Best of A Numbers Game | January 28, 2026

0:00A number is called the story of those idiots who believe in analytics. This is a numbers game with Kill I like Xander. Gone. He said good Wednesday morning to you. Is a numbers game of these in these sports betting. Now we're decent. Golf game. Plus I heart radio YouTube TV. And of course, series six of channel 158. It's Kill I like Xander. It's Danny Higgins. Once again in for Kelly Bidlin who's still suffering from the migraine. A little better today, a little better today. Yeah, spoke to him yesterday. I think you just need one more day. Y'all ready to go for Thursday. Kelly, it was like, I don't want to do 10 days of Super Bowl 60. So let me get a migraine up in here. Yeah, um, we hope Kelly gets better and his back tomorrow in the chair, uh, poor kid man with the migraises. That's, that's tough. We will try to make it do in his, uh, in his absence. Today on the show, we'll hill with all of his bets Super Bowl 60 and beyond. We'll also hear from Warren sharp a little later on Super Bowl 60. Toddie Wischneff in the hissy little later with his college hoops Paul car with a little

1:01champions league, uh, and Greg Peterson, a little later this hour talking college hoops with us by the way, Nick Whalen as well on the show talking Super Bowl and NBA with us. Greg Peterson, gonna have to ask him about this game last night between Nebraska and Michigan. We're in Nebraska, basically led the whole way, almost the whole way. And then Michigan clips him at the end, uh, Nebraska without, uh, without two of their, two of their better scores in the game as well, uh, and yet they can pour themselves very well. I almost feel better about Nebraska after the loss that I did even before. Gives it, gives me some, uh, Indiana vibes, Indiana football vibes, right? Traditional basketball school wins the, wins the football championship, traditional football school now, just now knocked from the ranks of the undefeated. But man, comported themselves very well yesterday in a game where a lot of people thought they're going to get blown off the court. So we'll talk to Greg about that. And, uh, oh, this, for God's sakes, how did I not lead with this?

2:02Later, ladies and gentlemen, um, let me just say this half times. Usually we've done a little cottage industry here on a numbers game, the beating the book podcast betting door before that about doing half times Bruno Mars, Katie Perry, whatever they were through the years, we used to catch big on these things. I'm gonna sit here and tell you, maybe I got old on this one. But, um, I don't know anything about bad money. I don't, and I'm not going to sit here and act like I do, because my ear doesn't even hear the difference between some of these songs. That's how non-bad money-ish I am. I'm going to agree with you. So I don't know too much about hamsters. So I don't know which, which song is going to be first. I think that's just one of those things we're going to have to get the intel three days before, when there's a rehearsal, two days before, and they go from there. But we have a full national anthem breakdown later in the show. Oh, yeah. Charlie, Charlie Puth, singing the national anthem, will it be over 122 seconds? Two minutes and two seconds for those who need the conversion. Or under 122 seconds, the juice is on the over.

3:03We'll talk about this. A way too deep dive, is that a thing? Way too deep of a dive on the Super Bowl national anthem with Charlie Puth singing it. Good for the, good for Charlie Puth, by the way. You familiar with Charlie Puth's words? A little bit not too much. I know the name, I just, it's a per se, but I'm not super familiar with it. He is a musical genius. So we'll talk about that a little bit on the show. Oh, and I got a chime in on Belicec, at some point. Oh, yeah. Maybe even at the time. Oh my god. First, tennis. Let's talk tennis. What is gentleman yesterday? This is, there are bad beats and then there are bad beats that you will probably remember forever because of the nature of the bad beat. We had a, we had a couple matches yesterday. We had a couple quarters on the line. If you followed all the place here. So on the matches, we end up splitting for a really modest gain. Eagle loses to Elena Rebachina. Rebachina is just a better player. So we lost on that one. Eagle was a slight dog.

4:04And then we won on Jesse Pagula, who beat fellow American Amanda Nissa Mova. Jesse Pagula now, the only American left in either of the semi finals at the Australian open the first slam of the year. So we, we get the small gain on the matches. But we hit the quarter on Jesse Pagula. So everybody who, uh, bet Pagula with his Q3, four to one odds, bang, that's a winner for us. We also continue with Pagula now to win the whole thing. We have our 31 to one as well. So that remains alive, but the, but the quarter caches the other quarter we had on the line. I didn't, I didn't back this up with a bet. I should have didn't want to double, I doubled up on Pagula, but I wasn't willing to double up on Musetti Lorenzo Musetti, uh, because he was facing Novak Djokovic. And you know, it was good enough to let the quarter ride for me, even though I thought there was value on, on Musetti's number yesterday. Well, what did we say? Drew Dinsick was on yesterday. We both sort of said, even if Musetti goes up two sets to nothing, uh, two sets to none, we are not going to be all that confident because Novak Djokovic is on the other side of the court.

