“It’s just a fantasy. It’s not the real thing. But sometimes a fantasy is all you need.” That is what Billy Joel tells us.  I thought it was Kenny Rogers who was the gambler.

Yes, it can remunerate to be a fantasy/rotisserie geek because it is a good dry run for excelling in the more important pursuit of gambling.  I know our good friend Rick Ballou of 1010XL radio in Jacksonville does not play fantasy sports because he does not want to have that rooting brain-teaser of betting on one side and having a player on the other side to applaud.

The cheering conflict of interest aside, the make-believe General Manager can get a lot of insight from the roto world.  In the ancient times before the World Wide Web, I found that fantasy football had me analyzing from an extraordinarily different and favorable viewpoint than before I met gambling’s cousin.

I had situations like having Emmitt Smith in his prime when he was the inimitable running back in the league.  I can for example remember one week when two offensive linemen were out and the Pokes were on the road.  Plus I had Chris Warren when he was in Seattle and he was playing a team without their two best run stoppers. Should I consider benching the world’s best running back because his match-up in not favorable? For the record, I stuck with Emmitt, but scrutiny like that actually refined me into dissecting games like few handicappers had ever before.

Fantasy sports managing helped me breakdown big match-up mismatches that occur in sports betting. It especially facilitated my acumen when it came to betting over/unders.  Quite often imprudent handicappers deduce that an injury to a key offensive player may mean fewer points or a key defensive player more points.

But in my fantasy breakdowns it became quite apparent that if a run blocker on the offensive line was hurt, it might mean the team has to pass more.  Kindred to that if a team’s leading rusher were out and his backup were an ample drop-off.   Often teams to compensate will have to fiddle with their gameplan and in such examples open up their offense.

A depreciated offense does not mean lower scoring.  So many sports speculators and general football fans fall prey to the myth that the better an offense is, the more points they will number.

One of my favorite all-time examples was in 2001 once Edgerrin James went down for the Colts.  It glaringly repressed their offense, but with a great weapon in WR Marvin Harrison and QB Peyton Manning, there clearly was one way to offset his loss: throw more often. Suckers determined losing such a weapon would mean lower scoring games.  I knew while it depleted their offense, it meant they would have to be much more high-octane.  They exceeded the total in 14-of-16 regular season games.

Let us say that a defense is lacking their two best run stoppers because of injuries and the total is high, I further investigate to see if it correlates to their opponent having motivation to run more.  If so, the end result would be longer possessions, which also means fewer possessions. Fewer possessions mean fewer scoring opportunities.

Luckily though in the hypothetical state of affairs, the total is likely posted higher because of the injuries.

A better offense is not necessarily a high scoring offense and to a lesser extent a superior defense is not inexorably going to give up more points. A great defense, whose strength is stopping the run, may force the opponent to take more risks. A bad defense that has a decent secondary may be run against more often.  Ergo the posted totals would be over-adjusted.

Hence the top fantasy sports advice sites can be priceless tools for sports cognation. Rotowire.com is the oldest and still the best all-around.  Consummate in all sports, their judicious view for the roto player can also be incalculable for us.

Footballinjuries.com is also fantastic for the NFL.  Many sites do stupendous jobs of player against team or often better yet, player against coach career statistical examinations.  For example Bill Belichick coached teams have such done extremely well shutting down certain quarterbacks.  We have found player history statistics can be of great handicapping value as so long as one also analyzes how much the parameters have or have not changed. Everything in handicapping must be taken in its proper framework.

In fact, now every major sports site, from ESPN to Yahoo has fantasy information of some kind. For the most part, if it is of value to the fantasy player, a handicapper should take note.

But there are compelling contrasts too.  The word’s best fantasy player could be a dreadful handicapper and visa versa if one probes them as one and the same.

We handicappers must explore games one at a time, while the fantasy players must query long-term performances.  Really this seems to happen more in baseball with hotshot pitchers up from the minor leagues, but can also apply in football. Joey Harrington may be great for your keeper league, but there will be peaks and valleys along the way.  Actually a head-to-head league in which a participant changes his line-up is more conducive to handicapping than the rotisserie style leagues, but both are sources of knowledge.

Using fantasy sports and the foremost sites dedicated to such can make a winning football betting season more than just a fantasy.  That’s the real thing.

