Somo’s Six Pack Week 1

Welcome to Somo’s Six Pack! Each weekend, I’ll hunt through the dark forest of betting options and give you my top six plays between college football and the NFL. 

I track this based off $100 units. When I’m laying juice, I’ll bet to win $100; when I’ve got a plus money bet, I’ll bet $100. 

I could not be more pumped up after last night’s amazing kickoff to the NFL season. Mike McCarthy made worse decisions than 2006 Britney Spears and Tom Brady got a beneficial call or two; everything feels right again in the world. The Bucs have a ton to clean up after getting whistled for 11 penalties and turning the ball over 4 times, but they look like they could be better than last year, which is awfully scary.

Without further ado, let’s get it!

Iowa (#10) at Iowa St -4.5 -105 (#9) – 4:30PM 

Every year, week 2 in both college and the pros offers some value based on overreactions from the first week. This game falls right into that narrative. Iowa came out and took care of business beating #17 Indiana 34-6 while absolutely showing out on defense. Meanwhile, Iowa St was unimpressive beating Northern Iowa 16-10 while playing inside a turtle shell on offensive. The line has responded accordingly, dropping from -6 to -4.5 and should get to -4 by Saturday. That’s more than enough of an overreaction for me to get involved. Ames is going to be full of excitement with GameDay in town and a 4PM kickoff means that stadium is going to be rocking. Expect to see a significantly more open Cyclones offense and a jacked-up defense who has been particularly stout in the second half.

The bet – I’m going to buy the 0.5 to get to 4; you probably won’t have to if you wait it out. $115 to win $100 – Iowa St -4 (-115)

Appalachian St vs. Miami -9 (#22)

Another tale of two week 1 overreactions when Miami got pasted by Alabama and App St took care of business as a 9-point favorite. Pretty much what you would expect from two programs that are consistent year over year. App St continues to take care of business and Miami continues to not be back (it hurts to type that as a Canes fan). This game is huge for the Mountaineers, who get to play a Power 5 team before opening their Sun Belt schedule. The Canes, on the other hand, don’t need this game since starting 0-2 doesn’t really matter heading into the ACC. Additionally, Miami lost both edge rushers and struggled against the run last year, allowing 174.5 YPG and leaving them with an exposed defense vs. an App St team that adds transfer QB Chase Brice, originally a highly-recruited Clemson Tiger, into the fold.  

The Bet – $110 to win $100 – App St +9

Philadelphia vs Atlanta -3 (-125) / 48.5

This game has all the hallmarks of what could be an end-to-end shootout. Both defenses are not good; in fact, they’re very, very bad. Specifically the secondaries; they’re downright awful at covering people. Atlanta got a monster upgrade when they hired former Titans OC Arthur Smith as Head Coach. He should have an immediate impact on the play-calling and turn last year’s passive offensive into an aggressive one. When I looked at this game, I leaned the straight over before considering Atlanta, but I didn’t end up on either. I simply don’t trust the Eagles at all. Philly’s offense will create Atlanta points either through scoring themselves or by struggling, and I don’t think they’ll be able to stop the Falcons, so let’s play the Team over for Atlanta.

The Bet – $120 to win $100 – Atlanta Team Total Over 26.5

Seattle -3 vs. Indianapolis / Denver -3 vs. N.Y. Giants

Adding Teddy Two Gloves was huge for Denver in the offseason. They don’t need someone to win games for them, they need someone to manage the game and distribute the ball to a solid set of weapons. They got awful QB play all last year and led the league in turnovers. Both of those statements will not be true this season. The Broncos defense is also stacked – top 5 in the league stacked – with a monster pass rush vs. an awful Giants O-line.  

Beat me, Carson Wentz. It’s that simple. It’s a show-and-prove situation for a QB coming off a foot injury who is likely going to need to run outside against the Seahawks to win. This game is wildly important to Seattle, who must be good out of division to complete for a playoff spot, and their offense should be flying high. Seattle also hired a new OC who is going to let Russ cook.

The Bet – $100 to win $164 – Two Team ML Parlay – Seattle / Denver 

San Francisco -9 vs. Detroit / Chicago vs. Los Angeles Rams -7.5

This is a classic two-team teaser.  I don’t want to lay 9 points on the road with San Francisco, even though Detroit is a bottom-3 team this year, but I can tease them down to -2.5. They should win without much of a sweat and we don’t have to worry about a backdoor cover from Detroit.

The Rams D line should create havoc all night for whomever the Bears trot out at QB; there are rumors that we may see rookie Justin Fields in the second half. LA’s addition of Matt Stafford should be more than enough to get the win.

The Bet – $120 to win $100 – Two Team Teaser – SF -2.5 / LAR -1

Cleveland vs. Kansas City -5.5 (-115)

One of the teams that I’m the highest on this year is … the Cleveland Browns … ugh. Look, they had one major hole last year, their secondary. They addressed it. There is no weak unit on this team now. Will they shut down Mahomes and the Chiefs? No, come on, but they will at least slow them down, and the Browns can put up 30 points here if needed. They can also use their top 5 offensive line and a solid 1-2 punch at running back to exploit a Chiefs run defense that was sub-par last year. 

This game was 6 last night when I decided to land on it and I don’t think it drops below 5, so it may be better to wait it out and see if you can catch 6 points. I’m only going to play available lines as of writing this, so I’ll stick with 5.5.

The Bet – $110 to win $100 – Cleveland Browns +5.5

There it is, week 1 of Somo’s Six Pack! I’m looking forward to knocking this out every week. Follow me on Twitter @somobomb18 for additional plays and thoughts throughout the weekend!