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 6,265 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.
We’ve got college basketball, and we’ve got another bowl game, and we’ve got our college football futures for the day. Here’s the context on each market for us.
Single-game college basketball bets: On the season, we’re 21–24. We’re down 5.03 units, and we’re 1–11 over our last twelve. It is bleak, but we’re adjusting the approach today.
Single-game college football bets: On the season, we’re 76–80–3. We’re down 8.56 units. Again, it hasn’t been good. We did get a good win yesterday, though.
College football futures: We started the season with 300 units in our college football futures portfolio, with the intent being to spend 200 of those over the season’s fifteen weeks and keep 100 in reserve for hedging and arbitrage opportunities. We’re down about 22 units so far, but we have upside remaining. More importantly: All of the bets we list here grade out as positive-value bets unless we explicitly mark them as a hedge. So, if you’ve been faithfully following, we’re still on track to not lose more than 25% (and we retain upside), but if you’re new, these are a good place to start.
Marquette @ Providence; Georgetown @ Butler
Parlays get a bad rap. If your ability to pick games is real, your results should be correlated to one another, and correlation is enough to make a parlay positive value—it decreases the rate of split finishes. The last two years, we’ve had private success over stretches of January and February picking moneyline parlays based on the rhythms of conference play—letdown games and the like. With Big East play opening tonight and our bets in a woeful place, we’re going to try it earlier than we have in the past. It can’t go worse than the last twelve days have gone.
Pick: Parlay – Marquette to win, Butler to win (–131). Low confidence.
UTSA vs. Marshall
We continue our bowl game moneyline crusade. After yesterday’s WKU comeback, it’s been a little profitable over the very small sample.
Pick: Marshall to win +255. Low confidence.
Sugar Bowl
Angles we like, as the markets currently stand: Michigan to win it all; South Dakota State to beat Montana; Texas to beat Washington; Alabama to beat Michigan. Taking Texas here raises our worst-case scenario (SDSU; Texas over Michigan), our best-case scenario (Montana; Michigan over Texas), and our median scenario (SDSU; Alabama over Texas). It also comes at good value. Eight units on it. Tomorrow? We’re looking at the Rose Bowl, where Alabama’s odds ticked longer a little bit today.
Pick: Texas to win –173. Low confidence. x8