How Much of An Element is Weather in Handicapping?
Even those few football fans who don’t gamble surely are aware of Brett Favre’s remarkable winning streak in sub 34 degree weather or Tampa’s ineptitude when the kickoff temperature is below 40 on the archaic fahrenheit scale. It though is not just fair but imperative for handicappers to note most of those Favre games were at home where he was rarely beaten and Tampa’s incompetence was compiled when they were a doormat playing on the road.
As far as weather benefitting one team or the other, more times than not the old adage of both teams having to play in the same conditions bodes true. This is not to say though weather won’t decide the spread or SU outcome. Many teams are built for their home field and extreme weather in a battle of dichotomous styles will without question be a factor.
Come playoff time and even late in the regular season we will hear pundits and handicappers question the ability of dome teams to win or even make it to the Super Bowl. Atlanta making it in 1999 and the Rams winning it all in 2000 did take some steam out of those convinced of a dome field disadvantage but both teams were able to avoid having to play in nasty outdoor conditions.
There is one major factor missing from the aforesaid critics. We would actually agree that dome teams clearly built for dome play are at a huge disadvantage in nasty outdoor conditions. We certainly don’t disagree that the Colts horrible defense needs to be improved and nobody can question the genius of Bill Belichick. But the Colts offense is much more high powered than they are great and we question the Colts ability to beat any team in northern winter weather. The same was true for Minnesota in the Randy Moss era.
The exception to the “both teams play in the same conditions” rule would be high powered offenses. Eagles linebacker Ike Reese said. “Sloppy-weather games are tailor-made for running teams. When you have to put the ball up, you’re going to have to worry about sloppy passes, balls getting fumbled.”
The famed Dolphins of the early 70s which went to the Super Bowl three straight years, winning two including the perfect season are a perfect example of a team that could win in any conditions. In fact un-Miami like conditions fit perfectly into their smash mouth ball control style.
Teams custom built for their climate or stadium of course will be most effected by conditions that deviate from their comfort zone. But a road team’s style is more quantifying than their city of origin or whether or not there is a roof on their stadium insofar as handicapping weather conditions.
The single biggest mistake handicappers make is thinking potential weather advantages benefit mostly warm climate teams playing in northern cities. No less of an authority on the subject would be Dan Marino. He played his high school and college ball in Pittsburgh and spent a Hall-of-Fame career in Miami, but with many a road game in New York, Foxborough, Buffalo and many other cold-weather cities.
Marino states emphatically that is tougher for a cold weather team to play in a hot weather city than visa versa. Ask any chad hanging seasoned citizen New York transplant in south Florida and they will tell you there is an acclimation period adjusting to the much warmer weather. But eventually one gets quite used to it.
Fans of international soccer will note how for example the USA soccer team admits the brutal conditions of Guatemala and the Central American countries is a huge disadvantage for the Yankees and adaptation is difficult.
As a point of fact, it’s easier for the heavily padded American football players to compensate for cold conditions than it is for the blistering heat of Florida, Texas or Arizona. Yet the handicapper seems to concern himself more so with the December frozen tundra. This is not the case at the Center of the Handicapping Universe.

