Our Story (Part 1): How We Met

I want to tell our love story and how we met because I feel like it’s so unique. From how we met, to our difficult and challenging journey of getting married, I want to share it with as many people as I can. I think it’s fantastic and pretty funny. So here is how my mom hooked us up I met my wife.

It started back in September 2014 on a weekday evening. I was sitting in my parents’ house after work one night watching TV when my mom approached and asked me a question. “Do you want to go on a double date with your brother?” I thought for a second and my instant reaction was “Hell no.” But I thought for a second longer and said, “Sure, whatever. What do I have to lose?” I was not looking to date anybody. I didn’t want a girlfriend. I didn’t want to get married. I enjoyed being single and was single my whole life. My mom was starting to pressure me since I was 24 and working full-time, so part of it was just to get her to lay off me. I had told my mom many times that I don’t ever want to get married because it would just cause more problems in my life.

So I asked my mom to give me some details. Who would I be going with? What was she like? When would it be? So she explained to me how there was this girl who was an au pair who took care of three little girls ages 2-6 that took them to the preschool she taught at. “An au what? Au pair? What the heck is that?” She’s from Brazil and takes care of three girls for a family while she lives here and studies to improve her English. My mom told me that my brother had asked her about this girl after his recent break up. He knew about her from a connection with his ex. Earlier that day, my mom had asked her if she was interested in meeting my brother. She was 25 at the time and he was 22. When asked by my mom, she said something to the effect of “He’s too young for me.” That’s where 24 year old me came into the equation. So my mom asked this girl if she would be interested in meeting her 24 year old son instead and she said “Okay.” But that wasn’t good enough for my mom. This girl had to have a younger friend that could go with my brother and make it a double date. She said she would ask her friends and proceeded to give my mom her phone number.

So my mom gave me her phone number and told me to text her on behalf of both of us to set up a double date. I texted her the next night and introduced myself and my brother and asked if she had someone that could go on a double date with us. She told me that the two girls she had in mind didn’t want to go. One said the same thing that he was too young and the other wasn’t interested either. (She now told me that the second girl wanted to go on a date with me, but she told her that I was already hers. She had already stalked me on Facebook and found a picture of me.) So I thought, “Well, I guess I’m gonna have to ask her out myself.” I wasn’t expecting anything and a part of me didn’t want to do it. My mom was begging me to do it, so again, part of me did it just to please her. So I did it.

We scheduled our date for the next Sunday evening, and it ended up not being the kind of day I had hoped for. It was the same day as the home opener for the Jaguars that season against the Colts. I thought about how good this day could be: a Jags win and a nice date in the evening. I went with my brother and as we were walking to our seats I remember seeing the huge new video boards through a crack in the stadium. But then I got a text from her. It said something to the effect of “I’m sorry, but one of the kids got me sick. I’m not going to be able to go tonight.” My first thought was, “Wow. She doesn’t really want to go out with me. That’s fine.” But something told me to try one more time. So I asked her if we could reschedule it for next week and she again said yes. So we made it to our seats only to watch the Jaguars get their asses kicked, but we got to watch rookie quarterback Blake Bortles make his NFL debut in the second half. So it ended being a pretty awful day since I got neither a Jags win or a date, but I did get one last chance the following week.

We scheduled the date for the next Sunday evening, and I asked her if she wanted me to pick her up. She told me no and that she would meet me at the restaurant. So I get there about five minutes early and wait outside on a bench for – I kid you not – at least 30 minutes. After about 15 minutes, I’m sweating bullets thinking there’s no way this girl wants to meet me. Finally, I get the text after about 20-25 minutes of waiting I get the text: “I’m here.” It still took her another 5 minutes to get out of the car and start walking. I finally see her walking and I was stunned. I didn’t expect to see someone that beautiful. I introduce myself and we walk into the restaurant together.

Now, the date didn’t actually go so well. I had only been on a handful of dates in my life. It started by me walking in front of her as the hostess sat us at our table. And I knew I screwed up, but it was too late by then. So we sit down and start talking and I can barely hear a word she’s saying. I’m thinking to myself, “Am I talking to a mouse? I can barely hear her.” I just wanted to get to know her, but it was really difficult because she was still improving her English too. Then she ordered a salad for her entree. I was hoping she would take advantage of me taking her to a nice Italian cafe restaurant and order something better, but she refused. Then towards the end of the date she started choking on her food. And I was like, “Oh no, you’ve gotta be kidding me.” A couple sips of water and she was okay. So I pay the bill and walk her to her car and told her I had a great time (It was more just okay, not great). I gave her the ol’ one-armed hug – which she would later tell me was the worst hug in her life – and said goodbye.

On the way home I was thinking about the date and how attracted to her I really was. She was mostly my type: quiet, humble, smart, and dark hair. I thought she was too skinny for an overweight guy like me (I have now taught her how to eat right). She also wasn’t into sports as much as I was, but if we’re being honest, not many guys, let alone girls, watch and analyze sports like I do. So that wasn’t a surprise, but she did tell me how much she liked soccer, being from Brazil. At least that was something to build on. She was working on her accounting degree back home in Brazil and planning on taking the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) exam. I definitely thought there was some potential, so when I got home I texted her that I had a good time, when again it was really just okay. And I asked her for her last name so I could add her on Facebook. She took quite a while to respond and I don’t quite remember what else she said, but she did tell me her last name, so I sent her the friend request and she accepted not too much longer. I went to stalk her page immediately and noticed she had changed her profile picture just minutes earlier. I knew exactly what that meant.

 

 

 

College Football Week 9 Picks

Last week was what I had been waiting for all season. I knew it was bound to happen after my crazy, hot start. I went 6-13 overall and fell to 82-68 for the season, which is still a respectable +14. Still looking for my first 2-0 week in the O/U picks as I again went 1-1 for a total of 5-11 on the season. I am the Gus Bradley of picking O/U lines so far this year. Actually, Gus Bradley (14-40 as a head coach) wishes he could be as good of a head coach as I am at picking O/U lines. Anyway, here are my week 9 picks for just a meh college football slate this week.

#25 Virginia Tech (-3.5) at Pittsburgh: Virginia Tech has had a weird season. They’ve blown out all their opponents in their wins by at least 3 touchdowns and lost by at least 2 touchdowns in their two losses. I like their strong rushing defense to slow down Pitt’s rushing attack and win by a touchdown.

#22 Navy (+6.5) at USF: The computer polls don’t like Navy as this is their 2nd straight week being an underdog as a top 25 team. USF has one of the worst run defenses in all of college football, which does not bode well against a team like Navy. I like the Midshipmen to cover and possibly win here.

#10 West Virginia at Oklahoma State (+3.5): West Virginia is one of the last few unbeaten teams, but I think it ends this week. I like Mason Rudolph and Oklahoma State to be able to keep up in the passing game and win a high scoring game at the end.

#2 Michigan (-24.5) at Michigan State: Want to know how far Michigan State has fallen? According to Sagarin, they are rated below teams like UCF, Troy, and Middle Tennessee. Not even home-field advantage getting this many points against an in-state rival will help them.

#24 Penn State (-13) at Purdue: This one comes down to which team do I like less. Penn State pulled off the miraculous upset last week, but I’m not sure I’m buying them. But Purdue on the other hand is so bad. Also, I feel like the public will all be on Purdue expecting a bit of a letdown from Penn State after last week. So, I’m going to stick with Penn State with not much confidence at all.

#5 Louisville (-33) at Virginia: I’m not betting against Lamar Jackson anymore this year. Virginia has one of the worst defenses in all of college football. This should be easy.

#4 Washington at #17 Utah (+10): I love Washington and QB Jake Browning, but I think is too many points to give up against a quality opponent on the road. And Washington has to play a close game eventually.

#8 Baylor (-3.5) at Texas: This is not going to end well for Charlie Strong and Texas. Their defense can’t stop anyone except Iowa State. Baylor is going to roll in this one.

Northwestern (+26.5) at #6 Ohio State: I’m still a believer in Ohio State after last week and still think they have a very good chance of winning out and making the playoff. Northwestern matches up well though with their strong run defense. This is way too many points to lay in what I think will be a fairly low scoring game.

