 This is covering the spread here are your hosts Jim Saunas and Dr. Ed Fang What is going on everybody welcome on into covering the spread that's right here on the fan dual podcast network and number fire Dot-com as we're taking a look ahead at week five of college football in the betting landscape and letting you know the best Numbers on the board with dr. Eric eager a pro football focus. My name is Jim Saunas I am a senior writer and analyst for number fire dot-com joined here as always by Ed Fang of the power ink dot-com and ed We had another guy the PhD on today. You are dr. Ed Fang So we got two guys of the PhD and then another guy who was a stats major for a week and decided it was not for him So I'm feeling a little bit outmatched here. Well, you know, I mean the only way I can say about that is like you managed to pick the two PhDs I can put a sentence together, so Looking in that department, but no no Jim We need guys like you to get the word out about all the all the good analytics and Make good bets. I'm excited to talk to Eric too because he has done awesome work With talking about quarterbacks and offensive linemen and I like I played offensive line in high school It's such a stupid thing to say but like as a person who played offensive line in high school I would like not some of the blame to not be on people like me every now and then So we're gonna talk with Eric about his research there We'll talk about also week five of college football Pro football focus green line as well and and you've talked to Eric before and I think that the research he has done into You know past rush versus past coverage and you know quarterbacks in their sacrate is just so fascinating And it's it's necessary to have stuff like that that kind of calls into question our assumptions Yeah, and the thing is like I don't think he meant to go in and Check all our assumptions about how we watch the game It's just you dig into the data you ask some interesting questions and sometimes things will shock you like you know Running is not very effective in the NFL Compared to passing, you know, none of us went none of us Try to find that answer, you know, it's just you know people who do awesome work like Dr. Eric eager just they dig into the data and you see what pops up and you do good analysis And he certainly does and we'll bring it in dr. Eric eager in just one second You can follow him on Twitter at pff underscore Eric He of course is a data scientist for pro football focus talk with him in just one second tomorrow on the podcast We're gonna bring whale capper back to break down week four of the NFL season and his favorite bets on the board to get that Podcast right as it is posted make sure you subscribe to the the covering the spread of podcast feed Wherever you get your podcast Apple podcast Spotify stitcher the Google Play Store. I heart radio It's everywhere you can find it believe me and while you're there leave a rating and review as well before we bring in Dr. Eric eager we got to look back to last week though and Ed gotta give you some kudos for your call about Notre Dame's game against Georgia That's coming up next Covering the past Our last week on the college football edition of covering the spread we had Kelly steward on We had in that game Texas A&M or in the podcast Texas A&M minus three and a half Auburn really impressive there They won that game outright BYU plus six and a half Washington We kind of laid the hammer on that one too Louisville minus six and a half Florida State did wind up covering that game I think it was seven points. I believe but Florida State did cover their Oklahoma State plus seven they did cover that one They were playing Texas really close game 36 to 30 there so Oklahoma State get did cover Kentucky plus five and a half I don't know if we had the quarterback news with Kentucky at that point, but they lost that one by 15 So, you know, let's start there But for sure but Ed you redeem the podcast by talking about Notre Dame against Georgia the spread at the time We recorded was plus 14 Notre Dame came out and I think a big part of this was kept at low scoring And it's hard to cover a 14-point spread when it's a low scoring game, but Notre Dame also played really well in that game Yeah, I did think they played really well I thought you could watch the first quarter of that game and feel like Notre Dame was on the same level Athletically they weren't scared and I felt pretty comfortable about that game in the first quarter Yeah, you know obviously got a little nervy towards the end when Notre Dame hadn't scored for a couple a while in the second half And it looked and Georgia certainly did have a chance to cover and I I don't know if I said this last week But I should have like I believe Georgia is the third best team in the nation. Yeah, there's nothing to shake that I just felt like the line was a little bit of a disrespect to Notre Dame I feel like that's what we saw so I'm happy to count it as a win You know, I think a lot of betters out there could be like hey man that game got to 16 You got two minus two points of closing line value. So that's a loss You know, it was weird and I respect, you know closing line value is a very important thing to look at I answered, you know, feel a bunch of questions on Twitter about why my numbers like Notre Dame so much And I was just like I just I just think that line's wrong You know when against it, I don't want to come on here every week You know, I don't want to come on here every week and and have such bad closing value But I did think it was the right side and I'll take it and I also think like the Movement there is indicative of kind of what we talked about both with Kelly and with you Where people are so sour on Notre Dame Against tough opponents given what they've seen on these high profile stages and both you and Kelly mentioned that as being Part of a reason why Notre Dame maybe wasn't getting the respect that they deserved there I think that that also feeds into that that late movement because Where people are gonna be betting late, you know, it's a lot of people may not be digging into the numbers as much So you're gonna see a lot of public money Go against Notre Dame late in games like that So I I don't think it was surprising that the line moved after we talked about it