Like the TMQ, all picks wrong or your money back! (Week 12)

SageStats ensign_lee
http://www.sagestats.com/img/data/en...l_75c453aa.png

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Last week wasn't too bad. My two biggest plays collided and netted each other out (less juice) in the Texans game, with the first half going over, but the game not. But hey: the Texans WON!!! so I was happy. Weeeh!

I'm just about two units away from the black. Yay! Funny thing is, if you look at my breakeven winning percentage vs. my actual winning percentage (it's on that page), my winning percentage is higher than my breakeven winning percentage, which means that had I bet the same amount on every game, I'd be up, but since I didn't, I'm down. D'oh to me... hah.

Well, anyway, here we go.

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2-team parlay (+281):
IND -7 1st half
IND/ATL OVER 20.5 1st half
2 units at BetTrojan

I think that both of these bets are +EV in their own right, and then throw in the fact that should Indy cover the -7 in the first half, the total going over for the first half is more likely, then I made it a parlay. I hit the first half rather than the game because Indy has a tendency to let off the gas late in fourth quarters with big leads and I don't feel like having to worry about that.

However, I think I'm 0-2 now in betting first halves regarding Indianapolis, so feel free to take that for what it's worth.

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Carolina Panthers +3 (-115)
2 units at BetTrojan

If you believe in trends, then you can apply the trend that a home underdog with just as many wins as its opponent tends to cover applies here.

If you don't, then let's look at this matchup. The Saints are losers of two straight to the Rams (THE RAMS) and the Texans. and yet they're favored coming into Carolina? Now, Carolina has its problems (*cough DAVID CARR *cough), but that specific problem is now sitting on the bench. Vinny Testaverde actually threw for a decent amount of yardage last week in Carolina's loss to Green Bay. What I see here is a matchup of two less than average teams, not a matchup of a superior team going into an inferior team's home turf (which is what you'd think from seeing the line of NO -3).

I may add an additional unit on the moneyline later, depending on what price I'm able to get. Being at home and being evenly matched, I think getting the +3 at home is +EV for Carolina.

So the Panthers line went all screwy during the week. It went down earlier in the week, presumably because people had been hitting the +3.5's and +3's really hard...all teh way to +2. then, the news of Vinny's injury came in and then today it was confirmed he wouldn't play and the line shifted back to +3.

In the meanwhile, I got trapped playing

Carolina Moneyline +120
3 units at JustBet

Fortunately, I was able to see the news yesterday and so hedged out of both that 3 unit bet and the prior 2 unit bet with the following bet:

New Orleans -2 (-110)
5 units at BetTrojan

So Right now, should new Orleans win by just 1 or just 2, I will be in a world of hurt. Hopefully, that doesn't happen.

Earlier in the week, I noticed that tons of bettors loved Cleveland against my Texans (and actually I was thinking my boys were going to get destroyed through the air and was thinking the same thing). But the line then moved from -4 to -3.5, where it held for a few days before finally shifting to -3. Fortunately, i was able to hit up

Houston +3.5 (-115)
2 units at BetTrojan

before the line shifted to 3's completely. I kind of had a hunch it was going there, but didn't know for sure. Heck, now that it's been at 3 awhile, it seems like the juice is heavy on the 3 and it could move back to -3.5. I think it'll stay at 3, though.

But when the line moved to 3, I added the following:

Houston Moneyline (+150)
3 units at BetTrojan

Usually when enough money is present to move a line on/off the 3 going BACKWARDS with what you'd think the line would do, that makes me look closely at a game and usually I end up making it one of my bigger plays. About 70% of the public is on Cleveland and it's one of the larger bet games of the day. and yet the line moved backwards A FULL POINT, and onto the 3 at that.

As for the rest of the card, I didn't see too much that interested me. Just the following:

San Diego -8.5 (-105)
1 unit at BetTrojan

It's hard getting over an close, tight loss, especially with a rival. It's even harder when you thought you won the game and then had to come back out to play some more...and then lost. I'm sure that the players were distracted for a bit of practice this week and well...that's all it'll take. Plus, the Chargers at home, when healthy, should be able to fire on all cylinders (emphasis on *should*). I think that they can take care of business here.

Oakland Raiders +4 (-105)
1 unit at BetTrojan

Yeah. I got the ass end of the line here. But I could hit up the +180's that were out there at any of my books. The line's been steadily dropping with about 2 bets on KC for every one on Oakland. From 6 all the way to 4. Now, some of this is due to Priest Holmes's injury, but not all of it. Plus, Pinnacle has been consistently holding the worst prices on betting on Oakland all week. And, when I placed this bet, they were holding KC +107, meaning they'd take Oakland +4 at -107, and I was getting it at -105. Anything pinnacle is willing to take, I'm willing to take

My biggest position yesterday went down in flames with the Texans. Yeah, that kinda sucked. Especially since I'm a big Texans fan too.

But overall for the week, I was able to come out ahead, so yay?

One play for the Monday Night Football game. I'm definitely backing the Steelers here and I think that they'll be able to just jump down the throat of the Dolphins. Am I right? Well, I guess we'll see. hah. But at the odds that I'm getting I think it's a good bet.

Parlay: Pittsburgh -9.5 / OVER 20 1st Half (+291)
2 units at BetTrojan

As for why it's a parlay, same reasoning as the above Indy parlay. I think that both bets are +EV in their own right, and since the occurence of the first is slightly correlated with the occurence of the second, I hit it as a parlay. Honestly, I think that Pittsburgh could be up 21-0 or 24-0 at half. We'll see what happens.

Adding:

Pittsburgh -9.5 (-105)
1 unit at BetTrojan

Meh. The rain started bothering me. So I added another unit at Pit -9.5 to hopefully cover my ass.

Here's to not losing 3 units tonight! :D