To give yourself the best chance to win a college bowl pick’em contest or confidence pool in 2019, you need to identify teams that are being underrated by your opponents.
In this post, we’ll first do a quick review of why these “value picks” play such an important role in winning bowl pool strategy.
Then, we’ll share three compelling value picks from the 2019 college bowl slate that you need to consider making in your bowl pool this year.
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Why Underrated Bowl Picks Matter
The process of identifying college bowl value picks takes time, because you need to gather and manipulate a lot of objective data like betting odds, computer projections, and public picking trends. But the logic behind the process is simple.
Just compare the following two numbers:
- A team’s odds to win its bowl game, based on objective metrics
- The rate at which that team is being picked by bowl pool players nationwide
If the first number (win odds) is greater than the second number (pick popularity), you’ve found yourself an underrated bowl pick.
For example, if a team has a 60% chance to win its bowl game but only 40% pick popularity in bowl pick’em contests nationwide, that’s a great opportunity. Why? Because if your bowl pool reflects national trends, over half of your opponents will be picking the riskier underdog in that game.
That knowledge is power. By sticking with the favorite in that game, you will not only have a better chance to get the pick right — you’ll also be one of a minority of players in your pool to earn points from that game if the favored team wins. The favorite is both the less risky side, AND the higher reward pick.
That’s a tried and true recipe for shooting up your pool’s standings, and sharp bowl pool players don’t let those opportunities pass them by. They recognize that picking the underdog in that game would almost certainly be a bad decision, and they look to take calculated risks elsewhere.
Our subscribers have reported winning college bowl pools 60% more often than you’d expect given the sizes of their respective pools, and identifying underrated picks is the foundation of the entire approach.
Anatomy of a Bowl Value Pick
Value opportunities only pop up in a minority of games, but they can happen for a variety or reasons. Here are a few situational culprits we tend to see each bowl season:
- Underdog Ranked, Favorite Not Ranked. A team that is ranked in the end-of-season AP Top 25 is playing an unranked team, but the unranked team is actually the favorite in the betting markets. The public is misled by the poll ranking, and overrates the underdog.
- Great Win-Loss Record vs. Barely Winning Record. A team with very few losses is playing a team that barely has a winning record, but the team with the worse record is actually the better team. The public fails to account for a much harder strength of schedule faced by the team with the worse record, and overrates the underdog.
- Historical Powerhouse vs. Relative Unknown. A historically very strong program from a celebrated conference has had a bit of a down year, and is playing in a mid-tier bowl game against a much less famous school. The brand recognition of the storied program causes the public to pick the “famous” team at a higher rate than is warranted by its objective win odds.
Those are just a few of the dynamics that can give educated bowl pool players the edges they need to win bowl pick’em contests far more often than expected, but every year presents a different mix of opportunities. We’ve identified this year’s short list of compelling value picks and listed three of them below.
Note: Win odds and projected pick popularity data quoted below may change between publication time and kickoff time. If you want to see the latest numbers, our Bowl Pick’em Picks product updates multiple times per day with the latest information.
Pick Category 1: Value Favorites
When a team is favored to win (i.e. has win odds of more than 50%), yet is being picked at a significantly lower rate than its win odds, that’s as close to a no-brainer pick as you can get in a bowl pick’em pool. We call these picks “Value Favorites,” and here are two of them from the 2019 college bowl slate.
Washington Huskies
Opponent: Boise State, Las Vegas Bowl
Win Odds: 61%
Pick Popularity: 44%
Boise State is 12-1, and is ranked 18th in the latest AP Poll. Washington, meanwhile, came into the year as one of the favorites to win the Pac-12 along with Oregon and Utah, but struggled to a 7-5 finish. Head coach Chris Petersen, who used to coach Boise State, is also stepping down after this bowl game, citing stress.
Washington, however, is favored by 3 points in the betting markets in this game, giving the Huskies around 60% win odds, and our predictive ratings agree that Washington is the better team. Why? Washington faced the much tougher schedule, and the win-loss records of these two teams are skewed by vastly different performance in close games. Boise State went 4-1 in games decided by one score, while Washington went 0-4, including close losses to top teams Utah and Oregon. Random luck can be a major factor in one score games.
The public, meanwhile, is treating Boise State as the favorite here, picking the Broncos an estimated 56% of the time. That’s not too surprising when you have a ranked 11-1 team facing a 7-5 opponent.
So how have favorites who have inferior win-loss records done in bowl games? There have been nine bowl games over the last five years where the betting market favorite had at least two fewer wins and two more losses than their opponent. The favorites went 7-2 overall in that stretch.
In other words, you should still trust the betting market when a team with a notably inferior win-loss record is the favorite. Washington is far from a lock in this game, but from a risk vs. reward standpoint, making a trendy upset pick like Boise State is usually one of the worst things you can do in bowl pools.
Ohio Bobcats
Opponent: Nevada, Famous Idaho Potato Bowl
Win Odds: 75%
Pick Popularity: 58%
We now go from talking about Boise State, to talking about the bowl game that will take place at Boise State’s blue turf field. Ohio (6-6) and Nevada (7-5) face off in a game where Ohio is a 7.5-point favorite, making them tied for the seventh-largest point spread of this year’s bowl games.
