The world’s best sports handicappers continue to dominate the bookmakers thanks to the preponderance of information. Extremely high on that list is champion handicapper Matt Rivers, who is widely accepted as the top college sports handicapper: basketball and football. The all-time leader in money won on a large network of websites, he is now part of The Show at OffshoreInsiders.com

He is taking the Knicks -1 (according to Bodog) hosting Golden State. Here is his rationale.

The New York Knicks are a complete abomination. Mike D’Antoni’s squad is all about 2010 and the culture is atrocious right now. The players don’t seem to care and the attitude is horrific. But with that said there is still some talent on the team and they are going to win some games. Today is a very very winnable game.
 
Golden State is not very good at all and are thousands of miles away from home. Going west to east is never easy and to ask Golden State to win this game is a lot harder than asking New York to win.
 
David Lee, Al Harrington, Chris Duhon, Danillo Galinari, Wilson Chandler and the Knicks do have an upside. They are just so psychologically frail because of the situation that they have underachieved out of the gate to this 1-8 star SU and 2-7 ATSt. But there are going to be some wins in their future and this is definitely one of those spots.
 
If the New Yorkers were playing even just bad basketball they would be a solid dozen point favorite here because of the fatcs that they are at home and up against the weak team they are up against. But the dreadful start has created a solid enough value here and a small play on the Knicks.
 
Who knows, maybe even little man Nate Robinson will return tonight and spark the club a bit.

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“Betting against Jay Cutler in big games should not be called gambling. It is highway robbery,” laughed Grandmaster sports handicapper Joe Duffy straight to the bank again as the 49ers on NFL Network Thursday night football completed yet another sweep. The doyenne definite of sports betting also nailed Rutgers as the Thursday Night ESPN Game of the Year and the first Wise Guy of the college basketball season with Ohio State.

Some say happiness in marriage is entirely a matter of chance. For those who master the Vegas sports betting odds, it’s a matter of marrying the right football expert and the best is Joe Duffy’s GodsTips, anchor of OffshoreInsiders.com.

Here is his premium report that professional gamblers got late last night. His report has remains hotter than the Carrie Prejean sextape and he’s been winning bets back when Larry King was married to his first wife.

Wise Guy plays are your maximum play.  Majors are .75 of Wise Guy plays.

Wise Guy…

RUTGERS -2 South Florida

Thursday Night ESPN Game of the Year

This is why is it best to buy early as professional gamblers wager on our picks and often move the line greatly. 

What else is new? South Florida is playing their worst football of the year and Rutgers their best as the season winds down. That’s part of the reason Rutgers has won three straight in the series.

South Florida has perhaps looked a bit better than expected since losing Matt Grothe, the bottom line is both losses have been since he was lost for the year. Remarkably inconsistent replacement B.J. Daniels will have his predictably unpredictable letdown.

After losing their starting QB and first-round NFL WR, the Scarlet Knights struggled early just as they did once they lost Ray Rice. But head coach Greg Schiano has shown it takes him a few games, but he can rebuilt. That’s why the home underdogs have won 6-of-7 straight up, the only loss to Pittsburgh.

USF has six wins. The first three were to Wofford, Western Kentucky, and Charleston Southern. Another was to lowly Syracuse. While beating FSU was pretty impressive, there was no way for the reeling Noles to manufacture the intensity USF had with the chance to finally face their evil in-step step brother.

Rutgers is better, they’ve dominated USF and yet they are getting points at home.

Major…

SAN FRANCISCO -3 Chicago

It’s tough not to go against Jay Cutler in a big game. The Bears are putrid on the road getting outscored by 10.5 points per game. The Niners are a dichotomous spread team.  We discount 98 percent of trends, but this has proven to be the exception to the rule. Explained in our articles around the Net, basically if a team has a great SU record but horrid ATS record or visa versa, you ride for that to continue as it is the sign of which teams are most under or overvalued.  

They have lost four straight outright to drop to 3-5, but are 5-2-1 where it really counts. San Francisco has been very proficient on defense holding teams to .7 below their normal averages rushing the ball.

Establishing the run is even more important on the road, but Chicago has done little of that successfully. The short week hurts the road team more.

Vernon Davis has really broken out for the 49ers and fits perfectly into head coach Mike Singletary’s ball control style. Bears are without linebackers Brian Urlacher and Pisa Tinoisamoa and that will open up the middle for Davis. Then there is RB Frank Gore who averages 5.6 yards per rush.

San Francisco is better than their record and wins comfortably here.  

In college basketball, professional bettors won their only pick.

Wise Guy…

OHIO STATE -17 James Madison

Going with home teams in non-conference games off a 20 point or more win is 150 plus units.

Duffy’s picks are exclusively on OffshoreInsiders.com   

Best wishes out to John Wetteland. We probably all know somebody who has had mental illness. I worked with two people who committed suicide. Often there are no warning signs.

Was the Bears-49ers game on NFL Network supposed to be an announcerless telecast? Why didn’t they do that when Bryant Gumbel was doing the telecasts?

Everyone has a friend whose betting strategy is simple as it is stupid: lay chalk across the board. He tries to convince you taking USC -45 over Washington State is the lock of the week despite the fact that the Trojans have yet to cross the 30-point barrier all season. The Yankees at -325 with CC on the mound? No problem, the Yanks have won nine straight! You forget to inform him he hasn’t done his homework because the Evil Empire clinched the night before and is starting their AAA lineup behind Sabathia. Sometimes these chalk bettors just need to learn a lesson.  Now you have to lend this chump buffet money for the rest of the trip because he forgot the number one sports handicapping rule: don’t fall in love with favorites.