High Profile and the Obscure: We Love them Both
Joe Duffy (www.godspicks.com)
I have a colleague who insists on picking the “little guys”, that is small conferences in college because he feels the big league games involving celebrated teams “everyone knows about”.
That is true. And it is false.
Having schooling of the pros and cons of each is one of the many munitions that we use in keeping our wiseguy clients in lucrative betting. First of all, let us examine how smart money affects higher profile games and the more obscure differently.
World-class vested interest makers bet on every sport and know that they can make as much money betting on Louisiana-Monroe as on Miami-Florida. Recreational players like to bet on games that they will watch and be discussed at the water cooler on Monday. Furthermore, the hunch player and parlay card level investor makes selections on games in which they have some level of insight. In 98 percent of cases, it will be on a marquee game.
Asks any bookmaker, be they in Vegas, Costa Rica or Big Ernie driving around in his van with a cell phone on whether they will book more bets on Nebraska-Oklahoma or Eastern Michigan-Toledo. Even in the heart of MAC country, the big match-up will generate more interest. Of course the burning question is what does it mean to the gambler?
Smart money will move a line a lot more in a mid-major conference than it will on a MNF game because the potential to balance it out is much higher in marquee contests. When a sportsbook will take $190,000 in action on a MNF game, a $4,000 bet is easier to offset than in game between Idaho and North Texas, where they may only get $500 worth of action on the other side without moving the line.
But the biggest books don’t merely have an exact mathematical formula for changing a line. “I really don’t move off of the amount of money but will move off what I consider to be sharp money,” says Leo Shafto of MVP Sportsbook. Shafto is certainly one of the most aggressive in moving the line when it comes to combating topflight sports betting swashbucklers.
In the games in which sportsbooks are getting low volume, books can be much more dynamic in moving the line because in the supposed situation, there was not enough money already bet on the Idaho-North Texas game that the books risk of getting destroyed by the handicapping aristocrats is more than the risky venture of getting “middled”.
For those of you not familiar, “middling” is the line shoppers Holy Grail—betting opposite sides of both ends of line moves and hoping the final score falls in the middle. In other words betting a favorite at –4.5 and the dog in the same game at +5.5. All they risk is the juice, but if the favorite wins by five, they win with both sides.
On a MNF game though, over-adjusting to smart money runs the risk of getting “middled”. Here is an illustration using the above hypothetical. A sharp player lays down that $4,000 on Idaho at -11 points. MVP Sportsbook now has $4,725 of money bet on Idaho and $600 on North Texas. If they move the line to –13 to prevent clients from jumping on the smart money, they can only get “middled” to the tune of $4,725. If they don’t adjust the line, the amount of money a sportsbook can lose by letting others gravy train the inside dope is unlimited.
Conversely if $4,000 in sharp money came in on the Pittsburgh Steelers against Cleveland, and MVP Sportsbook has $29,700 on the Steelers –6, but just $20,000 on Cleveland +6, moving the line two points like in the North Texas example leaves them vulnerable to getting middled by up to $29,700. That is why only a huge injury would ever move an NFL line as aggressively as “sharpie” activity can move a small conference college line.
Bookmakers combat that by adding juice instead of points, which too many nonprofessional players disregard, but smart players know they can get the same line for standard vig.
Also the Internet in making the spread of information so much more widely available has also caused the patsy player to outsmart himself. In the above theoretical illustration, word spreads that North Texas will be without their second best pass rusher and premier cornerback against the high-octane offense of Idaho.
Joeybagofdonuts reads about this on some gambling posting board and oblivious to the fact that the opening line was –11 and is now –14, bets the Vandals anyway. If he wins, he fancies himself to be a wiseguy and will just outmaneuver himself soon enough by pressing his luck.
A shrewd handicapper puts the line move under a microscope. First of all, were the injuries taken into consideration with the opening line? In other words, were the key players considered “questionable” only to have their status downgraded or were these injuries that happened in practice long after the lines were posted?
Not that I will mention any names (me), but you bet it abets a bet to have great fellowship in the offshore and Vegas sportsbooks. My ingenious alliteration aside, it takes out the speculation in discerning the smart money/sucker money ratio that moves a line. Or is it the linesmakers being proactive and anticipating smart money coming in on one side?
The answer varies from game to game. Opportunists find out the accurate dope sheet. We can be such mercenaries sometimes.
The more noteworthy a game is, often the more valuable handicapping revelation is easily procured. But the more indistinct a game is, the more treasured little-known bulletins can be. Conversely the public often takes the bait thinking they have the privy skinny and still bets the wrong end of an over-adjusted and off kilter line.
Time after time, the easier to get hot poop is on the games, the tougher it is for the books to adjust. Likewise the tougher-to-acquire information is on games in which the books have more leeway to react.
Bookmakers stay in business because a lot more people misapply what comes down the pipeline than those of us who synthesize and incorporate the lowdown into its proper perspective.
Shafto in fact expressed his linesmaking philosophy that is immensely similar to what I have used to beat him and his colleagues. “Bookmaking is not a perfect science. It’s having the math work for you. As soon as you become foolish and take giant pointspread leaps, you will turn the math against you. “
Luckily different linesmakers have different philosophies. That helps us line shoppers.
Too often, the bourgeois bettor outfoxes himself. We send our gratitude for helping us inverse their knee-jerk betting. It’s a “cool jerk” as far as I am concerned.
“TV or not TV?” that is the question. We say the answer is both.
Joe Duffy is General Manager of Freescoreboard.com, the premier handicapping hub on the Internet and also of 866-FREE-866, the top source for real-time toll-free recorded scores, odds, injuries, weather, news and notes, free picks and more. Duffy’s plays are part of the Dream Team at Godspicks.com. He is perhaps the most published and respected author on sports gambling theory and has been featured as a regular guest as the handicapping expert on the Rick Ballou Show on Sporting News Radio.

Handicappers Must Have a Threshold for Systematic Winning
Joe Duffy (www.godspicks.com)
Amongst our permanent clients the single most common question we get revolves around the position of “That system you been using is great, but doesn’t it seem like the parameters should point to the opposite pick?” So often our systems would be the converse to “conventional logic”. In gambling, acknowledging that “conventional logic” is almost always an oxymoron will put one on the right path to winning. Thus going against the grain is more times than not a stupendous line of attack.
As a for instance, many of our systems involve bad offenses going over, good and hot teams being go against and bad and cold teams being ATS goldmines. There are two huge rationales why this is the case.
The first answer is in the “should it not be the opposite?” line of non-thinking. Lines are made very much to adjust to public perception. Handicapping can be loosely defined as the art of finding the undervalued and overvalued teams. The teams at the top of the standings, even if they are a Cinderella team won’t fly under the radar too long. The public fears betting bottom feeders. As we discussed in our article “It is Good to Pick Bad” we synthesize the science of handicapping public perception.
Somewhat related though is the importance of what we call analyzing whether a team will reach their “threshold” or not. Nothing affects the pre-adjusted line (meaning before injuries, public perception and other considerations) than the two teams’ performances to date.
If someone could look into the proverbial crystal ball and tell you that both teams in an NBA game will shoot 10 percent above their season average, would you bet the over or the under? Chances are that you would happily invest in the over. Of course I know we preach a preponderance of evidence in handicapping, but I am trying to simplify the illustration.
Comparably in another game you had the two worst shooting teams in the NBA playing each other. Such hypothetical would put each of their field goal percentages at approximately 41 percent. Each team would need to hit just more than half their shots to exceed the aforestated threshold by 10 percentage points. However if it involved the two top shooting teams, that would put each team around the 48 percent mark meaning each team would have to shoot 58 percent to reach the exact same threshold. So in that comparison 58 percent shooting by both teams in one game is the equivalent of 51 percent in the other game.
How appropriate it’s called handicapping, because a team’s performance to date much like a “handicap” in your neighborhood beer bowling league is what the pointspread is based on.
I know a big time square player whom I will call Sal. Sal likes picking college hoop totals and one of his built in chestnuts is regurgitating, “I love the over in this game because both teams love to shoot the three point shot.”
“What’s the total Sal?” cohort Leo Shafto and I time and time again ask the dunderhead. Sal stammers, “It doesn’t matter, both teams will shoot a lot of threes.” Sal the Simpleton is oblivious to the high total, unfazed once he sees it and totally unwitting to the fact that to go over both teams will not only likely have to shoot a bunch of three-point shots, but exceed the high zenith and make an inordinate number to win his bet. This is especially the case to win based on the reasons Sal gave.
Systems that “make sense” to the uneducated eye are the ones that raise a red flag to the learned. Knowing “conventional logic” is an even bigger oxymoron in handicapping because oddsmakers are aware of public perception and knowing it’s easier to exceed a low threshold than a high threshold is indispensable wisdom.
As always system plays are only part of handicapping. We don’t consider a system to be statistically significant unless it has a Z-score of 4.0 or higher (statisticians consider 2.0 to be statistically significant. Or systems must have an ROI of 80 or above. But it is almost as important to be aware why systems work.
Duffy’s plays are part of the Dream Team at Godspicks.com. He is perhaps the most published and respected author on sports gambling theory and has been featured as a regular guest as the handicapping expert on the Rick Ballou Show on Sporting News Radio, the Meat and Potatoes gambling show, Pro Fantasy Sports Internet radio and Grogan’s Fantasy Football show. His Wise Guy Plays available exclusively at www.godspicks.com are widely respected as the biggest play in the handicapping abyss.

