Update: North of the Equator

>>> What's the over/under on Johnny Manziel? I mean, in terms of him completely falling off the cliff of sanity, dying, whatever.

>>>  So, were the Rams and Eagles really the teams most in need of QBs? Denver made a good pick in Paxton Lynch - he'll play well right away. Whether Dallas' pick of OSU's Ezekiel Elliot at the #4 slot pays off or not, it's definitely a Jerry Jones pick! But at least it's not a Greg Hardy reach...

>>> Who's "rebuilding", and who's making their push for 2016? You let us know what you think!

>>> What Tennessee and Tampa are trying to do to protect their young prodigy quarterbacks is promising on both fronts. Whether it bears fruit remains to be seen...

>>> Baltimore claims they pulled the plug on drafting Jeremiah Tunsil because of the "supposedly hacked" social media post with a bong. Right or wrong move?

 

Weekend Wapp-up Wezults...

Moral of the story... letting family come in the way of football hurts your prognostication prowess! (On the other hand, letting football come in the way of family is FAR WORSE CRIME.) We did well with the Aussies; no complaints on the CFL or NFL, although they could've been better; but our college predictions, so good last week, were well under five-hundred yesterday - while our Saturday was (more appropriately) spent with the oldest son off at college visiting (and stocking his pantry and gas tank!). Nevertheless: priorities, priorities...

CFL: Hard to complain when we go 1-3, partly because this season is NUTS in the CFL, partly because we still outscored many experts! However, we went 1-2-1 against the spread, getting a win from Hamilton (appropriate, as that's the son's name!) and a push from the Winnipeg/Saskatchewan game, while Ottawa and Edmonton pulled the mild upsets.

AFL: Hit three of the four out of the park - it will indeed be West Coast and Fremantle hosting the preliminary finals in west Australia in two weeks, and Adelaide did manage to beat the Western Bulldogs on the <ahem> "home" grounds of the MCG by seven points; our one miss was Richmond's loss at the hands of the well-rested North Melbourne Kangaroos, who were allowed to rest half their team last week in prep for this game. North plays at Sydney next Saturday, and Adelaide plays at Hawthorn on Friday; the winners return to west Australia the following weekend for the shot at the Grand Final.

NFL: Went 7-7 so far against the spread (NOTE to the uninitiated: the NFL is the HARDEST to make a living at betting on because of the parity of the league. Our model assumes only about a fourteen point gap from team 1 to team 32 on the best of days; certain conditions reduce that even further.) and 8-6 straight up, with two more games to go tomorrow night. Very impressed with Buffalo, Tennessee, and Cincy today!

NCAA: Well, let's see...
--> TOP TIER GAMES: Oddly, we were 3-0 against the spread but only 1-2 straight up. (Check the original post for the specific games and predictions - too many to list!) Oregon and Mississippi St covered, but only the Sooners came through for the win.

--> OTHER GAMES OF INTEREST: We went 12-4 straight up (with some more leaners that I should have been more explicit about claiming) but only 9-13 against the spread. (Particularly proud of picking in Houston's favor!)

-->BLOWOUTS: Of course all thirteen won (ahem - we're looking at YOU, Auburn! Very pleased for Jacksonville St!) but we only picked the right side of the spread explosion on five of the thirteen.

--> OTHER FBS: Actually, we did better on these than I thought we had... we went 15-11 against the spread, which we'll take; and we were 24-2 straight up (the two upsets being Bowling Green's rout of Big Ten's Maryland, 48-27 IN Maryland, and the worst of the SEC wounds, Arkansas' 16-12 loss to Toledo from the MAC, 16-12).  So, over all in the FBS choices, we went 32-32 against the spread - coin toss - and 50-8 straight up.

--> FCS GAMES: Here is where we fell on our faces... we may have managed 11-6 straight up (not as impressive as it sounds) but we were an abysmal 4-13 against the spread in the FCS only games. We plead ignorance, but we were the ones who picked which games to name, so that's no excuse. We did slightly better overall in the FCS games, and while our overall betting record this week was 61-14 straight up and just 36-45 against the spread; our record including games we didn't share ahead of time was three below 50% on points. (Can't claim it, though, unless we'd said it first.)