Laying chalk is a strategy oddsmakers easily countered with inflated spreads, run/pucklines (my obligatory hockey shout out for the year) and severely juiced moneylines. In a sport like baseball, the best team usually hovers around a .600 winning percentage so why risk taking any team at higher than -150? The only value you can find here is creating your own teaser or parlay, and well, we all know how that goes. (link to last entry here)

This leads us to the 2009 NFL season. In my season opening blog at Coopers Sports Picks and not a fish blog, I did my best to steer anyone who works hard for their money as far away from the No Fun League as possible. That was before weeks 1-7 proceeded to destroy my “NFL is the perfect parity machine” theory. This season has officially mutated into a chalk bettor’s heaven. The big dogs (Saints, Giants, Colts) are covering double-digit spreads with ease. This past week we saw favorites go 9-2-1 with six teams covering a touchdown or larger spread. Every week the sharps have warned Joe Public that the all-knowing oddsmakers will even out this number with painful results for those who choose to jump on the chalk bandwagon. The result? We’re one week away from mid-season and the favorites just keep on rolling. A fourth-quarter Saints flurry to erase a 21-point deficit over the Dolphins guaranteed that the NFL would have three undefeated teams (Saints, Broncos, Colts) heading into week eight for the first time in league history. Obviously the Football odds are where they are at for a reason and clearly, we are on unprecedented ground with this trend.

Enough crying. What can we do about this?

Pay close attention to scheduling. Many teams are entering the teeth of their division schedules. Look for value in the underdogs in the tougher divisions (AFC East/North, NFC East) in interdivision games. Division play features more familiarity between coaching schemes, similar pace, and less travel. You can worry less about a jetlagged teams history in mountain-central time or how a southern team will handle sleet and opposing fans’ snowballs once they are playing the majority of their remaining games within their division.

Stay away from heavy road chalk. Everyone is well aware that large road favorites are covering at record pace this season but remember again we are entering division play where double-digit blowouts are rare. The majority of road blowouts this season haven’t happened in traditional matchups, they’ve happened in once every five year matchups such as the Giants-Bucs, Saints-Bills, Jets-Raiders.

Create a tier-system for teams. Teams ranked in the lowest tier (Rams, Bucs, Chiefs, Browns) qualify as candidates to risk large spreads against in the right situation. Mid-tier teams (Dolphins, Titans, Seahawks) who have faced a brutal 1^st half schedules warrant strong consideration if they are getting points against top-tier teams, especially when they’re at home. For the record, I’m willing to wager my lunch money that the Titans finish .500 or better the second half of the season.

Finally, don’t read too much into the chalk trend. Focus on individual matchups and crunch numbers instead. Some weeks you’ll come up with more favorites, others you’ll have a stable of dogs. Either way, make sure you’re picking based on your research rather than blindly following a trend or gut feeling.

I know this season has thrown our chalk loving friends a slow fastball down the middle. We might be even be questioning our own time consuming research and considering abandoning discussion with fellow handicappers in the forums. Resist the urge to switch horses midstream. There’s plenty of football left to be played. Don’t forget every dog has his day. 

It’s the biggest weeknight of the year for football betting as handicapper’s see a lot of great sports picks tonight. There are two early starts on Bowling Green vs. Miami Ohio and Ball State vs. Northern Illinois. Then on ESPN, it’s South Florida and Rutgers, but it’s also the beginning of the NFL Network’s Thursday Night slate.

Week 10 NFL picks commence as Chicago Bears take on the San Francisco 49ers. Sportsbooks have San Francisco a three-point favorite and -115. The total is 43

The home team is an incredible 10-0 straight up in regular season meetings and San Francisco has won six straight in the Bay Area. Isaac Bruce, the 49ers WR who has had a bad ankle most of the year, is questionable with such injury.

Bears S Kevin Payne, who plays in the nickel package is out.

Backup RB Glen Coffee is out. For the Bears S Al Afalava is questionable. As far as bulletin board material, the Bears should have plenty of incentive. TE Vernon Davis promised his 49ers would “destroy” the Bears.  .

It’s part of a great night of football that includes Bowling Green-Miami Ohio, Ball State-Northern Illinois, and South Florida-Rutgers.

The Bears enter with middling 4-4 straight up and against the spread marks including 1-3 on the road in both groupings.

San Francisco is 3-5 straight up and 5-2 to the number. However, the Niners enter on a four-game straight up losing streak.

Now the handicapping preview utilizing the key indicators used by sports handicappers:

Chicago‘s offense has been average at best getting 4.0 yards per rush against teams normally allowing 4.2 and 6.7 yards per pass to squads that normally permit 6.7. On the road, they average a very pedestrian 3.1 yards per rush. Similarity, their defensive numbers are in line with what their opponents normally allow. Chicago allow 4.2 yards per rush to 4.1 and 6.3 yards per pass to 6.4.

However, San Francisco is horrid offensively in the air getting just 5.8 yards per pass to teams that normally allow 6.7, getting just 5.2 yards per play to 5.7.

The Niners are tough on defense allowing 3.4 yards per rush to teams normally getting 4.1 and 5.3 yards per play to 5.6.

Against the spread records: Chicago is 8-3 after allowing more than 150 yards rushing last game. They are 0-6 after allowing more than 250 passing yards last game.

San Francisco is 10-21 as a favorite and 2-8 after allowing more than 30 points their last game.

Over/under angles: Chicago has gone over 31-14 to the NFC. San Francisco has gone under seven straight after allowing more than 150 yards rushing last game.  

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