Editor’s Note: Since November 2018, Joe has been publishing picks here and back at All Things NIT, our former site. Overall, the results have been mixed, with an average return on investment, per pick, of –1% when weighting by confidence (1 for low, 2 for medium, 3 for high) across 6,273 published picks, not including pending futures; and an average return on investment, per pick, of +2.3% across 2,266 completed high and medium-confidence picks (low confidence picks these days are mostly in experimental markets for us).
Use these picks at your own risk. Only you are responsible for any money you lose, and you should not bet more than you can afford to lose. If you’re afraid you might have a gambling problem, seek help.
Odds for these come the better option between Bovada and BetOnline. We used to use the Vegas Consensus, but it’s no longer consistently available in an accurate form online. We use Movelor heavily to make college football picks. We use kenpom heavily to make college basketball picks. We use FPI heavily to make NFL futures picks, but not spreads and totals.
Active markets today: College basketball; college football; NFL. No college football futures today, but those will be back tomorrow and Monday. Those markets are fairly static anyway. Here’s the context on the active stuff.
Single-game college basketball bets: On the season, we’re 22–27. We’re down 7.08 units, and we’re 2–14 over the last 16 days. We did win last night, though, so we might be hot?
Single-game college football bets: On the season, we’re 78–81–3. We’re down 6.16 units. We’re up 2.88 units on bowl games so far.
Single-game NFL bets: On the season, we’re 17–27–8, and we’re down 11.76 units. No positive spin with this one.
Butler @ Providence
Seton Hall @ Xavier
St. John’s @ UConn
We’re back on moneyline parlays, trying to get revenge on the Big East after we got duped by early upsets this week on the weeknight games. Xavier and Providence each look vulnerable, Providence to a letdown game and Xavier to being a little bad, but we think Seton Hall’s probably overvalued and we like the Friars at home, even in the trap game.
Pick: Parlay – Providence, Xavier, UConn to win (+155). Low confidence.
Bowl Games
We’re sticking with moneyline underdogs in bowl games, and this is a big day for the theory. As we said above, it’s been successful so far, but the sample is just so small. Winning three of the seven here would be a great day, and would most likely require winning a profitable set of three.
Pick: Northern Illinois to win +120. Low confidence.
Pick: Duke to win +220. Low confidence.
Pick: Georgia State to win +120. Low confidence.
Pick: James Madison to win +100. Low confidence.
Pick: Eastern Michigan to win +655. Low confidence.
Pick: Northwestern to win +220. Low confidence.
Pick: Coastal Carolina to win +275. Low confidence.
Buffalo @ LA Chargers
The expectation here is that the Bills will blow out the Chargers. If that happens, we would expect a lot of points to be scored in total? We saw so much happen to the Chargers last week. So, so much. Surely, they haven’t fully fixed it yet, right?
Pick: Over 44 (–110). Low confidence.
