 This is covering the spread here are your hosts Jim Saunas and Dr. Ed Feng What is going on everybody welcome on into covering the spread? That's right here on the fan jewel podcast network and number fire commas We're taking a look at some men's college basketball and a little bit of the NBA as well With John Ewing of the action network breaking down his thoughts on some teams You can buy low on right now and a couple of futures bets as well My name is Jim Saunas. I am a senior writer and analyst for number fire comm joined here as always by Ed Feng You can find his work over at the power rank comm and happy Wednesday to you. How are you doing today? I'm doing great man Digging deeper into college basketball and then had had the pleasure of turning on the NBA all-star game randomly on Sunday night What happened there? I gotta admit I was watching rain delay coverage of the day 2500 I chose to watch Driver interviews and a replay of last year's race over the NBA all-star game Which is why we're having John talk basketball today and not me What happened? I did not see a single minute. So I don't know if I would have turned it on all-star games are Pretty typically boring a lot of offense. No one plays defense But I got a notification and it was interesting. They're like fourth quarter team LeBron versus team Giannis Goal score 157. So they changed the format of it. Yeah, where instead of playing to a clock You're playing to a score So it ends up being great because there's there's no chance for intentional filing at the end of the game True. Okay. Yeah, and it changed the complete dynamic of the game Like you have never it was like a pickup game that everyone of those guys wanted to win There was more defense in that quarter of all-star basketball than maybe Combined in the history of the all-star game. It was really incredible and you know, I think it was like team or blonde they needed three points to win and Obviously like it completely changes the game, right because now you must defend the three-point line and Giannis's garden LeBron and LeBron, you know, he was clearly not gonna let him shoot And so LeBron goes around them for what looked like a pretty easy Layup and Giannis comes out and blocks it. They call it a goaltend. It was actually a good block. They reviewed it So, you know, I mean the game still got slowed down a little bit by reviews But it was incredible like the excitement of that game a couple other people I talked to Really enjoyed it, you know, other people who had never you know, hadn't turned on an all-star game in years I think the players really enjoyed it and I think we're getting in this era in the NBA where you're gonna start seeing Competitions outside of the regular season and the playoffs there's been a lot of talk about having a mid-season tournament in February when there's not a lot going on in the tournament playing for a Cup similar to how European soccer teams do and I think with the excitement that this all-star game generated with this format You could see that format going into that tournament and I think that would be incredible for the sport of basketball, right and I think that's also very interesting because It was a year. I met you at Sloan I believe that was that year Adam Silver was talking and they say they look at League Pass data and They know when people tune out of games Yeah, and one of the areas they wanted to improve was the last two minutes because like you said People are fouling and it makes it kind of unwatchable. So I think This format being successful in that respect is interesting given that I know They are looking at that like the NBA has a lot of very smart people involved of it I know that they're seeing that I'm sure that you probably had a similar thought too Were you at that and Adam Silver talk? I was at that Adam Silver talk and actually just recently I think it was this past year where Daryl Morey mentioned this idea of playing to a score instead of a clock and and I think it's brilliant and like It's I think it's less I mean, I agree with you that there's a lot of smart people in the NBA But I think it's more the leadership to think differently and not to be stuck in an NFL mindset where you're not right going to put advertisements on your jersey, you know like So I think it's really Yeah, I think so many things in life are less about brains and more about a desire to try just just a Capacity to think a little bit outside the box, right and and I think you saw a great example of that Sunday night I think that's also very interesting because like the NFL has tried things during the Pro Bowl to make that like watchable like sideline player interviews and like you're seeing the XFL do that in regular season games, right? Don't think that's a coincidence because like the Pro Bowl I I watch it because I have heavy DFS interest usually I will admit that's the reason but like Seeing the player interviews makes it more watchable Than it would be previously So we've seen good ideas come from like funky all-star four months before and like when I heard the idea for the all-star game I was like this is way too confusing. I don't want to try that hard to think about it But like you're not the only person who has praised it I think Bill Simmons was talking about how like it was a good format this week, too So it's really interesting that it's got such good reviews. Yeah, exactly. And I think like I think it'll be it'll be