The Grey Cup

Nicky Santoro · 11-21-08, 08:00 PM

i, and 2 other posters here from montreal, might be the only ones that care here, but LETS GO ALS.. my montreal alouettes will be playing 12 miles from me here at the BIG O..in montreal in the GREY CUP.. should be fun.. cant wait..

mathdotcom · 11-21-08, 08:43 PM

CFL is so shoddy

Richkas · 11-21-08, 08:44 PM

How many teams are in this league?

bigboydan · 11-21-08, 08:51 PM

Calgary is a strong play for me. Their is absolutely no way that Montreal can or much less will win the Grey Cup!

mathdotcom · 11-21-08, 08:53 PM

8 teams in the CFL.

I even prefer college football to CFL

Richkas · 11-21-08, 09:17 PM

Originally posted by mathdotcom

8 teams in the CFL.

I even prefer college football to CFL

I knew it was a small league. Mudcat said somebody had a tougher schedule. How is that possible. 8 Team league, play everybody twice.

mathdotcom · 11-21-08, 09:23 PM

the divisions are separated geographically [and they play more within it] to lower travel times. it just so happens montreal's division sucks ass.

bigboydan · 11-21-08, 09:59 PM

I just can't see how anybody can back Montreal in this game, because I just can't make a case for them winning at all.

mathdotcom · 11-21-08, 10:37 PM

bbd
cfl games are often coin flips
thats the other case

pavyracer · 11-21-08, 10:46 PM

Originally posted by Mudcat

It's on Sunday. Here's what I like.

Calgary +1 (currently +106 at Matchbook)

My reason in a nutshell:

I believe that spread is giving Montreal too much credit for home field. Calgary had a better season record - and against a much tougher schedule.

Calgary was 14-5 with a focus on those tougher western teams.

Montreal picked up 12 wins with 6 of them coming against creampuffs, Toronto and Hamilton.

Yes, Montreal does have a home field advantage but I don't think it is as pronounced as that spread is saying. The value is on the better team, Calgary.

That is all.

I'm tailing you on this Mudcat. Is this cup sponsored by Grey Goose vodka? I know nothing about Canada's sports.

Mudcat · 11-22-08, 10:06 AM

Tail at your own risk. I like the play but it's not like I have a database of 500 previous Grey Cups to crunch numbers from and get strong statistical back-up.

And I do suggest taking the point or points (rather than Moneyline). In the CFL, +1 and +2 are more significant than the NFL.

I just think everyone is getting way too carried away about the home field. It has been surprisingly rare for the host city to land in the game, and now that it has happened, everyone is tickled - too much so.

Montreal is not even actually playing at their home stadium. The game is at Olympic Stadium. (The Als play their season games at much smaller Molson Stadium). Montreal has played exactly the same number of games on that field as Calgary.

Plus it's the Grey Cup - not a regular home game. Tickets get spread around and there will be lots of visitors from out west in the stands.

So I'm putting some money down.

Betting aside, it should be a good game. Unlike Super Bowls, Grey Cups tend to default to being really good exciting games. And these teams are a good match-up. The 1st place teams from the east and west. The stadium should be noisy and the elements won't be a factor.

Mudcat · 11-22-08, 10:20 AM

The line has not budged. Still Calgary +1 +106 at Matchbook.

It's +1 +105 at Pinnacle which is actually better considering Matchbook commission.

Problem is, I don't know what to expect for line movement. As strongly as I feel about my play, Montreal is getting most of the action and the line could still get better on the Calgary side.

Not sure when to pull the trigger.

betplom · 11-22-08, 10:21 AM

Greek has Calgary M/L +110

Mudcat · 11-22-08, 10:42 AM

Yeah Pinnacle has +115 ML. Matchbook has +113 (which works out to +110.7). Not much in the way of dollars at Matchbook yet though.

Anyway I will wait a bit before doing a thorough shopping comparison. For better or worse I have decided that things are more likely to improve for my Calgary play than get worse. We'll see.

PeachDog · 11-22-08, 12:45 PM

The Grey Cup is going to be an amazing game. I grew up watching CFL when the games were on ESPN and the old TUSA sports network(remember those days?)

This grey cup game might produce the most exciting football game of the entire season NFL and CFL, and College Football combined.

People that don't like CFL are nuts. How can you like college and not CFL? The CFL is a real amazing league!

first class tradition, fans, and athletes.

watch this game at 6pm tomorrow cause its going to be awesome!

Nicky Santoro · 11-22-08, 12:48 PM

# of sbr posters who are not canadian that will watch the Grey Cup over an NFL game on Sunday?

0.5 posters un -380
0.5 posters ov +320

dwaechte · 11-22-08, 12:59 PM

I'm pretty excited for this matchup, but I'm on Montreal here. I think they showed over the course of the year that they are right there with the top teams from the West. Add in the HFA and I think the Als take it.

But first up, Vanier today! Great weekend for Canadian football fans.

mathdotcom · 11-22-08, 01:02 PM

Statistics on previous grey cups are useless. What info can you get from them?

