Weekend wagers: Two more football plays as a part of five picks

By Case Keefer (contact)

Saturday, Aug. 7, 2021 | 2 a.m.

Preparing for football season and grinding golf has accounted for more than 90% of my sports betting energy for the last couple weeks.

It’s worked out well enough here considering the weekend wagers column is on a tear that’s seen it go 5-1 over the last two editions including a 10-to-1 outright winner on Xander Schauffele to win the Olympic gold medal. It just makes it difficult to present picks as wide-ranging as usual, so for the third straight edition, I’m going to stick to three current sports and handicap a pair of football plays in the weekly column.

Read them all below along with the rest of this week’s column. Records are attached individually by sport, with the cumulative at the bottom of the page. The monetary figure is calculated by the assumption of a bettor placing a $100 wager on each pick. Any picks outside of the column will be linked and included in the record total. Odds are the best currently available in Las Vegas at publication time.

Golf (16-9, $969.94): Bryson DeChambeau +115 vs. Louis Oosthuizen in third round of WGC: FedEx St. Jude Invitational (Westgate Las Vegas SuperBook)

This is a crazy price influenced way too much by recency bias. Oosthuizen is one of the hottest golfers in the world, but until two or three months ago, it would have been believable to think he'd never command this large of a matchup price against DeChambeau. The latter is one of the brightest players from the generation just now entering its prime but he's been in a mini-slump, with a few controversies tacked on along the way for good measure, recently. It’s made everyone forget just how great of a player he is when he's clicking. And he seems to be clicking once again over the first two rounds in Memphis this week. No one in the field is hitting it better off the tee than DeChambeau and few have been able to match him in approach. Oosthuizen has mostly gotten to 9-under par — the same score as DeChambeau — via his putting, which is always a strength of his game but tough to maintain at this high level of a level for four consecutive days. DeChambeau has been the better player overall this week, which shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone.

UFC (13-14, -$89.07): Ciryl Gane by TKO/KO or submission vs. Derrick Lewis at UFC 265 +105 (BConnected Sports)

The undefeated Gane has taken some criticism for the slow pace of his fights, but that shouldn’t be a problem in the interim heavyweight championship bout tonight in Houston. Lewis will leave some openings in a five-round fight, and Gane is quick and talented enough to take advantage of them. Lewis has knockout power of his own, but Gane is too technical of a kickboxer to fall victim to it. This looks like a knockout for the favorite — which is available at as high as +150 — but don’t underrate Gane’s strength and grappling ability either. A submission is a distinct, though admittedly less likely, possibility if the fight goes to the ground. I’d rather play it safe and get both stoppage methods still at a plus price with this proposition wager than limit myself to a knockout.

NASCAR (15-17, -$91.12): William Byron -110 head-to-head vs. Alex Bowman in Go Bowling at The Glen (SuperBook)

I’ve made use of this weekly matchup between Hendrick Motorsports teammates a number of times this season, backing each driver against the other depending on the situation. This weekend’s situation greatly favors Byron, to the point that he should be laying a much higher price than -110. Watkins Glen International is a road course, and Byron’s metrics on road courses are far better than Bowman’s. Ditto for Byron’s performance compared to Bowman’s in the 750 horsepower package that will be in effect this weekend. Neither Byron nor Bowman look like strong contenders to win, but the former should finish in the top 10 while the latter will be hard-pressed to find that much success.

College Football (0-0, $0): Nebraska -7 at Illinois in “Week 0” (Golden Nugget)

This Big Ten showdown is the very first college football game of the year on Aug. 28, so how can you not have action on it? Luckily, there’s a lot of value to be found. Lines have been shifting rapidly on a lot of the opening college football games over the last couple weeks, and while I agree with most of the moves, this is one where I did not. The Cornhuskers opened as 9.5-point favorites, which is closer to where this line belonged. Bettors are surely sick of waiting for coach Scott Frost to field a decent team in Lincoln, Neb, and I understand the cynicism. There’s not much reason to call for a big breakout this season, but the Cornhuskers should at least be competitive. That’s more than can be said for Illinois in coach Brett Bielema’s first season at the helm. In the first year of his last job, at Arkansas, Bielema stripped the roster down to its bare components to start putting in his systems and the results were ugly. It could be a similar situation with the Illini this year as they’re at a talent disadvantage to every other team in the conference. Nebraska at least boosted its roster with a number of transfer-portal additions and returns quarterback Adrian Martinez, who’s drawing rave reviews in preseason practices. I’m comfortable playing Nebraska up to -10 with a big edge on the current market price.

NFL (0-0, $0): Dallas Cowboys to win the NFC East +150 (William Hill)

Stop trying to talk yourself into the Football Team, Giants or Eagles. It’s not happening. The Cowboys are far and away the best team in the NFC East and should be the odds-on favorite to reach the top of the standings coming off of an injury-marred, defensively deficient season. Dak Prescott has never gotten enough credit for his efficiency, and it seems further forgotten after an ankle injury took him out of last season. Dallas is guaranteed to put up a lot of points once again and, big gulp, it might actually be able to prevent scoring itself. At the very least, the defense can’t be worse than it was last season. Dan Quinn is a big upgrade from Mike Nolan as defensive coordinator and the Cowboys made some shrewd personnel moves to go with it including drafting six defensive players including first-round linebacker Micah Parsons. Washington is the trendy pick to win the division for the second straight year, and I just don’t see it with a combustible offense and defense with nowhere to go but down. I’ll bet on the Cowboys’ upside.

Weekend wagers all-time: 164-150, $4,971.20

Previous pending wagers: Texas over 8.5 wins +110; Los Angeles Chargers under 9.5 wins -125; Georgia 10-to-1 to win College Football Playoff; Baltimore Ravens 20-to-1 to win Super Bowl; Texas 50-to-1 to win 2022 NCAA Tournament;

Case Keefer can be reached at 702-948-2790 or [email protected]. Follow Case on Twitter at twitter.com/casekeefer.