Michigan is currently favored in EVERY game on their schedule

Submitted by LV Sports Bettor on September 10th, 2019 at 1:09 PM

At the Westgate Superbook in Las Vegas on their Game of the Year board. The Westgate is the #1 sports book in the United States. They takes the biggest bets, highest limits so these numbers are very legit.

Michigan -1.5 over Wisconsin
Michigan -10.5 over Iowa
Michigan -6 over Notre Dame
Michigan -11 over Michigan State
Michigan -2 over Ohio State
 

*-I have no idea why the game at Penn State is not on their board but messing around with the spreads against common opponents and adjusting for home field it looks like they would have Michigan around -4 or -5 at Penn State.

ijohnb

September 10th, 2019 at 2:16 PM ^

A lot of the time the opponents you are talking about would be ranked but not for the loss to Michigan.  You are intentionally employing unsound reasoning that denigrates Michigan's football team when far more sound reasoning exists that results in a more favorable analysis.  I am unsure why you would do that.

G. Gulo of the Dale

September 10th, 2019 at 2:38 PM ^

On the flip side, but to further your point, some opponents only stay in the rankings because they beat UM.  Does the 2015 Utah squad finish ranked (they happened to finish 17), if Grant Perry and Rudock are on the same page and we beat them?  There's a good chance that they finish outside the top-25, and we don't "get credit" for that win; suddenly, beating Utah does nothing "to get the monkey off of our backs."  Were that to have happened, the 2016 OSU game would have been the only chance at a top-25 road win in Harbaugh's first two years here, and I don't think bad coaching was the main reason why we lost that game.  (And, of course, we beat Florida on a neutral site.)  So, there's a world in which Michigan goes 28-1 and wins two national championships in '15 and '16 without winning a true road game against a team that finishes in the top-25.

Given that UM plays more home games than away games every year, and given that securing a victory on the road to a team that finishes in the top-25 requires that the team stay in the top-25 despite that loss just means that this "not beating a team on the road that finishes in the top-25" amounts to not winning many of the few, very hardest games on the schedule...  This is just another way of telling us that Michigan has been finishing outside the circle of elite teams who've been making the CFP.

xtramelanin

September 10th, 2019 at 1:15 PM ^

call it the 'notre dame' effect.  so many partisans bet in favor of ND (and michigan) that it torques the line a little.  we should not be favored on the road v. wisconsin or at home v. ohio.  period.  and at this point i'm not sure we should be favored over PSU or sparty.  

we win at wisconsin, all things are good.  we lose, especially if we lose badly, pfffff.  

mGrowOld

September 10th, 2019 at 1:21 PM ^

Man, I hate to say this but is there even ONE of those lines you'd feel confident right now laying money on betting Michigan?   -1.5 against a pretty good Wisconsin team on the road?  -11 over a Michigan State team that always plays us as if they're lives depended on it with a coach that's candidly gotten the better of Harbaugh coaching-wise most years?  And -2 over an OSU team we havent beaten since Jesus was having his moment of doubt and pain?

I'm glad legalized betting doesnt exist (yet) in Ohio.  I would be sorely tempted to bet against Michigan in every one of those games.

DrMantisToboggan

September 10th, 2019 at 1:45 PM ^

I don’t think I’m blindly optimistic - some have built this perception of me apparently - I think I just stand out as being able to look at what can go right in a fanbase dominated by paranoid schizophrenics. I mean, last year I had us at 11-1 and we ended up 10-2. Does that level of accuracy make me a head in the clouds optimist?

To answer your question, yes, I would take us to cover 11 points against MSU right now. We were probably 24 points better than them last year - then the rain and missed field goals and weirdness of that game.

I don’t think they’re much better. I don’t think we are worse. I’d guess it doesn’t rain (I mean, at some point the consecutive rainy games against them has to end). It is at home. They’re fading and will have 3 or 4 losses by then. We won’t.

mGrowOld

September 10th, 2019 at 1:51 PM ^

Just to clarify I didnt say you were "blindly optimistic".  I said you were the "optimist's optimist".

And I'm not a pessimist's pessimist either.  I had us at 9-3 thinking we'd lose to ND, either MSU or OSU on the road and either Wisconsin or Penn State at home.  So I was off one game to the negative and you were off one game to the positive from actual.

Sounds about right.