....OVERALL, then, here are our 2015 records so far:
AFL - 146 right and 55 wrong overall; 118-83 against the spread.
CFL - 27 right and 21 wrong overall.
NFL - 7 and 7 overall; 8 and 6 against the spread; two games still pending.
NCAA - 131 and 24 overall; 83 right against the spread and 72 wrong. 

UPS and DOWNS for AUGUST WEEK 4!

Things are looking UP if you're a fan of young quarterbacks!

This weekend saw some very positive performances from the two start 2015 draft picks, Marcus Mariota in Tennessee and Jamies Winston in Tampa Bay! Both started for their teams, both have had glowing reports for their performances and behavior in camp (when was the last negative Winston story you've heard?), and this weekend they each demonstrated their command of the new offenses they've been hired to run. Remember, these two teams were 2-14 last year, and there are STILL a ton of problems, but they look to have the possibility of strong leadership in the pocket for a while to come. (The caveat of the dangers of injury for a scampering quarterback come into play, Right, RG3?) More exciting for us was the strong performances of Johnny Manziel in Cleveland, who looks to actually be challenging for a starting position, as does EJ Manuel in Buffalo, although in his case it's to regain it. MOST exciting, if you really think about it, is the play of Teddy Bridgewater in Minnesota. He went 10-14 this weekend with a TD, and his leadership of that young Viking team is remarkable. Between him and the young coach Mike Zimmer, there are some truly amazing possibilities for a team that suddenly can combine a competent defense and a good passing game with the god-like running abilities of excoriated running back Adrian Peterson, back from suspension for child abuse. (Understand. please: I'm a teacher. I have five children myself. You do not whomp a child the way Mr. Peterson did. Having said that, he has served his punishment. Welcome him back, and let the man do the job he was trained to make a living at.)

Things are looking DOWN if you're a fan of COLLINGWOOD or ESSENDON.

There are so many good stories in the AFL - the one-two western punch of Freo and West Coast; the ascendance of the young GWS and St. Kilda clubs, the strength and stability of the traditionally erratic Richmond and North Melbourne teams, the possibility of a three-peat from the amazingly talented Hawthorn Hawks, and most excitingly, the run-and-gun style of play that's made the Western Bulldogs one of the scariest teams in the league.

But there are downsides, too, and they are mostly based in Melbourne. The Carlton Football club looks destined to have the first draft choice, so pathetic was their season. But they looked like they'd be down the ladder to begin with (Following Football had them forecast for three wins in February, and we're two weeks from being proven right). Melbourne was at the bottom of the ladder for the last several years, save for the newbie teams, and for them five wins is progress.

Collingwood and Essendon, however, should have been playing finals football this year, instead of losing games by one hundred points as a regular occurrence. For Essendon, the causes are straightforward: the drug scandal of 2012-13, where the medical staff injected players with steroids and other WADA-banned substances without the players' consent, continues to haunt the team. 34 players still do not know with certainty if they might face punitive action down the road, even if they had no part in the illegal actions for which the entire Essendon hierarchy has now lost their jobs. The other cause, frankly, is the now-fired (excuse me: "retired") head coach, James Hird, an Essendon legend as a player, who may or may not have been part of the drug plans but certainly threw gasoline on the fire over the last two years with his bizarre and inexplicable actions both on and off the field. The list of problems under his watch are far too numerous to list here, but the combination of apathy, hypocrisy, and arrogance made him a sadly comical figure by the time the end mercifully arrived Tuesday. Unsurprisingly, the Bombers played with more emotion this weekend, losing by just two points to an under manned Gold Coast team that they should've run into the ground, but who under Hird they probably would've lost to in the second quarter.

As for Collingwood, their problems are only beginning. 8-3 at the midpoint for the second season in a row, they hit a rough stretch of the season where they had to play Fremantle, Hawthorn, Port, and West Coast in a row. Not all that surprisingly, they lost all four, but were competitive in all of them...until the end of the Eagles game. Then came a game against Western, and despite being favored, they let the Bulldogs beat them. Finally, they got a break (at 8-8 and no longer in the top 8) and get to play lowly Melbourne...and lost to them by 37 points. Now it's hit the fan. They somehow manage to beat bottomfeeder Carlton, by just 18, and then give top four Sydney a run before losing 87-76 in Sydney. Great, we're back on track... until this weekend, when Richmond not only beats them, but utterly obliterates them, 147-56, and the Magpies looked like they didn't want to play. At all. Geelong is probably licking their chops right now, waiting for the Pies to show up in uniform only this weekend, uninterested in competing against the Cats. 

