I've seen some concern in this thread on the amount of JUCO players in the rotation on Defense. There should be no concern, there should be "hope". K-State was 99th in the country last year in Pass Defense and 69th overall. They need help and hopefully they got it. I believe they did and if that's the case, I may switch my play to the Under because there is NO WAY the Louisville Offense could get out of the 20's against a good defense.
An hour from Louis here and have read a lot about them locally. They lost a lot of good players through graduation, quitting, kicked off, whatever, and have started fresh with this coach. At 6-6 last year brought disappointment to all that area. Then Kentucky beating them at home didn't help mattters any either. They will be fired up and should be a heck of a game. But give me KS and their QB over Louis and Cantwell in this one. Louisville not the explosive team were used to watching or hearing about anymore. Although I do think both teams will move the ball and the weather is just beautiful here this last couple of days.
Yes, but how many people comprise a betting syndicate? BP...I use to know a guy who did almost nothing but bet early line movements for games. It would almost literally drove him crazy trying to follow these things. To the point it messed up any kind of handicapping edge he might have had. The reason I don't like to play early line movements is because the dynamics of a game can change in the 6 days between when lines are released and the kickoff of a game. Betting early or betting line movements literally takes the human angle or edge out of the game in my opinion. Everybody has their own way of doing things. I have mine. I'm aware of the line. And I prefer to get a good number. But I'm not going to pull my hair out over it if I don't get it. The NFL is a different story. I realize those games can fall very close to the spread a higher percentage of time than the college game. That's why I prefer not to play the NFL seriously. There are more advantages in my opinion in playing college football. And it has less to do with numbers than it does angles..
It better be a ground game on Louisville's part or this game is over. This is what I'm counting on. Louisville's ground game against KSU's pass game. If Louisville can successfully move the ball on the gound with a few short passes by Cantwell here and there, this game should go under the number. The key here is to control the tempo of the game and keep it out of Freeman's hands. Freeman is an NFL quality QB that's still playing college ball. He's a junior and will be gone after this season, unless it's a total disaster. So all you have to do basically is watch for one thing, can Louisville run the ball?
Will be rooting for you on this one and if history is any indicator it will be under. However I am getting a lot of conflicting information on how scoring will play out in this game and give that the last two games for each team were relative blow outs with high passing and decent rushing numbers this game could see more points than at times in the past. That said the public is slightly favoring the over and there are two super situations favoring an under:
<table border="0" cellpadding="2" cellspacing="1" width="100%"><tbody><tr> <td class="matchupCells Text">Play Under - Any team against the total (KANSAS ST) - after allowing 100 or less rushing yards last game against opponent after outrushing opponent by 125 or more yards last game.
(173-107 over the last 5 seasons.) (61.8%, +55.3 units. Rating = 2*)</td></tr> <tr> <td class="matchupCells Text">Play Under - Any team against the total (KANSAS ST) - after allowing 125 or less rushing yards in 2 straight games against opponent after allowing 75 or less rushing yards in 2 straight games.
(35-11 over the last 5 seasons.) (76.1%, +22.9 units. Rating = 3*)</td></tr></tbody></table>
not to get off topic but i'll add a few cents...