And I don't think it's an indictment of you that it did either. Yeah, I don't know I mean, I you know, I've I've been kind of under the assumption that public money is not going to move a line Two points like that on a Saturday, you know, that it's some kind of sharp action. Yeah I don't know I guess like talking to bud bud Elliott of espionation and banders society has like influenced me to think that The sharp people are in early, you know, the the the limits are lower But I still think that if you are someone who's laying a lot of money, you probably want to get in pretty early So I guess like I have Within my own process guys like I use line in lines and line movement in dfs as well I have grown more skeptical of late movement than I used to be Kind of because of that. So I thought it was pretty sharp to be a Notre Dame Plus 14 regardless of the line set and Kelly mentioned that she thought that they were being Underappreciated as well. Oklahoma State plus seven two, uh, Spencer Sanders for Oklahoma State I think he's not like someone I'm like Falling over to watch it, but he's a pretty fun little guy to watch, you know, he's a freshman for Oklahoma State He's been a pretty efficient passer. He can run quite a bit too. So yeah, Oklahoma State's gonna be a fun team to watch They always are I'm interested in that for sure. Yeah, for sure. I I completely agree with you. I thought I felt pretty good about that game Um, I was really really was hoping that Oklahoma State would pull off the win Yeah, uh, just because I have that Texas under nine wins and Like part of that belief was that they were going to drop one of these games, right? They couldn't they couldn't get quite get it done. That's fine. Uh, Texas offense has been good But the thing to know about those game that game is that Texas lost a couple starters in their secondary, right and that is Really bad for a defense that has struggled and it's also the reason I really like to bet unders in college football win totals Right, you know, it's just so much more likely that some injuries are gonna affect the team then You know, you get a quarterback. That's amazing that we didn't expect or something Right. Um, so yeah, that that was uh, that was uh, something to note if you are looking at bet texas next couple weeks Yeah, and so ed kudos to you on Notre Dame against george and we did talk about wisconsin versus michigan You said you said to me before we started talking that you wanted to touch on this game Obviously wisconsin steamroll here, but but you wanted to re-evaluate part of your process Yeah, definitely part of the process. I mean, I'm not, um, you know, I I said I like michigan. I Don't necessarily want to I'm not going back on that based on what we knew before that game But one thing I had told people was like, oh wisconsin hasn't it hasn't played anyone Sure, and while that's true that ignores the fact that they just obliterated teams that they did play and that is predictive And I was wrong to just say wisconsin hasn't played anyone. Um, I should know better I'm the one that wrote a ton about how just predictive raw margin of victory is back in the day We were trying to get rid of the bcs and um, you know, I think my bias has played a role in that obviously Against michigan, uh, I live here in Ann Arbor and I promise not to make the same mistake with Ohio State who is also obliterating people and we we we can't just say that they haven't played anyone even though They haven't and we talked about that before they played indiana and then they blew the doors off of indiana too Or at least I did I talked about that. Um, and so yeah, I think that's interesting to mention to wisconsin Play as northwestern this week and I plan to not watch that game Uh, I saw um, I saw the sp plus projections, uh, for that, uh, from bill If 40 to four, um, and that seems right. No, that seems right. I mean the spurt is 26 now, right? It's 24 and a half. Oh, but it's at camp randall. Um, I'm just gonna really try hard not to watch that game. Yeah No, I mean so to put this in perspective, I mean you have to tip your cap to wisconsin what they did last week They played really well, you know pushing a perfect type game for them. No turnovers They're not going to play that well every week and for example, like, you know jack cone They they went for it on fourth and three near midfield kudos to paul chris for making that call But michigan got pressure on him and he had to make essentially a perfect throw Fade throw to the sideline and he did it and That's not going to happen every week. Um, I will take my chances pressuring jack cone On fourth and three any day any week any saturday of the year absolutely Still gonna go ahead and uh, just not watch that game on saturday If you want to get in on the action, maybe bet wisconsin minus 24 and a half Check out the vandal sportsbook and place your first bet today if you lose Fandall will give you a refund up to 500 and site credit visit sportsbook.vandal.com for more details terms and conditions apply Must be 21 plus and physically present in new jersey or pennsylvania or at one of the many retail sports books as well gambling problem call 1-800 gambler, let's bring on dr. Eric eager now a pro football focus He is a data scientist for them. You can find him on twitter at pff underscore eric in preview week five of college football Covering the present Let's bring dr. Eric eager into covering the spread You can find his work over at pro football focus where he is a data scientist and eric It's awesome to have you on the show here today. How you doing? I'm really good It's always fun to talk talk football and talk college football specifically Absolutely, we're gonna talk plenty of college football with you And I am pretty excited that we'll get to talk about one of your old schools in Nebraska as they have a a decently big game coming up on saturday, but first We're talking college football today, but I also, you know, we've got you on this podcast and eric You've done a lot of research into the role that quarterbacks play In taking sacks and if I'm gonna have you on this podcast I'm gonna take advantage and talk to you about this study. You talked about it with ed on his podcast But for people who didn't listen to that podcast What have you found yourself when looking