Good Handicappers Are In Midseason Form in the Preseason
Joe Duffy (www.godspicks.com)
The great Emmitt Smith did a commercial in which he said that championships are won in the preseason. Of course I found it ironic that in said year he missed the entire preseason and the first two games of the regular schedule before leading Dallas to the Super Bowl. But I digress. The thrust is that handicappers have a whole heap to win in the preseason as well.
I am exceedingly sure that you have heard it and percentages say that you have uttered it as well. When I first began handicapping I espoused the costly naivety too.
The fallacy is that nobody in their right mind would try to foretell preseason battles. The belief is that there are too many unknown factors to consider, too many nameless and faceless Division II players on each side of the ball who will be getting their only taste of the show for a few plays or series of downs.
True the argument behind this deduction is certainly based on fact, but the conclusion in not only untrue, but very much the contrary.
The reality is that smart players realize that such mentioned disadvantages actually apply to the oddsmaker and not the gambler. With the proliferation of offshore sportsbooks and the competitiveness leading to sportsbooks posting advanced lines earlier and earlier, the advantage continues to swing more and more towards the player, well at least to the wise player.
Preseason lines are made now a week in advance. After the first week, so often once both opponents have completed their preceding contest, a line is posted as rapidly as possible for the upcoming week.
The truthfulness is that the linesmakers have to deal with a lot more uncertainty that the bettor does. Of course lines do adjust—sometimes over adjust based on this information and the public responding to it, but the sportsbooks are still limited in exactly how much they can move the lines or they would get destroyed by line shoppers and “middle” players. “Bette Middlers” is what my cohort OC Dooley likes to call them.
Hometown newspapers are a Godsend for handicapping preseason football. Rarely is there a game in which coaches will not give out accurate information on quarterback and key player rotations as well as injuries. It is not remotely uncommon to find out because of injuries and other reasons that a team for example may be without four of their top six offensive linemen or many analogous situations.
As a general rule of thumb both offensive and defensive schemes are pretty vanilla in the exhibition games (apologies to the late Mr. Rozelle, that’s what they are). But yet when teams have a new head coach or new coordinator or a lot of new players projected to play key positions often coaches will throw in more stunts, blitzes, etc.
But because the purpose is for the players to learn a system and not to catch their opponent off-guard, such game plan is almost never kept secret. However rarely in preseason do coaches actually prepare for their opponent. Thus when research uncovers that one team is working on some more sophisticated packages, while the opponent is going to keep it straightforward, the big plus goes to team planning on mixing it up.
There are eternal issues that affects how critically each team approaches a particular preseason game, such as new systems on both or either side of the ball, the number of established veterans on each team who will only play some token downs merely for timing and getting in shape, the number of positions and roster spots up for grabs, individual coaches philosophies on how to approach a preseason game. The inventory really never ends.
But so often the coaches and key players own comments will give strong insight into whether or not there is an enormous dichotomy in how each team is approaching a forthcoming game. Inevitably a coach especially one of a young or perennially losing team will flat out state something to the effect, “We need to instill a winning attitude and habit early. We want to enter the regular season with some wins under our belt.” Not-so-uncommon annotations like that set off sirens at Godspicks.
The Dallas Cowboys for years were one of the great preseason go-against plays, especially during the “Triplets” era of Irvin, Smith and Aikman because most of the key starting positions were already etched in stone. Whether or not Jimmy Johnson or Barry Switzer was the coach, the Cowboys played future Arena Football players using the most basic schemes.
Read those newspapers and you will find that on any given preseason weekend, there will be several matchups in which one team will be play key members longer than their opponent or that one team because of injuries and precautions will be much more shorthanded at kickoff than their foe.
It is always important to keep a close eye on teams whose first and second string players were on one side of a dominating performance. So often such will effect how much work the key players will get the following week. If a veteran first unit outscored their foe 14-0 one week, there is a good chance that they be given little work the next week. But do not assume this to be the case. Hometown newspapers leave little to speculation by printing coaches’ answers to the obvious questions.
It is a pretty good general rule of thumb that teams off of humiliating losses will come out with vengeance the following week. But there is a reason that I qualified such statement with “pretty good” and “general”. Final scores can be deceptive in any and all sports but such is the case even more so in preseason football.
If a team loses 28-7 but the first and second teams were outscored 21-0, while the mop-up guys played evenly, it is a huge difference than if it were visa versa. The third and fourth stringers if totally outplayed are digging ditches and contacting the Barcelona Dragons. But if it were the primary players who were humiliated, they are the ones who have a fire lit under them.
It is much more important to look at how the respective top two units played than the actual final score. However one must very much take into account all the extenuating factors involved entering the game, as illustrated above. Perhaps a teams top two units were shorthanded against an opponent who used complicated schemes breaking in new systems. But I do love betting on teams whose first and second units got a good ole fashioned no-excuses butt whipping to rebound accordingly.
One has to though find that fine line between going with all of the above factors and being mindful of line moves. This is particularly so with the public jumping on the same side that you are.
I honestly can not give a definitive scientific explanation of exactly how my handicapping has been complimented so well by line moves, other than to know that it defies any laws of probability. But somewhere there is a congruency amongst my handicapping techniques, the opening line and public perception that affects the line moves.
I can with full honesty say that in preseason just as I do during the regular season, I win a lot more than I lose. However so many times if early in the week I pencil side A as a play only to have the public bet side A so much that the line moves enough to scare me off of the game, only to have side B cover both ends of the line move. Somehow there is a complimentary congruency in my handicapping that increases my winning percentage even further.
But all factors equal, I very much like going against preseason line moves of 2’ or more points. When those moves are not justified by the factors outlined about, I often make selections based about 85% on unjustified line, moves. But line moves that I deem justified more times than not results in a no-play.
The modus operandi that applies in the regular season and postseason handicapping are completely different than that of the preseason. Once a talented handicapper realizes that, he has taken first step towards a nice regular season bankroll. But after that, it still takes research, research, research…
Duffy’s plays are part of the Dream Team at Godspicks.com. He is perhaps the most published and respected author on sports gambling theory and has been featured as a regular guest as the handicapping expert on the Rick Ballou Show on Sporting News Radio. His Wise Guy Plays are widely respected as the biggest play in the handicapping abyss.