a real shot in the arm for basketball in general I think this is really the way to go, you know, because I always talk about like a lot of basketball Love football, but my favorite sport to watch is international soccer and the big reason for that is just the flow You know the game flow is towards the end. There's not the stoppages that you see And if you could get just just even better, I mean still you're gonna still get frustrated with basketball with all the reviews But it's a lot better Interesting. We'll have to keep track of that for sure and if anyone's going to Sloan this year Maybe see if you can get some more insights. Yeah, sure the plans are for that as well. Are you going to Sloan this year Ed? Yep, I'll be there. Okay So you are our beat reporter on the ground the beat reporter on the ground Does that mean I actually have to go to sessions or can I just tell you what the betters are saying and You can make things up and I'll never know So I'm just gonna tell you that right now So you have free reign to do as you need We're gonna talk more college basketball and more NBA to second with John Ewing You can find his stuff over at the action network He's a betting analyst there college basketball his process whether he sees it valued NBA futures right now With the off-season being here that we do have an interesting schedule for covering the spread So make sure you are subscribed to covering the spread to get every podcast right as it is posed Don't worry about seeing your tweets about it or anything You can just get a push notification right as it goes up by searching for covering the spread Apple podcasts Spotify Stitcher wherever you are we are as well And if you listen to Apple podcasts, please leave us a rating and review as well before we get to John Speaking of a lot of delays late in the contest We had to go back through the Daytona 500 a lot of delays there and a Scary incident at the end that apparently has a happy ending We're gonna go through that and then we'll get to John in just one second Covering the past All right, so last week on covering the spread We had a discussion about the Daytona 500 from a betting perspective and the one big bet that came from that at least for me was Chris Buescher to win at 75 to 1 and we had actually talked about that in December as well Because Buescher open at 75 to 1 Didn't get any closing line value, which was shocking to me. No closing line value at Fandle He was 40 to 1 other places. So closing line value elsewhere So he closed 75 to 1 and he's still almost paid off he was actually running in the top 5 late in this race and Then there was a big crash in front of him because it's Daytona and he went to the grass to avoid it and Nick Costos of You better you bet was messaging me because I talked about Buescher on their show too And he's like is he done and I'm like no he has to pit He has to get the grass taken off his car It's suboptimal, but like he's still alive and he restarted 15th and he had a fast car So he actually worked his way forward. He was running fifth and then with two laps left Buescher got this massive run and he went four wide on the front stretch And he was actually on the outside of Denny Hamlin who was leading it was about to take the lead with two laps left But then there was another huge wreck behind him and the caution came out So what they do is we were talking about loops last week the loop data And they go back to the last loop they passed Before the caution came out and at that last loop Buescher wasn't second behind Hamlin So he restart second. I was actually okay with that because Hamlin shows the outside line which is statistically the better line and it was smarter from to do so But that put Buescher on the inside and that means he had Kevin Harvick and Clint Boyer behind him Those are two forwards Hamlin had no toyot is in the top 15 with him. He was he was a lone ranger So Buescher's in a really good spot He didn't get a very good restart from second though And he slipped a third and then the caution came out again because there was another wreck right away So another restart Buescher's restarting third two laps to go But he was right behind his teammate Ryan Newman and you probably know that name now of Ryan Newman The outside got a better restart because Ryan Blaney was starting fourth and he Had a really fast car and he basically just bullied Hamlin forward And Buescher couldn't keep up with Newman. He kind of drifted back to fifth got a really good push I think from David Reagan and Buescher was back up to fourth on the the front stretch and then you've seen this by now Blaney Was trying to pass Newman Newman blocked him Blaney said whatever I give up I'll just push it forward to a win and then he hooked Newman huge wreck and it almost opened up the window for Buescher Buescher finished third. So at 75 to 1 I liked that process, but like It was really hard to get too excited given what happened with Ryan Newman now. Thankfully like today Finally, we got good news. Like apparently he is walking There's a picture from roush family racing with him and his daughters like standing up and smiling he is intact and like I Haven't felt that way in a long time from an ass car race like the the the the fright Honestly of like having all that go down, but thankfully he is okay And because he's relatively okay. I can you know feel better about the butcher bit, but like And that was that was a