Pac 12 thoughts?

thought i'd do write-ups on the pac-12 and mountain west. those are the conferences i know best and am. most interested in. i live on west coast.

south:

Arizona -  a hot mess....... interesting (to say the least) coaching hire. if the new HC really coaches in a unique way and coaches to the talent he has right now, i could see them being a great ATS pick.

ASU - lots of returning talent on both sides of ball. were a very very good team last year, just some growing pains (finishing out games) in a strange and shortened season for a young team. i think they are the team to beat in the south. 

colorado - durrell (sp?) did a great job. not sure it was completely real though. i see this as a consolidation year. so i would tend to fade them ATS.

UCLA - coming along finally. probably decent ATS team. sounds like good chemistry and well balanced roster.

USC - is this the year? i feel like they lost too many really key contributors. and strikes me this is a team that never achieves what it hopes for. some great young talent, but very young.

Utah - always tough. they lost so many D starters last year (i.e. last year they were short) so the D should look pretty good this year with some more experience and studs at LB and CB. hear great things about QB....... love the job willingham has done here but i wonder if expectations might be a tad high this year. seems everyone is on UTAH this year.

will do north later today

it's funny... i feel like i'm positive on every team...... but it seems like most of the top teams have held onto their winning ways and the average-to-mediocres have improved.... stanford and arizona would probably be the outliers here.

Arizona, "no pitty for the kitty". They sure hit rock bottom.

Never liked Rich Rod, Sumlin just couldn't make it happen.

Now Fisch. Gonna take some very good recruits and transfers.

Remember when ASU hired Herm Edwards. HERM EDWARDS????????? A lot thought that was a bad hire, myself included. Teriffic job!

They givin herm the business for some covid hostin lol .. keep hearing its the end of the program everyone gettin fired .. lines and rsw's even down .. sure everyone does it but there's a dossier!!! lol like wtf? .. we'll see idk .. POC Coach vs The Covid Commandments .. ESPN really gotta think about this one .. 

Yeah Jimmy I need to keep reminding myself when reading phil that not every team is going to be much better lol .. and that's every year.. gotta read between the lines .. and this year you see in Phil got everyone as a returning starter even teams that played 3 or 4 games got 20 ret starters lol .. and every paragraph says the unit is GREATLY IMPROVED!!!! .. Part of being Phil is puffing up the team because he gets to chat w the coach and get us the inside info .. can't be rippin em afterward .. he will leave us clues but it'll be like .. 'could be as good as last year' or if you see he's doing see the dreaded 'they lose their top 3 but are actually more experienced' then you know what that means now .. 

Agree w Utah .. I put some notes in my thread .. I don't think Brewer ever reached his potential w Baylor .. got sacked ALOT every year but he can catch fire I think we see more of that this year .. Experienced Utah teams are deadly good and looked at their portal I think they won even w out Brewer .. need their RB xfers to work out but they got 3 who 'could be' and they know how to develop good ones .. 

Rich Rod at ULM now ... OC under Terry Bowden .. You'll never guess who he got to transfer over there lined up to start at QB...... UA 4 year backup RHETT RODRIGUEZ!!! .. lol .. Grant Gunnell xfered to Memphis btw .. the one sliver of hope the mildcats had .. could be a great pickup for the tigers .. 

UCLA .. DTR like 5th year now starting? .. safe to say he's not probably not 'the guy' to run chip kelly's offense .. maybe the talent comes around but its another team that's only ever looked good when everyone else was struggling through covid hell .. and .. did they realllly look 'that' good? .. defense needs to make a huge jump or think its an overpriced dud .. 

USC .. is this the year .. is that the year .. lol .. they sure don't make the most of those top 5 recruiting classes .. funny feeling that even if it was 'the year' they could still find a way to only cover 30% of their games .. 

Phil got Stanford #3 in the North lol .. then again, who else you gunna put there? .. I do think at some point Wash State will be worth betting on .. like rolovich and de laura was working it early on .. think they need some WR's that fit that offense .. I suspect the 'run and shoot' is really quite finicky that way .. but they got Borghi back and idk, chirstian mccaffrey 2.0 gets rolling and that O will be alot easier to run .. also got former Wyoming coach Dickert at DC .. did some really great stuff for the cowboys, I'm hopeful .. if we catch them as they catch fire then we'll def catch the bookies napping.. 