into the relationship between a quarterback and his sack totals? Yeah, and I know, you know, you've done great work on offensive line play I think that I've heard about that on ed's podcast before as well And so and you know offensive line play is such an intricate thing And so and I think we at pff do a pretty good job of grading those guys And so it was a little bit like unsatisfying slash surprising to see that You know when you look at quarterbacks And their pressure rates it carries regardless of you know, the starters on the offensive line team to team To a decent degree schemed a scheme. So if you switch offensive coordinators We've just found that pressure rate And sack rate is something that quarterbacks carry with them a great deal And you know, it's just another reason why you know quarterbacks are king They sort of control everything and we found you know A lot has to do with you know time to throw but some of it is just like, you know Basic pocket presence the tendency to throw quickly Like you know drew breeze or weight forever in the pocket like Deshaun Watson It's something that's a very much a quarterback trait Absolutely And I think that when you watch football you kind of you know, you pick up on that and you look at the data between Joe Flacco's sack rate last year versus Lamar Jackson's Did not a lot changed up front, but those sack rates were wildly different. So when you're looking at you know sack numbers Can how much of that can you assign to the offensive line or when you're evaluating an offensive line Do you have to try to toss those numbers out entirely? You know, I don't know if it's it's necessarily tossing those numbers out, but it It's something where you look at it and I think you probably want to create a model that gives you the weights and you know Off because you do see like we were talking about Baker Mayfield off air and it you know He's got an offensive line full of players who are not particularly good They traded away a starting guard in the off season for a defensive end And so he you know, he's probably responsible for a great deal of his pressure But it might be as a result of him is you know, the prior in his head being like, okay, these guys aren't very good I need to make things happen on my own Uh, and that's and that's something you have to factor in same thing with Russell Wilson We always talked about Wilson, uh, you know with his uh, pension for sort of taking forever in the pocket Because and taking a lot of sacks and pressure because Seattle's offensive line was bad But now Seattle's offensive line is you know, not terrible anymore And he's still doing a lot of the same things he used to do before And so I think it matters certainly on the edges and especially when you don't know a lot about a quarterback The offensive line will will you know carry I think a decent amount of weight and prediction But you know the the guy's pressure rate that he takes on and then eventually You know his volatility as a quarterback as a result is certainly something I think the quarterback is the primary weight in your models Yeah, Eric, I mean after talking uh to you on my podcast like I feel like it's almost completely changed the way that I watch football Uh, we we watched Shay Patterson get really tentative in the pocket at Michigan We talked about that and then you know, there was a pass on you know on a Thursday night game where mariota It's tough to see what the quarterback sees usually on a television broadcast But sometimes you get a glimpse and there was one play action That mariota had that the guy was open And he just for some reason didn't pull the trigger and these are the you know and and with Patterson I'm trying to figure out because like I'm just viewing the game so differently after we talked That maybe I wasn't accurately looking at them last year in the same way But definitely Yeah, all the credit in the world to you for and to you know using analytics to to make people watch the game differently Yeah, I I think a great deal and thanks for the kind words honestly the the idea is you know We in the broadcast angle you do like obscure a lot and we started to see different broadcast angles on on You know, especially Sunday night football, but there is a night football And we're getting more of a glimpse of what the quarterback sees and it's it's in it. You know on top of it It's also this idea of like okay does pressure affect a quarterback more or less than coverage And sometimes now we're seeing you know historically We always saw Lawrence Taylor coming off the edge on the left tackle on your tv And that was what caused the offense to go kaput, but now we're starting to see a little bit more You know corners taking away a quarterback's first read and him holding on the ball too long And then the pressure coming in and it looks like you know, just the defense is swarming him on a play when in reality You know, there's the the little guys on the back end are making plays so that the big guys up front can can uh Can make their money That's another research you've done is the value of a pass rush versus coverage too So a lot of great research that Eric has done It's make sure to check that out over a pro football focus and also over while you're at pff You can check out green line and Eric you write up picks for pro pro football focus with the help of green line So for people who haven't used it before Can you explain what green line is and how it factors into your weekly process for college football specifically? Yeah, well, so this is the first year we had, you know, uh green line, which is you know Basically, you look at it It's a dashboard for you know where the consensus lines are and then using our grade data as well as you know as you would out rest and You know, whether or not they're playing an in-conference game and all that kind of stuff, you know Where our numbers would sit and then um on top of that we we write a column every week I I write an nfl one with my colleague George shahuri and then my colleague ben brown writes a college football one Using these and of course like I don't think any especially a model that's going to display You know 65 to 70 games a weekend You know, you don't want to blindly bet those and so as you said the the process is you go in and you look And