#14 Florida (-7.5) vs. Georgia: I’m taking Florida in this one, but I’m kind of nervous about it. Computer ratings have the Gators winning this game anywhere between 14-21 points. And also, this rivalry always seems to be close or have the underdog winning outright. Florida will be well rested and healthy after having bye weeks 2 of the last 3 weeks, and I have them winning 23-14.

#7 Nebraska (+9) at #11 Wisconsin: Another low scoring game here where I think too many points are being given up. This will be another snooze fest, but I really like Nebraska to cover in this one.

#13 Boise State at Wyoming (+13.5): I’m all over a lot of underdogs this week and this is another one. It’s actually not a great matchup for Wyoming, but again this is too many points for me to feel comfortable taking Boise State on the road.

Kansas (+40.5) at #16 Oklahoma: This one all comes down to when does Bob Stoops pull the starters and will Kansas backdoor cover? Oklahoma’s pass defense is so bad, that I think Kansas might actually be able to score a touchdown or two on them before they get pulled. I’ll take the Jayhawks to cover fairly easily.

#15 Auburn at Ole Miss (+4.5): I’m going to regret this, but I’m picking Hugh Freeze. Ole Miss is still a very high rated team according to the computers because of how many close losses they have. Everyone will be on Auburn after their blowout win over Arkansas last week. Maybe Ole Miss will actually win a close game for once or maybe Freeze will make another awful decision and lose another close one by 1-4 points.

#18 Tennessee at South Carolina (+13.5): This is a tough one for me as Tennessee is really banged up after that brutal 4 game stretch, but they did have an extra week to rest up. South Carolina has an awful run defense as well, but I’ll play it safe and take another home dog.

New Mexico State (+43.5) at #9 Texas A&M: It’s hard to get a more lopsided matchup between two FBS opponents. A&M will pull the starters early in this one and New Mexico State has a decent passing attack. I like them to backdoor cover.

#3 Clemson at #12 Florida State (+4.5): This is the best game of the week and I love FSU in this one. Clemson has been so lucky in close games this year and I think they will finally lose a close one here. FSU’s defense has been playing better the past couple weeks. Noles at home and at night getting 4.5 points is my lock of the week.

Over Pick of the Week – Texas Tech at TCU (86.5): Another high Texas Tech total, but I can’t fade this one. This one has two passing defenses in the bottom 1/4th of the country and two passing offenses in the top 15 in the country.

Under Pick of the Week – Duke at Georgia Tech (50.5): This one features two defenses in the top 1/3rd of the country and two offenses in the bottom 1/3rd of the country in overall YPG. I’ll be damned if I don’t go 2-0 this week.

 

College Football Week 8 Picks and Updated Rankings

Before I give my picks for the week, I want to give my updated rankings since I wasn’t able to do them earlier or do a recap of last week’s biggest games.

My first ranking is what I call my “resume” rankings where only wins and losses matter. This is how the Committee decides the Playoff, not by how good the teams actually are. I stop at 15 to include all teams that still have a chance at the College Football Playoff, in my opinion. Western Michigan and the two loss teams are extreme long shots, but I still think they have the smallest of chances. The top 4 teams are my playoff teams.

1. Alabama (7-0): Another dominating win for Bama. Don’t have to think twice about this one.
2. Ohio State (6-0): Fortunate to win at Wisconsin, but that’s what Urban Meyer does. Easy number 2 after Bama.
3. Washington (6-0): Been as dominant as any team in the country. Should get in as a 1-loss Pac 12 champ.
4. Clemson (7-0): Should’ve lost at home to NC State, but still think they win the ACC championship, which gets them into the playoff.
5. Michigan (6-0): Have them losing to Ohio State, which is why they are out.
6. Texas A&M (6-0): A couple OT wins might make them a little lucky, but they are atop the second tier of undefeateds.
7. Baylor (6-0): Not a very difficult schedule so far, but have been impressive.
8. Nebraska (6-0): No real impressive wins either. Have road games at Wisconsin and Ohio State back to back in a couple weeks.
9. West Virginia (5-0): Held a very good Texas Tech offense to 17 points. Have Oklahoma and Baylor at home and could contend for the Big 12 title.
10. Louisville (5-1): Easily the most impressive 1-loss team.
11. Utah (6-1): A win against USC is starting to look more impressive. Tough couple games coming up at UCLA and Washington at home.
12. Florida (5-1): Haven’t beaten anybody, but do have a “good” loss at Tennessee.
13. Boise State (6-0): Unbeaten but not in a Power 5 conference. Washington State win is looking pretty good too.
14. Western Michigan (7-0): Most dominant non-Power 5 team.
15. Wisconsin/Oklahoma/Tennessee tie (4-2): Best two loss resume teams that can still realistically win their conference.

 

My second ranking is my team strength rankings in which wins and losses don’t matter. This is my ranking of the teams by how good I actually think they are. Think of it as who I think would win if the two teams being compared played on a neutral field. For instance, Houston beat Oklahoma on a neutral field in week one. But if they played on a neutral field x number of times, I think Oklahoma would win more than 50% of the time.

1. Alabama
2. Ohio State
3. Michigan
4. Louisville
5. Washington
6. Clemson
7. Texas A&M
8. Oklahoma
9. Houston
10. Wisconsin

 

Finally, here are my picks against the spread. Bounced back from my first losing week to go 11-8 last week and move back to +21 on the season at 76-55. O/U continues to be a disaster with an 0-2 week (Screw you Hugh Freeze playing not to lose) and I’m now 4-10 on the season. Have to keep going though as Clay Travis says, “Shooters shoot.” My picks are the lines in parentheses and offense and defense ranks are in yards per game.

BYU at #14 Boise State (-7): Six of BYU’s seven games have been decided by 7 points or less. I like Boise here though because of their strong passing attack versus a weak BYU pass defense ranked 100th.

#10 Wisconsin (-3.5) at Iowa: Wisconsin showed last week that they are for real. I was not a believer after the LSU win, but now I am. I have a hard time seeing Iowa being able to score at all in this one. I’ll take the Badgers.

NC State (+20) at #7 Louisville: NC State should’ve beaten Clemson last week, but #CollegeKickers. Their defense should be good enough to slow Lamar Jackson down enough to cover.

#22 North Carolina (-8) at Virginia: This is an awful matchup for Virginia as they have the 114th ranked pass defense in the country. That’s not going to be good enough to keep up with Mitch Trubisky and a high tempo, pass first North Carolina offense.

TCU (+5.5) at #12 West Virginia: Two very evenly matched teams with good offenses and below average defenses. That means take the points even if the team is on the road.

Purdue at #8 Nebraska (-24): Purdue has the 124th ranked rushing defense in the country, while Nebraska has the 27th ranked rushing offense. Should be field day for Tommy Armstrong Jr. and Nebraska.

Eastern Michigan at #20 Western Michigan (-23.5): Eastern Michigan was one of the worst teams in all of FBS last season and they have really overachieved so far this year at 5-2. Even though I haven’t watched them, I think Western Michigan might be for real.

#6 Texas A&M (+18.5) at #1 Alabama: This is a good matchup for A&M’s defense as they struggle defending the pass, which isn’t Alabama’s strength. I think this is Nick Saban’s best Alabama team ever, but I can’t see them beating A&M by more than 18 even at home.

Memphis at #24 Navy (+2.5): This is an interesting line. A top 25 home team is an underdog versus an unranked team. This is tough to pick as Memphis has a good rush defense, but you never know with this Navy triple option. I’ll take the home team and the points.

Illinois at #3 Michigan (-35.5): Wouldn’t be surprised if this reaches Rutgers territory for Michigan. Illinois won’t score in this one.

#19 Utah at UCLA (-7): A 6-1 team is a touchdown underdog versus a 3-4 team. UCLA has been really unlucky in close game this year, and Utah has a ton of injuries. I like Josh Rosen and the Bruins.

#17 Arkansas (+10) at #21 Auburn: Another interesting line from Vegas. Also interesting to note that Sagarin has Auburn ranked 11th ahead of teams like Wisconsin, FSU,  Houston, and Baylor. The only advantage I see is Auburn’s rushing attack against Arkansas’ rushing defense. But I think Austin Allen is good enough to keep this one close.

Oregon State at #5 Washington (-37): Another insanely high line for two in-conference opponents. This is as bad a matchup as it can get for Oregon State. Washington wins by at least 40.

#11 Houston (-21) at SMU: Greg Ward Jr. and Houston will rebound after two bad games and will have a field day against an SMU defense ranked 109th overall.

