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After another preseason of position battles and a rash of unfortunate (and quite possibly preventable) injuries, not to mention a stunning retirement with landscape-altering ramifications, NFL games that count are just around the corner. Week 1 in the NFL is unlike any other in that the lines have been up since mid-April, so by this point there isn’t much meat left on the bone in terms of of uncovered edges. But that doesn’t mean an actionable edge or two can’t be found in what’s left of the lead-up to kickoff, so let’s roll up the sleeves and see what we can do.
And with most of CFB Week 1 in the books we’re one step closer to midseason form, unless you're Tennessee or Iowa State....
Digging deeper into the college ranks, one angle worth monitoring closely is Alabama’s potential for first half dominance, which took the market until the Tide’s 11th game to catch up to in 2018 based on Alabama covering the first half spread in each of its first 10 games. To start the 2019 season, the oddsmakers didn’t shade the first half line much in Alabama’s direction against Duke - they were correct in making that decision, but the same approach very well may not be the way to line Alabama first halves moving forward. That's because, while the Tide failed to cover that first half line of -21, the absence of four players suspended for the early going won't be a factor on an ongoing basis. Redshirt freshman Jerome Ford won't be getting regular carries and thus won't be losing fumbles as he did on the second drive against the Blue Devils. Nick Saban likely won't settle for negative expected value field goal attempts like he did on the following drive, sending out his true freshman kicker for his first career attempt (and miss) from 49 yards out, when Najee Harris and Brian Robinson are manning the backfield. Even with their uneven start to the season opener, in the first half the Tide racked up three times as many first downs as Duke and more than twice as many yards per pass attempt. If Alabama continues to be a first-half wrecking crew and the market is a step slow to adjust, we might as use a rising Tide to lift all bankrolls.
And longtime readers might not be surprised to be getting a USC take from a USC grad, so here goes: It's time to fade the Trojans if the market hints at even a remotely rosy outlook on them. With QB J.T. Daniels out for the season with a torn ACL and meniscus, in steps true freshman QB Kedon Slovis for a ringer of an upcoming schedule: vs. Stanford, at BYU, vs. Utah, at Washington, at Notre Dame. In other words, it's surprisingly possible that USC doesn't win another game until Arizona comes to the Coliseum on Oct. 19. While this would force Lynn Swann's hand to finally bring in a coach capable of steering the program in the right direction, it might also mean a window of opportunity to bet on Trojan opponents in the coming weeks. When you get outgained in both yards per pass and yards per rush at home against a team of Fresno State's caliber, to see optimism in the current state of USC football may require some squinting. It's tough to say where the line will open for the Trojans' Week 2 showdown with Stanford given the unknowns around Slovis, but if we get word K.J. Costello is a “go” and the Cardinal aren't favored by at least a field goal, The Farm will become part of the portfolio.
As a quick housekeeping note, I’m experimenting with moving our weekly threads to the Players Talk Forum in an effort to keep them as discoverable as possible on this site and thus as easy as possible to find for the Point Blank Community, which is always welcoming to new members. For any new readers who want to know what the Point Blank Community is all about, check out our 2019 football kickoff thread and SBR’s Point Blank archive.
Now let’s get to business and go find some edges….
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Originally Posted by deltonmyers
