Intro by Sam
Your favorite blog boys got back on track last week. For the first time since we started writing this blog, Yank and I were both above .500 on our picks and with a little better allocation of resources, I’d be looking at a slight positive instead of a slight loss on the week. Let’s look at what we did right and how we can maintain the momentum this week.
The Recap
We updated Principle 1 last week to represent a takeaway from Week 3 – Only bet on HCs and Offenses you are confident in. The lesson from last week – trust the principles. We had a solid bounceback Collaboration by getting on the Bills with a good coach vs. the Raiders with a .500 coach. The game was never really in doubt, just like our willingness to jump on the Bills bandwagon. The second leg of our Collaboration featured another smart coach and smart coaching decisions from one John Harbaugh. Admittedly, we started to get a little tight, but we got a fake punt in the right game situation and the TD we needed to cover the first half spread. Harbaugh would later go on to save my neck again late in the game when he decided to go for it on 4th down to keep possession instead of giving the Football Team a chance to get me with a backdoor cover and kill my heavy favorites teaser.
As for The Confrontation… I plead the fifth. I took a shot on Foles and I missed. Somehow losing a bet against Foles in Week 3 and subsequently losing by betting on Foles the following week accurately sums up the Foles experience and my gambling expertise. Ultimately the Bears were never able to move the ball on the Colts and boy is that going to come into play for our picks this week.
The Isolation didn’t play out the way we wanted, but it doesn’t have us down. Yank’s Chiefs 1H Over bet let him down again, and sure we probably could’ve foreseen a Bill Belichick defense generating some problems for the Chiefs, but that’s the nature of the game. I went .500 with my two Isolation picks. The Rams really wanted to make me right about how bad their offense actually is (guess what? They still did), but they managed to pull it out and join forces with the Ravens to win my tease. My bonus bet wasn’t so lucky. Somewhere along the way, I got swept up in the excitement and enthusiasm of the Cardinals and simultaneously overlooked the main lesson – bet on good coaches. Kingsbury might not be the coach everyone wants him to be, so let’s not put him up there with all of the geniuses until he makes it to the playoffs. Enough about last week, on to Week 5!
The Principles
Stay away from bad QBs and bad HCs.Only bet on HCs and Offenses you are confident in.- Bet for a team not against their opponent
- Parlay (and tease) at your own peril.
- Due to the salary cap, there isn’t a significant talent gap between the vast majority of NFL teams.
- If you’re going to pick a dog Week 1, play the money line.
Nominated Principles:
- Division games are less predictable than non-division games, due to team/scheme familiarity.
- Don’t chase your opinion about a team with bets.
Week 5 Picks
The Collaboration (3-1 ATS; 1-1 bonus bets):
The Indianapolis Colts-1.0 @ The Cleveland Browns
Sam: Last week I went with the upside of Foles over a not so hot Rivers and Colt’s offense, so this pick may look like an overreaction on my part. Some might say, stick to your guns, Sam! Or call me a flip flopper. And you know what? That’s exactly what this is. I’m a flip flopper and I’m proud of it. The reason for the change is pretty simple. This Colts defense is legit. They still rank 1st in defensive DVOA after last week (2nd in Pass and 5th in Run). They have the ability to stop the run, which is what the Browns do best (2nd in Rush DVOA).1 As I’ve stated previously, I like to look at line play and DeForest Buckner is an animal. Missing Darius Leonard might hurt, but with good line play and safety help it may not be the end of the world. On the other side of the ball, I still have my concerns about the Colts offense. They might be without Anthony Castonzo this week going against Myles Garret (*gulp*) and like I said last week, Rivers is just as likely to lose you this game as he is to win it. That being said, I’m taking the comparative advantage of strength vs strength here. If we lose we will learn critical things about both of these teams, and that’s good for us in the long term too.