#16 Oklahoma at Texas Tech (+14): This is my lock of the week as Texas Tech will be able to match Oklahoma’s passing attack with their own. Oklahoma’s passing defense has been just as weak as Tech’s, and I like Tech to come back at home after a poor performance last week against West Virginia.

#2 Ohio State (-19.5) at Penn State: Terrible matchup for Penn State with their sieve of a rushing defense. Love the Buckeyes to get back to blowing out opponents again.

#23 Ole Miss at #25 LSU (-6): Hugh Freeze makes me angry. He plays scared when making in-game coaching decisions. Give me LSU and Coach O for no other reason.

Over Pick of the Week: TCU at West Virginia (65.5): Two high ranked offenses versus two low ranked defenses as I mentioned above. And a much lower line than Oklahoma-Texas Tech. Love this one.

Under Pick of the Week: Wisconsin at Iowa (42.5): This is by far the lowest total of the top 25 games this week. I think the public will be all over this one too, which scares me. I’m going to stick with it though as I have a hard time seeing either team getting to 20 points.

College Football Week 7 Picks

Finally took a big L last week going 6-9 (nice). But I was way overdue for a bad week, and I’m still at +18 for the season at 65-47. I still can’t get a perfect 2-0 in the O/U picks as I went 1-1 again, moving to 4-8 for the season. Looking for a nice bounce back week and my first 2-0 for O/U. I can’t believe it’s week 7 already and some teams will be surpassing the midway point of their regular season. Not a very good slate of games this week, but there are two top 10 matchups I’m really looking forward to. Let’s get to it.

Duke at #7 Louisville (-34.5): Louisville is coming off a bye week after a fantastic game against Clemson, despite the loss. In Duke’s 4 games against FBS opponents not named Notre Dame, they are averaging 15 points a game. I just don’t see Duke being able to score enough to keep up and cover. Take the Cards big.

Kansas State at #19 Oklahoma (-14): I still feel Oklahoma is underrated even with their porous defense. This is a good matchup for Oklahoma as Kansas State has the 116th ranked passing offense in the country, which has been Oklahoma’s weakness on defense. I like the Sooners to hold them enough to cover.

NC State at #3 Clemson (-17.5): Clemson gets an extra day of rest coming off the win against BC last Friday night. NC State has good defensive stats, but that may be skewed because of a weak schedule and them coming off a 10-3 win over Notre Dame during Hurricane Matthew where the only touchdown came on a blocked punt. I’ll go with Deshaun Watson to have a big game at home and the Tigers to cover.

#20 West Virginia at Texas Tech (+1): First one to 50 might win this game. Seriously. The O/U on this game is 83. Both teams have top 20 offenses and defenses ranked in the bottom half of all FBS teams. Texas Tech QB Patrick Mahomes leads the nation in passing at 455 yards per game. I’ll go with him and the Red Raiders to get it done at home.

#24 Western Michigan (-12) at Akron: Western Michigan might actually be a legitimate top 25 team. They’ve already beaten Northwestern, Illinois, and Central Michigan all on the road. And the only close one was at Northwestern by one point. I think they could be the second best non-Power 5 conference team behind Houston. Akron’s defense is among the worst in the country. Give me the Broncos in an easy win.

Kansas at #11 Baylor (-35): Kansas nearly pulled off one of the biggest upsets last week against TCU, but missed a field goal in the final seconds. They have now lost 14 straight Big 12 games. I like Baylor coming off a bye and Kansas returning back to being a dismal team once again.

#1 Alabama at #9 Tennessee (+12): Eventually Alabama has to have a close game. As good as they are, I refuse to believe they are going to win every game by double digits. Tennessee has a ton of injuries and they are coming off the 5 hour marathon against Texas A&M. I still think they will be able to keep this one close. Bama wins by a touchdown.

North Carolina (+7) at #16 Miami: Despite getting nearly shutout against Virginia Tech in the storm last weekend, I still love North Carolina’s passing attack. Miami’s defensive numbers are good, but they hadn’t played anyone until Florida State last weekend. Miami won’t lose two in a row at home and it will be a close one, but UNC covers.

#10 Nebraska (-3) at Indiana: This game opened at Indiana (+6) and has been bet all the way down to +3. I know Indiana beat, in my opinion, an overrated Michigan State team and covered against Ohio State, but only 3 points? I’m no fan of Nebraska, but I think this is way too low. Write this one in stone and lock this one up. Also heard a funny stat earlier today. Of the four FBS teams in Indiana (Indiana, Purdue, Ball State, and Notre Dame), Notre Dame has the worst record.

Wake Forest at #14 Florida State (-21.5): FSU’s defense finally showed up last week against Miami and they have a great matchup this week against Wake Forest whose offense ranks 110th. I like the Noles big in this one.

#17 Virginia Tech at Syracuse (+19.5): Interesting matchup here as VA Tech has a great defense and an average offense, and Syracuse has a great passing offense and a horrible defense. When the units are fairly similar on both sides of the ball, I would think taking the home team and the points is the right play. But maybe the Hokies will force some turnovers that give them short fields and allow them cover. I’ll go with the former.

#21 Utah at Oregon State (+9): So apparently Utah is down to its sixth string running backand fourth string center. This is also supposed to be a low scoring game with the O/U at 41. Oregon State is pretty bad and this is two teams I don’t know much about, so I’ll just take the home team and the points and move on.

Missouri at #18 Florida (-13.5): The Gators get starting QB Luke Del Rio back after a “bye” week where they “ducked” LSU. Missouri’s defense may be just what Florida needs to get going on offense. I think they do and win by 17 on homecoming. In McElwain I Still Trust.

#12 Ole Miss at #22 Arkansas (+7.5): This game features the two best passing quarterbacks in the SEC and there’s nobody else even close. Arkansas may not be as good as we had thought, but I still love Austin Allen. Combine that with the game at home and an Ole Miss defense that really struggles, I like the Razorbacks to cover here. I’ll still stick with Chad Kelly and Ole Miss to win, but give me Arkansas +7.5.

Tulsa at #13 Houston (-21): Have to wonder how Houston will respond the rest of the season after the disappointing loss to Navy. Tom Herman needs to continue to show that he’s an elite coach, and I think they’ll bounce back against a Tulsa team that struggles against the pass. I’ll take Houston to cover the 21 points.

#2 Ohio State at #8 Wisconsin (+10.5): I can’t believe Urban Meyer has yet to lose a true road game at Ohio State. That’s an unbelievable stat for a guy in his 4th season. I think he will remain undefeated after this one, but I’ll be damned if they cover against a defense like Wisconsin’s. I’ll take the Badgers.

Colorado State (+28.5) at #15 Boise State: I have no idea what to make of Boise State again as I have yet to watch a single minute of them play this year. Apparently they have a really good quarterback named Brett Rypien who has thrown 11 touchdowns to 3 interceptions so far. This just seems like too many points to lay, so I’ll take CSU with zero confidence.

Over Pick of the Week – Ole Miss at Arkansas (67): Two top passing offenses versus two average to below average defenses. I like my chances in the over with this one.

Under Pick of the Week – Ohio State at Wisconsin (44): This is an awful matchup for the Wisconsin offense as OSU is top 10 in overall, rushing, and pass defense. Ohio State’s strength on offense is running the football and Ohio State is 6th in the country in stopping the run. Under is the easy play here.

 

College Football Week 6 Recap, Florida-LSU, Rankings

Texas vs. Oklahoma: It pains me to say it, but the Charlie Strong era is over. I really like Charlie from his time at Florida. He was a very good coach and a good defensive coordinator. It just hasn’t worked out at Texas. It looked like they might be able to pull off the upset in the first half, but their defense is just not good enough.

Everyone thought Texas was back after the big win against Notre Dame in Week 1, but I was still hesitant to come to that conclusion. Now we know that Notre Dame isn’t very good at 2-4 and might not even make a bowl game.

The question now is does Texas allow Charlie to finish out the season? My guess is one more loss and they probably let him go, but that’s just pure speculation. Texas has to go after Tom Herman hard now, and I think he would undoubtedly take the position.

If, for whatever reason, Herman doesn’t take the Texas position, I think the next best realistic candidates would be Les Miles or Jimbo Fisher. Miles is available and I think he would no doubt take the position. Jimbo may want out of FSU with the personal issues he’s gone through the last year, but I’d be surprised if he left. I’ve seen some people suggest Art Briles and I’d be pretty shocked if Texas went that route with the Baylor mess from last year.

