Pirates -130

Jays/Rays Under 7.5

Mets/Royals Under 7.5

Royals +110

Arsenal vs Barcelona over 3 goals

The best forward line in history against a team with a shaky D and some pretty solid offensive pieces (Welbeck and Walcott) coming back from injury.  This is a lock for sure.

Juventus vs Bayern Munich draw (+210)

Basically the championship for the pretenders in the bracket…  Bayern Munich would clean up in this game if everyone was healthy and maybe a couple years younger, but they’re not and Juventus has made a name for themselves by drawing out shitty low scoring games at their place.  Take the draw.

Manchester Shitty (+119) at Dynamo Kiev

Alexi Lalas keeps touting Kiev as the big surprise team of this round and Man City has looked pretty suspect as of late…  But still go ahead and back the team with twice as much talent.  Man City fucked up their supposedly uncatchable lead in the EPL, but Lester and Tottenham needed some help from two pretty damn controversial penalty calls to make that happen.

Everyone also talks about Pellegrini and his lame duck coaching status hurting the team, but he seems to have a Pete Carroll like bro-ness about him that I think will have players feel like stepping up for the big games like this one.

Atletico Madrid at PSV Eindhoven over 2 goals

PSV Eindhoven leads the Dutch league while Atletico Madrid might have the most unimpressive 2nd place status of any major European team ever.  This is setting up for an upset draw or win by PSV but I can also see an experienced Champions League side like Atletico to find a way to scrap out a goal and get themselves an advantage going home.  With the over/under only at 2, it’s conceivable enough for both teams to score to take the over.

Just now started watching some Liga MX for the first time and I have to say it’s fucking awesome so far…  The Mexican announcers and the crowd make the dopamine rush exponentially more thrilling.

Did some research and found a lock coming up for y’all – Monterrey -200 at home vs Veracruz.  It’s the first place team against a team that hasn’t won a game yet, and apparently Monterrey has a lot of help with injuries and shit as well.

 

While there’s a windfall coming for you in May if you ride Madrid, there’s no reason you can’t be making more money while you wait!  Here’s picks for the four games this week…

PSG -155 vs Chelsea

This is going to be a dope matchup fueled by enmity and hate that’s been brewing between these clubs over the past two years.  In 2014, PSG was three minutes away from glory before Demba Ba subbed in and did this…

Last year, PSG looked doomed to suffer a repeat failure when they tied 1-1 at home and then Zlatan got sent off early in the second leg.  Then came some of the craziest 40 minutes in the history of soccer…

Everyone expects PSG to win going away in this rubber match, but I can see Chelsea keeping things pretty competitive.  Ever since Mourinho got canned, they’ve been playing more and more like they give a shit.  Willian is emerging as one of the deadliest wingers in the world and Diego Costa is rounding into form.  However, their defense is in shambles right now with both Zouma and Terry out, and Zlatan’s attack should be too much for them.

PSG is rested and at home, and they’re going to win the first leg no question.  If they give up an away goal, though, their buttholes could be clenching much harder than expected during their trip back to Stamford Bridge.

Benfica +105 vs Zenit

I would be lying if I said I knew a lot about these teams; however, I would also be lying if I said I didn’t know enough to make a fun ton of money gambling on this game.  Benfica has been tearing up the Portuguese league, going on an 8 game winning streak and 13 game unbeaten streak until a loss to Porto last week.  Zenit, on the other hand, is 6th in the Russian league and hasn’t played since December 9th because Russia is cold as fuck right now.  Zenit’s best player is Hulk, who everyone in Brazil despises.  Hammer Benfica at home.

Gent PK (+105) vs Wolfsburg

Gent is the defending champs of the Belgian Jupiler League and they’re in line to repeat this year.  People don’t know what to make of them because, although they’ve been destroying most of their competition this year, it’s usually been against shitty Belgian teams.  However, they did have a quality win at Moscow against Zenit in the qualifiers.  They are at the very least moderately talented and have some Belgian and Swiss internationals who can knock home their fair share of goals.

Wolfsburg was pretty legit in the Bundesliga last year and won the domestic cup.  They don’t care much about defense, but their offense is the fucking truth.  That is, until the last couple of months where they’ve been sucking all around, especially on the road.  In addition, their striker Das Bost is out, so I’m ready to fade their asses on the road.

Real Madrid (-125) at Roma

Being a road favorite against a quality Serie A team like Roma scares me.  Italian teams are usually pretty good at slowing games down and neutralizing high powered offenses, and Roma has been on a hot streak since they got a new coach last month.  However, that hot streak has been against all the shit teams of Serie A, and as I outlined in my futures pick, I’m looking for Madrid to start rolling.