Didn't even know this "scandel" was going on! Looks like Antonio Pierce had made enemies within. Not good for sundevils!

don't quite have the time/energy right now for pac 12 north writeup. but here are my initial thoughts on stanford,

Fade them at your own risk..... BUT, it seems like the program's success is getting long in the tooth... i don't see them getting 5-star or upper 4-star talent the last few years..........

as an example they lost walker little (who didn't play last year but was extremely highly regarded before injury) and foster sorrell (sp?) to potential NFL..... and no real replacement stud recruits..............

i think shaw is doing a good job outperforming the talent level, but i think the talent level is deteriorating. one preview magazine (where they anonymously interview opposing coach about team) said stanford has thrived on A-list skill position talent but doesn't have it any longer. i would somewhat disagree. they may have it at tailback. 

so maybe play UNDER with good run offense and perpetually a pretty good defense.

as a generic comment, i really think the transfer portal is leading to more and more parity. oregon state type teams are getting talent they'd seldom out of high school

ok here's my north thoughts...... i think my general idea is that there will be more parity going forward with the transfer portal being so active. mediocre teams get talent they would never get out of HS. and can fill holes nicely. 

cal - this could be a better year for Cal. i think they have things lined up pretty nicely on both O and D. definitely some depth issues at some key positions. but the projected first string is very good.

stanford - i think they fall this year (i didn't look up how the cardinal did the last few seasons. so it technically might not be a significant fall-off. just  no bounce back to being top pac12 team......... missing high 4* and 5* talent, esp. on offensive line which has set the tone for the cardinal..... defense doesn't have enough talent either...... FADE them at your own risk, but i am negative myself.

oregon - i think things line up very nicely..... brown should do a good job at QB...... some monster talent on D. wonder if it's just too young right now..... 10 point UD at ohio state i see. gotta take the Ducks there... very bullish on Oregon

Oregon State - i think they step back some this year......... jefferson was a big part of their success.. got colorado's 2nd team all-P12 QB so maybe i need to factor that in more ..... things are shaping up ok on D so maybe UNDER here

Washington - interesting QB battle there. 5* freshman but last year's freshman QB played well..... Washington wasn't too good last year. gave up alot of points to Arizona and lucky to beat OSU at home........ issues in the secondary, which has been Huskie's strong area season after season. transfers may help... they want to run the ball alot, so UNDER?

Washington State - no real insight. did pretty well last year with freshman QB. but he got popped for DUI in off-season. i think he's playing but who knows?...... some nice transfers on D.................... i never have much insight on this team. not sure why

Wash was wayyy up on UA and had all their backups in which were really the 3rd string because they had MASS opt outs on the defense preseason .. I remember because I had UA team total under I think 20 and of course after 3 quarter dominating in every way shutout cats drop 27 in Q4 .. Grant Gunnell at UA was really not bad .. im sure he saw the writing on the wall and xfered because he wants to experience at least one win in his college career lol .. man cats look real bad again .. maybe one of those few teams every year where they cant make the line big enough?

Phil is super duper high on wash .. #1 surprise team! .. i guess its possible for them to surprise because they had opt outs and cobvid hit them bad and new QB and coaches, etc etc so could be a big boomerang effect .. kinda surprised his top surprise team is in the PAC think they gotta go 11-2 and win the PAC to be a surprise .. #1 surprise to me would be make the playoff . although he had them #1 surprise when they made the playoff in like '16 or whenever .. Phil prob looked at their schedule and thought it could be done again .. The D should be back to top notch again Jimmy Lake was the D guru before HC ... but we really haven't seen the QB or offense do much yet and if they can't get it together then they could lose a few .. Oreg, ASU, Stan, UCLA... all capable teams this year at least to some degree .. 

Thinking Oregon will be overrated again in the ATS department .. if they look competitive vs OSU they'll also get Fres / fcs team / UA to beat the crap out of before they go to stanford .. Stan kicks off with K-St / Vandy / UCLA / USC .. think we'll know if Stan is dog sh!t before Oregon .. I got that game circled, good chance Stan actually has some ATS value vs a big team .. its been a while .. 

thanks for all the color guys :)

that was interesting az @ wash comment....... az got much much worse as season went on and ASU 70-7 was not remotely representative of the season. and gunnell was pretty good for them. so huskies giving up alot of points to AZ might not be that bad as commentator mentions.

i see the comment in a AZ preview (magazine) that gunnell isn't a big loss. that comment surprises me.

where are you getting phil steele's comments from? is his online and/or print magazine out yet?

