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Fab 4 picks
You want the good news or the bad news?
I’ll wait.
The good news is last night started a seven-week run where we get a college or pro football game on TV every night.
Cue “Weird Science” — “Every dang night?” “I’m talking devotion.”
Anything Goes Thursday starting point: “Where would you rank the criminally underrated “Weird Science” among the John Hughes catalog of teenage comedies? Also, while Hughes and Macaulay Culkin have a dynamic duo with “Home Alone” and “Uncle Buck,” Anthony Michael Hall and Hughes combined for a true monster Rushmore of 1980s comedy teenage roles with Russ Griswold in “Vacation,” Gary in “Weird Science,” Brian Johnson in “The Breakfast Club,” and Ted in “Sixteen Candles.” That’s stout.
Where were we?
Yeah, football, every dang night from last night to the Wednesday before Thanksgiving.
As for the bad? Our picks have spiraled of late. Bad breaks. Bad beats. Bad picks. This late in the year, it’s hard to remember a time when the Fab 4 picks were under .500.
We are now. We are the Penn State of picking right now, and that’s not a good thing.
But like Spaulding Smails, pickers gotta pick.
› Oklahoma plus-2 against Texas. Know this: My money will be on OU money line, but for this space without odds, we’ll keep it simple. And if you were among the folks who really bought stock in the Longhorns before the season — hi, Mr. Finebaum, table for 1 million? — so did Vegas. Before the season started, Vegas opened this game at Texas, minus-11.5. I also think John Mateer is trending toward playing, and while Texas may have more pub, OU has the better defense too.
› Tennessee over 41.5 points as a team and Tennessee-Arkansas over 34.5 in the first half. No one scripts a fast start as well as Josh Heupel does with the Vols. No one looks as cuddly when they try to tackle as Arkansas. And, to add to the points-a-poolza early, don’t you have to believe that Bobby Petrino has spent the last two weeks since getting the interim tag crafting some offensive wizardry in an effort to make an early statement as he states his case to get the HC gig full-time?
› Maryland plus-6.5 against Nebraska. The Terps are at home. The Terps have a top-10 defense. Plus, with a college game with a total in the mid-40s, getting almost a full TD feels like a bunch, right?
› Ole Miss minus 19.5 in the first half over Washington State. Washington State is really bad and gave up 59 points to North Texas and to Washington. Yikes. Now, WSU travels across the country from the international airports in Pullman and Oxford, respectively. Did I mention that a) the game kicks off at 9:45 a.m? West Coast time? With a trip to Georgia on the horizon, this screams fast, Fast, FAST start for the Rebels and then turning on the cruise control.
› Georgia minus-3.5 over Auburn, more on this below, but what offensively can any AU fan hang their visor on right now? Asking for countless others.
Last week: 1-3 against the spread (25%)
This season: 17-19 against the spread (50%)
One shining moment
There are two monster SEC games this week. Strike that. Every SEC game is a monster game. Truly.
But as the narrative of the entire college landscape becoming more NFL-like because of growing talent-disbursement with the portal and NIL continues, we get two fascinating test cases of that theory.
And Vegas is trending toward that belief, too.
We’ll start with the nooner in Columbia, Missouri.
Alabama is playing as well as anyone in the country since stumbling in Week 1 in Tallahassee. Ty Simpson leads the SEC and ranks 10th nationally in passing efficiency.
Tackle Kadyn Proctor likely will be the first non-QB offensive player drafted next spring.
The Tide are tough and talented. Of course, they are. They are the Tide and amid all the changes among college football the perpetual success Lord Saban built will never be replicated.
All of that said, Alabama is a 3-point favorite against the unbeaten Missouri Tigers.
Now go to Saturday night in Auburn, Alabama, where Georgia — the school built very similarly by Kirby Smart to Saban’s steamroller — is also only a 3.5-point pick over a 3-2 Auburn team that offers protection somewhere between an insurance company from a matchbook and a Trapper Keeper.
These feel like games — even on the road — that the road teams would be much closer to 7 (and more) point favorites, no?
Yes, Missouri is good, and yes, crazy things happen at Auburn at night, but has the divide between the traditional powers shrunk to a theoretical field goal between the SEC’s traditional superpowers and teams projected to be in the middle of the pack?
Thoughts?
Thursday night drama
The NFL takes center stage tonight, with the Eagles and Giants playing in New Jersey.
The Eagles are the defending Super Bowl champ. They are 4-1 and have maybe the best QB1-RB1-WR1-WR2 quartet in the league.
But there are issues, because there are always issues at the highest levels of sports because complacency always sets in.
If Father Time is Saban, championship complacency is Marcus Freeman and wins far more than it loses.
Can the Eagles fix it? I think so, and that has to start tonight against a Giants team that is defensively frustrating and missing their best overall player after Malik Nabors tore his ACL.
Thoughts? I think they get it done tonight. Bigly, with a big game from Saquon Barkley.
Side note: And the NFL-ization of major college football does not equate on equal terms because the schedules are adjusted each year to maximize balance across the league and the paths to the postseason are universal and transparent.
This and that
› More shoes dropping about the messy exit of Kevin Costner from The Dutton Ranch and “Yellowstone.” To be fair, every fan of the show wanted to get into a fight with Jamie, too.
› The MLB playoffs featured all four best-of-five division series on Wednesday. Philly beat L.A. (Dodgers lead 2-1), Detroit beat Seattle (series tied at 2), Chicago beat Milwaukee (Brewers lead 2-1) and Toronto eliminated the New York Yankees.
› In that Phillies’ win last night, Kyle Schwarber homered twice, including one that landed about 20 minutes ago. Schwarber has 23 career postseason homers, which is now the third most ever.
› Rules, people. Here’s Paschall weekly college football picks column.
› Speaking of Alabama-Missouri, Kalen DeBoer is 17-3 all-time against ranked foes. Those three losses are vs. Oregon as Fresno State’s coach, against top-ranked Michigan as Washington’s coach in the title game and last year at Tennessee. Other than a Michigan loss, DeBoer is 7-0 against top-10 foes. Spy, that seems pretty good, no?
› Far from fab pick, try the Belichick experiment in Chapel Hill. After a Wednesday afternoon report that Bill Belichick was exploring excising his personal buy-out, both coach and Carolina have issued reaffirming statements of commitment. Yuck.
Today’s questions
It’s an AGT — Anything Goes Thursday, friends — and we have a few above.
We’ll add this one: Tide-Tigers, who you got? Dawgs-Tigers, who you got?
As for today, Oct. 9, let’s review:
› The Black Sox scandal World Series ended on this day in 1919.
› John Lennon would have been 85 today. Much respect.
› Robert Wuhl, who played assistant Larry Hockett in “Bull Durham,” is 74 today.
Rushmore of sports movie assistant coaches. Go. And remember the mailbag.