5:05What we did not anticipate was how it's went down Musetti up two sets to nothing. Yesterday over Novak and then at the beginning of the third set, all of a sudden, you can see the leg is bothering him. I don't know if it's a groin. I don't know what the story was. We're not quite clear what part of what part of the leg is from when's the injury comes? When it was a parent, he couldn't move. And then of course Novak breaks him because he can't move and Novak sees this. So Novak 38 years old and done for in this match. He admitted it as much afterwards. He goes, I was, I was leaving. I was, I was going to be done. Musetti can't continue. We come one set away from hitting our plus six. By the way, I had a straight nine to one on it too. But plus six fifty was the, was the official bet on Lorenzo Musetti to win quarter three. And I will probably remember this. This tournament ends up being a profitable one on matches.

6:07Not the most profitable ever. I almost take more pride in this one being profitable at all because it was so chalky that you had to be really precise on which underdogs you hit through this tournament. So I'm pumped about that. We also now with the Pagula quarter win. The futures are are a wash at best, right? Or a wash at worst now at this point. Because even if we lost all the other futures that it's a wash, we saw Pagula going to win the whole thing at 31 to one. Pardon me. But man, if Musetti wins the quarter, which he's on the cusp of doing and joke of it, admits as much that it's about to happen. What a great tournament. This will be, I'll always remember it for the Musetti injury now. That's, yeah, it's a brutal way to go down. We do have one play today, though, at the Australian Open the semi-finals. This might end up being my last match play for the Australian Open. I don't know, but I'm thinking it could be. I'm on Pagula again versus Elena Rabakina. So the women turn around and play the semis today. The men's semis are tomorrow.

7:09And the men still have, and still has Yannick center going up against Jokovic. Still has Carlos Algaraz going up against Sasha Zverev. As Drew said, the men's tournament starts on February 1st, when it's the finals. But I have Pagula at plus 181 versus Elena Rabakina in the semis tonight. Rabakina was great yesterday when she is on. She is tough to beat, but like with Iga, this is a numbers play for me. And Jesse Pagula should not be plus 181. Of the two of them are three, three lifetime. Rabakina won the last, the most recent two of these. But those were indoor hards. And those indoor hard courts are faster than what this Australian Open hard court surfaces. This is a very moderate hard court surface in Melbourne. I love Pagula plus 181 to get it done against Elena Rabakina. Could be the final Australian Open play of the tournament. But there it is. That's just the muceti thing. It's just brutal. Let's go Pagula. Let's go Jess. Let's go. Let's do it. All right. Should we talk about this billbell check thing real quick? Oh, yeah. Okay.

8:10Before we get into all the guests, billbell check for those of course, in case you've been trapped under a heavy object, was not voted, was not voted into the NFL Hall of Fame on the first battle yesterday. That was the reporting of Seth Wickersham and Don Van Natta. That billbell check failed to get the requisite 40 out of 50, 80% of the votes needed to be put in on the first bound. So that means at least 11 of 50, 11 of 50 at the very least, said, nah, we're good. Make him wait a year. I'm putting words in their mouth, but I think that's what they're saying, right? Now, I just want to say that, so I'm going to be a little more nuanced than most before I jump on everybody's, you know, jump, jump on the side of everybody else. This is exactly the, I'm going to be consistent with what I say about burial, Lamar bonds and baseball, right? I do it every year about burial, Lamar bonds and baseball. It's like it put them in and then if you want to put a plaque that says, he was alleged to have taken performance enhanced drugs,

9:10right? With billbell check, you can say put them in. There was spy gate. There was deflate gate, right? There was all these things, but good God put them in. Now, I want to say that this is not the same as bonds, because bonds is incomparable. Bill Bell check, I just want to say this, the guy on the trophy, Vince Lombardi, was not a first ballot guy either. He was a, he was not made a, he was a first ballot. He got in when it was a finalist. The next year, same with Joe Gibbs, right? Who won three Super Bowls with three Rando quarterbacks compared to Bill Bell check's Tom Brady. He was not put in on the first ballot either. It was the next time when he was put in as a finalist. So it's not unprecedented, right? The only, you know, the who are some examples of the first ballot guys, Don Shula, Chuck Null, Tom Landry. So I just want to say on the one hand, it's not unprecedented in that respect, but guess who else is in the hall of fame? So we can quibble about that. Guess who else is in? Marv Levy, who never won a Lombardi trophy.