The last time I was touting soccer picks, I was making it fucking rain.  Now that tournament season for soccer is getting underway again, you can bet your ass I’m publishing some more moneymakers.

Many Americans say that February is a horrible month for sports, and those Americans are sheep.  It’s 2016…  Xenophobia is out.  Soccer is in.   It’s a shame it’s so difficult for working Americans to watch, but the Champions League might be the best tournament in all of sports.  The teams are flat out insane in terms of talent, and the international rivalries are something you just can’t see in the US.

You know what also makes the Champions League awesome?  Gambling on it and making a fuck ton of money .  Here are the three teams with chances to win…

Barcelona +225

Easily the favorite to win this tourney and at above +200 I think the odds here are great.  It’s extremely rare for a team to repeat as European champions, but Barcelona might have the most transcendent collection of offensive talent ever assembled.  Messi and Suarez are the two best goal scorers in the world, and Neymar is still a top 5 talent himself.

IMHO, Barcelona has same probability to win the title as the Warriors would have if Cleveland was in the western conference.  That is, Barcelona is slightly less likely to win than Golden State, but still pretty damn likely.  And if Golden State had odds as high as +225, I’d bet my life on them to win.

If you took your most recent paycheck and put it all on Barca, I wouldn’t judge you one bit. They also should be heavy favorites in the finals, so you can hedge and lock profits if you get in on them now.

Bayern Munich +260

Bayern looked like the truth last year and were the favorites going into the tournament, but ran into serious injury issues and got bounced by Barca in the semifinals.  That being said, the first leg was at Camp Nou while at their most depleted point of the season, and they managed to get 15 minutes away from escaping with a scoreless draw before heading home with reinforcements.  But then the MSN line scored three quick goals and shat all over their dreams.

Bayern will have the Bundesliga wrapped up and they will be rested and talented, but they are older and having just as much injury issues as last year.  Even at full health, I don’t trust them as much as the Spanish teams.

Real Madrid +500

This is easily the best value bet in the market right now and the one I’m rolling with.  They don’t have the historic offensive prowess of Barcelona, but their collection of talent across the board is much deeper.  If you look at their roster, you realize they have top 10 players at every starting position…

• Goalie: Keylor Navas, the dude who made you a Costa Rica fan for a hot second two summers ago
• Defense: anchored by Sergio Ramos, Pepe, and Marcelo, this is the only d line in the world fast enough to keep pace with the MSN trio, and they also have incredible ball skills to feed the offense
• Midfield: the best in the world by far and it’s not even close…  James Rodriguez, Luka Modric, and Isco each have the chance to be the best players on cup winning international squads this summer
• Forwards: Bronaldo, Benzema, and Bale…  Not quite MSN, but still pretty fucking impressive

If Barcelona is the Golden State of soccer, then Madrid is the Cavs (or any team that LeBron is ever playing for)…  Enough talent to win a title every year, but usually doomed by a total lack of mental tenacity and coachability.  That being said, at 5:1 odds, I’m willing to bank on Zinedine Zidane being what the Cavs are pretending Tyronn Lue can be.  Zizou is a bro, a former legend, and just as rich as his players.  For once, Madrid players might actually respect their coach and start playing halfway to their abilities.

At this time last year, Barcelona was at +500 and Madrid at +250.  Barcelona got their shit together and won a title, and I can see Madrid doing the same thing.  Take Madrid +500 and then just to be safe, bet on the winning team to be from Spain (-125) and you can’t lose.

 

A TSN writer published a piece yesterday where he discusses the results of a GM poll concerning a wild card play-in game, and it turns out almost all of them are onboard.  Of 28 GMs who responded, 16 said they absolutely wanted a play-in game, and 5 others said they wanted a best of 3 play-in series.

The results of the poll don’t really surprise me.  What does surprise me, however, is how the NHL hasn’t already implemented this brilliant idea…  A lot of people complain about the play-in game for baseball, and it’s true that it seems counterintuitive to boil a 162 game grind down to a single night for two teams, but those games are also entertaining as fuck to watch.  Since hockey is even more intense by nature, NHL play-in games would be that much more dope.

Not only would it be awesome for current fans, but it would also help enlighten the birds out there who spend their entire spring consumed in NBA playoff basketball and nothing else.  Sure, the last few minutes of an NBA playoff game is exciting as hell if you have the patience to sit through a commercial break every 30 seconds, but anybody who watches both hockey and basketball knows that the playoff hockey product is a lot more entertaining.  It would be pretty chill to be able to follow this with the friends who are only capable of following the leagues that SportsCenter tells them to.