Tennessee at Texas A&M: Have to give credit to Tennessee. Yes, they’ve been lucky and that luck (or pixie dust as Verne put it) ran out yesterday. But they don’t ever quit until the final whistle and that’s an attribute to Butch Jones, who also deserves a lot of credit.

This loss yesterday actually proved to me that Tennessee is a legit top 10 team despite the crazy amount of luck they’ve had this season. I’d still be pretty shocked if they were able to pull off the upset next week against Alabama considering the way Alabama is playing right now.

I think they’ll lose to Alabama next week and run the table pretty easily the rest of the way and finish 10-2. Florida will lose at least one more SEC game and the Vols will play for the SEC championship. I’ll talk about the Florida-LSU mess later.

Houston at Navy: Ugh, I was so looking forward to undefeated Houston and undefeated Louisville playing in November and that unfortunately is not going to happen now. I thought Navy would keep this one close, but no way did I see this happening. And how cool was it see Navy rush the field?

Houston now has almost no shot of making the College Football Playoff. Even if they can run the table and beat Louisville, their schedule is just not strong enough to put them over other potential one-loss teams. We’ll see how it plays out, but right now it doesn’t look good for Houston. This also shows just how difficult it is to go undefeated in college football, even against a mediocre schedule.

Florida State at Miami: This was a bit of a surprise for me. I thought this was an awful matchup on the road for FSU playing a very good QB in Brad Kaaya. And the FSU defense really stepped up.

The Noles started off slow going into the half down 13-3. Then after a quick 3 and out, Miami was driving into FSU territory looking to go up 20-3. And then Kaaya made an awful throw that was intercepted by Tarvarus McFadden in the endzone, which completely turned the game around.

After a couple touchdowns and a field goal, the Noles went up by a touchdown. On one of the drives, Miami’s Jamal Carter was thrown out of the game for targeting, which is the worst rule and is ruining college football. Nobody knows exactly what constitutes a “targeting” call and neither do defenders. But it was funny that it allowed Miami fans to show their asses by throwing trash onto the field.

Miami then drove down for what seemed like the game tying touchdown only to have the PAT blocked by DeMarcus Walker. This was a very impressive win all around by the Noles. The defense was great compared to what they had been and Jimbo called a great game. Deondre Francois is going to be so good and that really sucks as a Florida fan. He was outstanding in the second half going 11/13 for 152 yards and 2 TDs.

This is a down year for FSU and they can still prove they are the best team in the state by beating Florida at the end of the season. Miami still controls their own destiny to the ACC title game, but the game at Virginia Tech in a couple weeks looks a lot more difficult.

LSU at Florida postponement: So this has been the biggest story out of the SEC this weekend, and I want to give my thoughts on this. Early in the week everyone was wondering why they kept pushing the announcement back about the game. They finally made the decision on Thursday afternoon to postpone the game due to uncertainty of conditions and personnel needed for the game, which to me seemed like the right decision at the time.

This sent LSU beat writers and media into a frenzy because Florida refused to play the game in Baton Rouge. And why blame them? They didn’t want to lose the only quality home game on the schedule this year. At the same time, LSU doesn’t want to make up the game by canceling their home game against South Alabama and play three straight SEC road games. It’s because you have a significant disadvantage playing on the road!

And then the conspiracy theory came out that Florida AD Jeremy Foley fooled SEC commissioner Greg Sankey into canceling the game. This is just total absurdity. The only thing Foley said that I wasn’t buying was that it was impossible to make a road trip to LSU with such short notice. I think they didn’t want to move the game, and like I just said, who can blame them? But to suggest he fooled or tricked Sankey is just asinine. Sankey is a grown ass man who understands what he’s dealing with and made the decision.

And then you have guys like Fox Sports’ Clay Travis, who I normally like, calling Florida “scared” and talking about the good weather in Gainesville on Saturday, other games being played in-state, and other games being played in poor conditions like NC State/Notre Dame and UNC/VA Tech. It’s really easy to say that in hindsight. It’s a shame he would come to these conclusions with no evidence whatsoever other than his feelings. He should be smarter than that having graduated with a law degree from Vanderbilt University.

Here’s my final conclusion on what happened. Florida no way wanted to play the game in Baton Rouge, and they were overly cautious in postponing the game indefinitely. Florida wasn’t trying to postpone the game to try to get healthier with Del Rio being injured, and they weren’t trying to gain an advantage in the standings by playing one less game. As Sankey said on the CBS broadcast, the game has to be played. In hindsight, the game probably could have been played on Saturday or Sunday like Georgia and South Carolina are doing as I’m writing this.

There’s really only two scenarios for making up this game. The best one is playing it on December 3rd. If the game has SEC championship implications, then the championship game has to be moved back a week to December 10th. This was done in 2001 for 9/11 when Florida and Tennessee played to decide the SEC East. (That still remains one of the most frustrating Gator games I’ve ever watched). This also allows Florida and LSU to keep their scheduled “cupcake” home games and only forces one game to be moved back a week. If the game doesn’t have SEC championship implications, play it on 12/3 anyways at noon and have an SEC double header with the championship game to follow. Pretty simple.

The other scenario is playing on November 19th. The SEC would have to buyout both cupcake games that the teams have scheduled and make up for lost revenue for LSU. This would mean LSU would have three straight road games, and as Yahoo’s Pat Forde put it “Deal with it.” Sometimes unfortunate circumstances happen. I do think that if this were to happen that LSU’s Thanksgiving game against Texas A&M should be moved back two days later to Saturday. But this scenario is just much more complicated.

Bottom line is this game needs to be played, and I think it ultimately will regardless of impact in the standings.

Rankings: Finally, I’m going to give my rankings, but I’m going to start doing it a little differently this week. One thing I’ve learned while watching sports is there’s a difference between how good a team actually is and how good a team’s “resume” is. So I’m going to give two different rankings. One that is simply based off of a team’s “resume” or results and one based on how good I actually think the teams are. The first one is my resume rankings, which is how I think teams should be ranked because it’s the one where the only thing that matters is wins and losses. However, the top 4 is my current projection of the College Football Playoff. Here it is:

1. Alabama (6-0)
2. Ohio State (5-0)
3. Clemson (6-0)
4. Washington (6-0)
5. Michigan(6-0)
6. Texas A&M (6-0)
7. Baylor (5-0)
8. Nebraska (5-0)
9. West Virginia (4-0)
10. Louisville (4-1)
11. Tennessee (5-1)
12. Virginia Tech (4-1)
13. Wisconsin (4-1)
14. Utah (5-1)
15. Miami and Florida (tie) (4-1)

I have all undefeated Power 5 conference teams ranked above everyone else because they currently have perfect “resumes” since they haven’t lost yet. The rest of the teams are 1 loss Power 5 conference teams ranked by resume. When looking a team’s resume I value “quality” wins over “bad” or “good” losses.

Next is my quality team or projection ranking which ranks how good teams are regardless of wins and losses.

1. Alabama: I think this is Nick Saban’s best team he’s ever had. They beat a good Arkansas team on the road by 19 and it wasn’t even that close.
2. Ohio State: Struggled a little with Indiana but still no concern. Big test next week at Wisconsin.
3. Michigan: Could’ve scored 100 on Rutgers if they wanted.
4. Washington: Complete domination of Stanford and scoring 70 at Oregon warrant a top 4 ranking.
5. Clemson: Clemsoning is no longer a thing after the beatdown of Boston College.
6. Louisville: Bye week and other teams looking really good.
7. Texas A&M: They are good, but two overtime wins suggest they might be a little lucky. Bye week and then they go to Bama.
8. Tennessee: Yes, they are lucky. But they are really good and have a deep roster.
9. Houston: Playoff hopes are done, but still think they are a top 10 team in strength.
10. Oklahoma: Lost to two really good teams. I still think this team is legit even with defensive problems.

Week 6 College Football Picks

Five weeks down, and five weeks in the green to start the season. Not as good of a week by going 12-10, but it’s positive so we’re keeping the streak going. Would’ve gone 13-9 if college football allowed extra points to be kicked on scores that occur on the final play of the game like the NFL does. I’m now up to +21 at 59-38 for the season, but a dismal 3-7 in O/U picks.

