Week 9 Primer

Eastern Michigan is 22-4-1 ATS in its last 27 games as an underdog.

Published on Friday, 10/25/19, at 7:01 p.m. Eastern.

What’s up?! As most of you probably know, most of my time this football season is being spent at MajorWager.com. That’s why I haven’t had as many posts here on my website.

However, we found time to put this together for Week 9. Here are plenty of notes, trends, tweets, links, injury updates, etc. Best of luck with your wagers!

Will Muschamp is 7-0 as a head coach against Tennessee. He’ll put that on the line tomorrow at Neyland Stadium as a 4.5-point road favorite at most books. The Gamecocks will be without RB Rico Dowdle, but Tavien Feaster and Mon Denson are plenty capable of carrying the load on the ground.

Eastern Michigan is 22-4-1 against the spread in its last 27 games as an underdog. The Eagles are three-point road underdogs at Toledo. Both team’s starting QBs (EMU’s Mike Glass and Toledo’s Mitchell Guadagni) remained ‘questionable’ as of early Friday evening.

–LSU WR Terrace Marshall Jr. has been upgraded to ‘probable’ vs. Auburn. He had six TD catches in (not even) four games before getting injured at Vandy on Sept. 21.

–Both of Stanford’s QBs — K.J. Costello (thumb) and Davis Mills (calf) — remain ‘questionable’ for Saturday’s home game vs. Arizona. Ditto for Maryland with Josh Jackson (leg) and Tyrrell Pigrome (leg). Other QBs who are question marks include Arkansas’ Ben Hicks, Air Force’s Donald Hammond (and Isaiah Sanders), Syracuse’s Tommy DeVito (and Clayton Welch, who threw two second-half TD passes vs. Pitt last Friday), Indiana’s Michael Penix and Nebraska’s Adrian Martinez (and Noah Vedral).

N’Kosi Perry has been named Miami’s starter at Pittsburgh. Star LB Michael Pinckney is ‘doubtful’ and WR Jeff Thomas is suspended.

–After starting six games as a grad transfer from South Alabama, Syracuse OT Ryan Alexander is no longer with the team. The ‘Cuse is an 11-point road underdog at FSU. There will likely be in excess of 25,000 empty seats at Doak Campbell Stadium. The Seminoles will be looking to avenge a 30-3 pimpslap at the Carrier Dome last year.

–Before Bob Stoops swooped in and stole Lincoln Riley when he was Ruffin McNeill’s offensive coordinator at East Carolina, I used to rave about how great Riley was in shredding ECU’s record books with QB Shane Carden and WR Justin Hardy. I hailed Stoops’s OC hire as the best offseason hire in all of college football. Now I’ll say the same for Joe Brady, the new offensive guru for LSU that came from the Saints. Now Brady isn’t the OC in his late 20s like Riley was at ECU, but he’s the guy that’s the hot name out there. So I pose this question to the schools that are about to conduct coaching searches in the next month or two: Do you have the balls to hire a head coach that’s still in his 20s? If you do and you pluck Brady away from LSU, it’ll be a high-risk, high-reward move. The guess here? I’ll say high reward. (Let’s just hope it’s not FSU!)

2019 Coach of the Year Power Rankings:
1-Matt Rhule (Baylor)
2-Sonny Dykes (SMU)
3-Ed Orgeron (LSU)
4-Ryan Day (Ohio St.)
5-Lincoln Riley (Oklahoma)
6-Eliah Drinkwitz (Appalachian State)
7-Dave Clawson (Wake Forest)
8-James Franklin (Penn St.)
9-Dan Mullen (Florida)
10-PJ Fleck (Minnesota)

Honorable Mention/Hat Tip: Mack Brown (UNC), Nick Rolovich (Hawaii), Willie Fritz (Tulane), Ken Nuimatalolo (Navy), Scott Satterfield (Louisville), Brent Brennan (San Jose St.), Luke Fickell (Cincinnati) and Herm Edwards (Arizona St.).

–Mississippi St. is 0-5 both SU and ATS in its last five games as a road underdog. Meanwhile, Texas A&M is 6-2-1 ATS in nine games as a home favorite under Jimbo Fisher.

The Westgate SuperBook has Georgia as a 5.5-point favorite vs. Florida in Week 10. That’s way too many points and I doubt bettors will be able to get that number for the Gators on Sunday night. Dan Mullen indicated on Monday that UF will get three of its best players back to face the Bulldogs. That trio would be WR Kadarius Toney, DE Jonathan Greenard and DE Jabari Zuniga.

–Oklahoma St. is 10-5 ATS in its past 15 games as a road underdog. The Cowboys, who have lost back-to-back games by double-digit margins, are +10.5 at Iowa St.

Other updated Games of the Year numbers from the Westgate include FSU -3 vs. Miami, Utah -2.5 at Washington, Michigan -6 vs. Michigan St., Ohio St. -17 at Penn St., Mississippi St. -6 vs. Ole Miss, Washington -7.5 vs. Washington St., Iowa -7 at Nebraska, Ohio St. -14 at Michigan, Kentucky -4.5 vs. Louisville, Florida -18.5 vs. FSU, Clemson -17 at South Carolina and Oklahoma -18.5 at Oklahoma St. My favorite is UNC +3.5 at N.C. St. 

–I still love me some Derek Mason! Another epic post-game interview after a victory last week. Remember, he’s beaten Tennessee three years in a row by double-digit margins. Shouldn’t it be a rule that a Vandy coach can’t get fired when that factoid is alive?

–Quick Thought: I don’t think Alabama back-up QB Mac Jones is very good.

–Quick Thought II: If you didn’t know yet, I’ve been saying for more than a week that Florida and LSU will rematch in Atlanta at the SEC Championship Game.

–Auburn is 5-8 ATS in 13 games as a road underdog during Gus Malzahn’s tenure.

–My MajorWager cohort Christopher Smith went 8-2 ATS in Week 8. You can check out his Week 9 plays here if you wish.

My video on MajorWager’s YouTube channel rewinding Week 8 from the Hard Rock Hotel’s Sportsbook in Las Vegas.

My Week 9 selections.

–Washington St. has beaten Oregon outright in four consecutive meetings and has covered the spread against the Ducks nine straight times. The Cougars, who are 14-point underdogs Saturday night at Autzen Stadium in Eugene, are 16-7 ATS as double-digit underdogs during Mike Leach’s tenure.

–California has to go with a third-string QB as its starter Saturday at Utah:

My Auburn at LSU preview with lots of Bonus Nuggets (at the bottom) for VegasInsider.com.

–Check out my cousin, Southlake Carroll senior DB Jonah Doddridge, with the sick pick last Friday night:

–I was on The 3DogThursday podcast with TJ Rives (in the third and final segment) earlier this week if you want to check it out:

–How about these outstanding ATS stats for Ed Orgeron against Top-10 opponents from ESPN’s Chris ‘The Bear’ Fallica:

There’s a new UNO in my Week 9 Power Rankings.

–Some Mizzou at Kentucky Factoids in this tweet:

–In honor of Week 9 that’ll be filled with bets, ballgames and Budweisers, let’s offer up some bikinis and eye candy as well. The first picture below has the aforementioned cousin Jonah with Instagram sensation Sexy Nat G. That a boy!

That’s my cousin!

Anna Katharina!

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