I have to admit that I’ve never felt more foolish as a sports fan than these past few days following Super Bowl 50.  All season long, the NFL blogosphere kept lamenting over the hordes of underground racists hating on Cam Newton because he was black.  Unfortunately, my inability to buy into the veracity of that consensus turned out to be a disgraceful reflection of my own shameful conceit.

You see, I never found anybody who actually hated Cam Newton (outside of NFC South rival fans).  No friends, people I met at bars, or even internet commenters had anything bad to say about him this year.  I thought that if I couldn’t find those racists myself, then the whole notion of their existence must have been overblown.  Even by objective standards, there were metrics backing up my belief.

But now, after seeing all the vitriol directed at Newton following his Super Bowl loss, it’s become crystal clear that good god I was so fucking wrong about everything!  I get it now.  I totally get it, and it’s absolutely appalling to witness.

It turns out that Greg Howard has never been more prescient than he was in this piece from last November covering the phenomenon of racist Newton bashers…

Disingenuous gripes about Newton’s character could be couched in critiques of his playing style, sideline demeanor, and immaturity. It was easier to look at a young, brash quarterback, and ask if he was fit to lead a franchise when that franchise sucked… With Carolina undefeated, people have to resort to hating him for more transparent reasons rooted in their own biases.

That’s it!  When the Panthers were winning all year, I couldn’t find any of his racist bashers because they were all staying quiet.  They knew they had to lay low because the internet would out their racism if they complained about a winner.  Now that the Panthers shat the bed, these racists are having a field day ‘couching their gripes’ in Cam’s supposed immaturity.  This time, however, I’m not getting fooled…

Newton pouted and sulked in front of reporters before storming out of his press conference, but that’s something you have to deal with in this new era where athletes wear their emotions on their sleeves.  You can say you have a problem with it, but you’re not fooling anyone this time.  You were racist when Cam sulked every single game in 2012 and you’re racist now that he’s sulking after the Super Bowl.

Not a fan of Newton doubling down with his ‘sore loser’ comments?  I bet you think he’s being a bad role model to children, just like that racist mother who wrote that racist newspaper letter.

Have an issue with all those passes Cam sailed over his receiver’s heads?  Yeah, I bet you had those same critiques the past four years.  But this year you were exposed as a racist.  You’re not pulling the wool over my eyes anymore.

Do you think Newton was a pussy for not diving on his own fumble with the Super Bowl on the line?  Well I guess according to you, a black quarterback isn’t allowed to worry about his health for the next season.  Racist.

 

In all seriousness though, I wonder if these self righteous race baiters will turn next year’s focus on a quarterback who legitimately has suffered from racism.  It would be cool, but they’d have to admit that sometimes people lie.

It seems the trendy thing to do this season is to pretend that everybody hates Cam Newton because he’s black, and it confuses the hell out of me.  I mean, I get why a lot of people have ripped on him in the past…  His college history is pretty damn sketchy and his early pro years have been littered with issues of constant sideline sulking or over celebrating during blowout losses.  But nobody really cares about that shit anymore because his team is awesome and he’s been an absolute thrill to watch all season.

In fact, whenever I talk with friends, go out in public, or even peruse the internet, I can’t find anybody (outside of Falcons and Saints fans) that doesn’t like Cam Newton.  As usual, Big Daddy Drew Magary hit the nail on the head when he summed up America’s collective opinion on the matter .  Where all these supposed HATERS are coming from, I have no earthly idea.

Apparently they exist in large numbers, though, because Newton’s got a lot of questions about his critics this week.  In one of his responses yesterday, he dropped this bomb…

I am an African-American quarterback that scares people because they haven’t seen nothing that they can compare me to.

Umm what?  There’s no other black quarterback we can compare you to?  Okay Cam, you’re on!  I’m gonna give it my best shot…

• Warren Moon – the trailblazers of the black QBs, but nobody under 40 actually saw him play in his prime, so Cam’s statement that we “haven’t seen” a comparison to him technically rings true for a couple of generations

• Randall Cunningham – absolute dynamite in NFL Blitz 2000, also was punter which is pretty dope, but he tore his ACL once and that took like 3 years to recover from back in the 90s.  You can’t blame Cam for playing in the better era

• Steve McNair – maybe the toughest QB of all time and unparalleled leadership skills, but Cam is still alive

• Donovan McNabb – I thought he was pretty sick back in the day, but maybe Cam thinks Rush Limbaugh wasn’t being a complete moron about our biases back then

• Daunte Culpepper – Cam is basically a clone of the Madden 02 cover… Same size, speed, and arm as Culpepper, but Cam hasn’t blown out his knee yet

• Michael Vick – most exciting dual threat QB of all time until, you know…

• Colin Kaepernick – started in the Super Bowl three years ago, but was only successful in one type of scheme (albeit the same offense Cam runs in Carolina)

• Russell Wilson – started the last two Super Bowls, but apparently is not actually black enough to be considered a real black quarterback

 

Damn.  Maybe Cam’s on to something…  What a pioneer!

