Saturday, Helen and I will go to the Kansas game. We’ll leave our house at about three o’clock for the 5:07pm kickoff. Before the kickoff, we’ll have a pop at the so-called Champions Club at the UT Performing Arts center across the street from the stadium. We plan on leaving the game at halftime to go out to dinner at the restaurant we’ll choose purely by whim. It’ll be a nice Saturday afternoon and evening. The weather may even call for me to breakout my burnt orange sweater. I’m looking forward to it.
Yet, we’ve reached that time of year that has become a little too familiar to Texas fans. It’s that time of year when Texas is struggling just to become bowl eligible making the games of contending teams more interesting to Texas fans than the Texas game. (I don’t think I’m speaking only for myself.) So, while I’m looking forward to our Saturday afternoon and evening, I’ll have at least a slight inclination to stay home to monitor Georgia-Auburn at 2:30pm, Alabama-Mississippi St. at 6pm, and Notre Dame-Miami, and TCU-Oklahoma at 7pm. As my father once famously said, “I can remember when things were different.” And, as my mother often said, “C’est la vie.”
For the record, I like Georgia, Notre Dame, and TCU to win outright and Mississippi St. to cover the 14 ½ spread.
Oh yeah, Texas-Kansas. I find the betting line on this one interesting. Texas is favored by 34. Can Texas score 34 points? On anybody? I know, I know, Kansas is allowing 42 points per game but I’m still asking the question.
What I’ve discovered over about 47 years of paying attention to betting lines is, that when I see a line that looks wrong, nine out of ten times it’s right. Now, if I could figure the one in ten times that it’s wrong . . .
Recruiting
I saw an interesting recruiting chart on “Inside Texas” this week. It showed that Texas’ recruiting class has ranked first or second in the Big 12 every year since 2010 and has ranked no lower than 17th in that same time period. Have I told you lately why I’m not very interested in recruiting news?
In case you haven’t heard
Sam Ehlinger and Toenail Carter are expected to be available to play Saturday.
Tom Herman has hinted at the possibility that Mitchell Becker will replace Josh Rowland for field goal attempts against Kansas.
The Over/Under Press
There’s a quaint little tradition in golf betting called the “press.” A “press” usually occurs in the middle of a match when a player is decisively losing. For example, after 15 holes of an 18-hole match, player A is losing to player B, 9 holes to 6 holes. The best outcome player A can achieve at this point is a 9 hole to 9 hole tie. However, if player A challenges player B after the 15th hole to a “press” and player B accepts the “press,” a new bet is born based only on the outcome of the last three holes. So now there are two bets in play, the 18-hole bet and the 3-hole bet. This gives player A the opportunity to salvage a win by winning the three hole match.
Introducing the Over/Under Press
Starting with the Kansas game, all players participating are automatically entered into a “press.” For players who have only an outside chance of winning the season-long competition, this is an opportunity to win the “press,” which is based only on the last three regular season games. For players who are in contention for the season-long competition, this is an opportunity to win twice.
This is exciting isn’t it?
Hook ‘Em,
W.E.
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