I've found the last few grey cups pretty boring. Because there are only 3 downs it's more exciting in a sense, but the poor quality gets annoying. Brutal pickoffs here and there, even some blatant strategic blunders by coaching (gambling when you have nothing to gain, or not gambling when you absolutely need to). If you remember the Cgy game last week, the Cgy kicker punted the ball out of bounds to give BC one last place to win the game. All he had to do was keep it in bounds and that would have been it.

Mudcat · 11-23-08, 11:35 AM

Originally posted by PeachDog

The Grey Cup is going to be an amazing game. I grew up watching CFL when the games were on ESPN and the old TUSA sports network(remember those days?)

This grey cup game might produce the most exciting football game of the entire season NFL and CFL, and College Football combined.

People that don't like CFL are nuts. How can you like college and not CFL? The CFL is a real amazing league!

first class tradition, fans, and athletes.

watch this game at 6pm tomorrow cause its going to be awesome!

It's not just the Grey Cup. There have been some great playoff games.

Many times I'll see some great CFL playoff action and get all caught up in it and tell myself, that's it, I'm getting more into that league next year.

But by the next season it's forgotten. I remain an NFL guy.

Anyway it's game day. 6 o'clock EST start.

I was right and the line has improved for Calgary. Currently +1.5 +100 at Pinny. +117 ML.

I'm still going to wait and see what happens at Matchbook as gametime approaches.

dwaechte · 11-23-08, 11:38 AM

I'm guessing the trend continues and the line moves to about 2.5. If that happens I may have to sell off a bit of my position.

Mudcat · 11-23-08, 11:40 AM

If I may ask, what is your position?

dwaechte · 11-23-08, 11:43 AM

Montreal pk at -105. I know would be better to let it ride but I put more on this game than I should have at the time, mostly because it was "The Grey Cup" and I knew I'd be watching it. I'll probably cut it in half using the Calgary ML at kickoff, hopefully its around +125 by then, but even +120 or so would do.

Mudcat · 11-23-08, 12:04 PM

At the moment, there is all kinds of room for movement at Matchbook. The moneyline is +113/-128. I expect that gap will close as gametime approaches. But the question is always, where will it close. Hopefully for you it will be closer to +126/-127 than +114/-115.

Even as I typed this, the line moved at Pinny. Calgary now +1.5 +102. Moneyline = +120.

Good signs.

Crayzee · 11-23-08, 12:11 PM

bookmaker currently has +2
is that worth buying up to 3 like nfl would be?

Mudcat · 11-23-08, 01:27 PM

Originally posted by Crayzee

bookmaker currently has +2
is that worth buying up to 3 like nfl would be?

The number 3 wouldn't be as big a deal as in the NFL - but it probably wouldn't cost as much either.

Don't get me wrong. 3 is an important number. Just not as important as the NFL.

The precise answer for me would be, depends how much it costs.

But in general I probably wouldn't (but then I never do that in the NFL either.)

bigboydan · 11-23-08, 02:23 PM

What channel with this game be on gentlemen?

RogueScholar · 11-23-08, 02:26 PM

It's on Versus, Dan. Channel 603 on DirecTV.

bigboydan · 11-23-08, 02:27 PM

Thank you sir.

RogueScholar · 11-23-08, 02:32 PM

Originally posted by Mudcat

If I may ask, what is your position?

I'm on Montreal -1.5, Mudcat, and for admittedly very poor reasons. First, Calgary eliminated my Lions from the Grey Cup last week, and that's simply unforgivable. The other reason being that the CFL season is relatively long for gridiron football, and the West was much stronger this year, thus placing more wear and tear on the Stampeders.

Also, I loved singing that French children's song Alouette, about plucking the lark, when I was a youngin'. So everything seemed to point to Montreal for me today, but I wish you nothing but the best of luck on your pick.

Mudcat · 11-23-08, 02:42 PM

Well thank you.

The way I'm blathering on and on here, you'd think I was planning some huge action. The truth is, I am just looking at a recreational amount and this will only be about my 8th most important football play of the day.

But I guess I feel like I'm doing a patriotic duty or some damn thing.

Mudcat · 11-23-08, 04:07 PM

Line just bounced. Screw it, I took Calgary moneyline +115 at Greek. If they lose by exactly 1 or 2, I will be doing some of this:

rain_e · 11-23-08, 04:15 PM

I'm in Calgary so I'll put a small wager on them just to try and make it interesting. It really is shitty football.

rain_e · 11-23-08, 04:16 PM

Forgot to mention the bet... Calgary +2.5 @ -110 at SportsInteraction and Calgary ML +115 at SportsInteraction.

dwaechte · 11-23-08, 04:19 PM

Originally posted by rain_e

I'm in Calgary so I'll put a small wager on them just to try and make it interesting. It really is shitty football.

I guess we'll have to disagree. I think they put up a great entertaining product. The actual quality of the players oviously isn't the same as the NFL, but these are still professionals. It's certainly better quality players than NCAA, and has fan friendly Canadian rules.