Almost New Year, Plenty of Football

 

I took a break from last week from predictions and now I am back.  So far, I am 13-9 in the bowl games so far.  I would be 17-5 if I didn't favor the SEC teams.  Oh well.  I'm excited for the playoff games to start and for Arkansas' bowl game.  I hope the season ends with a bang.  The NFL has this week and next week to finally end the regular season and begin the playoffs.  We'll see how this all goes.

Last week I went 9-7 (56.25%) for NFL predictions (Total: 129-85 (60.3%)).  Now let's do this week's predictions!  I'm not updating my college predictions until bowl season is over.

NFL Week 17:

Chiefs vs. Bengals: Chiefs

Falcons vs. Bills: Bills

Giants vs. Bears: Bears

Dolphins vs. Titans: Dolphins

Raiders vs. Colts: Colts

Jaguars vs. Patriots: Patriots

Buccaneers vs. Jets: Buccaneers

Eagles vs. Washington: Eagles

Rams vs. Ravens: Rams

Broncos vs. Chargers: Chargers

Texans vs. 49ers: 49ers

Cardinals vs. Cowboys: Cowboys

Panthers vs. Saints: Saints

Lions vs. Seahawks: Seahawks

Vikings vs. Packers: Packers

Browns vs. Steelers: Steelers

Bowl Games and NFL Games

 

It's that time again.  It is about to be bowl season.  There are many bowl games and I will make my predictions for all of them.  Especially for the Outback Bowl since my Razorbacks will play in it.  Even though Arkansas is 8-4 and Penn State is 7-5, they still seem to be a tough opponent to beat.  Right now the ESPN FPI has Penn State favored at 58.9%.  Penn State is 0-4 against teams that in the current Top 25 and Arkansas is 1-3 for this season.  Both are 0-3 against teams that are currently in the Top 10.  They look evenly matched so we will see how it goes.  But I feel confident that the Razorbacks can end the season 9-4 and be 4-0 in trophy games this year.  There are a ton of bowl games so we will just get to those in a second for predictions.

If you have followed me for a while, I made a preseason prediction for all of Arkansas' games.  I predicted that we would go 7-5 and we went 8-4.  It makes me happy that we actually performed better than I expected.  For the 2020 season, I predicted us going 3-7 and we did and I predicted the exact games that we would win and lose.  The link for the 2021 season prediction is here.

Last week I went 0-1 (0%) for my College Football predictions (Total: 193-62 (75.69%)) and 9-5 (64.3%) for NFL predictions (Total: 120-78 (60.6%)).  Now let's do this week's predictions!

Bowl Season:

MTSU vs. Toledo: Toledo

N Illinois vs. Coast Carolina: Coast Carolina

Western Kentucky vs. Appalachian St: Appalachian St

UTEP vs. Fresno State: Fresno State

UAB vs. BYU: BYU

E Michigan vs. Liberty: Liberty

Utah State vs. Oregon St: Utah State

Louisiana vs. Marshall: Louisiana

Old Dominion vs. Tulsa: Tulsa

Kent State vs. Wyoming: Wyoming

UTSA vs. San Diego State: San Diego State

Missouri vs. Army: Missouri

North Texas vs. Miami (OH): North Texas

UCF vs. Florida: Florida

Memphis vs. Hawai'i: Memphis

Georgia State vs. Ball State: Georgia State

W Michigan vs. Nevada: W Michigan

Boston College vs. East Carolina: Boston College

Houston vs. Auburn: Auburn

Air Force vs. Louisville: Louisville

Mississippi State vs. Texas Tech: Mississippi State

UCLA vs. NC State: NC State

West Virginia vs. Minnesota: Minnesota

SMU vs. Virginia: Virginia

Maryland vs. Virginia Tech: Virginia Tech

Clemson vs. Iowa State: Clemson

Oregon vs. Oklahoma: Oklahoma

North Carolina vs. South Carolina: North Carolina

Tennessee vs. Purdue: Tennessee

Pittsburgh vs. Michigan State: Michigan State

Wisconsin vs. Arizona State: Wisconsin

Wake Forest vs. Texas A&M: Texas A&M

Washington St vs. Miami: Miami

C Michigan vs. Boise State: Boise State

Cincinnati vs. Alabama: Alabama

Georgia vs. Michigan: Georgia

Penn State vs. Arkansas: Arkansas

Oklahoma St vs. Notre Dame: Oklahoma St

Iowa vs. Kentucky: Kentucky

Utah vs. Ohio State: Ohio State

Baylor vs. Ole Miss: Ole Miss

LSU vs. Kansas State: LSU

Predicted National Championship:

Alabama vs. Georgia: Alabama

NFL Week 15:

Chiefs vs. Chargers: Chiefs

Raiders vs. Browns: Browns

Patriots vs. Colts: Patriots

Panthers vs. Bills: Bills

Cardinals vs. Lions: Cardinals

Jets vs. Dolphins: Dolphins

Cowboys vs. Giants: Cowboys

Washington vs. Eagles: Eagles

Titans vs. Steelers: Titans

Texans vs. Jaguars: Jaguars

Bengals vs. Broncos: Broncos

Falcons vs. 49ers: 49ers

Seahawks vs. Rams: Rams

Packers vs. Ravens: Packers

Saints vs. Buccaneers: Buccaneers

Vikings vs. Bears: Vikings

Army and Navy and Heisman

 

