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 –0.6% when weighting by confidence (1 for low, 2 for medium, 3 for high) across 5,106 published picks, not including pending futures, and an average return on investment, per pick, of +3.1% across 1,617 completed high and medium-confidence picks (low confidence picks, these days, are 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. FanGraphs is heavily used in making MLB picks. Movelor is heavily used in making college football picks.
One MLB moneyline today, four college football picks against the spread. MLB futures are off for the weekend. Here’s the context on each market.
Single-game MLB bets: On the season, we’re 89–59–4, we’re up 21.79 units, we’re up 14% (the average line on our winners has been –110). We don’t have great history in September, but we didn’t have great history in August, and August was one of our two best months of the year.
Single-game college football bets: On the season, we’re 2–3, 2–2 on FBS games.
Minnesota @ Texas
There isn’t amazing value here, but it’s not bad, and the probability is high. The Rangers are pretty fresh in the bullpen and throwing one of their best starters. The Twins are throwing a guy who’s become a reclaimed swingman for them and has been giving up a lot of hard contact. With the game in Arlington, we’ll take the home team.
Pick: Texas to win –188. Low confidence. (Keuchel and Montgomery must start.)
Colorado @ TCU
Deion Sanders has shown himself to be impressive at amassing talent at a college football coach, and great at building community support for his program. The jury’s still out on how good a coach he is.
Even without that last piece, though, this line implies that Colorado has gotten better and TCU has gotten worse by a combined 18 points since the end of last year. That is so many points. We’re going with the Horned Frogs.
Pick: TCU –21 (–115). Low confidence.
Northern Iowa @ Iowa State
This line has moved 14 points from where it opened. That is ridiculous. Unless there are surprise suspensions which we haven’t heard about and weren’t on Iowa State’s depth chart this week, this is herd mentality. Yes, the opening line was bad, not making enough of how good Northern Iowa actually was to finish last year. But despite all of ISU’s troubles with UNI over the years, it’s likelier than not that they can win by more than seven. We’re not terrible, you guys.
Pick: Iowa State –7 (–110). Low confidence.
North Carolina vs. South Carolina
We remain unconvinced about UNC, and there’s actually a lot more reason to believe in South Carolina than there was this time last year, when to my ears the hype was louder. UNC has shown under Mack Brown that it can score points and command media attention. It’s yet to show it can consistently beat strong opposition.
Pick: South Carolina +2.5 (–105). Low confidence.
South Alabama @ Tulane
A lot of people are trying to make themselves look smart by saying South Alabama will be this year’s Tulane. What about last year’s Tulane, though? They return enough to be a good team again, and South Alabama wasn’t that good last year. They weren’t blowing teams out. They still lost three times. And while the Sun Belt is very well run and seems to be ascending, the numbers don’t yet bear out that ascent. Tulane should be the better team here, and by a meaningful amount.
Pick: Tulane –6.5 (–110). Low confidence.