and you sort of immediately look at places where your model You know would tell you have an edge and then you do a little bit more research and you know, whether it's like injuries or You know, there's specific spot stuff that I don't think any model can incorporate. I think there was like, you know, uh Yeah, peterson in in washington always has washington states number That's not something you can like put in a model and it would be robust But there are you could put it in the model You could yeah, and then yeah, I don't want to and would be like five, right? So then so it would be a tough thing to sort of robustly put into a predictive system So, you know, you add that to your handicap or you lay off games because you know, there might be Um, you know, there might be extraneous factors that you haven't put in But it's certainly the first place I look and then after that Uh, I sort of look at, you know, maybe where the market's moved and all that kind of stuff Well, there's that mostly go ahead go ahead Eric Eric, I want to point out just the the way the green line is different from a lot of what you see elsewhere Including on my site, you're building this based on player grades that PFF is making based on charting studies and that makes it a lot different from just looking at team statistics So can you give us an example of maybe a team Where like your elo grades are different from What other people have based on team numbers? Yeah, so for example, like Cal, I believe is like 15th in the AP poll And uh, and that and we don't have them ranked. I think we're they're in the 30s for us And in you know, you you talk about your elo system It's basically the way that we do our first order power ranking You know, generally speaking like that would explain about 75 to 80 percent of the variance and the vagus spread And I can't remember the exact percentage of the actual outcome of the game And the way that we build that is we take our our PFF player grades at the college level And we basically reverse engineer what the score of the game should have been based upon that And then we put it through an elo system You get a power ranking And you move on and I think with Cal what you have here is a couple things first off You know their quarterback chase garbers hasn't particularly played well. I think he's only completed like I got a look here Like six passes over 20 yards downfield All season he's got a grade PFF grade below 65, which isn't particularly good on any of those plays They just don't get chunk plays from the quarterback position And quarterback is the most important position even in college football. It's less so than in the nfl And so like our model is always going to sort of grade them worse in a game that maybe they even win Then then you know the box score itself or even you know yards for play type of stuff Just because we know that certain things carry and then in addition to that we do a huge adjustment for what conference you play in And so for example the pack 12 has been weak over the past year plus And so that you know in that regression Every team in the pack 12 has moved down a little bit just because there are going to be other teams that are stronger than them In other conferences and that gets to like a team like Missouri where we have them I believe yeah, I think Missouri is in our top 25 Which is super surprising given that they lost to wyoming but our game grade for that game didn't have them losing the wyoming And then they've had you know three pretty big wins since and then Also, they play in the sec which is far and away the best conference in college football So they just like that rising tide lifts that boat So then we've seen a lot recently is a lot of you know backups playing Do you feel that because it's a player-based model you can have more confidence When we have changes within personnel Do you feel better about the model knowing that it can account for that? To a degree, you know But the difficulty and this is what makes to me like you I lean away from Some you know overreacting the injuries a little bit in college football Is it's very difficult to define what a replacement level player is in college football? You know, we have we built a wins above replacement model for the nfl Uh, and that was and that was something where I think we're pretty decent at defining replacement In college football. I think a replacement level player with respect to alabama is a is an all-star on fAU You know, so it's super hard to sort of you know, and then And then when you get into intra conference play like how does that? You know, how does that different than inter-conference play? And so, you know for the quarterback position I think we have a robust way of sort of weaving people in and out But at other positions, we're you know, we're very we regress quite a bit when it comes to injuries when guys are out We don't know we try not to overreact too much All right as we've on here to our first game We're talking about four week five in college football here with dr. Eric eager pro football folk is talking notardame versus virginia The spread in this game is now notardame minus 12 and a half and open at 11 And it has shifted since then the total here is 48 and a half notardame Didn't play that badly against georgia kept it a low scoring game and kept that game close Did that georgia game for notardame Do anything to change the way you view notardame at all going forward? Yeah, in fact, I think you know, we have notardame with something like a six percent chance of running the table this year And in those instances, they make the college football playoff about half the time So they you know that game they very much like I think I can't remember what the full game grade was But they were far closer than the the the score of the game would indicate even in covering a two touchdown spread So it was a good it was an impressive victory or impressive victory against the spread for them in a loss overall But uh, so it does it does increase for them. We have them as the sixth ranked team in the country still after that game But in this particular matchup, I think with that 12 and a half point spread We would lean a little bit towards the virginia cabalese here Interesting and virginia is undefeated here. So, you know, definitely their