I was thinking about nourishing my passion for daytime gambling today and noticed that Aston Villa is only -175 in the FA Cup.  Are you kidding me?  I did some more research, and I still can’t believe this line.  It is the lock of a LIFETIME!

They are playing at home against the almighty Wycombe Wanderers of Football League Two (the 4th division in England).  Aston Villa is last in the Premier League, but they should still clean up against some scrub ass mid table club of the 4th division.  Besides, Aston Villa hasn’t been that bad over the past two weeks – a draw against 2nd place Leicester and a win against West Brom.  Also, Aston Villa was garbage last year but still made it to the finals of the FA Cup.  They take this tournament seriously.

These teams tied 1-1 earlier this month, but that was at Wycombe and apparently the field was shit and had a huge effect on Villa’s abilities.  That is not a cause for concern; instead, it is a blessing that it causes bettors to be nervous enough to make this line so affordable.  Thank you gambling gods – for you are so kind!!

 

UPDATE: 2-0 Aston Villa, that was easy….  Not content to quit while I’m on fire, here are some Wednesday picks…

Tottenham PK (-122) at Leicester City

These teams have played twice in the past two weeks, with Tottenham getting a lucky draw in the first leg of their FA Cup round and Leicester getting an outright win their Premier league matchup.  However, in both games, Tottenham looked the way better team with twice the amount of time of possession.  They just didn’t have breaks go their way.

This is an important game as the bracket lays out a trail of cupcakes to the final for whoever wins this game.  However, the top priority for both teams is still getting into the Champions League with top 4 EPL finishes, so they’ll be sending out their B squads for this match.  Tottenham is a much deeper team than Leicester, especially with the dope Korean forward (Son Heung-min) they acquired from Germany this past August.

Liverpool -340 vs Exeter City

The exact same situation as Aston Villa, except Liverpool is way better than Aston Villa and Exeter City is much shittier than Wycombe.  Who cares what the price is.  It’s a 100% guaranteed lock.

Jim Caldwell received a lot of scorn for his fuckup against Green Bay last month, and he deserved every bit of it.  Aside from a victory formation kneel down or a spike to stop the clock, defending a hail mary is the easiest play in all of football.  It’s even easier than defending an onside kick or converting an extra point.  You just put all your tall players in the end zone, converge on the ball as it travels in the air for like 5 seconds, and then bat it down.  It’s simple, and it works every time!

That Thursday Night Football game was devastating for Americans everywhere, but at least we all had the foresight to know that if any team was capable of fucking up and losing to the Packers in the most excruciating way possible, it was the Lions.  We all expected much better from two time Coach of the Year Bruce Arians on Saturday night, but he went out and shat the bed even harder…

Seven blitzers failed to bring down or contain one of the most evasive quarterbacks in the history of the league, while the four DBs left to defend the actual important part of the play failed to out-jump a receiver that was four inches taller than each of them (except Patrick Peterson, Janis is only two inches taller than him).  Why???  It was inexcusable, and it felt so depressing to see such a smart man be responsible for the biggest travesty of the season.

The only thing more perplexing than Bruce Arians’s decision is it’s attempted justification in this Bill Barnwell piece making the rounds lately.  I understand that Bill Barnwell’s word is gospel to a significant amount of football fans.  I understand that finds innovative ways to develop mathematical models for his predictions.  I also understand that, despite the significant sample size challenges that come with NFL statistics, his models still turn out accurate forecasts every other year or so…

However, defending that blitz call was still a load a shit.  He says it was the right thing to do because…

• It was still a better defense than what the Lions called
• They would have gotten a sack if Rodgers wasn’t so good at evading sacks
• They didn’t blitz on the 4th and 20 conversion earlier in the drive (that GB did not score on)
• The Cards have blitzed a lot in the past and he really likes that they blitz a lot

Fuck outta here….  Just a classic case of overthinking the situation.  Defend the hail mary normally like every other team besides the Lions have done, and the game is over.

Thank GOD for Larry Fitzgerald.