Intro by Sam
Another tough week to swallow. This marks the third weekend in a row where the only winning bet was The Confrontation. Not a recipe for cash inflow. Despite all of this, I am really excited to get back out there (so to speak) and make some things happen. Facing the bottom of the barrel, Yank put in some heavy-duty analysis of what’s been going wrong for us and found some potential strategies that can get us out of this sinkhole.
As you’ll notice from the chart below, Yank has a total of $6.53 left in the bank for this season. Given how close he is to hitting the $100 floor, Yank has opted to forgo the Confrontation and the Isolation for this week. We agreed that with a balance of under $15, you are allowed to make just 1 pick, but that you must spend the amount you have remaining in the bank. Before diving into how Yank is going to stave off bankruptcy, a quick recap of what didn’t work last week.
The Recap
Like many of us – the gambling public – we got decimated by the Raiders no show this week. We had the Raiders in two different bets in last week’s Collaboration. We had them in an ML Parlay with the Chiefs (no brainer) and we had them and the Falcons covering the over of 53. Needless to say, the Falcons did their part and almost carried us to victory in the over by themselves but alas, we fell short. Thank you Jon Gruden.
It’s impossible for both of us to lose in the Confrontation, although I’m sure we’ll find a way before we’re done, so this time I escaped with a win. I feel like I’ve had my finger on the pulse of the Titans this whole season betting on them and against them successfully throughout the season. It’s probably just chance, but they took care of business against Yank’s Colts who have been incredibly inconsistent and doubly frustrating.
Meanwhile all 3 of our Isolation picks fell short. I had another unsuccessful over featuring the Bills and Chargers. I should’ve known Anthony Lynn’s terrible coaching would be the end of me, but here I am $50 in the hole this season. My ML underdog of the week – Da Bears over the
Packers – stood no chance as Mitchell Trubisky used his benching as an opportunity to double down on how much he sucks as a quarterback. And finally, Yank tried to juice the odds with his Browns-13 line over the Jaguars which now counts as the 4th time we have tried desperately to bet against the Jaguars and failed. Consider that a losing strategy at this point.
Now that we’ve sorted through what went wrong, I want to point out a couple of unintentional patterns that have developed that we believe are keeping us in the red. Number 1 – With the Raiders pick, it was a big time over-reaction pick. I had been following them for a few weeks but they played so well against the Chiefs that it was a no brainer that they wouldn’t play that well. All of the betting public was on the Raiders and that’s a scary proposition. Number 2 – We’ve bet a lot of road favorites that have lost outright. This indicates to me that we haven’t considered Principle 4 enough. This principle provides a possible explanation that teams outside of the top-tier teams like the Chiefs, Saints, and Steelers are good but flawed and teams that are bad but not Jets, Bengals, Jaguars bad are competent enough to show up and beat any of these good but flawed teams. Number 3 – we overthink everything. We’d be in the black if we bet the Steelers/Chiefs/Saints every week and against teams like the Jets. For Number 4, I want to bring Yank in to explain this next observation. Yank, take it away!
Yank: You’ll hear people throwing around the idea that “home field advantage doesn’t matter” this year. There is probably some truth to that with no fans in the stands, but just because there is not as much advantage from a spread perspective, doesn’t mean there are no trends impacting home teams. Similar to Sam’s point on home underdogs above, there is a tangible takeaway for home favorites as well. Through week 12 the top 14 teams by record as home favorites (aka the best teams in the league) are a combined 48-6 straight up. So while it’s true when picking ATS it’s hard to discern if home field is a factor, the same is not true when trying to find winners. If we know who is going to win, we should be able to use that to make money in teases and money line parlays. You will see more teases from us going forward, largely on home favorites, for this reason.
Sam: Thanks for that explanation. In summary, we are looking at three new strategies:
- Don’t overthink it.
- Tease big-line favorites down, especially at home.
- Identify the home underdog(s) that we think are overlooked.
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.
- Division games are less predictable than non-division games, due to team/scheme familiarity.
Nominated Principles:
- Vegas knows better. Some lines don’t look like you think they should – be very careful.
Week 13 Picks
The Collaboration (5-8 ATS; 1-2 bonus bets):
Two-Team 6-Point Teaser:
The Philadelphia Eagles @ the Green Bay Packers-2.5 (was -8.5)
The Las Vegas Raiders-3 (was-9) @ the New York Jets
Yank: I am inciting the people’s revolution against Vegas this weekend. I have been terrible this season, falling into the traps they have laid for me over and over again, but no longer. We are avoiding the pitfalls and trying to exploit the edges described in the intro. One key element of that new strategy involves not overthinking. The Jets are TERRIBLE. We spend every week talking ourselves out of them because this may be the one week they show up. No longer. Vegas wants us to talk ourselves out of betting against them. I am throwing them in a teaser every week. The second leg of this tease involves the Packers at home, against the Eagles, in line with the principle I described above. The Packers are a good team, favored at home, against a bad team. They should win this game. If I am going down, I am going down swinging…and singing, the song of angry men, the music of the people who will not be squares again.