wild and scary night Monday with all the stuff Did you were you paying attention to that at all? Yeah, I was going down. Yeah, I watched a little bit of it Definitely caught the replay of the wreck the next day. It was sunday, right? Not monday. It was monday night Yeah, because they got postponed by rain Oh, okay. Yeah, it was monday night. Yeah, okay Yeah, so definitely saw you know more NASCAR than I probably have You know the recent memory so yeah, so it's good to engage any things Absolutely And we actually I got a tweet from someone too is saying they they watched the race because of the podcast They got some interest from it So that was uh, definitely good good good interacting with them and Thankfully everything with newman looks like it'll wind up being okay because like that put It's been really weird to talk about NASCAR this week. It's just like it's it's been so scary, but uh, he sounds like he's gonna be okay, and We could feel better about busher finishing third then even though it didn't quite pay off Hopefully you got an each way from your book. I didn't mention that if and will probably should have but For those you got a top three each way got paid out So congrats to those of you who did and if you want to get in on the action Make sure you check out the fan dual sportsbook and place your first bet today If you lose fan dual will give you a refund of up to $500 and site credit visit sportsbook.vandual.com for details terms and conditions apply Must be 21 plus and physically present in new jersey Pennsylvania, west virginia or andyanna gambling problem call 1 800 gambler Let's shift focus now and bring on john ewing find him on twitter at john ewing He is a betting analyst for the action now recording a breakdown men's college basketball NBA talks and futures talks and march madness and get his thoughts on things as they stand right now Covering the present Let's bring john ewing into covering the spread to talk a little bit of men's college basketball and some nba john Welcome to the show. How you doing today? Thanks for having me on fellas. I'm excited Yeah, absolutely. We're excited to have you here as well. Now. We're going to talk about a couple different things We're going to go through bet labs at the action network. We're going to talk men's college basketball in the nba But first I saw you tweeting about the Daytona 500. Um, I am also I love nascar We were talking about it last week on the show. How did things go for you down in Daytona? I ended up coming out ahead. Thankfully. I had a busher in the top three He was a long shot. So he got home for me other than that It was uh looking to be disastrous But when you bet on cars going in circles and there's a lot of racks that can that's bound to happen Absolutely chris busher. I I will say he is the official driver of covering the spread. So, uh, I I'm fully on board of that. There are a lot of like nascar people in a busher So I know that uh pj wall just talked about him too last week So it was uh, always good to be rooting for the same guy there for sure now john You work for the action network and you've got a thing called bet labs there that stores Tons of historic data for bets. You can tweet out a bunch of different trends for people who don't know What bet labs is? How can that be applied for placing your bets? Well, I think all gamblers have theories, right? Uh teams score less in cold weather You should fade squads on back to backs, etc And bet labs gives you the ability to test theories. Uh, see what's true What's not it's kind of like myth busting but for sports betting And so with our massive database you can test almost any theory you have and then if you find something that's interesting You can get alerts set up so that when games match, uh, you know, uh, you have an opportunity to profit Excellent so so a lot of a lot of that part is finding trends Is there any general advice you have about either searching for trends or following trends that other people post? Yeah, I mean always sample size matters, right? It depends on support for the the more games The more consistently profitable it has the the more confidence you can You know lend a trend or a system going forward and in general where I have most success is going against common held beliefs Uh, which often means betting against the public So just to kind of go back on that like teams and cold weather and scoring, you know, we often see And this is usually media driven. We need to talk about football games the NFL If it's going to be, you know, 10 degrees in lambo That's always a storyline leading up to kickoff and you'll often see The under getting a ton of action because again casual bettors just think it's cold outside players don't want to be hit That leads to lower scoring But we've seen historically That really cold temperatures don't matter all that much Overs have hit about 57% of the time when it's 32 degrees or colder outside So kind of going against the grain again going against common held beliefs Has historically provided betting opportunities. Did you say 57% go over? When it's below freezing Yeah, so in general that's since 2003 and if you kind of look at the closing total Usually the the lower the total obviously the easier it is for a game to go over So in lower total games with cold temperatures So again, that just you know games tend to have lower totals and cold weather because Betters will bet the under and osmakers