biggest game so far What pushes you towards thinking that virginia can keep this game close? Uh, I mean perkins is a player that you know at the quarterback position who you know He has struggled so far under pressure is passer rating when under pressure is less than 55 nfl passer rating You know, he has had some turnover worthy throws But you know, those are a little bit less stable his passer rating when clean is about 105 and we know that that carries a little bit more Then you know on a on a game to game level than when he's pressured And when you add to that his ability to sort of like, you know make plays You know with his legs. I think that's a, you know Something that I think can keep them in the game, especially when you think about athletic Athletically, I don't think virginia is like worse than Notre Dame. I think Notre Dame's more of a, you know, very tactical team Uh, unless it you know going to athletically blow out a team like virginia Ian book's been great. Um, but I think he's been buoyed a little bit by some, you know, unstable things If you talk about with perkins, you know under under pressure his passer rating is 55 Books is 85 and those things generally tend to regress a little bit more towards, you know, the 65 70 range So, uh, just a little bit of fading noise a little bit here I just think the number is too big for a team in Notre Dame That's far more of a close, you know, the total in this game is, you know, less than 50 in college football So it's sort of hard to sort of square both of those things and in which case I kind of like the underdog here Yeah, Eric. Thanks for talking about the Notre Dame's win out probability I think a lot of that has to do with those road trips to michigan and sanford don't Look as tough as they did at the beginning of the year Let's move on to Clemson at north carolina. Clemson's a 26 and a half point favorite Before getting into this game would love your thoughts on trevor laurence in terms of your player grades Guy that isn't lighting it up like you did at the end of last year Some interceptions going on. What what do your numbers say about trevor? Yeah, he's a player actually who's Pacerating under pressure is a little bit higher than when clean and that's something that you know It's very unstable and when we look at the quarterback position, you know, he was starting out with the first game against I believe was Wake forest, I believe but he had like a turnover where he plays on in the first half numerous times And that was something that we didn't see at the end of the season last year, especially against alabama Later on so when I look at that I'm thinking to myself, you know Either I he improves fundamentally or some of this noise where it's pastorating, you know When under pressure is you know above 90 above 100 even like if that regresses that offense might not be as explosive on the other side You know their epa per run play is over a quarter of a point And they run the ball half the time So there's sort of that like floor for that offense that I think Will probably carry for them It'll be interesting though when they get into these games, you know Obviously, they'll probably play an sec opponent in the playoffs if they get there which we have over 90 chance that they will Whether they'll be able to compete if laurence is not the player he was a season ago Yeah, and that's gonna be interesting to watch too because it could just be you know situation where he's underperforming in the pocket and the The the more volatile number may be the more predictive one here But it's it'll be interesting to track for sure and see how that goes But their opponent here in UNC Allegedly got onto a hot start Ed was talking about how there was some noisiness in their win over miami They've kind of regressed pretty heavily since then with back-to-back losses Do they keep it close enough to cover in this one with a spread of 26 and a half for a home game? Yeah, UNC was you know the model like UNC the first I believe three weeks and they came out of that two and one both straight up and I believe against the spread I think wake backdoored them in week three But here, uh, you know after losing the appalachian state The model is not is going to adjust significantly in that situation, especially at home Young quarterback is sort of still getting his um, you know feet wet I think Clemson is a team that's probably you know, especially at this 26 and a half I know, you know numbers is greater than this it's hard to call them key numbers But 27 and 28 are pretty key out here I If I'm I probably wouldn't bet on this game, but if I had to I'd probably lay the points with Clemson Yeah, and it'll be an interesting one to watch. I think the larger the sample gets on Lawrence It's it gets more interesting Because it's been it's been an interesting start to the year for for sure for him Let's move here to Ohio State against Nebraska a little college game day action out in Lincoln Ohio State 17 and a half point favorite the total year is 67 and Eric you got your phd out in Nebraska So we of course had to include this game pretty big game to begin with though But before we talk about Nebraska versus Ohio State What's your overall impression Nebraska so far in year two with scott frost? You know it It was one of those things where I I thought that the end of the season was very encouraging for them because You know, they they couldn't have gotten off to a slower start losing to Troy last year Uh, you know getting blown out a few times by some of their, uh, you know, big 10 opponents I thought they're a game against Purdue Where Purdue kind of got out in front of them But the Nebraska sort of hung with and kept scoring and and showed a lot of their potential offensively Really, you know boated well for them down the stretch and they they were kind of impressive down the, you know On the stretch run, uh, especially in big 10 play But then this year I thought that they were a little bit overrated and it started, you know immediately when they were You know multiple touchdown favorites to south Alabama and couldn't cover that game Probably should have lost frankly if they didn't get defensive touchdowns and special teams touchdowns You know, I thought, you know against Illinois. I didn't think they were particularly sharp or