Week 6 has a few good matchups, but six of the AP top 25 teams are on byes, so we don’t have as many games this week to pick. Also, Florida and LSU is now postponed because of Hurricane Matthew. If the postponement of this game impacts the race for the SEC championship, they have to find a way to play it. It would be totally unfair for another team to get left out because of one of these two teams playing one less game.

Anyway, let’s get to my week 6 picks. As a reminder, I base my picks off of odds and statistical probabilities based on previous results to predict future outcomes rather than breaking down team strengths and individual matchups. I’m not much of a football scheme and formation type of guy. Give me statistics, probabilities, and numbers to help me predict the games. My picks are the lines in parentheses.

#3 Clemson (-17) at Boston College: Boston College’s head coach is Steve Addazio. As a Gator fan, I know what to do in this one. The Eagles lost to Virginia Tech 49-0 three weeks ago. It’s pretty likely we’ll see a similar result in this one. Clemson is coming off an emotional win over Louisville, and I expect them to put the “Clemsoning” narrative to bed.

#19 Boise State at New Mexico (+17): Boise State underwhelmed a little last week against Utah State. New Mexico is not very good having lost to Rutgers and awful New Mexico State already. Can’t tell you much about either team so I’ll just close my eyes and ride with the home underdog getting two touchdowns and a field goal.

Texas (+10) vs #20 Oklahoma: I wasn’t sold on Texas even after the home win against Notre Dame. But now they are getting 10 points on a neutral field in a rivalry game, and we saw what happened last year. Oklahoma is really underrated and I wouldn’t be shocked if they totally blew Texas out. If that happens, Charlie Strong may be fired next week. Just going to play the odds and hope Texas can keep it reasonable.

#6 Houston at Navy (+17): Greg Ward and Houston have been very impressive to start the year. Navy always seems to have an underrated, well coached team. They also run the triple option, which could give Houston problems. Even with Keenan Reynolds gone, I like Navy and the points here at home.

Indiana (+29) at #2 Ohio State: Indiana may actually not as bad of a team as we think. They beat an overrated Michigan State team last week thanks to a leaping penalty on a missed field goal that allowed them to re-kick. Ohio State has been really impressive so far, and I feel a little bit of a letdown coming with a big game next week at Wisconsin. I’ll take the Hoosiers to keep it within the spread.

#9 Tennessee at #8 Texas A&M (-7): Tennessee has been very lucky so far this year, but they are still a very good team. I love what I’ve seen from Texas A&M this year especially on defense. I like them to win big at home in this one after their somewhat disappointing game and Tennessee’s Hail Mary last week.

#25 Virginia Tech at #17 North Carolina (-2.5): I know FSU’s defense was horrendous, by I loved what I saw from the Tar Heels and QB Mitch Trubisky. Virginia Tech has blown out all of their bad opponents and lost to Tennessee thanks to some awful fumble luck. I think UNC is just a little bit better, and I just need them to win by a field goal at home.

#21 Colorado at USC (-4.5): Colorado is in the top 25 for the first time since the 2005 season. I’ve talked about how poorly coached I think USC is, but they have had a brutal schedule with three road games against top 25 teams. The computer polls still like them despite the poor record, so I’ll pick them to beat a quality team at home by a touchdown.

#1 Alabama at #16 Arkansas (+14): Arkansas might be a little overrated, but I really don’t get this line at all. I mean, everybody and their brother has to be taking Arkansas in this one. Alabama is great, but 14 points on the road at night with a true Freshman QB against a very good QB, great? I’d be shocked, I tell you. Shocked. If Vegas is right, you just have to tip your cap to them. This is my lock of the week.

#4 Michigan (-27.5) at Rutgers: I can’t believe this is the third game this season I’ve had to pick a game involving Rutgers. I don’t care that they’re at home in this one. It’s going to be similar to the other results. Michigan wins by at least 40.

#5 Washington at Oregon (+9): Oregon has been absolutely dreadful on defense so far this year, and they are coming off a three game losing skid. Washington is coming off a total beatdown of a very good Stanford team. I actually love the home team and the points in this one and actually wouldn’t be shocked if they pulled off the upset.

#23 Florida State at #10 Miami (-3): I wonder when the last time FSU was unranked. I think it’s going to happen after this one. Brad Kaaya should be able to pick apart the FSU defense, and I doubt Jimbo will make any strategic changes in coaching for this one. He’ll likely play conservatively again in the first half, despite knowing he’s going to have to score a lot to win this one. I’ll take the Hurricanes to win by about 10.

Arizona (+10) at #24 Utah: When in doubt, take the team getting points especially if the team laying points appears to be overrated. Utah is 41st in the Sagarin PREDICTOR  and Arizona is 58. So these two teams aren’t too far apart in terms of predicting future outcomes. Remember Arizona took Washington to overtime just a couple of weeks ago.

Washington State at #15 Stanford (-7): Despite the awful loss to Washington, Stanford is still a very good team. I know Mike Leach likes to throw it around and score points, but I think the Stanford defense will bounce back and slow them down. Going out on a limb and saying McCaffrey won’t have a bad game again and will lead the Cardinal to a big win.

Over Pick of the Week – Virginia Tech at UNC (58): Sigh. The O/U picks have just been atrocious as I haven’t gone 2-0 in a week yet. It’s going to change this week. This one may have weather implications, but both of these teams are averaging over 40 points a game. Still think this is a good bet.

Under Pick of the Week – Auburn at Mississippi State (54.5): Well, I was going to have the Florida-LSU game here, but we got a postponement and a possible cancellation. This is the highest under consensus pick according to oddsshark.com. In 3 games versus Power 5 opponents, Auburn is averaging just over 15 points per game. In it’s two SEC games, Mississippi State averaged 23.5 points per game. Small samples, I know, but both teams have strong defenses and both struggle passing the ball. Expect a low scoring one here.

College Football Week 5 Recap

Did yesterday really happen? I woke up this morning and thought it was a dream. That’s got to go down as one of the best weekends of finishes in college football maybe ever. I’m just going to give my thoughts on how awful the Gators looked and those three outstanding finishes. I’ll also give my top 10 teams as well.

Florida at Vandy: The combined score of this game the past two seasons is 22-13 in favor of Florida. That is unbelievable. Good thing there weren’t many better games in the noon time slot because this was the biggest snooze fest of the day.

We all know the offense is not very good, especially with an inept QB like Appleby. I thought he would be okay with what I thought was much better talent around him than he had at Purdue. But maybe the talent on offense at Florida isn’t much better than Purdue, and that’s really a problem. He got no help from the offensive line or the running game, other than Jordan Scarlett.

And why the hell is McElwain so stubborn in sticking with the four running back rotation? I was surprised to see Jordan Scarlett still has the most carries of the four, but he needs to be the feature back getting around 15-20 carries per game. I’ve been calling for this since week one, and he’s still sticking with giving Thompson and Cronkrite carries who are just okay, in my opinion. They certainly aren’t at the talent level of Scarlett. And it was clear yesterday that Scarlett had the hot hand and he needed to get more carries.

This has been my biggest issue with McElwain. He did it last year with Treon Harris too. I knew Josh Grady probably wouldn’t have been much better if at all, but you had to try something different. I still think he’s an excellent tactical decision maker when it comes to fourth down percentages, field position, and clock management, which is why I still think he’s ultimately the right guy for the job. And it makes me feel good when I see other supposedly top tier coaches (*cough* Jimbo *cough*) make awful tactical decisions. Although, Mac did have his worst clock management decision at the end of the first half yesterday by leaving a timeout on the board and not giving us an extra chance to score a touchdown. He’s got to turn the offense around and keep winning to be able to attract the top recruits and talent in the state of Florida.

Even with Luke Del Rio possibly returning next week, I don’t have much confidence the offense will look a whole lot better. With Tennessee winning yesterday, the SEC East race is all but over. Tennessee would have to lose the next two weeks against Texas A&M and Bama (which I think is likely), and Florida would have to win out in the SEC (which is no way happening). The Gators will have a tough one next week as LSU looked damn good with interim head coach Ed Orgeron taking over. I think a 9-3 finish to the season would be excellent and is still reasonable. I predicted 8-4 before the start and anything less than that there will be major concerns with the team and coaching staff.