Yank: Having been on the other side of the Colts/Bears coin last week I don’t have to flip flop to make this point, but that doesn’t mean I disagree with anything Sam said so far. We mentioned last week that we power rank the teams each week, in my personal rankings the Colts are decidedly in the top 10 while the Browns are decidedly in the “fine” tier. Much of the data Sam cited above, along with the overall DVOA ratings through 4 weeks (Colts #4, Browns #12) seem to confirm the eye test for me: the Colts are a better football team than the Browns. Why then are they only laying 1-2 points in this matchup then? If Vegas is giving the Browns the traditional 3 point bump for being at home that implies the Colts are 4-5 points better, which starts to make more sense. I continue to be skeptical that home teams with no/limited fans in the stands should receive any bump at all. I also am ready to double down on the process given my success last week. Just like last week’s Bills, the Colts have the best unit in the game (their defense) and the Browns have the worst (again, the defense). Just like last week’s Bills, the Colts are better than people realize because so many of their best players are unheralded. Easy decision here, we RIDE (ahem) with the Colts for another week.
Yank’s Play: $5.50 on the Colts-1 (-110)
Sam’s Play: $5.25 on the Colts (-105)
The Confrontation (3-1 Yank):
The Minnesota Vikings @ The Seattle Seahawks-7.0
Yank: Welcome to another edition of The Confrontation. For my next trick, I am going to show you how to make $5 appear out of thin air. Step 1, find a team that has covered the spread in every game this year. Step 2, determine how their strengths (MVP caliber QB with a chip on his shoulder—Russell Wilson—you may have heard of him) match up with their opponents weaknesses (the Vikings CBs, guys named Mike Hughes, Holton Hill, and several other dudes I’m sure you haven’t heard of…short version, they were torched by Tannehill quality). Step 3, make sure the QB/coach you are betting against don’t bring something extra to the table that could throw off your logic (Kirk Cousins and Mike Zimmer hmmm what about….lol just kidding yeah we’re good). Step 4, profit. Did I mention Seattle is 4-0 against the spread?
Sam: I’m not one to bet on my own team normally. First and foremost, I’ve learned from years of Vikings fandom to never have expectations. They are champions at destroying them, so this is dangerous territory. This game could be the same way, namely for the reasons Yank lays out. The Vikings CBs are not good, the DLine can’t consistently get pressure, and they can’t stop the run… Normally I would say, Seattle will run away with this game, but their defense really isn’t what it used to be. It’s currently super banged up and they haven’t really shown they can stop anyone from scoring either. On the other side of the field, they will have to stop PFF’s number 3 RB Dalvin Cook, who apparently cannot be tackled, PFF’s number 1 WR Justin Jefferson (surprise!), oh and PFF’s number 2 WR Adam Thielen.2 Play-caller Gary Kubiak has his rhythm back a bit and this offense is COOKing (👀). As for Russ, there really isn’t much the Vikings – hell anyone for that matter – can do to stop him. He’s awesome. I thought about betting the Vikings straight up to win, but I expect this to be a shoot out and Russ will probably rip my heart out at the end (but at least it’s not my wallet).
Yank’s Play: $5.50 on the Seahawks-7 (-110)
Sam’s Play: $6.25 on the Vikings+7 (-115)
The Isolation (Yank 1-4; Sam 2-3):
Two Team Teaser:
The Los Angeles Rams-2.5 (was 7.5) @ The Washington Football Team
The Arizona Cardinals-1 (was 7) @ The New York Jets
Yank: I should start this by saying I am not sure I have ever won a teaser in my life. I am a staunch adherent to Principle 3 – Parlay and Tease at your own peril. When you are dumb and bad at gambling, it is really hard to make one correct pick, much less two, that both have to happen for you to win. This is basically the one circumstance where I would consider a tease:
- I can get both favorites under 3 points
- Neither matchup is a division games (division games are always weird)
- I love both offenses for the favorites and I hate both QBs on the opposing teams
You all know my stance on the Rams by now. If everyone stays healthy they are going to win 12/13 games this year. The Football Team is one of the worst teams in the league. Kyle Allen will not change that. Arguably the riskier play of the two here is the Cardinals, who Sam is now completely out on. I think they are who we thought they were: good offense, bad defense. This week they have the privilege of playing the Jets and Joe Flacco. I liken this whole tease to following what the book says at the blackjack table. With these two matchups, I feel like I was dealt 17 and the dealer is showing a 4 – I’m happy to have my money on the table at this point. Is it possible the dealer hits a 5 and takes my chips, certainly. But I like my chances here.