Both teams should lose this weekend, and then a fascinating game awaits for the last match of the season, on a Sunday afternoon on September 6th: Collingwood v Essendon, with absolutely nothing on the line - probably five or six wins apiece at that moment, so far out of finals that the game was relegated to that last time slot while all the teams who'll still be playing next week are home resting by then.

Oh, is the draft this week?

Lost in the NHL and NBA playoffs, the baseball season, the buildup to the Kentucky Derby (which admittedly is pretty light this year), and the Mayweather fight, there's the non-event event that is the NFL collegiate draft, held for some inscrutable reason in Chicago this year.

So - if I recall, FSU's Jamies Winston goes first to Tampa, yes? Then, what? Tennessee trades #2 to San Diego for Philip Rivers and the Chargers take Marcus Mariota? Seems the most reasonable to me - Philly isn't going to do it, Tennessee would take Rivers over a rookie any day of the week, right? And Rivers would LOVE to come home, raised in north Georgia as he was.

And after that? Who cares...Wake me up when they do something in the league...

About NFL Week 16...

Pride before a fall...before the Seattle/Arizona game, Following Football is 2-0 outpredicting the casinos: Baltimore lost outright to Houston, and San Diego not only took the 49ers to OT despite their great start last night, they won outright.

But more than that, if you used our predictions to bet against the spread in this week's games, you'd've gone 10-2 with two games that were washes and two still to go!

(Therefore, we're about to look like fools in these last two games!)

UPDATE: Yup. Seattle just annihilated the team with the fourth string QB. NOT really a surprise, but it won't show up on a pure performance based model. So, we fall to 10-3 against the spread this week (w Denver/Cincy to go), and we went 2-1 outpredicting the casinos, moving to 37-34-3 for the year.

The Oakland Raiders look like they're starting to gel a little bit, don't they? Sure, they're just 3-12, but the wins against KC, SF, and now Buffalo all had some guts involved in them... The Houston Texans may not be playoff bound, but they're sure campaigning for an MVP candidate! The visual of the bloodied JJ Watt dominating the Ravens' offense will stick with the voters... The Indianapolis Colts look like the very definition of "pretenders"... The Jacksonville/Tennessee game Thursday night was a pathetic battle of 2-12 teams doomed to failure today and the impending future, containing no real stars worth watching, still managed to beat the last ever episode of The Colbert Report and every other show on cable Thursday night, So...still think that the NFL is an endangered species?

(Maybe, but not in the next few years...)

Playoffs are getting clearer...the Eagles are out, and all that's left to really determine in the NFC besides seeding is the "winner" of the South division, which will come from the winner of the game Sunday between two six-win teams, Atlanta and Carolina. Meanwhile, the AFC still has a host of eight and nine win teams fighting over a dwindling number of slots, now that the Pittsburgh Steelers hit ten wins and clinched a spot of some sort. So, two places remain, facing the Steelers, Patriots, Broncos, and Colts.

UPDATE: It's really hard to watch the Seattle Seahawks decimate the Arizona Cardinals, 35-6 as the clock is running out, and NOT think they're the favorite to repeat as Super Bowl champions in the same stadium they won in tonight. Hop onto ESPN.com and take a look at Marshawn Lynch's impossible run for a 79-yard touchdown, as well as Russell Wilson's sick TD run towards the end of the game. You won't be disappointed.

...AND, what about the "wooden spoon"? Who gets the first draft pick?

Six teams have a shot at the worst record in the NFL: Tennessee, Oakland, Jacksonville, and Tampa all have 2-12 records, with the New York Jets and Washington one game up at 3-11. 

Projecting the last two games, the key may be the Tennessee at Jacksonville debacle this Thursday night - talk about a bad game. This season has shown that teams simply are not ready to play on Thursday nights, and the game is either a blowout (with one unprepared team) or a sludge match (with two). Add to that two BAD teams to begin with, and look out, America! You've been warned!