UNC at FSU and Tennessee at Georgia: This was the greatest 20 minute span in college football history. I actually was watching the second half of both games simultaneously on my mobile devices. I had the Tennessee game on my iPhone and the FSU game on my iPad. After the FSU game ended I switched my iPad to Twitter and the ending of the Georgia game was ruined for me because of the delay on mobile. Oh well. It could’ve been worse. My dad said he turned off both games thinking they were both over.

Let’s start with UNC at FSU. The Noles defense is just an absolute sieve, and we all knew that coming into this game. And the Tar Heels’ offense is really good with their up-tempo play and aggressive passing attack with Mitch Trubisky, who’s been great so far this year. As Tomahawk Nation’s Bud Elliott pointed out all game, Jimbo and the coaching staff knew they were going to have score a lot of points to win this game. Instead, he opted to kick field goals in the first quarter, and they missed all three. Now two of them were in 4th and long situations, but field goals weren’t going to win this game. And on top of that, you have a true freshman kicker, even though his older brother was the Christ. Jimbo can bring the talent in, but he mismanages game situations so badly.

And then UNC had their own set of bonehead plays to allow FSU to get back in it. The stupid guy trying to block the punt and roughing the punter was idiotic when the Noles were backed up to like 2nd and 30 earlier in the drive. And then on the Noles final offensive drive, they left Dalvin Cook wide open on third down after they were backed up to 2nd and 25 after a penalty. This game should’ve never ended the way it did, but as a Florida fan, it was nice to see FSU get Janikowski’d. See the original here and fast forward to the 2:59:45 mark.

And then the total swing of emotion in the Tennessee-Georgia game is unlike anything I’ve seen. Jacob Eason’s touchdown pass with ten seconds left was one of the most beautiful touchdown passes I’ve ever seen, let alone by a true freshman in a late game situation. How does Tennessee let the receiver get behind them there? And then why the heck did Georgia kick a high, short pooch kick on the kickoff? You kick the ball as far as you can. Maybe I don’t know what I’m talking about.

Anyway, the good fortune for the Vols continues after this one and all but locks up the SEC East for them. If they can find a way to split the next two games with Texas A&M and Alabama, they will likely head into the SEC championship game with one loss and a de-facto play-in game to get into the College Football Playoff.

Louisville at Clemson: The other two games had the best finishes, but this was the overall best game of the day. We were watching what may go down as two of the greatest quarterbacks to ever play college football. I can’t believe Lamar Jackson is only a sophomore and we get a whole year to watch him again next season. He had the greatest incomplete pass we’ve all ever seen. And his sidestep is the best I think I’ve ever seen from a quarterback. It sucks his wide receiver wasn’t aware of where the first down marker was at the end. In my mind, he lost no ground in the Heisman race.

Deshaun Watson made some bad throws in this game, but he stepped up when his team needed him and he made the big plays. Clemson is now in the driver’s seat to win the ACC Atlantic division with their toughest remaining games being at Florida State and a potential ACC title game. The biggest question coming out of this one is what does the Committee do with a 1 loss Louisville who doesn’t win their division? There wouldn’t be many quality wins other than an FSU team who isn’t as good as we thought and a really good one at Houston. They would need a lot of help, but I think it’s certainly possible.

Top 10: This is my top ten doing my best to combine preseason projections with what we’ve seen on the field. The top 4 is who I’d have in the playoff if the season ended today.

1. Alabama: Didn’t cover against Kentucky. Shameful.

2. Ohio State: Could make an argument for #1, but went with Nick Saban over Urban just slightly.

3. Clemson: All the questions about what was wrong with them are now gone with the most impressive win of the season.

4. Houston: Still counting down the days until the Louisville game.

5. Louisville: It’s going to be tough to get in the playoff without winning the ACC Atlantic, but they are the best team not in the playoff as of today.

6. Michigan: They showed yesterday they can win with defense too.

7. Washington: Maybe the most impressive dominating performance of the season the way they manhandled Stanford.

8. Texas A&M: Struggled a little bit with South Carolina, but big game looming with Tennessee.

9. Miami: Not very tough competition, but the Hurricanes look very impressive.

10. Tennessee: Don’t think they are this good, but maybe it’s just Tennessee’s year. At some point, results have to count. Their fans deserve this.

 

College Football Week 5 Picks

I don’t know what else to say. I don’t want to sound like a douche, but I think I have to say it. Maybe I’m pretty good at making college football gambling picks. I keep waiting for a massive regression week to come and it hasn’t yet. I went 11-7 last week and moved to +19 at 47-28 for the season. Now my O/U picks continue to suck, as I went 0-2 last week and now sit at 3-5 for the season. I’ll keep doing those and hopefully turn it around, but I simply can’t call those locks anymore.

Week 5 looks to be a good week with four match-ups featuring top 25 ranked teams, three of which are between two top 10 ranked teams. But all the other games featuring top 25 teams are mostly against really bad competition. Here’s why I like college football more than NFL: We’ll all be able to watch all three of the top 10 match-ups and not have to pay up for a TV package. You can’t watch the best NFL games for each time slot on Sunday because of the regional broadcasts.

Anyway, here are my picks for week 5. I want to stress that I’m starting to use more of a statistics and analytical approach to predicting the games. We’re now 4 weeks into the season, so we have a decent sample of the teams’ performances to predict future outcomes. I cite my favorite computer college football rating system, Jeff Sagarin’s ratings, to justify my picks. You can read a little bit about Jeff here. My pick is the line in parentheses.

Connecticut at #6 Houston (-29): With the Les Miles firing, Tom Herman is probably the leading candidate to take over in Baton Rouge. UConn is not good as they barely beat Maine at home and lost to Syracuse at home as well. Houston has proven they are for real even if people think Oklahoma is overrated. I think Oklahoma is still a very good team as Sagarin still has them #8 in his overall ratings. Houston with an easy win here.

#7 Stanford at #10 Washington (-3.5): Stanford is coming off one of the greatest gambling wins ever by returning a sack-fumble for a touchdown as time expired, and Washington is coming off an overtime win at Arizona that nobody on the east coast saw. I think it’s really tough to win two straight road games against quality opponents. I think Stanford is the better team, and I feel like a lot of people will be picking them, but I’ll go a little contrarian and take the Huskies to win by 4 at home.

#14 Miami (-7) at Georgia Tech: I said before that I love Miami this year. I felt like Mark Richt was an excellent hire, and they have an outstanding QB in Brad Kaaya. Georgia Tech looked like absolute crap against Clemson. Tech might keep it close in the first half, but I think Mark Richt will have them focused and they’ll win fairly easily with a big home game next week against FSU.

Rutgers at #2 Ohio State (-38.5): Rutgers is bad. Here are some teams ranked ahead of Rutgers according to Sagarin’s ratings: Western Illinois, Youngstown State, and Chattanooga. No more analysis needed. Buckeyes win by 40+.

#13 Baylor (-16.5) at Iowa State: Baylor is coming off a nice win at home against Oklahoma State. Iowa State is 1-3 with a loss to Northern Iowa and a blowout loss to in-state rival Iowa at home. Even on the road, look for Baylor to completely dominate in this one.

#23 Florida (-10) at Vanderbilt: If the Gators can’t beat Vandy by at least 10 points on the road, there’s some serious problems. Vandy is so bad and were lucky to beat Western Kentucky last week. I’m still a believer in McElwain and I think he’ll have them ready. Gators bounce back and win by three touchdowns.

#22 Texas at Oklahoma State (-2.5): The line is too low in this one. Texas is a little overrated as Sagarin still has them at about 39 overall, while Oklahoma State is underrated at 30 with a couple tough luck losses. Texas is coming off a bye week, but I don’t think it matters. Oklahoma State might be a little better and they are at home. Just need them to win by a field goal, and I think that’s an easy win.

#8 Wisconsin (+10.5) at #4 Michigan: Wisconsin is coming off a complete dominant performance over Michigan State, while this is Michigan’s first real test. I think this is too many points for a team like Wisconsin and their defense. Michigan will win but it will be a really close game.

Illinois (+21) at #15 Nebraska: Illinois is another bad team coming off a bye and a 34-10 loss at home to Western Michigan. Nebraska beat a good Oregon team a couple weeks ago, but I’m not sure they are as good as their #15 ranking. I think Illinois will barely cover in this one.