Good Handicappers Are In Midseason Form in the Preseason
Joe Duffy (www.godspicks.com)
The great Emmitt Smith did a commercial in which he said that championships are won in the preseason. Of course I found it ironic that in said year he missed the entire preseason and the first two games of the regular schedule before leading Dallas to the Super Bowl. But I digress. The thrust is that handicappers have a whole heap to win in the preseason as well.
I am exceedingly sure that you have heard it and percentages say that you have uttered it as well. When I first began handicapping I espoused the costly naivety too.
The fallacy is that nobody in their right mind would try to foretell preseason battles. The belief is that there are too many unknown factors to consider, too many nameless and faceless Division II players on each side of the ball who will be getting their only taste of the show for a few plays or series of downs.
True the argument behind this deduction is certainly based on fact, but the conclusion in not only untrue, but very much the contrary.
The reality is that smart players realize that such mentioned disadvantages actually apply to the oddsmaker and not the gambler. With the proliferation of offshore sportsbooks and the competitiveness leading to sportsbooks posting advanced lines earlier and earlier, the advantage continues to swing more and more towards the player, well at least to the wise player.
Preseason lines are made now a week in advance. After the first week, so often once both opponents have completed their preceding contest, a line is posted as rapidly as possible for the upcoming week.
The truthfulness is that the linesmakers have to deal with a lot more uncertainty that the bettor does. Of course lines do adjust—sometimes over adjust based on this information and the public responding to it, but the sportsbooks are still limited in exactly how much they can move the lines or they would get destroyed by line shoppers and “middle” players. “Bette Middlers” is what my cohort OC Dooley likes to call them.
Hometown newspapers are a Godsend for handicapping preseason football. Rarely is there a game in which coaches will not give out accurate information on quarterback and key player rotations as well as injuries. It is not remotely uncommon to find out because of injuries and other reasons that a team for example may be without four of their top six offensive linemen or many analogous situations.
As a general rule of thumb both offensive and defensive schemes are pretty vanilla in the exhibition games (apologies to the late Mr. Rozelle, that’s what they are). But yet when teams have a new head coach or new coordinator or a lot of new players projected to play key positions often coaches will throw in more stunts, blitzes, etc.
But because the purpose is for the players to learn a system and not to catch their opponent off-guard, such game plan is almost never kept secret. However rarely in preseason do coaches actually prepare for their opponent. Thus when research uncovers that one team is working on some more sophisticated packages, while the opponent is going to keep it straightforward, the big plus goes to team planning on mixing it up.
There are eternal issues that affects how critically each team approaches a particular preseason game, such as new systems on both or either side of the ball, the number of established veterans on each team who will only play some token downs merely for timing and getting in shape, the number of positions and roster spots up for grabs, individual coaches philosophies on how to approach a preseason game. The inventory really never ends.
But so often the coaches and key players own comments will give strong insight into whether or not there is an enormous dichotomy in how each team is approaching a forthcoming game. Inevitably a coach especially one of a young or perennially losing team will flat out state something to the effect, “We need to instill a winning attitude and habit early. We want to enter the regular season with some wins under our belt.” Not-so-uncommon annotations like that set off sirens at Godspicks.
The Dallas Cowboys for years were one of the great preseason go-against plays, especially during the “Triplets” era of Irvin, Smith and Aikman because most of the key starting positions were already etched in stone. Whether or not Jimmy Johnson or Barry Switzer was the coach, the Cowboys played future Arena Football players using the most basic schemes.
Read those newspapers and you will find that on any given preseason weekend, there will be several matchups in which one team will be play key members longer than their opponent or that one team because of injuries and precautions will be much more shorthanded at kickoff than their foe.
It is always important to keep a close eye on teams whose first and second string players were on one side of a dominating performance. So often such will effect how much work the key players will get the following week. If a veteran first unit outscored their foe 14-0 one week, there is a good chance that they be given little work the next week. But do not assume this to be the case. Hometown newspapers leave little to speculation by printing coaches’ answers to the obvious questions.
It is a pretty good general rule of thumb that teams off of humiliating losses will come out with vengeance the following week. But there is a reason that I qualified such statement with “pretty good” and “general”. Final scores can be deceptive in any and all sports but such is the case even more so in preseason football.
If a team loses 28-7 but the first and second teams were outscored 21-0, while the mop-up guys played evenly, it is a huge difference than if it were visa versa. The third and fourth stringers if totally outplayed are digging ditches and contacting the Barcelona Dragons. But if it were the primary players who were humiliated, they are the ones who have a fire lit under them.
It is much more important to look at how the respective top two units played than the actual final score. However one must very much take into account all the extenuating factors involved entering the game, as illustrated above. Perhaps a teams top two units were shorthanded against an opponent who used complicated schemes breaking in new systems. But I do love betting on teams whose first and second units got a good ole fashioned no-excuses butt whipping to rebound accordingly.
One has to though find that fine line between going with all of the above factors and being mindful of line moves. This is particularly so with the public jumping on the same side that you are.
I honestly can not give a definitive scientific explanation of exactly how my handicapping has been complimented so well by line moves, other than to know that it defies any laws of probability. But somewhere there is a congruency amongst my handicapping techniques, the opening line and public perception that affects the line moves.
I can with full honesty say that in preseason just as I do during the regular season, I win a lot more than I lose. However so many times if early in the week I pencil side A as a play only to have the public bet side A so much that the line moves enough to scare me off of the game, only to have side B cover both ends of the line move. Somehow there is a complimentary congruency in my handicapping that increases my winning percentage even further.
But all factors equal, I very much like going against preseason line moves of 2’ or more points. When those moves are not justified by the factors outlined about, I often make selections based about 85% on unjustified line, moves. But line moves that I deem justified more times than not results in a no-play.
The modus operandi that applies in the regular season and postseason handicapping are completely different than that of the preseason. Once a talented handicapper realizes that, he has taken first step towards a nice regular season bankroll. But after that, it still takes research, research, research…
Duffy’s plays are part of the Dream Team at Godspicks.com. He is perhaps the most published and respected author on sports gambling theory and has been featured as a regular guest as the handicapping expert on the Rick Ballou Show on Sporting News Radio. His Wise Guy Plays are widely respected as the biggest play in the handicapping abyss.