will force them to take bad numbers Interesting. That's super interesting. Is it is it weird for you to be Going so heavily against the public a lot of times like I know that like we want to try to exploit public But it is kind of strange to be kind of on island a lot of times Does that make you nervous at all betting against where a lot of the money is going so often? No, only because so often the public is wrong, right? Yeah, there's a reason, you know, the casinos exist out in vegas They they the osmakers always win so being on the same side as the bookmakers tends to be a profitable long-term strategy Absolutely. So let's talk about your process more broadly with men's college basketball betting Do you have your own numbers you lean on? Do you try to pinpoint certain stats that are bound to be regressed? Do you look for the trends you were just in now, you know talking about what's your process when it comes to men's college basketball? As much information as possible. I want it all. So I mean, yeah, we have power ratings at the action network My colleagues on corner creates those for us. So that's always a great starting point Of course, you have betlabs, which can highlight, you know, great situations or profitable situations We track, you know ticket and money percentages as well as sports insights, which can kind of highlight Maybe where some sharp moves are going in the course There's a bunch of analysts at the action network that write up college basketball on a daily basis So when I try to consume all of that information, whenever all those factors line up That's where I've had the most success betting on college basketball Excellent So, John, you most recently wrote a piece about the value of targeting teams that have struggled against the the spread as bookmakers start to Bake that in Are there any college teams that stand out right now that you can take advantage with this this idea? Yeah, so when is this going up? Are your listeners going to be able to be active on this by tomorrow? Uh tonight, honestly, because it it should be up by I would say three o'clock on wednesday at the latest Okay, well then I got a bunch of game matches here for you. I was hoping you guys are gonna say that Yeah, you guys were talking about bad against the spread teams Um, I was looking at, you know, just a real simple strategy bad teams against the spread against opponents that have winning a ts records and you know, again casual betters are Our victim to recency bias if a team fails to cover they tend to bet against them if one is consistently getting Cashing tickets for them, then they're going to be on them again the next game So again osmakers understand these tendencies and then they will adjust lines accordingly So historically when you bet a bad team, I defined it as covered only about one in every three games When they face a winning against a spread opponent in conference games They covered 56 of the time with over a 3000 game samples since 2005 So ton of games really consistent winner been Has returned a profit in 10 straight seasons this year. This system is 89 62 and 5 So that's a 59% win rate against the spread. So again huge sample consistent results something that can Now you might say, okay I'm not a trend better But at least this can point you in the right direction and you can use power ratings or models to help You know confirm this data, but some matches for tonight Votek against miami north dakota against south dakota state illinois state against laola chicago Wofford against nc greensboro. So those are just a few this evening that match this system where you're going to take a team that has not been covering and Historically, um, the data says they're going to be undervalued At what point in the year does that start to work out because a lot of time in the year where you may see teams Covering the spread because they were undervalued coming into the year Is this like a february thing where you start to buy into stuff like this, uh, trying to you know Go again once we have a large in a sample on these teams Right, uh, so I mean these are win in conference games So when the calendar flips and you start seeing more conference matchups, uh, that's when this system starts kicking in Okay, interesting. Now speaking of that, we got a pretty good sample on All the teams now meaning we can see some teams that could be due for some regression That could be another thing we could be looking for here. Do any teams stand out to you right now as having unsustainable performances that could present betting opportunities, whether it be for them or against them Yeah, one team, uh, that I thought of was arizona state They're just a half game behind oregon and colorado in the pack 12 Uh, they won five in a row But most of those have come against, uh teams in the bottom half of the conference They're 17th right now in kimpom's luck rating which looks at, uh, when their actual record versus expected Uh, they're 10th right now and free throw percentage in the pack 12 while their opponents Uh, have are shooting just the second worst mark against them and that's another, uh Area where I've looked at some of the stats, uh free throw percentage for and against Is pretty much luck and so that's one where area where you can kind of target a team that's, uh unfortunately had an opponents make a high percentage of free throws against them Where you could see that kind of flip later in the