Yeah idk if losing gunnell will make a big diff in the W column but it means you lose any stability and think he was kinda the one bright spot the new coach could have counted on .. they did play USC down to the wire and he hit almost 70% of his passes last season .. the xfer QB jordan mcleod was on USF last year during their horror show and guess we'll see .. funny feeling the UA fans will be seeing Gunnell at Memphis and saying 'we lost that guy?!?!?!?'.. lol

 Washington is stacked. Running the ball won't be a problem.......but who ends up at qb is a ?. The real question......how good of a HC will Jimmy Lake be?

Good stuff. 

It's possible every team has improved at least some and nobody is completely rebuilding.

But even an improved team can go 4-8 with a few unlucky breaks and key injuries.  Their actual record may not necessarily indicate if they are an improved version or not.

I was thinking the same thing.  I won't force a mediocre bet on a side when a total may be a better option . 

I love ASU and Oregon. I think they are serious this year. Utah will be solid. Washington, UCLA, and Cal aint cakewalks. And Stanford, Oregon St, and Wazzou all on the rise..... Pac 12 will be much stronger this year

Stan maybe one to watch out for but man what an awful 5 year sliiiiide and don't think they're getting the recruits now that they once were ..  I'm not convinced this is the year for Oreg State / Wazzu, they might surprise in a game here / there .. Wazzu lost a couple guys to the portal they wanted to keep .. Cal is a 'we'll see' team in my view, they were kinda dark horse surprisers LY pre-ssn but didn't look like it .. oregon was in pretty rough shape LY .. tough to gauge how meaningful that win was ..  

PAC South looks fairly deep w USC/ASU/UCLA/Utah ... Colorado might have been a one hit wonder, def another "we'll see" .. 

Agreed.  A lot more parity in PAC 12, at least to begin the fall camps  Things could change by Sept 2, and who knows whether covid/delta might have an impact again.

I like it.

While I think Beavers will still lose a bunch of games I do believe they will be very competitive, which is actually more important to our betting than actual wins/losses per se.

Good comments on both divisions.  

PAC 12 may be the most competitive conference in terms of number of teams who have a decent shot to win it.

All but one team could be significantly better,   if all goes well in camps and with covid

UCLA is a dark horse to win the conference.  I think they will show folks what they have in week 0 at home against Hawaii as a 16 pt favorite...

That would be something! 

I'm kinda pulling for them to have a great season.  They should have an offense that can match any in the PAC 12 with DTR solid as a dual threat QB.

Negative 4 net turnovers cost them a close loss @Colorado last yr and they had a big lead over Stanford late only to suffer a couple bad breaks and lose by a point.  They were just a couple breaks away from being 5-2 instead of 3-4 and they have 20 returning starters listed this year.  If they can avoid the bad breaks Bruins could surprise a lot of people.

i like ASU...... i think they have a "massive chip on their shoulder" after last season.. if they'd won tons of games over a full season, then i'd be wary of complancency.

of course, USC ducks oregon and washington this year... very very important.

Asu ducks cal and oregon.. pretty good too.

it's a bit mysterious how colorado seems to get zero respect for doing well last year... not saying they should be in the division winner  talk. but they are a potential landmine for most teams.

fyi,

colorado doesn't play stanford,wsu..... that's not good

utah misses cal and washington. pretty good

ucla doesn't play osu, wsu.... NOT GOOD at all

seems to me that there's 3 levels of "doing well" that you have to analyze.

1) overall wins.. phil steele talks about this alot.. but predicting that 0-12 southern mississippi (a few years back) will have more wins the next season isn't saying much.

2) conference wins and shot at division/conference title.

3) just being a better or worse football team. even if you are 3-9 both seasons or 10-2 both seasons..... i think somewhere along the line this often gets missed, but this is all that matters in terms of betting ATS on games.

I’ll look to be fading Chip Kelly as much as possible this year as usual 

This is my general feeling as well. UCLA will

score points. But I remember UCLA only beat ASU last year thanks to some VERY SUSPECT calls. if i remember correct, Refs took 2 touchdowns AND a turnover AWAY from ASU in that game. While also REPEATEDLY targeting ASU corners for PI calls to help UCLA extend drives. 

That game showed me how weak Ucla actually is. Specifically that defense. I havent forgotten being on the wrong side of that fraud.