Again, we have a case where the team with the worse record is favored, in this case by a larger amount, and the public is demonstrating a bias toward the team with the better record. We estimate that the public is taking Ohio only about 58% of the time, which means solid value on one of the larger favorites of the 2019 bowl season — you can’t ask for much more than that.
Ohio went 2-4 in close games, and also lost 20-10 on the road at Pittsburgh, and its win-loss record somewhat under-represents their performance level. On the other hand, Nevada’s winning record is disguising some pretty poor performance. Nevada is the lowest-rated team in our predictive ratings in 2019 to make a bowl game, and we have them ranked No. 119 out of 130 teams. They scored a big upset of Purdue on a last-second field goal to start the year, and one more big upset of San Diego State toward the end of the year. But here are the rest of their results against other bowl teams:
- Lost to Oregon by 71
- Lost to Hawaii by 51
- Lost to Utah State by 26
- Lost to Wyoming by 28
It is true that the Famous Idaho Potato Bowl has produced plenty of upsets, and the MAC team has not performed well the last two years, losing by a combined 54 points. Those facts may be driving the low pick popularity we’re seeing on Ohio this year. However, those last two MAC teams were underdogs, not favorites.
Compared to our predictive ratings (which see Ohio as 13.4 points better on a neutral field), the point spread for this game already seems to be docking Ohio for factors like travel and the upset-prone history of this bowl game. But there’s still a lot of value left against a Nevada team that has struggled often in 2019.
Pick Category 2: Value Gambles
All underdogs are not created equal. If you’re going to take a risk on an upset pick, you want to focus on highly underrated teams that have a legitimate shot to win. We call these teams “Value Gambles,” and the following team qualifies this year.
Florida Atlantic Owls
Opponent: SMU, Boca Raton Bowl
Win Odds: 43%
Pick Popularity: 24%
[EDITOR’S NOTE: Less than 24 hours before the bowl game, news broke that two starting receivers and a defensive starter for Florida Atlantic are suspended for academic reasons, and other starters could miss due to injury. As a result, the point spread jumped from SMU favored by only 3 points to now favored by 9 points, making them one of the bigger favorites of bowl season. Florida Atlantic is no longer a good value gamble and you should look elsewhere, such as Iowa State vs. Notre Dame or Florida State vs. Arizona State.]
Florida Atlantic went 10-3 this year, after an 0-2 start with losses to Ohio State and Central Florida. SMU started the year 8-0, and had aspirations of going to the Cotton Bowl entering November, before losing to Memphis and Navy.
Florida Atlantic also gets to host the SMU Mustangs in this bowl game. How many of your pool opponents do you think realize that this is a true home game for Florida Atlantic?
As a result, the point spread in this game is just 3 points in favor of SMU, and Florida Atlantic has a realistic 43% chance of pulling off the mild upset. Meanwhile, around 75% of bowl pool players nationwide are rolling with SMU. For some perspective, there are four other bowl games in 2019 where the spread is a field goal, and on average, the public is picking the underdogs in those games around 45% of the time, compared to a pick rate of only 24% for Florida Atlantic.
A quick word about head coach Lane Kiffin leaving Florida Atlantic to take the Ole Miss job is of course warranted. The Owls have hired former Florida State coach Willie Taggart to run the program, and defensive coordinator Glenn Spencer will serve as interim head coach for the bowl game. While conventional wisdom may lead you to think that a head coach leaving is a cause for concern, in general, the data doesn’t support that line of thinking, at least as far as point spread based expectations are concerned.
Over the last decade, there have been 46 bowl games in which a team had a different head coach in the bowl game than it did during the rest of the regular season, because the old coach left or was fired. The team with a new head coach for the bowl game has gone 26-20 straight up and 25-20-1 against the spread over that span. FAU’s coaching change is public knowledge, and as such, has already been priced into their betting odds for this matchup.
What’s most important to realize here is that despite being an underrated team, unlike Ohio and Washington, Florida Atlantic is still an underdog in the betting markets. FAU is more likely to lose than win, so whether you should pick them depends heavily on the specific characteristics of your pool.
In smaller bowl pools where picking very conservatively is often the best strategy, it may not make sense. But in bigger pools, where taking more calculated risks to differentiate your entry from the masses usually helps your cause, Florida Atlantic looks like a solid upset play to make a gamble on.
All Bowl Picks & Value Plays For 2019
The three picks above provide specific examples of how to use objective predictions and pick popularity data to give yourself an edge in bowl pick’em contests and confidence point pools.
In addition to these three picks, we’ve identified 13 more value picks worth considering in your bowl pool pick sheet this year. From a risk vs. reward standpoint, these teams — whether they are underrated favorites or unpopular underdogs that have a legitimate shot at pulling off an upset — represent the smartest potential bets to make in order to leapfrog opponents in your pool standings.
You can see them all in the Data Grid feature of our Bowl Pick’em Picks product, as well as get our customized pick recommendations for you specific pool(s).
We’ve also published a comprehensive post on the top value picks for 2019 bowl pools, as well as a complete list of college bowl confidence point picks ranked 1 to 41 that includes rationale for each pick.
Best of luck in your 2019 college bowl pools!