season. So arizona state definitely an opportunity there, uh, they're Playing organ on thursday. So that's going to be a step up in competition. I like the ducks there against arizona state Excellent. So john you were mentioning, uh Before the show that that you've been working on a tournament model for for college basketball Is there any insights into college basketball futures from that model? Yeah, so I just ran 10 000 simulations of the most recent bracket ology from jolyn arty uh using our power ratings for college basketball and what stands out to me is that We are much higher on the top favorites than the market is right now. So you're talking like kansas gonzaga duke We we see it maybe leaning a little more chock this year right now kansas Is sitting in that like nine to one future odds And by our model we have them as the most likely champion winning it about 20 of the time. So Fair odds on for them would be about four to one. So there's definitely some value there on the j hawks When you kind of look at some of their underlying numbers, they're One of the top 10 in both offensive and defensive efficiency according to ken palm So this is a really good balanced team. Uh, that maybe the market isn't as high on as our numbers That's really interesting too. Uh, kansas eight to one Over at vandal sportsbook as of right now And john is this the first year you've done the simulations in february? I think it's very interesting because it's going to account for Seating or potential seating hypothetical stuff like that and there's a lot of value in that Have you done this in the past as well? Or is this the first time you've done this? We've done this for the last Two three seasons now. I'm thinking how we would always do a pre-season And then starting after the nfl ended when more interesting college basketball starts picking up start running these numbers every week And that's what i'm going to do going forward. So, uh, we'll see how seating changes with, you know Bracketology, which then obviously impacts some of our projections here But in general right now, uh sitting about a month out from selection sunday It looks like the j-hawks have some value. I put a little I put a unit on them, uh, just for some action That's interesting. John. Would you would you maybe suggest waiting until after this weekend? Just because if they lose the baler, you maybe get a better number on it That's true. Yeah, that's a that's a really good, uh tip right there And that's something where you know, if you look at your numbers and you say, yeah, baler's gonna win this match I bet against baler last night. They keep burning me Uh, our power ratings had that game, uh, bares minus one. I got it three and a half You know, they're just they're really good. So yeah, kansas is gonna have the hands full this week If they do fall, yeah, that number could slide to maybe 10 to 1 Yeah, so we were talking about baler last week actually or two weeks ago with ken barkley Locky lockerson and yeah, he was talking about baler two and they've been a pretty big talking point from a betting perspective What's been your read on them? Like you said you bet against them the numbers that have been against them Are you expecting regression to happen or are you just going to hold off and just forgo them for a while? Yeah, the thing with baler is they're number one right in the ap poll so often casual betters look at that and they say Okay, they're clearly the best team but the underlying numbers at least according to our power ratings Make them more like the fourth or fifth best team in the country So there's it's kansas duke and zaga and then just underneath them is baler. So while they are very good they're maybe not as good as You know the ratings suggest which often influences spreads and the betting odds So you can find value betting against them when I do though. They keep making me look silly Yeah, it's interesting I actually watched a bunch of the game at oklahoma last night And while they're it's kind of like a team that I kind of want to root for in the tournament If they if they weren't a number one seed because it's really like a very cohesive team There's no, you know, NBA lottery pick on that team, but they move the ball around well play good defense Um, but they're probably going to be a number one seed. So, you know, they're gonna they're going to be the favorite going in Uh, it would be interesting to see how everything shakes out Yeah Go ahead and say by our simulations There they would be one of the one seeds that we would avoid Okay, just because again kansas duke and zaga we have them much more likely to reach the final four So that would be if baler is a one seed They're probably one that i'm looking to fade when i'm filling out my bracket At least we will certainly 30 days off from the tournament. Oh, yeah We're gonna get plenty more tournament talk before things tip off and i'm looking forward to that It's always fun to talk to Ed about that. So Uh, it's definitely a good time of year for that now john while we have you here Might as well talk a little bit of nba as well because End of the all star break is coming up and on the action network You recently created a consensus nba championship projection used a couple of different rating systems Compared that to where the betting odds were at did any team stand out to use being profitable futures bets after going through that exercise? Yeah, uh, the nba is