impressive on the road Um, you know, they've had they've had some success in those middle games, but uh for me, you know, I'm I'm bullish on them long term. I think this year is not going to live up to, you know People in Lincoln's expectations of them, but frankly since I started going to grad school there in 2008 The Nebraska corn huskers have never lived up to Lincoln people's expectations of them. So Yeah Yeah, and and what about the team on the opposite side of the ball? Ohio State has looked pretty good Putting on big margins of victory against the lesser competition Uh, Justin Fields looked pretty good at the quarterback Position thoughts about Ohio State and whether they can cover 17 and have points on the road Yeah, absolutely when when Ohio State drops back to pass they average almost half an expected point So that's extremely good We have these things that are akin to touchdowns to interceptions But they're big time throws and turnover worthy plays and they are sort of the more predictive versions of those Um, Ohio State's 10 to 1 in that ratio Which which is tremendous and and they're avoiding not only are they making big plays in the passing game But they're avoiding turnover worthy plays, which are the sorts of plays that can really hurt you if you're trying to cover a big point Spread like this, um, you know, they're over 150 pass rating as a team, uh, you know, uh Win clean. So they're just they're humming offensively a positive epa per rush. So, uh, you know Top top offense in the big 10 second best defense in the big 10 in terms of our ranking So they're a team to be reckoned with here and uh, if the sec wasn't so strong I think that they would be, you know, it went out there a relative shoe in for the college football playoff Yeah, and uh, Justin Fields has been fun to watch The numbers for him really good, but i'm watching as more of like a casual fan, you know to the trained eye How has Justin Fields looked? What is pro football focus his impression of him so far? Oh, he's he's great at extremely well, uh, the you know, the big time throw to turn over where they play Stat is really going to be, you know, something that we look at and in it And the thing that's tough is like you look at a guy like dwayne haskens who You know sort of hasn't gotten on the field yet for washington. He was a player that got a lot of I would say Expected points on like expected throws so throws we would give him a zero grade or an expected grade You know because there was some of those touch passes or those crossers or things like that and he was certainly a good prospect Right, but but he sort of left us wanting more with the lack of sort of You know explosive plays. I don't think that'll be the case with fields and Terry mclauren and In paris campbell can lead to a lot of explosive plays which is kind of what you were alluding alluding to there Yeah, very much I never beds go ahead Oh, i'm sorry. I was just gonna say so you're are you not surprised that he hasn't gotten the job in washington Based on what your grades were last year? uh, well Like I I are our raw numbers considered him sort of more of a tier two quarterback in college football last season only because of only because of the Ohio states that the offense is very comfortable, you know, it is the way I like to put it He got rid of the ball very quickly Uh, he his average depth of target I can't remember exactly what it was or where it, you know, his distribution was but he got a lot of You know essentially expected points on what we would consider non-nfl throws So throws if you'd put in a bucket of plays that sort of even Blake Bortles at the nfl level can make Excellent Eric before we let you go here any other bets you see on the board that you like for week five of college football That stand out to you when you look at green line and things like that Uh, yeah, so and I don't know if this is the consensus line or not, but um Again, I've seen it at At 72 but I like texas tech versus oklahoma is over, you know, I don't think you could ever go wrong Hoping for points in a game like that. I know Against ucla they didn't they didn't put it on the pedal and that game went under But even opening night against houston that got over the closing number at 80 or 79 and a half. I think If it's if it's out to 72 73, I'm a little less bullish on it, but if it's at 70 and a half, which You know, I think our consensus number is I I'd like it The other one that I like I like fAU at charlotte fAUs plus one I think charlotte is a little bit overrated Because the three of us could probably go out You know and and have and have success last week for them. So Um, that's that's another one. I like fAU I think without turnovers would have blown out, you know, we had them I think two weeks ago and I and they they covered pretty convincingly And I think without turnovers they probably would have won by four touchdowns. So Um, and you always know that lane kiffin sort of has that has your Has your um, uh back is a better Yeah, absolutely. I yeah, I would agree with that assessment for sure. Uh, texas tech in oklahoma at fandall sports book 70 and a half so right at that number and uh taking the over there That is dr. Eric eager of pro football focus you can find him on twitter at pff underscore eric eric Thanks for stopping by. Um, I'll be rooting for the coron auscars for you on saturday. Hopefully things go well with that one Appreciate stopping by and uh, good luck, uh for college football and the nfl this week a lot of fun guys. Thanks for having me Covering the future Big thank you once again to dr. Eric eager for swinging on by in previous week five of college football and And I feel like we could have been very selfish and kept eric on for a very long time But it's really fun information and it's it's fun to hear other smart people talk about things like this I I just geek out getting to like listen to you guys go back and forth a bit Yeah, I know eric is the best and uh, I really love the way that he's taking all these player grades Which is really different from what? A lot of other people like myself that are you know using play-by-play data to make these projections I think there's a lot of value in seeing what he comes up with Right and then we talked about the player-based model with rob