Billycool

Hi - first time poster, very interested in this topic. Was thinking Bucs, but they violate my rule on not picking a descending or finding ways to lose team. Will prolly go Jags, which I kinda hate cuz of the Monday night factor. Still sorta tempted by Chargers, tho.

Damn, that girl is a smoke-show.  You like your team covering with Appleby as QB playing on the road?

Why do you like FSU?

Yep, the secondary is a mess.  For some reason, we didn't know  how to deal with zone read or read option, etc.  And, we didn't instruct our DB's and LB's to hit Jackson every single time he carried the ball, even if he ends up pitching it.  And, we seemed to be completely confused with this thing called a "crossing route"

And, mostly, we've demonstrated all year that we have no idea how to deal with a tempo offense.  Any team that doesn't run tempo at us going forward should fire their coach.  USF doesn't have Lamar Jackson, but they have a decent QB and Mack is a real back.

You're welcome.  Yesterday, Jimbo basically admitted that his OL is a complete mess and that he's going to rotate four linemen at one guard position.....give them each a couple of series and see where some of these guys fit. 

Man, that's what spring and fall practice is supposed to be for.  I could be completely wrong, and I hope that I am, but I just get this sense that this is one of "those" kind of seasons for our team.....lose 4 games, fire a position coach or two.......reset and try again next year.  We'll see.

Maybe not.  Only consolation for UNC is that JMU's offense specializes in the run and is one of the top 10 or so programs in FCS.  But, still.....

(My son is a freshman at JMU, he was very excited for about a half.)

USC has a good defense and zip on offense.  Kentucky can score points against bad defenses, which USCe is not, and has zip on defense.  Is USCe's paltry offense good enough to take advantage of UK's bad defense? I'd guess maybe a little, but probably not too much.  Can Kentucky score a bunch on USCe? I sorta doubt it.

If forced to make a play here, I'd probably bet the under, for what that's worth.

Early leans/thoughts for this coming week:

Notre Dame

Western Kentucky

West Virginia (meh)

Southern Miss

Temple

Maybe Eastern Michigan, maybe Ga Tech.....I think Idaho is a really bad team, need to look deeper at UNLV on that one

Haven't looked at totals much yet.......may be some opportunities to tease.  I usually don't make any final decision til Friday, or even Saturday

I'd say the ones I like the most right now are Temple and Western Kentucky.....am a little surprised at the WKU line......they seem like a pretty good team, and Vandy looked downright awful this past Saturday.

Utah State -9.5 Yep

SDSU -11 Yep

Bama -10.5 Nope

Ga Southern -24.5 Nope

E. Michigan -3 Yep

Wash State -24.5 Yep

Toledo -20.5 Yep

6-point tease Vandy/GT Under 52/Bama -4 Yep

10-point tease Utah State +1/SDSU -1/Toledo -10 Yep

10-point tease Ga Southern -15/EMU +7/SDSU -1 Nope

Damn you, Georgia Southern.  Really shocked at how a bad ULM team kept up with them.  May be a fade this week.  No, I don't have week 1, 2 numbers, etc......been doing this a while, but just started posting again.

FSU Thoughts:

I'm an FSU grad and avid fan (also a Jags fan, imagine my weekend), which will cause bias, obviously.  But, I'm not certain that betting the "bounce-back" is as obvious a play here as some suggest.  Yes, it's possible that FSU will put it all together and destroy USF......All-American DE Demarcus Walker has promised a big change in the team this week.  But, the reality is that this team is a mess in many important areas.

First of all, there is something wrong with Dalvin Cook.  He gained 15 pounds of muscle in the offseason, but I'm not a big fan of RB's gaining much weight, even if it's "good" weight.  He's lost some explosiveness.  Also, there's something else going on here......he had a shoulder injury that kept him outta spring practice, and I think it's bothering him again.  He's tentative at the point of attack.  Please remember, that last year DC was pretty much our entire offensive gameplan.  His backup, Jacques Patrick, frankly looks like the better RB right now.

The OL is a mess.  We converted a DE to play tackle and it's not working.  There is all sorts of underachieving here, and it doesn't look like the coaches are confident that they have the pieces in place to correct.

The secondary, hit hard by the loss of Derwin James, is a mess.  I frankly don't know what's going on here.

Our top LB backup is a walk-on.....and it's not some heart-warming Rudy story, like he's good or something.  He's not.  Why he's our first backup in the game, ahead of highly-recruited scholarship players is a mystery and not a good one.

Our receivers are mostly all smurfs.  Auden Tate actually played well against UL, so maybe he emerges as our "big" WR threat, but I dunno.k

Coaching is under fire.  Not so much Jimbo, but the OL coach and the D coordinator.  Rightfully so, in my judgment.

Anyway, the bottom line to me is this: Vegas set the line at 4 and it's since gone to 7 as the public is playing the bounce-back.  It very well could happen.  But, I'm not betting FSU at anything more than 6 1/2.  A bigger number than that and it's a no-play for me.