*** Freak Pics *** (Week 7)

Alabama @ Arkansas

Here are some brief thoughts on the game.

First of all, there is a pretty wide talent gap between these two teams, so theoretically this should be an Alabama blowout.  But as we all know, there is a lot more to football than just talent.  And the old saying that says "the cleanliness of theory is no match for the mess of reality" are never truer than in the world of gambling.

One of the things that I look for in gambling is consistency.  In other words, how sure can I be that Team X will perform as expected?  During the Nick Saban era, there has been no team more consistent than Alabama.  You pretty much knew what you were getting from week-to-week, which made them a very easy team to wager on - either for or against.  That's the reason I have pretty much reserved my largest wagers for Alabama.  I could rely on Alabama's consistency to not self-destruct and trick-up my money - particularly on the road.  Unfortunately that paradigm has been shattered the past two seasons, and there are various reasons for this.

Whatever those reasons may be, the fact remains the Alabama currently ranks 79th in nation in penalties, and 106th in turnover margin.  For last week's game Alabama had two weeks to rest, get healthy and clean up their penalties and turnovers.  Everything pointed to us seeing the old Alabama that we're all use to - the Alabama teams that didn't self-destruct with stupid penalties and costly turnovers.  But what we saw last week was not progression over a 2-week period of time, what we saw was regression.

On paper Arkansas is the ideal match-up for Alabama.  I have spoke about this many, many times in the past.  The Alabama teams in years gone by were specifically built to stop pro-style offenses with a power running attacks, and they excelled when they faced those types of teams.  The problem for Alabama is they haven't faced a team like that since playing Arkansas last season.  In other words, they have had almost no experience defending this style of offense.

Look at what Alabama is facing in terms of preparation.  They had to prepare for Ole Miss which is a more run-based spread attack.  Then they have to prepare for a totally different type of offense this week in Arkansas, and then they have to prepare for a pass-oriented spread attack in Texas A&M next week.  So this is a very difficult 3-week stretch in terms of preparation.  But of those three games, the one you would have thought they would have been the most prepared for was the team they had 2-weeks to prepare for.

Alabama has the beef on the defensive side of the ball to pretty much shut the Arkansas offensive down, and I think they'll have a lot of success doing that for the most part.  One of biggest obstacles they'll face this week is going into a hostile environment with rookie center.  That caused them quite a few problems last week when their starting center went down with injury.

If Alabama brings their A-game, this will be a blowout.  The question is can we trust them to bring their A-game.  Perhaps this will change at some point down the road, but for the time being the answer is "No."

**  Note:  monitor the weather situation if you plan to place a wager on this game.

There are several really good college football cappers on Covers.  I always hate naming names because invariably I will leave someone out, but blowout, tideman, Boom, Macwestie, Chung  are all probably having better year's than I am.  amd is having a little bit of an off year, but he is usually one of the best on the site.  I wouldn't recommend fading him on Big 10 games.  Nostradamus is also solid on college football.  Everyone should be hitting their threads' on a weekly basis.

You're starting to creep me out Train!!!

I lean UNDER.  I think both offenses will struggle to score.

My favorite total play of the night though is UNLV TT UNDER 28.5.

I don't disagree with you, but at this point they are going to have to show they can play with some discipline before I back them again.

They are your first pick, what do you mean "before I back them again!"