bezola, too And kind of the value in that some of the difficulties with that which is what eric talked about too But I I think it's a very interesting approach because again, I'm we talked about this with rob, but like I like to consider situation and I think you consider situation better When you're accounting for the players and I love that the player-based model does that I know it's like so hard to do because there's so much change across college football across the nfl But I think that it's a really interesting way and having the data that pro football focus has To help you with that. I think is is phenomenal So follow eric on twitter at pff underscore eric and add a little plug for football analytics show You can hear more about his research on the football analytics show. I think you had him on over the summer But I thought it was a more expansive listen about things we talked about at the beginning there Yeah, absolutely. I think it was early september Because I think we did talk some teams and stuff but You know the football analytics show is a little bit different because I like to talk a little bit more about the numbers and the insights And you know, I mean there's betting on there, too Right and and like I just like it because it can like let the nerd out a little bit like I like that It's it's a less time constrained thing where you can actually like expand on those really interesting things and dig into those So I'd recommend finding the football analytics show if you search spotify for eric eager it pops up right away Excellent. Yeah, so I would recommend that for sure If you want to find the best lines and the best value in betting on games Look no further than the new odds comparison or engineers have developed over at number fire dot com Odds fire is a premier odds comparison experience across major bookmakers in the regulated u.s. market Compare odds quickly identify the best value and even examine first party fan dual data all in one place Never settle always get the best odds check out the experience for free now on number fire or dots fire dot com gambling problem call 1 800 gambler Let's dive in now to covering the future starting off with you ed. We're talking more college football here You want to talk about penn state and potentially getting an edge on this team and it's an edge You said we may not be able to get for much longer Yeah, I mean it's actually really talking about maryland their opponent on friday night And I think it's a good opportunity to fade mike loxley. He is the new head coach Really had a a horrible time at new mexico as the head coach Has rehabilitated his career at alabama rose up to be Nick saban's offensive coordinator last year and got the job at maryland And they came storming out of the gate looked really good against howard and sarah keys And then finally kind of came back to earth two weeks ago against temple but To put those games in perspective you really need to account for strength of schedule Um, so maryland had eight yards per play against howard, which is great and they put up a lot of points but it Youngstown state had 11.2 yards per play against them hampton had 6.7 yards per play against howard And one of the things that i'm able to do is adjust for strength of schedule Including those fcs opponents. And so when I do this, um, I mean i'm actually taking all games In which both teams are either fps or fcs So essentially I have like the whole network of fcs teams in order to maryland Yeah, in order to evaluate maryland at this point of the year And You know, it doesn't particularly look good for maryland. So just based on four weeks of data and three games from maryland You know, their offense is 56 in adjusted yards per play. The defense is 75th So while the scoreboard looked pretty good against howard and sarah keys My numbers aren't really loving that team And penn state's been pretty good so far. I kind of forget that, you know, both my pre-season metrics Both my data base model and my market driven model had penn state as a top 15 team So far this season, uh, they're actually third in adjusted yards per play based on just, uh, this season Not quite as good on defense. They're 61st, uh, you know, maybe we'll see if they're not as good because of You know losing a couple of guys in the secondary to the nfl But a lot of people expected that defense to be better But essentially, you know, when I'll come it's down to it Like they they've lived up to their billing as a top 15 team so far this year My model says that penn state should win by nine on the road James franklin has no qualms about late game scores. The cover spread Uh, I would definitely take, uh, penn state. I think minus six and a half right now Yeah, it is. Um, and that number is actually seven at a couple of other places Thanks to odds fire. I can tell that very easily Uh, but it's minus six and a half right now at the fandom sports book And right now 80 of the bets and 72 of the money are on penn state So if you want to get six and a half, it's probably wise to dive in there I would say given that it is seven at some other spots And the other thing too, I think with maryland to keep in mind Is that win against syracuse has gotten worse the more syracuse has played in 2019 And also that syracuse game, I think it's important to remember That was the game before syracuse played clemson and the talk that entire week was If syracuse wins this game college game day will be in syracuse for the first time ever and I was listening to the pregame shows on saturday morning. That's all I talk about I didn't hear a word about maryland. It was all about if they win They're gonna, you know, college game day will be at the carrier dome And so I think that there are a couple of reasons to Knock that that win against syracuse down and then you're kind of on thin ground for being super jazz about this maryland team So I agree. I think that People are coming around on it based on that temple game, but maybe not fully there yet So I think it's a pretty smart way to view things there too. Yeah, and I don't think there's gonna be This kind of value on maryland going forward. I think I think they're they're gonna They're gonna lose and and will you know, I mean it's gonna be maryland You can only take advantage of early season inefficiencies for