Sam: How can you not get totally jacked for this bet after that song? I’m ready to run through a wall now! There are a couple of takes I’ve been on this season that have played out well for me for the most part this season and betting on the Packers against bad teams is one of those takes. Rodgers is liable to go off and decimate them and if not a blow out, still grab the W. Every week I’m confused by the Eagles being bad, but it seems to be a pattern at this point. Why not try and capitalize on that? In the other matchup, we go against the Jets… enough said? Hopefully the Raiders have enough pride and are in a stock down spot, which I like. If they hadn’t been blown out by the Falcons I might have been scared off for another week. But this is the week of not overthinking it.
Yank’s Play: $6.53 on the Packers/Raiders Teaser (-120)
Sam’s Play: $13.06 on the Packers/Raiders Teaser (-120)
The Confrontation (7-5 Sam):
Postponed Indefinitely
The Isolation (Yank 6-12; Sam 9-13):
The Washington Football Team+7 @ the Pittsburgh Steelers
The Washington Football Team ML @ the Pittsburgh Steelers
The Detroit Lions ML @ the Chicago Bears
Sam: I’ve got 3 picks from 2 different matchups for you this week. In the first game, I have the FOOTBALL TEAM as a spread bet to fund the ML bet. The Steelers have no doubt been excellent this year and I’ve won a lot of my bets on them this year, but I have a couple of reasons why I’m going against them this week. 1 – The Steelers have won every game this year, but they’ve been actually pretty close games in most of them. 2 – The WFT is actually pretty competent as we’ve laid out a number of times this year. 3 – Particularly WFT is great rushing the passer and the Steelers have no run game right now, so I expect Ben to take some hits. 4 – Even great teams don’t go 16-0. Does that mean this is the week they lose? Maybe not, but its the most low-stakes game they have the rest of the way. They’ve got a big Bills game next week, which could be a recipe for overlooking a bad-record team in the WFT. 5 – Alex Smith has played pretty well recently, they’ve got some weapons on that side of the ball, and the Steelers are a little banged up losing Bud Dupree to another long list of stars getting hurt for the Steelers. In conclusion, I think WFT has a chance to win this game, I think they’ll most likely cover, so its worth the +275 odds. On the flipside of this, I would also recommend throwing the Steelers in a tease for the same reason I’m taking WFT+7. It should be a sneaky close one.
In the other game, I have the Lions to beat the Bears. Why on earth would I do that? Well, that’s a great question without a great answer but that doesn’t mean I have no reason. Here’s the reason: the Bears stink. They shouldn’t be favored over anyone even at home and even against the stinky Lions. While I have a lot of respect for the Bears’ defense, I do not have a lot of respect for Matt Nagy. This guy told the media that his players have to have some “personal pride,” that they need to work harder, and aren’t doing enough to prepare. Are you kidding me? Even if that’s all true, why the hell are you telling the media? Go tell your players that. Have some GD accountability for yourself. If your players aren’t prepared, that’s on you buddy. You’re their coach. You’re also an offensive minded coach and your offense sucks!! I don’t care who the QB is, the Bears have talented playmakers who should be getting the ball. At the end of the day, he seems like he sucks, I wouldn’t want to play for him, and we’ll see if his players don’t either. This could be a quit-on-the-coach spot, something the Lions just pulled off successfully last week. While I don’t think Bevel is a good coach either, hopefully the players come out with some energy because Patricia, who is even worse than Nagy, won’t be on the sideline this week. Additionally, I don’t think that Lions are as bad as they’ve played the last two weeks. They’ve got talent on both sides of the ball but just keep making losing plays. The recipe is that the Lions are inspired to play without Patricia and the Bears are ready to quit on Nagy. I don’t know that I would recommend betting on this game to anybody else, but it feels like an okay shot to me.
Sam’s Play: $5.00 on the WFT+7(-110), $3.00 on the WFT ML(+275) and $3.00 on the Lions ML(+145)
The Bank-Week 13
| Yank | Sam | |
| Starting: | $6.53 | $41.44 |
| Risk: | $6.53 | $24.06 |
| Potential Earnings: | $5.44 | $28.03 |
| Record: | 16-32 | 23-31 |
| Record against the Spread: | 13-22 | 16-21 |
Authors: Sam Mattson and Michael Yanckello
One Last Line 