#11 Tennessee (-3.5) at # 25 Georgia: Georgia might be the most overrated team in the country as Sagarin has them at 53 in his overall rating. Tennessee is coming off one of the most impressive comebacks I’ve ever seen. Tennessee keeps it rolling and wins by a couple of touchdowns.

North Carolina (+11) at #12 Florida State: Florida State has some serious issues on defense, and I don’t think you can comfortably pick them to beat any good team by this many points right now. UNC is really capable of putting points on the board. I think Dalvin Cook will run wild, but Noles only win by a touchdown.

#9 Texas A&M at South Carolina (+17.5): Oh man, I’m gonna do it. I’m going to pick Will Muschamp. They are at home and have a good defense, and I think it will be enough to cover the 17.5 points they are getting. I think A&M might be a legit contender in the SEC West, but I feel like they might be in for a bit of a letdown this week.

Oklahoma at #21 TCU (+3.5): Oklahoma is one of the most underrated teams because of two losses to top 10 teams. I’m going to hedge a little bit and pick Oklahoma to win this game by a field goal, thus I have TCU +3.5. It’s just so hard to lay more than a field goal on the road against another good team.

#18 Utah at Cal (-2): I have to admit I don’t know much about Pac 12 football. So I’m just going to flip a coin and go with the home team. I don’t think Utah is as good as their ranking. They’ve been pretty lucky this year so far, beating BYU by 1 and USC by 4. They lose a close one here. I’ll have more on this one later.

Kentucky at #1 Alabama (-35): Maybe the worst Power 5 conference team versus the best. Don’t think twice about this one.

Memphis (+14.5) at #16 Ole Miss: Memphis was able to pull off the upset last year versus Ole Miss. They’ve blown out their weak competition so far this year, and Ole Miss has lost two games to really good teams. Ole Miss avenges last year’s loss, but Memphis is a good team. I think the Tigers cover.

#19 San Diego State at South Alabama (+19): I honestly can’t name one player on SDSU without looking them up. Not sure what they’ve done to warrant a #19 ranking other than beat a Cal team that plays no defense. They’re #51 in Sagarin’s overall rating. South Alabama won’t pull off an upset like they did against Mississippi State, but they will keep it close.

#17 Michigan State (-7) at Indiana: Yes, MSU is coming off a total beatdown at home from Wisconsin, and they probably aren’t as good as their #17 ranking. But as my dad who’s from Indiana might say, “IU is still IU.” Mark Dantonio is too good of a coach to let the Spartans lose by less than a touchdown to Indiana.

#3 Louisville at #5 Clemson (+2): This may be one of the most anticipated games all season. This game opened at Louisville +2, so the money is coming in hard on Louisville. I think Clemson’s defense can contain Lamar Jackson enough to win. I’m going to go with the experienced QB in Deshaun Watson at home to pull it out.

Utah State (+20) at #24 Boise State: Here’s another one where I don’t know much about either team. Interesting that Boise State is also rated 24th by Sagarin, so they may be a legit top 25 team. Since I’m not confident either way, I’ll just go with the team getting almost three touchdowns. I have no confidence whatsoever in this one.

Over Pick of the Week – #18 Utah at Cal (67): Here have been the scores of Cal’s first four games this season: 51-31, 45-40, 50-43, and 51-41. Maybe Utah’s defense is the best they’ve seen, but this still feels like a really low total for a game involving a team like Cal.

Under Pick of the Week – #3 Louisville at #5 Clemson (67.5): I know Louisville is averaging like 60 points a game, but they have to come back down to earth sometime. It has to be this week against a good Clemson defense. This game could still be a fairly high scoring game and still not hit the over. I have Clemson winning something like 34-31.

Honorable Mention – Indiana University of Pennsylvania over Seton Hill: Had a request in the comments last week from my Great Uncle Tom. The Crimson Hawks open their home schedule this week coming off a 3-0 start on the road averaging 61 points per game. They are the Louisville of Division II football and are ranked #8 according to NCAA.com. Take IUP to win with ease this week.

College Football Top 10

I’m not going to be doing a full college football recap this morning because the Gators sucked all the life out of me yesterday. I wrote about it yesterday saying how disappointed I was in McElwain and the coaching staff, but I’m not giving up on this team yet. So instead, I’ll just give my top 10 with a few thoughts on each team. When doing my rankings, I try to combine results we’ve seen on the field with predictive analysis. The top 4 would be my playoff teams if the season ended today.

1. Alabama: Ugh, I had the over 50 in the game yesterday against Kent State, and it was looking good with a 41-0 score at the half. And then Bama pulled the starters and Kent State couldn’t even get a pity field goal! C’mon man. Bama gets Kentucky next week, and it may be the biggest point spread ever for an SEC game.

2. Ohio State: Bucks had a bye week and have two cupcake home games against Rutgers and Indiana before going to Wisconsin in what should be a big game.

3. Louisville: Cardinals and Lamar Jackson only scored 59 points against Marshall after Akron put up 65 on them the week before. Cards are slacking.

4. Houston: Another route of a really bad team for the Cougs. Not many tough opponents until the match up against Louisville on November 17th. Can’t wait for that one.

5. Michigan: Wolverines seem to be flying under the radar a little bit with the blowouts against mediocre teams. Big matchup next week to show they can beat good teams too against Wisconsin at home.

6. Clemson: They finally showed up in a tough road game and completely dominated defensively. I said I wasn’t worried about Clemson after the slow start. They will be fine.

7. Texas A&M: Aggies looked damn impressive last night against Arkansas. No way did I think either team would win by more than a touchdown. I think they are for real.

8. Stanford: What a game winning drive last night by Stanford. That was a beautiful fade pass and catch for the win. And then the sack-fumble recovery for a touchdown to cover. Go gambling! Big game next Friday night for the Cardinal at Washington.

9. Washington: Huskies sneaked out a tough road game at Arizona in overtime late last night. Arizona might be better than we thought. Looking forward to the game against Stanford next week.

10. Wisconsin: I was skeptical of Wisconsin early in the season and a blowout on the road of a good Michigan State team is worthy of a spot in my top 10. I have t give them my respect. But doubt they stay here long with a brutal two weeks coming up against Michigan and Ohio State.

Thoughts on Florida vs. Tennessee

Photo credit: AP/Wade Payne

As a Florida fan, this game was a heartbreaker, but didn’t really upset me. We had beaten Tennessee 11 straight seasons mostly because we were better, but also because of some good fortune. We were on the other end of this last year thinking the game was over, only to come back and win. I was way more disappointed because I never thought a Jim McElwain coached team would lose a game like that. More on him later.

Prior to this game, I was really confident that Florida’s front 7 would be able to shut down Tennessee’s rushing attack and force Josh Dobbs to beat them by throwing it in the air. And I thought our running game and the experience of Austin Appleby would be able to do just enough to get the job done. And I was even more confident when they were up 21-3 at the half. No way could Josh Dobbs come back and win this game by having to throw it. And I was wrong. I have to give him props for stepping up and making the throws in the second half. If not for his terrible receivers dropping balls in the first half, it would’ve been even worse. I have no idea what was going on in Florida’s secondary, but that was totally embarrassing. Maybe it was Tabor being out briefly in the second half, but he got burned too when he was out there. The Gators definitely took advantage of three cupcakes early to inflate those defensive statistics and totally got exposed today.

I thought Austin Appleby was actually pretty good in this game, much better than I thought he would be. Florida’s offensive line just totally got whooped in the second half by Tennessee. It was just about as bad of a collapse as I’ve ever seen from any of my teams. Everyone mentioned the Choke at Doak against FSU from 1994, but I wasn’t old enough to remember that one. The one I remember more was the 2003 Miami game where Florida was up 33-10 with 6 minutes left in the 3rd quarter and Brock Berlin, who transferred to Miami from Florida, led the Hurricanes back to win 38-33. This had that same sickening feeling.

Now let’s talk about the coaches. Jim McElwain had a great game plan coming into this one by wanting throw it deep early and often, and it worked. Thanks to some very fortunate Tennessee drops and goal line stands, the Gators were able to take a comfortable 21-3 lead into the half. I actually thought Butch Jones made some good calls in the first half by going for the touchdown instead of kicking an early field goal and not punting on 4th and short. His players just didn’t execute.

