The Good old days are gone!

By Tony George - Covers Experts

Oh do I remember the days when I could just tell my clients to lay the wood with the better team and they covered. The work it took 11 or 12 years ago to handicap a football game, or basketball game, was one tenth what it takes now, College or Pro Sports, and why is that one ponders when his bankroll is shrinking. Let us talk a little football.

In one simple word, in no uncertain terms, it boils down to one thing, Parity. I hear numerous skeptics of professional sports handicappers, most of whom have no idea what it takes to become a professional sports handicapper on a national level, or wager sports professionally, say that the word “parity” is a cop out and excuse for people in my profession when we lose games. Well, there is fact and there is fiction, and parity is a fact, and we all better start dealing with. It all started with salary caps and free agency in pro sports. I have proof of that for those who doubt me. In the last 10 years in the NFL the margin of victory is 5.7 points when all games were averaged out. Check the margins of the 60’s, 70’s and 80’s, I assure you it was much higher. Free agency at it’s finest, meant to level the playing field for all, and with the salary cap thrown in, giving medium and small market franchises a way to narrow the gap in talent and be competitive.

How can I prove this beyond a reasonable doubt when it comes to the NFL? Remember when Seattle and Tampa Bay came into the league as expansion teams, and how deplorable and laughable they were? Lay any number, the favorites usually killed them. Now fast forward about 15 or so years, when the Panthers and Jag’s came into the league, in their 2nd year, they BOTH were in the Playoffs and the Panthers were a quarter away from the Super Bowl in their second year, and for that fact the Jags too! Proof that spreading around talent, and peaking a salary cap with the right players can even the playing field for a team even in their second year.

Now switch gears to College Football. First of all, they build a better athlete nowadays. Weight training, mini summer camps, off season conditioning, nutrition and supplements, better equipment and facilties all play a part. The NCAA lowered the scholarship players available to each team to 82, down from 105. Schools like Nebraska and Michigan, and other national powers who used to take away players from other conference schools now have to pass on them, which allows schools, lets say, from the MAC, Sun Belt, WAC and Mountain West conferences to get some talent into the mix. It also allows lower tiered schools in big conferences to get better athletes and play with the big boys as well. It has narrowed the gap and made a huge difference in how one handicaps a game. Five MAC schools beat big time programs on one single weekend alone this year in 2003, one of them a Top 5 team. Could they compete week in and week out in the Big 10 or SEC or Big 12? I doubt they could, but for one game, these schools and many like them can beat anyone at home or on the road. You better be sure the team you lay points with has their A game and are ready to play. Teams slack off in this day and age, and you have no idea about it, and lay double digits, you most likely are going to lose that wager. Throw in the fact that in college the BSC Bowl committee dropped the margin of victory equation into the mix for the BSC bowl alignment, and the pressure is off Team A to blowout Team B.

The days of laying big numbers in conference play, or non conference play on the road are over, and the sooner you realize it, the less richer Vegas Books and offshore books will become. Fading the teams versus laying the wood is the future in handicapping, have no doubts about it. Pubic darlings like Notre Dame, Penn State, Nebraska, Florida and Florida State or instance, can no longer go somewhere, for the most part, and beat a school 62-0. It simply is not in the cards, yet oddsmakers continue to put a premium on these teams with the pointspread, and the public continues to pound them. Good luck to those who do. I rarely, if at all, will be one of them.

Need proof, I mean real games? Just ask Tampa Bay about Carolina this year, or in College, ask Miami about West Virginia, or Kansas State about Marshall, or Missouri about Kansas, Nebraska about Missouri, or Pittsburgh about Toledo or Alabama about Northern Illinois. Getting my drift yet? Your bankroll will thank you if you take these thoughts and utilize them in your handicapping. A conference team at home getting double digits in College, or the Bengal’s and Lions at home in the NFL getting more than 5 or 6 points, may be worth a second look.