Bodogblog

September 10th, 2019 at 2:48 PM ^

With all due respect, you are the pessimist's pessimist, in this sense: when something goes wrong with the team, and the waters of discontent on mgoblog begin to warm, you come running out of the house, hit the diving board at peak speed, reach full extension on the lift off, and land max cannonball into the pool of discontent.  

mGrowOld

September 10th, 2019 at 5:07 PM ^

Absolutely incorrect.  What i do, which drives you and the other sunshine and roses folks insane, is call things for what they are BEFORE they happen, not after.  My prediction ability is pretty damn good when it comes to seeing things for what they actually are as opposed to what we hope they would be and I'm not afraid to call it.  About the only thing I've gotten wrong was Shea's eligibility.

You will be hard-pressed to find evidence of me bitching about something after the fact that I didnt loudly call BEFORE it occurred and usually it's only to remind folks (like you) that I told you the bad thing was going to happen and you didnt want to hear about it.

And if you care to take a look at my comments I've remained optimistic about the season throughout the first two weeks I've just pointed out that the play-calling is very similar to that which we've seen over the past four years.  Saying I think we're going to win but not cover ridiculous point spreads is hardly pessimistic.  And pointing out we havent won in Madison since Lloyd fucking Carr was the HC so I'm a bit surprised we're a favorite or pointing out our less than stellar record against OSU and again questioning why we'd be a favorite is simply being a realist.  Not a pessimist.

 

Bodogblog

September 10th, 2019 at 5:52 PM ^

I disagree.  Many people on this board throw themselves into fits of drama when things don't go Michigan's way.  Some fans seem to enjoy the throes and woe.  Whenever I see this, your avatar is nearby. 

You're a flawed human, just like all of us.  So it's not a big deal, just don't realize it yet.  You like to think your prognostications are sharp, but predicting Michigan won't win the B1G when OSU is at its beastiest peak since Woody Hayes and Michigan is coming off the RichRod and Hoke years isn't particularly prescient.  And unbelievably, Harbaugh almost proved you wrong in 2016 and ripped off a 10 game win streak in 2018 to put Michigan in position for another title shot and playoff.  My guess is you never predicted the run-ups, but gloated in that last game in November.  "See, we didn't beat some of the best teams (talent wise) OSU has fielded in 40 years in Columbus, I told you so." 

mGrowOld

September 10th, 2019 at 10:37 PM ^

I've predicted a shit ton more than that son and ironically enough I predicted we'd WIN, not lose, last year against OSU.  I called the final score 38-20 Michigan and was obviously wrong as rain on that one.  I think tomorrow I'm going to drag them all up just to show you the disparity in what you believe I've said and what I've actually said.

Facts suck I know.  Especially when you've got a perfectly good narrative going about someone and those pesky facts keep getting in the way.

gustave ferbert

September 10th, 2019 at 2:56 PM ^

Lots of tension still regarding the scandals.  These rape cases won't be going away.  Especially now after the Board of trustees put the kabosh on an internal investigation. 

If they won't maintain their own house someone else will.  I fully expect these problems to trickle down into the athletic program. 

TrueBlue2003

September 10th, 2019 at 2:30 PM ^

ATS, yes.  They have underperformed expectations in their first two games by a significant margin, and these lines have gone down some as a result, but it's a small sample and it includes some fairly random unlucky events plus some injured players have been out that are expected back for these games.

Bottom line is that Michigan has a lot of good players that propelled the team to a very good season last year (statistically) and are relatively well-coached so that's what gets reflected in the lines.

CompleteLunacy

September 10th, 2019 at 2:50 PM ^

Which makes sense given the comedy of errors committed by the team so far.

But no, they're not really 0-2.  And anyway, the spread is set to theoretically give both sides a 50/50 chance of covering (I know that's not strictly true but it's close enough). So, against the spread, you would expect us to be 1-1. 

BTW Alabama did not cover their spread last weekend. I guess they suck.

 

uncle leo

September 10th, 2019 at 1:43 PM ^

Phew! This makes me a lot better now. All the stuff I was watching on TV was an illusion.

In reality, they are a well-oiled machine that hasn't fumbled 20 times.

UMich2016

September 10th, 2019 at 1:46 PM ^

Wow, this is pretty shocking.  Thanks for sharing. The capitalistic model, the ones who are putting themselves on the line with thousands of dollars, still like our team.  If they didn't they would be hammering these spreads and they would shift.

Its an efficient market.

Obviously it means nothing for the future, but it should help some of us back of the ledge a little bit knowing the professional bettors still really like our team.