Regardless, the winner of that game probably takes themselves out of contention, because they'll each be heavy underdogs against division heavyweights Indy and Houston in week 17, even with extra time to prepare. Meanwhile, Oakland will be the underdog week 17 at Denver UNLESS they rest everybody for the playoff run (possible), but they'd still lose in more likelihood. This week's game, hosting Buffalo, may be more winnable. And Tampa Bay has two games that are at home, but against teams that need to win for their own playoff ambitions (Green Bay, New Orleans). All other things equal, we'd bet on the Buccaneers being the most likely to finish 2-14. But, if Tennessee loses both games, they ARE the #1 pick.

PREDICTIONS for Week 15!

Here we go! After a break-even week during the last regular season week of FBS games (although, remember that to our credit, we don't just have to be on the correct side of the line - we have to be closer to the actual result than Vegas was! Much harder to do!), we strive to call the quarter finals for the FCS playoffs and Week 15 of the NFL season...

[By the way, overall during these past five weeks since we've had the full Following Football ranking and rating system in place, we've gone 32-29 overall against Vegas' predictions, with three draws. Feelin' purdy guud 'bout thay-at!]

THURSDAY
Arizona @ St. Louis - Sagarin and FF both have Arizona winning this game (we say Cardinals by three; Sagarin ratings say 1.7); while Vegas is picking the surging Rams to win by 4.5 points. Winning team takes the point. And that winner is US! Arizona won the defensive battle 12-6, won game number 11, and proved that for this team, like other defensive powerhouses in the past (see: Ravens, Baltimore), it doesn't matter who's at quarterback.

FRIDAY
Chattanooga @ New Hampshire - we all think Chattanooga by 1-2 points. All of us were wrong - New Hampshire 35-30.

SATURDAY
Navy @ Army (actually a fairly neutral site game in Maryland) - Vegas, the Sagarin ratings, and Following Football are all picking the Naval Academy to win by 12-18 points. Navy took most of the first half to get going, so the margin of victory was only seven, 17-10. But it made for a good game!

FCS Quarterfinals - We differ with Sagarin on all of these (casinos don't set lines on FCS games)...North Dakota St over Coastal Carolina, but we say it'll be close (7 points) while the computer says it's 16.5 points NDSU's way. Cut off is halfway (below 12)...We pick Sam Houston St to beat Villanova on the road by 3; Sagarin says it's a tossup (technically, Villanova by "0.02 points"!) We'll take any SHSU victory as our point...Finally, some northwest pride: Sagarin chooses Illinois St by 8 over Eastern Washington in Cheney; we don't think they'll survive the fire-red turf and are picking EWU to win. Winner of the game or overtime, we get the point. NDSU by exactly seven! Sam Houston by exactly three! Eastern Washington by... Um, bye-bye, actually. Lost, 59-46, so that point goes to Vegas, but otherwise it's FF 3, Vegas 1!

SUNDAY
Only the games where we disagree somehow... hmmm....on most of these, we're all three pretty close (within three points)...Pittsburgh by 1-3 - by seven, 27-20...New England by 7.5 to 9 - more like 41-13, Brady!...Kansas City by 9-10 (Sagarin's a little higher), and so was reality: 31-6, KC, getting revenge for three weeks ago...Indianapolis by 7-8 - exactly right: 17-10 Colts...Baltimore by 13-14 (again, Sagarin's a bit higher on these big-spread games) Ravens by 8, 20-12...Green Bay by 5-6 - Buffalo's defense stifles GB with style, wins 21-13...Carolina by 6-7 (with Cam Newton questionable, we're surprised we still agree) - actually, TB stayed close, losing 19-17...Cincinnati/Cleveland is within a point either way (and it depends on how you count a first-time starting QB for the Browns) Cincy 30-0 over Manziel. Coaching error to start him, in our opinion...Denver by 2-4 - won by 12...Detroit by 8-9 - won by two...Seattle by 10-11 - on the nose!...Philadelphia by 3.5 to 5 - a landmark win for the Cowboys!

