9/7 VIP Picks
I was expecting all hell to break loose on social media last night after we went 1-2 to start the NFL season but you guys handled the loss better than I thought. We had a chance right until the very last play and Julio made the catch this time but he came down out of bounds and the Falcons lose. I will say that we were literally a few plays/calls away from a 3-0 night and it not even being close. First drive of the game, inside the 5 yard line, Falcons run the ball three times in a row against the #1 run defense - you have to throw the ball there. Stuffed on 4th down. Next - the deep ball to Julio that he pinned to his helmet for the catch that was reviewed but call on the field stood as an incomplete catch. That took away a 52 yard gain and probably a touchdown. How about the late drive by the Falcons that was going great until Matt Ryan (and his major contract) threw a week pass to Julio that was intercepted. If he threw it over the top, it was wide open and would have been a touchdown. Lastly, the final play of the game when Julio came down out of bounds. I’ll own the losses but damn, if things went a little differently we would have started off 3-0. We did hit the Julio player prop for 6 catches, he finished with 10 and had 19 targets. Let’s move on to today and we need to have a winning Friday and Saturday so we don’t go into our first NFL Sunday timid.
MLB:
Cardinals (Gomber) (-146) - You guys know that I’m a huge matchups guy especially for baseball and I like to see what each lineup has done in the past against pitchers. We don’t have any matchup history in this one but I do think the Cardinals are an obvious pick in this one. Austin Gomber will start for the Cards and he comes in to this game 5-0 with a 2.77 earned run average. They will take on Daniel Norris who only Marcell Ozuna has faced before but Norries comes in 0-3 with a 5.49 earned run average. Another factor here is that the Cardinals have more to play for than the Tigers because they are in the hunt for the post season while the Tigers are not. I got the Cards tonight.
Phillies (Nola) (-155) - Aaron Nola has been one of the best pitchers in baseball this season and comes into this one 15-4. He has held this Mets lineup to a .172 avg in 93 at bats. I’m expecting him to dominate tonight. The Phillies bats will take on Steven Matz who comes in 5-11 with a 4.20 earned run average and they lit him up like it was 4/20 last time they faced him scoring 6 runs in 2 innings. I like the Phillies in this matchup tonight.
2 team moneyline parlay:
Indians / Rays (+106) - You are taking two heavy favorites and combining the moneylines here to get a plus money payout. I would rather play both of these moneylines in a parlay than count on each run line to hit individually. Carlos Carrasco and Blake Snell will be pitching for us and they both have pretty good matchups against the lineups that they are facing.
NCAAF:
TCU / SMU Over (59.5) - JACKHAMMER -
Friday Night Lights, literally as these two Texas rivalries will square off tonight in the battle of the Iron Skillet. I think both of these teams will throw some meat on the skillet and score some points in this one. These teams put up 92 combined points when they played last season which would absolutely toast the over of 59.5 tonight. TCU put up 55 points last week which would almost cover the over themselves tonight. SMU put up 23 points last week and allowed a North Texas offense (that isn’t even close to the caliber of this TCU offense) to score 46 points. I am expecting TCU QB Shawn Robinson to put on an encore to his performance last Saturday when he threw for 3 touchdowns and ran for 2 more. I think TCU has a legitimate chance to cover this over themselves and any scoring SMU does will be icing on the cake.