The second half was just a complete and total meltdown by the Gators and the coaching staff. I put it on McElwain more than anything else, which really disappoints me. He went total Hugh Freeze on us with the conservative play calling. I never thought I would equate those two coaches in the same sentence. It was mostly runs and predictable short throws with no creativity like we saw in the first half. And you have to hand it to Butch Jones for making the necessary adjustments. I didn’t think he was capable. They went all out to put pressure on Appleby and just totally dominated Florida’s offensive line. Tennessee just beat us in every phase in the second half, and Florida wasn’t as dominant in the first half as the score would suggest. And good for Butch Jones and Josh Dobbs making the “duck pulling a truck” comment for the cameras after the game. Florida’s dumbass players talking trash before this game was just exactly that: dumb.

So where do both teams go from here? I said before the game that this was probably a de facto SEC East title game after the way Georgia looked against Ole Miss and the two previous weeks. Tennessee is certainly now in the driver’s seat but have three very difficult games coming up at Georgia, at Texas A&M, and home against Alabama. I still think they’ll probably lose two of those games. Florida is still not out of it however, but they probably have to win out in the SEC and Tennessee has to lose two more SEC games. Florida’s toughest remaining opponents include LSU at home, neutral game against Georgia, and at Arkansas. It’s certainly possible they could run the table, but I wouldn’t bet on it. There’s still a little hope left in the season, and I’m going to remain optimistic. While this loss hurt, we kind of deserved this after all the trash talk before the game and the giddiness we showed during the first half. But I’m not angry, I’m just really disappointed.

College Football Week 4 Picks

Well, I’m continuing my hot streak into week 4 of the college football season. I went 13-6 last week and moved to an astounding +15 at 36-21 for the season. This can’t possibly keep up. As good as I have been at picking games overall, I’ve been just as bad at picking locks. I went 1-2 last week after Georgia squeaked out a victory against Missouri, and Vandy completely crapped the bed against Georgia Tech. We’re now 3-5 in our lock picks and that sucks. The week 4 slate looks to be a pretty good one with four games that feature top 25 teams. Let’s get to it.

#5 Clemson at Georgia Tech (+9.5): Clemson has underwhelmed a little this season with subpar performances against Auburn and Troy. Georgia Tech is 3-0 having not beaten anyone yet. Georgia Tech’s triple option always seems to give teams trouble, and I think they do it again here in front of a crazy Thursday night crowd. Clemson wins in a close one, but give me the home dog to cover.

USC at #24 Utah (-3): USC is a complete train wreck with Clay Helton at the helm. Utah hasn’t looked all that great either against three teams not as good as them. USC is making a quarterback change to hopefully ignite a spark. I don’t think it will help as I’m rolling with the home team.

#12 Georgia at #23 Ole Miss (-7): Georgia may be one of the most overrated teams, as they have fallen all the way down to 52 in the Sagarin PREDICTOR while Ole Miss is still way up at 11. Georgia had two really close wins against bad opponents, while Ole Miss had two really close losses against good opponents. I ripped Hugh Freeze last week for being too conservative, but I think they actually get it done this week and don’t blow another big second half lead.

#13 Florida State (-6) at USF: I have no idea what to make of FSU after last week’s game against Louisville. Are they really that bad? I don’t think so. Lamar Jackson and Louisville are really that good. We don’t know much about USF as they have blown out 3 bad opponents. Sagarin has them ranked higher than I thought at 34. I’ll go with FSU to bounce back.

Kent State at #1 Alabama (-43.5): Won’t spend too much time on this one. Kent State is one of the worst teams in all of FBS. They lost to North Carolina A&T in four overtimes. I’ll take Bama to cover.

#11 Wisconsin (+5.5) at #8 Michigan State: I’ve been calling Wisconsin overrated the past couple of weeks, but I actually like them in this matchup. This is going to be a low scoring game, and I love picking the team getting points in even matchups. I think Michigan State will win, but I’m playing the odds and taking the Badgers to bounce back after a dreadful performance last week. I wouldn’t be surprised if Wisconsin actually won.

#19 Florida (+6.5) at #14 Tennessee: Oh yes, the game of the year for Tennessee fans. Knoxville may burn to the ground if they lose this one. The Gators lost starting QB Luke Del Rio to a knee injury and now turn to Purdue graduate transfer Austin “motherf***in” Appleby as Clay Travis put it. I’m still confident in Florida because of Appleby’s experience. If they had to go with one of the true freshman, then they would be in trouble. The defense will dominate Tennessee’s offensive line and shut down the running attack and no passing game. Gators win for the 12th straight year, 17-10.

Penn State at #4 Michigan (-19): Michigan hasn’t played anyone yet this season, but they sure do look damn good. Jabrill Peppers is having a monster season so far on both defense and returning kicks on special teams. Penn State is coming off a home win against Temple by 7. Michigan wins easily.

#18 LSU at Auburn (+3.5): Auburn is coming into this game having lost its last 6 SEC home games. Think about that. That’s almost impossible. I wonder how many times Vandy and Kentucky have lost 6 straight SEC games at home. The last SEC team Auburn beat at home was South Carolina in 2014. It has to end sometime, and I think it’s this week. Les Miles will be in some serious trouble after this one.

#6 Houston (-34.5) at Texas State: It’s normally really hard to pick a road team by this many points, no matter how good they are or how bad the home team is. Tom Herman is one of the hottest coaches right now, and I think he’ll have Houston ready to play. I’ve been surprised at how good Houston has been on defense. Not too confident in this one, but I think they’ll cover.

Oklahoma State (+7.5) at #16 Baylor: Baylor went 0-2 against the spread in their first two FBS games, and I picked them both times. I’m afraid going against them here will bite me in the ass. Oklahoma State is a good team with a good QB in Mason Rudolph. They should be 3-0 after losing because of a rule that nobody knew to a decent Central Michigan team. I think OK St keeps it close but Baylor wins.

#20 Nebraska (-7.5) at Northwestern: Nebraska is coming off a nice win against Oregon, while Northwestern is coming off it’s first win against Duke. Not real sure what to make of Northwestern after they overachieved last year going 10-2 and then getting blown out by Tennessee in the Outback Bowl. Two weeks ago they lost 9-7 to Illinois State. Even Will Muschamp was disgusted. This will be a low scoring game, but I’ll take Nebraska as Northwestern just won’t be able to keep up on offense.

#3 Louisville (-26.5) at Marshall: I mean is there any way we can pick against Louisville right now? I’m not a big transitive property guy when it comes to sports, but Marshall gave up 65 to Akron last week, who scored 10 against Wisconsin the week before. Louisville could probably score 100 in this game if they wanted to. Lock this one up and don’t think twice about it.

#7 Stanford (-3) at UCLA: Besides the UF game, this may be the one I’m anticipating the most. I’ve gone back and forth on this one a couple of times. This all comes down to whether UCLA can contain Christian McCaffrey because you can’t stop him. He ran all over UCLA last year with 243 rushing yards and 369 all purpose yards. UCLA has a lot of experience in their front 7 even with losing Myles Jack, but I don’t think it will be enough. Stanford wins by a touchdown.

#17 Arkansas (+6) vs. #10 Texas A&M: This is another tough one for me. Arkansas was awful in their opener and then have been really good the last two weeks. A&M has been really good in their two meaningful games. I’m going to play the odds here and just bet that this is a close game between two pretty even teams in what Vegas projects to be fairly low scoring on a neutral field.

#9 Washington (-11) at Arizona: Here’s why I’m taking Washington: Chris Peterson is coaching their team and Rich Rodriguez isn’t. Arizona is not very good having lost to BYU at home and only beating Grambling by only 10. Washington has done what they were supposed to and blown out their inferior competition. Huskies win big.

Over Pick of the Week – Kent State at #1 Alabama (50): I have to refrain at least one week from using the term “lock” since they have been anything but locks. One thing I’m trying to start looking for in the over pick is a low line, and I think I found a good one here. Alabama is averaging 46 points a game against some pretty good competition. There’s no reason they shouldn’t be able to put up a 50 burger on Kent State. If they don’t, they’ll be awfully close and hopefully Kent can get a garbage touchdown to go over.

Under Pick of the Week – #19 Florida at #14 Tennessee (43.5): This one is too easy. Florida is starting their backup quarterback, and Tennessee is starting one who can’t throw. And both teams have great defenses. I know this is probably everybody’s lock pick, but sometimes you just gotta go with the chalk and pocket the cash.