sometimes early moves are fake moves by syndicates as well... sometimes they are moves by scalpers looking to get a good number early and play it back later... remember, early in the week limits are low and numbers will move quickly... if a game is -3 instead of pounding the side they want at low limits and losing a good number, they'll hit the other side at low limits to get a better number to smash it at higher limits later in the week... for instance, line opens at 6.5... if they hit it moves to -7 or 7.5 and all they got it for was a few dimes... if they hit the opposite it moves to -6 or -5.5 and then on saturday they come in w/ 20 dimes and they got the number they wanted, keeping the line under -7
some of the early movement is from sharps playing a few dimes on good numbers so there still should be some respect for early moves, but trying to read the market early or mid-week can sometimes be futile... but if you know of a sharp book and they are leaning strong on one side ON GAME DAY then there is a reason for it
:toast:
sometimes early moves are fake moves by syndicates as well... sometimes they are moves by scalpers looking to get a good number early and play it back later... remember, early in the week limits are low and numbers will move quickly... if a game is -3 instead of pounding the side they want at low limits and losing a good number, they'll hit the other side at low limits to get a better number to smash it at higher limits later in the week... for instance, line opens at 6.5... if they hit it moves to -7 or 7.5 and all they got it for was a few dimes... if they hit the opposite it moves to -6 or -5.5 and then on saturday they come in w/ 20 dimes and they got the number they wanted, keeping the line under -7
some of the early movement is from sharps playing a few dimes on good numbers so there still should be some respect for early moves, but trying to read the market early or mid-week can sometimes be futile... but if you know of a sharp book and they are leaning strong on one side ON GAME DAY then there is a reason for it
:toast:
Louisville will NOT test these numbers. They don't have the skill players to test these numbers. One of the reasons KSU was rated so low in defense last season was because they play in the best offensive conference in the country. Another reason they were rated so low was because of their defensive depth. They didn't have much of it at all last season and it showed in their last 5 or 6 games when they started to get worn down. I guarantee they didn't have this low a rated defense through their first 6 games. Their defense shouldn't have too much of a problem tonight with the big play. But they still have to stop the run. And this is where the question will be answered tonight. I think Louisville has a shot to get their run game going against the 3-4 KSU defense....GL
I can see why they purposely make these lines move early. But it seems like it would work much better in the NFL than it would the college game where most scores don't end up that close to the ending line. Unless maybe you have two defensive teams going at it. Then I could definitely understand it.
To put minds to rest regarding betting syndicates
There's a good book out there about the inner workings of at least one large betting syndicates: The Smart Money by Michael Konik. There's not much handicapping information that can be gleaned from the book, but it's a very fun read and it does reveal betting syndicates to be a much less scary thing. Those groups have a lot of money with which to flood the books, but their success rate is about the same as any other bettor who is willing to put in the time researching and handicapping matchups.
The one area where they typically have a big advantage over regular ol' bettors is that they're much more likely to handicap and bet without emotion -- I'm sure we all know how easy it is to lose perspective on our favorite team -- and much less likely to go chasing after losing bets.
The bottom line is that to worry about what a large betting group is doing is to lose focus on your own handicapping of a matchup. You'll fare better doing your own work and betting the side your research shows to be best at the number you show to be reasonable, then emulate the Big Boys by not chasing bets or betting bad numbers.
I personally recommend that book, by the way. I enjoyed reading it a lot.
There's a good book out there about the inner workings of at least one large betting syndicates: The Smart Money by Michael Konik. There's not much handicapping information that can be gleaned from the book, but it's a very fun read and it does reveal betting syndicates to be a much less scary thing. Those groups have a lot of money with which to flood the books, but their success rate is about the same as any other bettor who is willing to put in the time researching and handicapping matchups.
The one area where they typically have a big advantage over regular ol' bettors is that they're much more likely to handicap and bet without emotion -- I'm sure we all know how easy it is to lose perspective on our favorite team -- and much less likely to go chasing after losing bets.
The bottom line is that to worry about what a large betting group is doing is to lose focus on your own handicapping of a matchup. You'll fare better doing your own work and betting the side your research shows to be best at the number you show to be reasonable, then emulate the Big Boys by not chasing bets or betting bad numbers.
I personally recommend that book, by the way. I enjoyed reading it a lot.
The real problem that I'm having with trends is there is much more of an influx of division 2 opponents now than what there was even 5 years ago.. More so this season than any season I've seen. This can really taint a teams overall stats. And make them look like something their not. As for this game, i think there is more than one way to hit the under, whether it is a blowout or not. My opinion is there are less playmakers on the KSU offense this year. And there are almost none on the Louisville offense. It isn't often that I'll bet an under when there is two talented QB's involved. But the problem I have here is with their surrounding casts. There isn't much there. Most of the talent is on the defensive side of the ball. As a rule from almost every KSU game I've seen in the past, their offensive numbers go down on the road. Last season was a little bit of an exception because KSU played OSU, Nebraska and Fresno on the road. And those were all very bad defensive teams. They scored 41 on Texas. But only about 17 points of it actually came from their offense. The rest was scored on defensive TD's and special teams. I can see a much tighter less mistake prone game played by Louisville this time. They may not be a very good offensive team, but I think their going to give 100% effort on defense. If it's a blowout it will be one-sided with very little scoring done on the losing side.. If it's a close game I believe it will be low scoring. Either way I'm really liking the under here.