Good Amateur Psychologists Make Great Handicappers
Joe Duffy (www.godspicks.com)
Long-time clients know when I mention the name Yogi Berra in our game breakdown, we have a good likelihood of winning. We often quote his “90 percent of the game is half mental” malapropism. Very often teams are playing two opponents—the guys in the other uniform and a mental whammy.
Several illustrations have applied very recently. The most high profile would be the Boston Red Sox and the Chicago Cubs falling prey to billy goat and Bambino curses. Also Florida and Godspicks again cashed in against Georgia in the World’s Largest Cocktail Party. Going with Michigan against John Cooper’s Ohio State teams was free money.
Regular clients know that this is not a case being a hindsight genius. There was no reservations that the Chicago Cubs should have been heavy favorites “on paper” in Games 6 and 7 of the NLCS. They were playing at home with Kerry Wood and Mark Prior on the hill with the 3-2 lead.
With Pedro Martinez on the pitcher’s mound, the Red Sox “on paper” was justified in being a road favorite in Game 7.
One need not believe in Voodoo or witch doctors to subscribe to “jinxes”. But regardless of the origin of the alleged hex, one need only to acknowledge that the brain is the most forceful muscle in an athlete’s body.
Natalie Newton is a former athlete and well respected sports psychologist. She articulates, “What you have to realize is that any time you put two losses or errors or mistakes or any negative experiences back to back, then the anticipation turns into expecting a third loss,” Newton eloquently explains a theory that I subscribed to as a handicapper for years. “So if you’ve lost to a same team or same person or had a same similar error occur two times in a row, then the expectation is for it to occur the next time. Some people call it superstition. Whatever you want to call it, that is a natural human expectation.”
The more I hear and read about coaches and players denying a jinx or “curse”, the more I take into account that it becomes increasing inescapable for a team to not bear this mental weight.
Dr. Newtown fluently expresses why we think it is no coincidence that both the Cubs and Red Sox were five outs from a World Series birth before imploding or that Florida again beat a more talented Bulldog team on the last series of their 2003 football contest.
In times of pressure one team’s subconscious reminds them that history tells them they will win, the other team…well this is from a website Bambinocurse.com “If you look at voodoo or Santeria, psychologists will tell you that the curses work because the people truly believe in it. Neurology is full of cases demonstrating the power of our own minds, consciously or unconsciously, over our bodies.”
Sports psychologists and coaches will tell you if a player believes his lucky socks make him perform better, chances are they will. When I read that coaches have found something mechanical that a slumping player had been doing wrong, I realize believing there is a corrected flaw is every bit as effective as there actually being one.
The fact that professional and college teams have hired sports psychologists or that coaches believe in “bulletin board material” is beyond corroboration that elite handicappers have to recognize when black magic is one teams opponent of the psyche.
When foretelling the outcome of games, a team’s mindset is a terrible thing to waste. Those who pooh-pooh such will curse themselves.
Duffy’s plays are part of the Dream Team at Godspicks.com. He is perhaps the most published and respected author on sports gambling theory and has been featured as a regular guest as the handicapping expert on the Rick Ballou Show on Sporting News Radio, Gamblers Zoo national radio show, the Meat and Potatoes gambling show, Pro Fantasy Sports Internet radio and Grogan’s Fantasy Football show.
His Wise Guy Plays available exclusively at www.godspicks.com where daily sports handicapping information is available to crush the sportsbooks. Godspicks.com is the top source for NFL picks, college football winners and more.