Two games we disagree on - we have the Giants  over Washington by 3.5; Vegas says it's 7. Split the difference and say five is the tipping point - Whoops; casinos were right here; margin was eleven...and we actually think Tennessee will beat the Jets by 1; the casinos are saying New Jersey by 2. (Sagarin kinda agrees with us; Titans by "0.3"...) Winner takes the point. And that turned out to be the casinos when the Jets pulled one out of the fire with a 16-11 victory. We're all tired up! FF 3, Vegas 3! It will all depend on the Saints and Bears! Can't remember the last time we actively rooted for Chicago, but here's goes! Rah! Rah! Sis boom bah! 

MONDAY
We REALLY disagree here! - The casinos argue New Orleans will win by 3; we agree with Sagarin that the Bears should be 2.5 point favorites. Winner takes the point! AARGH! Saints win. We lose, 4-3. Bah, humbug. Da Bears looked "turrible" Monday night.... Don't know what you DO about the QB situation there, with Cutler contracted through another few years.

So, in the end we have a total of seven games to wage war on - three FCS playoffs, one NFL game Thursday night, two Sunday afternoon, and one more on Monday night. Hello! My name is Inigo Montoya. You tied me on predictions last week. Prepare to die...

We never covered how the predictions went this weekend...

...so here we go!

FBS games: Oregon beat Arizona BIG, 51-13 (point Vegas)...Marshall barely edged La-Tech (point us)...Connecticut not only lost to the spread but lost outright to previously winless SMU, 27-20 (point us)...Alabama whupped Missouri in the end, 42-13 (point them)...and we were correct to choose Ohio St over Wisconsin (they squeaked by the Badgers 59-0! - point us!) ----- Score: Vegas 2, FF 3!

FCS games: There were two on our "disagreement" list - we were correct in thinking that Sam Houston would give Jacksonville St fits; they did, and won 37-26. However, Illinois St handled Northern Iowa with ease, 41-21. So ------ Score: Vegas 3, FF 4!

NFL games: Going down the five games we marked (wish we'd thought to mark the Detroit/Tampa discrepancy; we would've won that one!)... St. Louis blanked the Redskins, 24-0 (point them)...the Giants wiped out the Titans, 36-7 (and knocked Tennessee to the Bottom slot, H32; point them)...we were right to think the Saints were in trouble, but even we didn't expect the offensive ineptitude we saw from a Drew Brees-led offense (point us)... Although Arizona won, they only won by three, so by a hair, (point Vegas)...and the Raiders dispatched their cross-bay rivals with ease, 24-13; (point FF). ------ FINAL Score: Vegas 6, FF 6. (Like I said...wished we'd claimed that Detroit game!)

Our pro football tiers and rankings for Week 14...

The biggest change at the top of the rankings is the emergence of the defending champs in Tier A, the Seattle Seahawks. Their threat is real - just ask Arizona and San Francisco!

At the other end of the spectrum, the Oakland Raiders have worked their way out of the dungeon, and left the Tennessee Titans at the bottom, following their evisceration at the hands of the New Jersey Giants. 

In between, the continuing demise of the 49ers and the Saints mystifies, and the continued bunched success of the AFC North invites a host of "what ifs?" for folks like us to ponder!