one of the sports where I don't have a simulation model But what you can do and you know, it's really simple for any of your listeners that are looking to play some future bets Just go gather as much information as you can like I looked at ESPN number fire basketball reference get all of their projections and then just create You know an average projection for each team It's really simple you get a bunch of models and inputs that are theoretically all independent of each other Which should create some value as long as they line up and According to this consensus projection You know, there's three clear favorites to win at all. It's the Lakers bucks and clippers They're all sitting at like three to one or better every other team is in the double digits But the bucks stand out uh far and above According to these models they have about a 43 chance to win the nba championship So even though you're only getting about plus 260 on them, there's still value You could bet it down to about plus 140 based on those And it's really I mean betting on milwaukee. It's not too hard to make a case for them They have the best record in the nba second in offense first in defensive efficiency and they have some guy named yannis who's like 30 points and 14 rebounds per game so I really like them. I was on them last year at 10 to 1 and obviously disappointing when they blow a 2l lead to quiet and the raptors, but This is a spot where I don't love laying such a short price But if they are winning about 50 or you know, if they're a clear favorite, then there's still value I still don't know how toronto ended up beating milwaukee last year Like I really love to replay that series like toronto just had an unbelievable defensive series Um, so I definitely I I definitely agree with you on that I mean if you're getting 10 to 1 before the start of the playoffs last year, that was fantastic And it was the exact same exercise I ran last year that i'm doing today where I created consensus projection and yeah the bucks, you know because uh The Everyone's usually slow to catch up to teams that haven't actually proven it yet And you know, that's why milwaukee still tied with the lakers and clippers because lebron And kwai have rings and and yannis doesn't yet Yeah, and I remember some people really cashing in the first year the warriors got good The first year kerr got there With the splash brothers too for exactly the same thing that you mentioned, right? People don't think that they can win because they don't have that experience Well, it turns out that they were pretty good at basketball Yeah, just one of those things where you can't win until you do that is john ewing Make sure you find all of his work over at the action network john I do want to thank you for swinging by and spend some time talking men's college basketball in the nba very much appreciated And hopefully we can talk to you again here soon Yeah, and if anyone bets the j-hawks or bucks, and they win please send a portion of that to me What to link your venmo in the episode description here John thank you so much. We'll talk to you again soon. Appreciate it. Thanks for having me on Appreciate it Covering the future One final big thank you to john ewing find him on twitter at john ewing and make sure you check out all his work Over at the action network ad and I always preach searching for the best value when betting on games Well, look no further than the new odds comparison our engineers have developed over at number fire dot com It's called odds fire. It's the premier odds comparison experience Across major bookmakers in the regulated us market Compare odds quickly identify the best value and even examine first party fan dual data on one place Never settle always get the best odds Check out the experience for free now a number fire or at odds fire dot com gambling problem call 1 800 gambler Let's move now into cover the future and stick with men's college basketball And you want to focus on three-point shooting in college basketball what we can learn from that What are some things we can uh, we can take from that and apply to this year Yeah, so in college basketball, we know that the efficiency metrics are most important So how many points you score per possession adjusted for strength schedule and the same on defense And uh, ken pomeroy does a good job with all these numbers on his site So then the question is well, what what what can we know like in addition to that right like what We have these numbers, but you know, what is the sources of randomness in there? And ken's not a lot of work about the randomness of the three-point shot Both on offense and and defense So if you look at how a team Defends the three-point shot in terms of field goal percentage at the first half of conference play That has almost no ability to predict How well that team will defend the three-point line on the defensive So for the rest of the season in conference play and and weirdly it's the same thing is true on offense You know, like how well a team shoots the beginning part of the conference season has almost no ability to predict later in the year and It seems a little bit weird because usually when there's that lack of ability to predict something It means that that's not a skill That's clearly not the case with three-point shooting. I'm not trying to tell you that there's no skill in shooting the ball there is but What it does say is that there's a lot of randomness