Bonus: The Las Vegas Raiders @ The Kansas City Chiefs 1H O16.5
We continue with the bonus bet another week as well. You can see my logic for this bet and why I keep playing it in last week’s Isolation. While you’re there you can also get a refresher on how awful the Raiders defense is in our section on The Collaboration. They stink. Sam is down on this bet but the reality is KC would have covered 16.5 twice in 4 games (I am 1-2 on this one for the season because we don’t bet on TNF on this blog, which is how we prove we haven’t reached the degenerate stage yet). Did I feel dumb when I saw the stat last Monday night during the game that Mahomes has never topped 14 points in a first half against Bill Belichick. Yes. Does it make me feel worse about betting this consistently against non Bill Belichick opponents. Absolutely not.
Yank’s Play: $7.30 on the Chiefs-2.5/Cardinals-1 Teaser(-122) and $6.00 on the Chiefs 1H O16.5(-135)
The wild and crazy ML-apalooza:
The Los Angeles Chargers ML @ The New Orleans Saints
The Jacksonville Jaguars ML @ The Houston Texans
The Miami Dolphins ML @ The San Francisco 49ers
Sam: You might call this wild, you might call this crazy, but I call it… a shot. Essentially the way this works is that you need one underdog ML to cover all of your bets, with two hits you feel good, and with all three… well, let’s be honest all 3 probably won’t happen. But if it does… cha-ching! While these picks partially go against the head coaches part of Principle 1 we’ve laid out, the goal is to find the variance this week. Our principles aren’t full-proof and teams that don’t fall in the “good or elite” tiers are liable to be overly favored from time to time. In some ways you might think of this as a test of Principle 4 – Due to the salary cap, there isn’t a significant talent gap between the vast majority of NFL teams.
How did I settle on these matchups you ask? Without this bet in mind, I created a tier in our power rankings called frisky bad teams. This tier includes teams like the Vikings, Lions, Bengals, oh and also the Chargers and Dolphins. The Jags might belong in that category as well, since they’ve been all over the map. What I like about the Jags and Chargers the most is, they have a better offense in terms of DVOA than either of their competitors. I like these teams to score points and be in it until the end. Similarly, the Dolphins and Jags have QBs who like to blow up the tanking process. They may not be good enough to be consistent starters, but they have their moments. There were a couple other teams that almost made the list, see Giants and WFT, but the key to this bet is to have an offense that can put up points. Both the Giants and WFT have defenses that can keep a game close, but I don’t see them having the firepower to go out and win a game. As for the teams I’m going against, Yank and I separately ranked the Saints and 49ers as teams with high variance and the Texans as bad. The high variance category is pretty self-explanatory. Sometimes everything clicks and they score 30+ points and sometimes it doesn’t click and they’re down to 17 points. The formula for this bet comes down to this: an offense that can make things happen + a team a little too highly ranked. Maybe the Texans get a new coach bounce, maybe Jimmy G returns to form and mows the Jags down, and maybe I just look pretty darn dumb at the end of the day on Sunday (likely), but just like my picks, I’m young, scrappy, and hungry and we’re not giving away our shot!
Sam’s Play: $3.00 on the Chargers(+290), $3.00 on the Jags (+205), and $3.00 on the Dolphins (+315)
The Bank-Week 5
| Yank | Sam | |
| Starting: | $104.90 | $81.77 |
| Risk: | $23.30 | $20.50 |
| Potential Earnings: | $20.50 | $34.73 |
| Record: | 8-7 | 7-8 |
| Record against the Spread: | 6-4 | 4-6 |
Authors: Sam Mattson and Michael Yanckello
References
- We will likely refer to DVOA throughout the season a lot. It made sense to provide a brief definition: “DVOA measures a team’s efficiency by comparing success on every single play to a league average based on situation and opponent.” Please go to their website and check out their great work if you want more information: https://www.footballoutsiders.com/info/methods.
- Similarly we will likely point to Pro Football Focus (PFF) from time to time as well. PFF, among many things, provides individual player grades on play-by-play basis to provide a more contextual overview of a player’s performance. For instance, it takes into account a perfectly thrown ball by a QB that is dropped by the WR. For more information, please check out their work: https://www.pff.com/grades.
One Last Line 