God’s Tid-Bets, Vol. 14
Joe Duffy (www.godspicks.com)
This is the latest in a serious of a Godgepodge of gambling strategy and thoughts.
Great Read
The best gambling related magazine I’ve seen is Highroller (www.highrollerlife.com). It covers ever aspect of gambling and is certainly a must read for all poker players. My understanding is it is very commonplace at newsstands. It gets the much sought after Godspicks seal of approval.
The next time you head out for some Doritos and brew, pick up a copy.
Bulletin Board Material
There is some value to handicapping the intangible of so-called “bulletin board material”. That is one team with a player calling out the other team. However sometimes it can benefit the trash talking team, other times a detriment. There is a certain physiological warfare and we find a veteran player questioning the big game capabilities of a key young player on another team is does rather a player when things are going well.
Ironically the other extreme is that a well disciplined team can also be flustered. The famed guarantees of Mark Messier, Joe Namath, and Jimmy Johnson are examples of the consistent and superior teams being taken off their single-mindedness.
One of the best assertions I’ve heard is from someone who believes handicapping the effects of such can have great value in football. He believes practice preparation is much underrated—we do too as we’ve previously spoken of what great precursors “great week” or “poor week” of practices are. He believes “bulletin board material” increases focus and determination during the week more than having a direct affect after kickoff.
Contrary to popular belief, it’s worse to call out underachieving teams or players that need a wake-up call. Why light a fire under Randy Moss? It’s the old why wake up a sleeping dog syndrome.
Conversely a top shelf team didn’t become that good by waiting for some blowhard on the other team to provoke them. From a “face saving” standpoint, there are risks to calling out a much more exceptional opponent However in 1994 when the Cowboys Jimmy Johnson took his dog Pokes to Candlestick Park and proclaimed “put it in three-inch headlines. We will win” he proved correct. As Johnson correctly stated years later, he believes he got underneath the skin of the usually clearheaded collection of veteran future Hall-of-Famers as they engaged the Cowboys in a pre-game near brawl.
Thriving teams are more likely to be distracted by being on the giving or receiving end of calling out. Struggling teams are more likely to be awoken. In short, a big favorite does not need to have the boat rocked by a braggadocio on either team.
The Dictionary as a Handicapping Tool
With conference tournaments followed by the Big Dance upon us, it is imperative we warn you against yet another dunce assumption that gamblers make about neutral site games, be it in football and basketball. Neutral according to the dictionary means “Not aligned with, supporting, or favoring either side in a war, dispute, or contest.”
The dumb cluck investor overplays road statistics when weighing performance to date. This is a gross misapplication. A road game is a game on the opponent’s court. The oddsmakers absolutely are prepared for this common delusion. A neutral court is just that—it’s no more a road game than a home game.
Of course we consider if one team has to travel much further or is bringing along a much larger supporting section, but that’s part of the research. And under that circumstance one team’s neutral game is more like a home than a road battle.
But the presupposition that one should handicap each team’s road performance disproportionately is not based on any factual historical data or simple common sense. Wise men handicap neutral games like the dictionary defines them, not as if each team is playing a road contest.
Duffy’s plays are part of the Dream Team at Godspicks.com. He is perhaps the most published and respected author on sports gambling theory and has been featured as a regular guest as the handicapping expert on the Rick Ballou Show on Sporting News Radio, Gamblers Zoo national radio show, the Meat and Potatoes gambling show, Gridiron Gamblers, Pro Fantasy Sports Internet radio and Grogan’s Fantasy Football show.