FF rank	Team	Div	OvRecord	ConfRc	DvRec
A1	Green Bay Packers	N-N	9-3	6-3	4-1
A2	New England Patriots	A-E	10-3	7-2	2-1
A3	Denver Broncos	A-W	10-3	8-1	4-0
A4	Seattle Seahawks	N-W	9-4	6-2	2-1
B5	Indianapolis Colts	A-S	9-4	7-3	4-0
B6	Philadelphia Eagles	N-E	9-4	5-4	3-0
B7	Dallas Cowboys	N-E	9-4	6-4	2-2
B8	Arizona Cardinals	N-W	10-3	7-2	2-1
C09	Detroit Lions	N-N	9-4	7-2	3-0
C10	Baltimore Ravens	A-N	8-5	4-5	2-3
C11	Pittsburgh Steelers	A-N	8-5	7-3	3-2
C12	Cincinnati Bengals	A-N	8-4-1	5-4	2-2
D13	San Diego Chargers	A-W	8-5	6-4	2-2
D14	Miami Dolphins	A-E	7-6	6-4	3-1
D15	Houston Texans	A-S	7-6	6-3	2-1
D16	Kansas City Chiefs	A-W	7-6	5-4	1-3
E17	Buffalo Bills	A-E	7-6	4-6	3-2
E18	Cleveland Browns	A-N	7-6	4-6	2-2
E19	St. Louis Rams	N-W	6-7	4-5	2-2
E20	San Francisco 49ers	N-W	7-6	6-4	1-3
F21	Minnesota Vikings	N-N	6-7	5-5	0-4
F22	Atlanta Falcons	N-S	5-7	5-4	4-0
F23	Carolina Panthers	N-S	4-8-1	4-6	2-2
F24	New Orleans Saints	N-S	5-8	4-5	2-2
G25	Chicago Bears	N-N	5-8	4-5	1-3
G26	New York Giants	N-E	4-9	2-7	1-3
G27	Washington Redskins	N-E	3-10	1-8	1-2
G28	New York Jets	A-E	2-11	2-7	0-4
H29	Oakland Raiders	A-W	2-11	1-8	1-3
H30	Tampa Buccaneers	N-S	2-11	1-8	0-4
H31	Jacksonville Jaguars	A-S	2-11	1-8	0-3
H32	Tennessee Titans	A-S	2-11	2-7	1-3

We suffer from "premature tiering"!

Even with 1 1/2 games to go this weekend, we're ready to separate the NFL into eight tiers after Week Ten, although the gaps at the top are rather narrow!

Bottom Four: We're promoting the Jets after their upset win over the Steelers, which leaves us the Raiders, Jaguars, Bucs, and Titans.

Next Four Up: Four teams with moments of glory and weeks of misery - the Rams, Jets, Falcons, and Bears.

Tier Six: Four mediocre, non-descript teams on the field with interesting issues off it - the Vikings (Adrian Peterson), Redskins (RG3), Texans (JJWatt the celebrity), and the NYG (they're in New York).

Tier Five: These four teams seem to be good, and yet... they're still the Saints, Niners, Panthers, and Bills.

Tier Four: Now, we're in the upper half of the league, and these four teams could very well be in the playoffs in nine weeks - or not? Consistency! We'll just have to see what happens with the Seahawks, Chiefs, Dolphins, and Chargers.

Tier AFC North: Literally. How do you separate the Browns, Bengals, Steelers, and Ravens right now? Arguably, they may not be teams #9-12, but they belong together until someone makes a move (one direction or the other!).

Top Eight, Subdivided: The divisions here are a bit muddy, but let's see what makes sense - certainly the Cardinals and Broncos are up there, and the next two teams, Patriots and Packers, may or may not be below them. The Colts, Cowboys, and Eagles all sit very snugly up there next to them, and if we have to choose a number eight, the 7-2 Lions would probably be there. But these are the eight best in the league right now; interestingly, five are from the NFC and three from the AFC (but seven of our next eight are, too!).

As usual, an erudite analysis by Bill Barnwell

Grantland's Bill Barnwell has a great piece on the NFL at the midpoint of the season, and what statistical trends we can expect to "regress towards the norm" (hint: the Cardinals aren't going 7-1 in the second half of the season, folks).

"You remember SimCity?"

Bill Barnwell has the greatest description of a (potentially) bad football game I've heard in a lo-ong time... Courtesy of Grantland:

WASHINGTON (-5.5) over Titans

You played SimCity, right? You know, the original SimCity, the one you had on a gigantic 5.25-inch floppy disk, that SimCity. Do you remember how bad your attempts at a metropolis were when you played SimCity as a little kid? They were bizarre, nihilistic works of art.

Residential buildings just slapped next to smokestacks. A decaying commercial zone, victimized by a statistically improbable number of simultaneous earthquakes and Godzilla attacks. Electrical lines building a grid totally unconnected to any power plant. For public safety, six police stations and six fire stations placed directly next to one another next to a road that never loops back on itself and just runs out in the middle of nowhere. Oh, and the totally useful sports stadium, presumably attended by the one poor, confused family who showed up to live in one of your residential zones for a couple of in-game seconds before immediately leaving in a terrified huff.

Washington vs. Tennessee is the football equivalent of that city you created.