in Three-point shooting and so, you know, what kind of insights can you get out of that? Well, first, let's go to kansas You know, they're a top ranked team In in ken's numbers and in some of my numbers as well Um, they could actually be better. So one of the best players is debon dotson Incredibly quick guard. Uh, they can get to the basket But kind of the knock on the entire team is that they don't shoot the ball well And dotson is definitely not an exception to that. He's shooting about 30 percent this year Um, but I think that could get better as a freshman last year. He shot 36 percent So when you get some regression to the mean or get some regression to his skill level Um at the end of the year if you project out from now on He in particular is probably going to shoot a little better and he is one of the main people on their team Maybe you can potentially see kansas being better than even they are right now in the efficiency numbers The second example is kentucky This is a team that probably is not a good shooting team But when you look at their numbers from three, they're shooting 31 percent So that's 260 second in college basketball. Uh, that's pretty well below the mean of In terms of college basketball percentage And what this analysis said is well, there's probably some bad luck in their shooting so far Um, you can kind of try to go do the same analysis see some of the better shooters are kind of off their Skill level in terms of what they've done previous seasons. Uh, that doesn't really seem to help out kentucky But they're probably a bit better than they are And you know, I was always interested like, you know, I had them as a very small dog against lsu last night And you know, they ended up making half their three point shots and and pulling off the road wind yesterday last night So there's a lot of randomness in three pointers You can also look at this on the defense side of the ball To see regression and it just gives you a tool like above and beyond just looking at efficiency numbers Of where teams are potentially headed going into the tournament Is the thought process there that Three-point shooting is volatile and over a small sample. Is that the thought process there? It's incredibly volatile and like, I mean I actually talked to ken this morning like It's volatile on the player level as well Not just the team level you can kind of expect for the team like You get, you know, a lot of different people shooting. You're playing a lot of different levels of defense Um Randomness still plays a role even on the individual level and and you see that all the time with guys, you know Having bad nights having great nights We saw that a lot with michigan earlier this season where You know, I mean they they were missing their best shooter But none of their other guys can make up for it during a stretch where they lost a bunch of games Um, I kind of saw it as a lack of shooting Most other people didn't unfortunately But they have bounce back and um, you you're gonna see that a lot I mean the three-pointer is a huge source of randomness in basketball and uh And and that's just the way to kind of look above and beyond the efficiency numbers to get some insights And that's kind of stuff that you talk a lot about a lot on our march madness podcast Which is kind of identifying teams that may be Bound for some regression, uh, maybe overvalued because of that stuff So definitely valuable too. Kentucky is 20 to 1 right now at vandal sports book Is that number long enough to entice you or do you think that's appropriate? Um, I Because like I can see how Kentucky is never gonna really get a long number So like even if they're due for regression, I could understand like from a futures perspective Yeah, it might not be enough. I mean it definitely interests me. That seems definitely low Um, Kentucky, let me look at this. So before yesterday's game, they were 25th when I looked at efficiency So offense and defensive points for possession. Just for who you played Um market rankings, they're actually 14th in the nation And you got to remember this is a team that started, you know top five in the preseason So calpire is always going to have the talent there Definitely a team that can make the run um But you know, they haven't really shown it yet. So like, yeah, is that a team that can make it? Make it run. I definitely think so All right, so looking for volatility and trying to exploit it in smaller samples Definitely good takeaway for all betting not just men's college basketball For my cover in the future I want to talk some golf because we talked NASCAR. I talked baseball last week Let's get some golf in here too because I do us a dfs show with brandon gadoola talking daily fantasy golf and when we were talking this week, I Slowly talked myself into patrick reed not from like a fan perspective because I don't think necessarily want to root for patrick reed all that many times But I do think he's being undervalued in betting markets for the wgc mexico, which tees off on thursday And there are a couple of routes for attacking that with him being undervalued First I want to discuss why I like him and then we'll discuss the markets you could look at here First the main reason is that He's really well-rounded statistically That's a big key in Such a tough field and it is hard to come through if you have glaring weaknesses against rory macaroy duston johnson and all those guys and reed