Batting Practice #5: A Weekend for Learning
The weekly sport analytics review and criticism from Wolohan Analytics
You can listen to the fifth episode of Batting Practice here:
This week is all about college football, because it’s too early in the NFL season to say we know much — and we are getting our first slate of topflight college football games.
I talk about…
The media was too quick to crown Jalen Hurts a star. We had him at the bottom of Tier 3 of our P(100) QB tiers and he is off to a poor start to the season. Hurts will need to play better for the Eagles to match the Cowboys this year.
Ohio State at Notre Dame is the most interesting game of the weekend. We’ll learn a lot about how good this OSU team is. Before the season, they were one of three teams our Simple Talent Tiers projected as Top 5 teams, along with Georgia and Alabama.
Same-Game Parlays we like for (6) Ohio State at (9) Notre Dame
Ohio State -3.5 and Over 55.5 (+258)
Notre Dame +3.5 and Under 55.5 (+312)
Iowa at Penn State should be a preview of an early favorite for next season: Penn State and QB Drew Allar. Penn State is top 25 in terms of talent this year, so they don’t have the juice to compete with the big dogs, but another good recruiting class and an elite QB will put them in the mix.
Colorado at Oregon will tell us about Colorado for the first time this season. But without 5-Star, two-way player Travis Hunter, the Buffalo don’t stand a chance against the Ducks. The spread is 21 points for favorite Oregon.
Alabama hosts Ole Miss, with a chance to prove to the world that they’re still a national title contender. Ole Miss is considered as good as Notre Dame, so the 7-point spread Alabama is getting means Vegas still considers ‘Bama a top dog. Will they play like it against the in-conference rival? We’ll learn a lot about the Longhorns this week as well — depending on how Alabama fares.