It is that week again.  We have the Heisman Trophy Ceremony and the Army vs. Navy game.  Next week is when Bowl Season starts.  This week is just a little break from a lot of College Football before that part of the season starts.  When it comes to the Heisman, Bryce Young will definitely win it this year.  His stats are crazy but what convinced me was his last 2 games.  When he played Auburn, he didn't really have a good game compared to how he usually plays. He was 25-51 with 317 yards, 2 touchdowns, and 1 INT.  But his Heisman moment was on Alabama's last drive during regulation before overtime.  Alabama gets the ball with 1:32 left in the 4th Quarter starting at the Alabama 3 yard line.  3 yard line!  Bryce Young was able to lead the offense to score a touchdown with 24 seconds left in the game to tie it.  If it wasn't for his brilliant time management and clutch throws then Alabama might've lost the game and not be in the playoff potentially.  That was the drive that convinced me that he deserves the Heisman.  He already has the monster stats from the whole season.  Now he has a great moment when his team really needed him during adversity to be clutch and give them the chance to win.  He also threw 421 yards and 3 TDs against Georgia.  Freaking Georgia!  That's my case for Bryce Young for Heisman.  

With Army vs. Navy, Army all the way this year.

Last week I went 6-5 (54.5%) for my College Football predictions (Total: 193-61 (75.98%)) and 9-5 (64.3%) for NFL predictions (Total: 111-73 (60.3%)).  Now let's do this week's predictions!

NFL Week 14

Steelers vs. Vikings: Steelers

Raiders vs. Chiefs: Chiefs

Ravens vs. Browns: Ravens

Jaguars vs. Titans: Titans

Saints vs. Jets: Saints

Cowboys vs. Washington: Cowboys

Falcons vs. Panthers: Panthers

Seahawks vs. Texans: Seahawks

Lions vs. Broncos: Broncos

Giants vs. Chargers: Chargers

49ers vs. Bengals: Bengals

Bills vs. Buccaneers: Buccaneers

Bears vs. Packers: Packers

Rams vs. Cardinals: Cardinals

Conference Championship Week: 2021

 

It's that week again.  It's Conference Championship weekend.  It's the weekend that will finally determine the Top 4 in the College Football Playoff rankings and show who plays who for Bowl Season.  This is definitely one of my favorite parts of the year and not just because of Christmas.  This time of year really shows us what the rest of the College Football teams and NFL teams are made of.  College Football teams try their best to get in their best bowl game and then really go out to end the season well.  NFL teams are really cracking down to play better to end the season well and get a shot at entering the playoffs.  All of this with the Christmas season just makes it a great time.

The regular season for the Razorbacks ended with an 8-4 record with 4-4 in the conference.  8 wins is the same amount of wins from the 2017, 2018, and 2019 seasons combined.  These seasons were Bret Bielema's last season and the Chad Morris years.  We have grown so much since those terrible years.  This is actually the first season that I feel that resembles more with the success that we had with Bobby Petrino.  We are not there yet but with how Sam Pittman is handling things, we can definitely get there.  With Bret Bielema, we did have great moments but too many times we would get blown out or lose to a team that we should've beaten.  This year we only got blown out by Georgia (obviously they are #1 now) and had close games with Ole Miss and Alabama.  Auburn was a more or less a close and blown out game but sometimes those games can happen from nowhere.  But we've had other close games where we came out of the top where we would normally choke under Bret Bielema or Chad Morris.  With Chad Morris it was just terrible.  I'll show you a chart of the average amount of points we score each game (offensive) compared to points we give up (defensive) from 2009-2021.

From 2009-2011 are Bobby Petrino years and he was good at keeping the offensive points more than defensive points.  The only years after that where that happens is from 2014-2015 and 2021.  If you know Sam Pittman, he was here as one of the coaches from 2013-2015 and then head coach from 2020-2021.  Notice that the years after Bobby Petrino that we've been able to score more Offensive Points than Defensive Points given is when Sam Pittman is here.  Our winning percentage is different because of this.  When Offensive Points > Defensive Points, our winning percentage is 67.53%.  When Offensive Points < Defensive Points, our winning percentage is 30.12%.  It's a simple concept of football that determines how well the team is.  Score more than the other team.  Bobby Petrino did that more often and that's why his winning percentage was at 74.36% from his best years from 2009-2011.  All I have to say is so far we seem to be on the right track to get like that again but of course we will need to do more.  Seeing how consistent Bobby Petrino was in doing this is why we Razorback fans really miss those good days of Arkansas Football.

Last week I went 18-5 (78.3%) for my College Football predictions (Total: 187-56 (77%)) and 11-4 (73.3%) for NFL predictions (Total: 102-68 (60%)).  Now let's do this week's predictions!

College Football Week 14:

Oregon vs. Utah: Utah

Baylor vs. Oklahoma St.: Oklahoma St.

Utah State vs. San Diego State: San Diego State

Appalachian St vs. Louisiana: Appalachian St

Georgia vs. Alabama: Georgia

Houston vs. Cincinnati: Cincinnati

Michigan vs. Iowa: Michigan

Pittsburgh vs. Wake Forest: Pittsburgh

Western KY vs. UTSA: UTSA

Kent State vs. N Illinois: Kent State

USC vs. California: California

NFL Week 13:

Cowboys vs. Saints: Cowboys

Broncos vs. Chiefs: Chiefs

Buccaneers vs. Falcons: Buccaneers

Cardinals vs. Bears: Cardinals

Chargers vs. Bengals: Bengals

Vikings vs. Lions: Vikings

Giants vs. Dolphins: Giants

Eagles vs. Jets: Eagles

Colts vs. Texans: Colts

Washington vs. Raiders: Raiders

Jaguars vs. Rams: Rams

Ravens vs. Steelers: Ravens

49ers vs. Seahawks: 49ers

Patriots vs. Bills: Patriots