doesn't really have big weaknesses if you look at the past 50 rounds per fantasy national Reed is in the top 30 in the field in driving distance stroke skiing approach and stroke skiing around the green He's actually 14th in approach, uh, which is the biggest number for me So really good rating there and he's also a good putter now poa is the putting service for this week And it's not his best surface, but He's still 20th there in stroke skiing putting over the past 100 rounds So a plus putter on poa in addition to the good around the green play good approach play decent distance so no real holes in reeds game and He's had really good approach play over his past two events despite kind of middling results If we look at the past 21 events read he has a win. He has five top fives He has nine top 10 So he's getting good finishes and a lot of those have come against tougher fields Which is what we have for this weekend. So that's why I like patrick reed You one route you could take is betting him to win outright at 41 to 1 if andro sports book That is the official recommendation here, but You can't get him longer at some books. I know brandon benham at 45 to 1 Bet 365 has him at 45 So I would shop around if you want to bet him outright But you can also bet him with some of the top guys taken out of the picture at fandall sports book you can bet with With dustin johnson rory macaroy John romp and justin thomas all taken out of the pool And bet who finishes best with those guys not considered which is It's big for me in this in this case because reed is not in the same class Especially rory right now. So taking those four guys out of the picture It makes me more inclined to bet a golfer And I think that's beneficial for reed whose number is still 29 to 1 even when you take Those guys out of the equation. I do like that number more than the 41 to 1 outright. So The reason i'm not recommending that overall is I know that not every book is going to provide that If it does I would take a look at that number You can bet him as a first round leader if you want that'd not be my favorite format for him You can uh do some match betting group betting But just broadly I think that patrick reed is someone being a bit undervalued right now for the wgc mexico And someone I would be looking to buy into and maybe we can get branded on here Some point to talk some golf maybe before one of the majors, but at any golf interest for you Yeah, just listen to you talk about it. Uh, i'm not much of a golf fan or better or numbers guy Uh, listen to the guys like you and rufus so Yeah, uh, brandon's really smart. So talking to him Makes me feel a lot better about this stuff. Uh, he he had adam scott last week and adam scott won So I'd follow brandon on twitter at kadula 13, but uh, he also is into reed So I feel I feel pretty good about this one Just look for your favorite marco patrick reed and I would dive into that one A lot of different ones available over at fan dual sports book and that is all we have for this week What do you have going on over at the power rank com? Yeah at the power rank make sure you get on my email newsletter Um before the start of the tournament. I'll give you a cheat sheet. It's my favorite strategy good for small pools Uh, it just it's an easy way for you to fill out your bracket If you don't have a ton of time get that service over at the power rank com slash predictions That's also the page where I've been posting a sample of my best predictions for college basketball every day So you can definitely check that out. Uh, see what number I got workers in michigan tonight And uh, yeah, I just basically every day I sample some subset I actually take all the top 25 teams and then sample the rest of the games and uh You know like I think 10 or 30 of the rest of the games and I post them there So it gives you a taste for um, you know my college basketball numbers, which have been really good this year I should talk about that some other time. I did some analysis on that this week Uh, so I'm feeling really confident about those numbers check them out at the power rank com slash predictions And for ed's book the power rank net for a link to that and I'd recommend that if you Are like everyone else and in a tournament pool I'd recommend that as well the power rank net for the book find at on twitter at the power rank I imagine sonnis j i m s a n n e s if you enjoyed the nascar talk last week I'll have a nascar betting guide up later this week over on number fire dot com on nascar dfs podcast Went up today breaking down the pens oil 400 in las vegas also got some betting thoughts in there too Uh, if you want to attack it from that angle make sure you are subscribed to covering the spread Wherever you get your podcast and if you're listening to apple podcast, please leave us a rating and review because again Those help us out a ton and thank you to those of you who have already done so also big Thank you to calvin theobald our video producer for keeping us on the air here today Thank you cal as always and if the final thank you to john ewing for swinging by and talking men's college basketball The nba follow him on twitter at john ewing We'll talk to you all again next week should be a whole lot of fun to tackle Another episode of covering the spread until then good luck with your bets. We'll talk to you again next week This has been covering the spread right here on the fan dual podcast network