas line..

the 4 win totals where CFN prediction varied more from vegas line were:

bullish: colorado, kansas state, west virginia (CFN predicts more wins than vegas)

bearish: oregon...

i like the k-state and WV calls, but not the colo/oregon ones. my initial lean on col/ore would be the opposite but i respect cfn and haven't done hard core look at schedules

[BigdaddyQH]

The schedules are very important for overall success evaluations of teams, but not as important on a game to game basis. So far, IO have only made 8 "GOY" wagers, the smallest amount of wagers by far for the first round of "GOY" wagers. Of course, they only listed 50 or so games.

[daneblazer]

Florida is a great GOY wager. I took them +3 1/2 at home against LSU and +15 in Jacksonville vs Georgia. I am also looking at the Florida-FSU game. Florida is +7 now. I would like 8. Florida is a very good sleeper.

It’s all about the Qb for them. It’s going to take Mullen a year to get them going

[reigle9]

didnt UF get a transfer qb? memory is hazy on who all got transfers and who was just expected to

franks was supposed to be big time, but i guess he's useless

[daneblazer]

didnt UF get a transfer qb? memory is hazy on who all got transfers and who was just expected to

franks was supposed to be big time, but i guess he's useless

They got a good Qb recruit. All of their QBs are young

[reigle9]

They got a good Qb recruit. All of their QBs are young

jones? he def won't play this year

remember him sucking at camps and there was talk about osu letting him go, which might've happened (i dont remember)

[daneblazer]

jones? he def won't play this year

remember him sucking at camps and there was talk about osu letting him go, which might've happened (i dont remember)

Ya Emory jones. He “flipped” from Ohio state. Unless franks has made strides, the Gators will be above average but not good. They had a lot of problems. McElwain was an idiot

[reigle9]

McElwain was an idiot

lol, guy looks/sounds like he should be leading a scout troop in north dakota