God’s Tid-Bets, Vol. 13
Joe Duffy (www.godspicks.com)
Inconsistency is Your Friend
Here is another Golden Rule of handicapping. As Schneider from One Day at a Time used to say, “Always remember and never forget” what is bad for the oddsmakers is good for you. What is good for the oddsmakers is bad for you. The linesmakers and square players loathe uncertainty. That’s why books love the square player; they play to linesmakers’ strengths while the sharp player will exploit their weakness.
Games are circled or off-the-board because of ambiguous injury information to a key player, severe weather or sometimes pending motivation factors late in the year concerning playoff ramifications, coaches resting healthy key players, etc. Why? The sharp players use equivocal information as a resource not a liability.
I hear bush league punters (as they call them in Europe) all the time say something along the lines of, “I just can’t get a handle on that team. I avoid their games altogether.” I’ve spoken to most of the big name oddsmakers and sportsbook directors at one time or another and every one of them will bemoan that the haphazard teams are the ones they despise the most. “Predictably unpredictable” teams are very high percentage plays. Such teams are box of chocolates–you never know what you will get. That’s why taking a large pointspread number in a game in which the oddsmakers struggle to cipher is a good venture. There are many teams that will on a predictable basis follow up a great effort with a dud and visa versa. This is typical of young teams or those with erratic star players, and talented but poorly coached teams.
Hence contrary to what Joeybagodonuts thinks, it’s actually better to go against “predictably unpredictable” teams when playing well and with them when they are playing poorly. Combining the two, inconsistent big dogs are good percentage plays to bet on and inconsistent favorites playing well are go-against plays. In short the same teams that seem to loathe prosperity also are the most dangerous once essentially counted out. When it comes to bettors, winners are proactive, losers are reactive.
That’s a Bowl of Crap
There are not many givens in gambling. One that’s almost etched in stone is the books make a windfall during the bowls. The square players come out of the woodwork for the bowls and March Madness. One of the biggest groupthink falsities is those who believe in betting the teams that enter bowl season the hottest. While we do find that true for March Madness, in both the conference tournaments and the Dance, not only is it not true for football’s postseason, actually more times than not it’s the opposite. But that’s why there are not many bookmakers in the breadline. Conventional illogical separates the fool from his money.
Which team needs 20-30 days off the most—the team playing their best football at the end of the year, or the one playing their worst? Rest can often take a team out of their rhythm, be it good or bad pulse. Three weeks is a lot of time for mentally and physically tired teams to regroup. Also it’s the perfect trap for a peaking team to lose their edge.
Be a Fan of Fan Attendance For Bowl Games
Not all widely held conventions are based on illogic, though in many cases there is still more that meets the eye and the pocket. A great example is most gamblers sharp and square realize if there is a huge difference in fan contingencies one team brings to a bowl game, there is without debate an advantage to the team that will have more partisans on a neutral field. But this advantage is exploitable when it’s actually a symptom of a greater truth. Especially when it comes to minor bowls, one of the biggest x-factors is analyzing which teams are truly interested and which are playing in a consolation game.
In that sense the fans and the players are congruent. If there is less fan interest, there is less player interest and visa versa. There’s a chicken/egg scenario in there somewhere. However if the dichotomy is better explained by one school being much physically closer to the site of the bowl or a larger school with more alumni then the advantage is lessened. However if one school is transporting a much larger contingent despite a geographical inconvenience, there we have an angle. That’s a strong indicator one team considers the bowl a major contest while the other is in the proverbial kissing-your-sister game.
Media reports and the teams’ and bowls press releases are sources for accurate information on which teams will have the bigger cheering sections.
Duffy’s plays are part of the Dream Team at Godspicks.com. He is perhaps the most published and respected author on sports gambling theory and has been featured as a regular guest as the handicapping expert on the Rick Ballou Show on Sporting News Radio, Gamblers Zoo national radio show, the Meat and Potatoes gambling show, Gridiron Gamblers, Pro Fantasy Sports Internet radio and Grogan’s Fantasy Football show.