so long And I think it's smart to get in with them there again Penn State minus six and a half right now at the fandal sports book now my covering the future We don't have odds yet up yet on the fandal sports book But that's for the charlotte roval race for nascar and we talked about nascar before The road race at watkins glenn and I love betting road courses because lines are always terrible For road courses to be fully frank because sports books tend to overrate performance at road course And I think that based on odds. I have seen some other places There are a few drivers to look a bit undervalued to me One of them is kevin harvick who was 14 to 1 at westgate when their odds opened on tuesday And he's actually number one in my model right now I would not rank him there personally because Martin Truex jr. Has won three of the past seven road course races He could have won the other four as well. He was runner up twice and then got wrecked or had mechanical issues in the other two So he could have won seven straight. So martin Truex jr. Should be the favorite But harvick being first of my model at least is interesting to me 14 to 1 seems a bit too long for him there. He's always been awesome at sinomo Which is one of the road courses. He had eighth place average running position in Watkins glenn this year Which has never been his strongest track, but he also has good equipment and he's a very good driver So I think that 14 to 1 is just a bit too long no matter what his road course record may be So harvick at 14 to 1 very interesting I also like daniel suarez and matti benedetto They were both 80 to 1 at westgate and not the guys in the playoffs So What we're going to see on sunday is a lot of drivers prioritizing stage points, which is good for them It's very smart if they want to advance in the playoffs But it also will lower their expected finishing position if they prioritize that over track position to start off the next stage Benedetto and suarez aren't in the playoffs. So it doesn't matter for them They can just worry about the finish. Benedetto fourth and sixth in the first two road course races. He has been awesome All this year at tracks that have had additional off throttle time Which will be the case this week in charlotte's and he almost won it bristol another track like that He has three top fives overall this year all of which have come since that sinoma race So i think debanedetto makes a lot of sense suarez Doesn't have the best record on road courses in the cup series Did have top fives and wattkins glenn earlier in his career He also ran well on road courses in the xfinity series, but Last the races for him haven't been that inspiring and that's going to let you get some value on him from a betting perspective But he's had a top 15 average running position in six straight races now Which is awesome for a driver who checks into 80 to 1 so i think that debanedetto and suarez Normally you don't want to bet on guys where 80 to 1 in nascar because they don't win very often But this is a high variance track. We saw rex in practice last year leading into this charlotte race. So i think chuex Probably going to win this week. He's crazy good, but it's a high variance track So i'm okay with dabbling in some longer shots And i think that harvick debanedetto and suarez are all longer than they should be so Odds on vandal sportsbook tend to go up thursday morning I would check out where they are then but i think those are the guys most likely to get some action And i would expect them all to probably move before this race starts I think that harvick is very interesting at 14 to 1 I do you have any idea what the nascar playoff system is like because it's very weird And i feel like it's so hard to explain it to anyone I don't So it's like they have four separate rounds There are three races apiece and they're they're the trim the field is trimmed after each three races So this is the end of the first round. There are currently 16 drivers in the playoffs There are still 40 drivers in the race, but there are only 16 drivers who can win the championship After this race they lop off four of those guys. It's only 12 guys onto the next round It's a very weird format, but i think that in these cutoff races where Guys need to prioritize stage points and there are a lot of drivers who are in that that bubble For this week we can find some value in the guys who don't have to care and harvick is one of them He's already clinched and then deep in the dead on suarez both so far out that it does not matter They're out of the playoffs. So I think that there is some value there for sure Ed that's all we got for today You are over at the powerink.com anything good going on over there this week Yeah, absolutely. I mean you can get ahold of my email newsletter I'll be talking more about some of these adjusted college football U.S. Pro play numbers get some early insights Into what teams look like Yeah, and then also head roof is peabody on the football analytics show. So that is out He's a professional sports better. Oh, it was a good conversation A lot of interesting tidbits there that he gave out. So and check that out You can get that all at the powerink.com Yep, and the football analytics shows wherever you get your podcasts to I listen on spotify Like I said, but that listen everything on spotify. So it just makes it a lot easier when I'm going from my Computer to my car. You can find Ed on twitter at the powerink as well. I'm on twitter at jim sonnis j i m s a n And yes, you can also follow the fan dual podcast network at fan dual podcast Big thank you to calvin thea ball for producing the video side of things for today keeping us on the air as always Big thank you to dr. Eric eager of pro football focus for swinging by and talking about week five of college football and All of his research into pass rush Offensive line play quarterback play big. Thank you to him follow him on twitter at pff underscore eric big Thank you to all of you as well for tuning in for today Don't forget tomorrow to check out our nfl week four Betting preview with whale capper that will go tomorrow Subscribe to covering the spread to make sure you get that podcast right as it goes up We'll talk to you then this has been covering the spread right here on the fan dual podcast network