10:12Tom Flores, who only had six winning seasons. Don Coriel, who was like 111, 111, 183 and 1. Bill Bellacek's resume is unassailable. Here it is. 302 wins, third most six Super Bowl wins, 9AFC Championship's, 9 Super Bowl appearances, 19 consecutive winning seasons. So even if you dislike the guy, right? Even if you think he was guilty with spygate and deflategate, even if you think he's just a horse, is you know what? In his, in his inner, you know, in his press conferences, whatever you think of the guy. How arrogant are hall of fame voters across sports that they would keep a dude like it's out on the first ballot? It is really the most ridiculous thing ever. And there should be again, I don't know if the outrage is decided with bonds or if people, just if they're like, if I can't put my finger on what it is about bonds that you are not as outraged about with Bellacek, but it's the same exact sort of thing, right? It's just like, what are we doing? How the halls of fame are these museums

11:16that we are stewards of from generation to generation? How arrogant of us to feel as if we can prevent future generations from seeing these in or in the case of Bill Bellacek, how arrogant we are to make him pay this price for your personal feelings about him rather than what actually took place on the field itself. It's just ridiculous. Absolutely ridiculous. We'll come back, we'll hill with all of his bets. Across the sports betting landscape, it's a numbers game at Beeson, these sports betting network. You're here because you want an edge. That's what separates listeners from winners, but let's be real, mindset alone doesn't get bets home, pros win because they've got the tools, the data, and the discipline. And now, so can you. Beeson pro gives you access to the same real time insights the sharps use, no secrets, no fluff, just actionable info that moves markets. Tap the link and see why serious bettors are turning knowledge into profit with Beeson pro.

12:24Numbers game on Beeson, these sports betting network. Get ready to win a larger than life world soccer championship experience, only at Circle Resort, Bicino and Las Vegas. And by world soccer championship, Danny, I mean the global goblet, you know what I mean? One lucky winner scores a two-night stay at Circa, a VIP cabana for the games of stadium swim with $500 in credit, plus $250 in food and beverage. Arriving style with limo transportation and celebrating with cocktails at a legacy club. Enter now and kick off the world soccer championship at Circle Resort, Bicino, forgive away details, visit Circa Las Vegas. Dot com, Gill Alexander, Danny Higgins, hanging out with us for another day. In for the ailing Kelly Bidland, we get Tweet Speed in the book, Jesse Welch. Damn, wish I had known that the Numbers Game injury reports work just like the NBA. Kelly was listed as questionable yesterday. Not even doubtful. Hope you feel better soon, Kelly. That's true. We totally faked out everybody with the questionable. Wait, did we end the questionable? You're right, Jesse. Trip Tepper, top five record scratch moment for a Numbers game, asking Greg about four play had me spilling coffee

13:25on my laptop, falling out of my chair with laughter. Elite line of questioning. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Appreciate it. Pat Monteforte. I was a Monteforte or Monteforte. I don't know. He says, I'm following you and will on the Rangers. Oh, he following me and will on the Rangers. 81 and a half and 75 and a half. Was that mean that you did an alt as well in there? 81 and a half and 70 and a half, uh, 75 and a half. Maybe he meant the A's also in there. Uh, Jakob Ellis at WPZ Capital. Kelly's gone for a few days and next thing you know, we're talking about Greg's four play tactics. Keep up the good work. Now you're very, very, very welcome. My pleasure. Uh, BP Futures Bet Eagles fan here. So I'm not sucking up. But how many titles with Joe Jackson Gibbs have won? If he knew the plays that his opponents were going to run, I'm glad they're sticking it to Bella, Bella Cheater. So there is again, there is that opinion, right? Thank you. By the way, for the shout out on Joe Jackson Gibbs. Very good knowledge of his full name there. Only the greats get the full name treatment.

14:26Um, yeah. Look, that that's the thing, right? Spygate. They're alleged to have known the plays. And so there you go. Deflate gate. They're alleged to have deflated the balls and they got punished for both. And so yes, some people are like, well, I'm going to, I'm going to make an example of it. Okay. I mean, great. Your morality is one thing. But to take it to the extent that you would then do the disservice to the guy of not allowing him to have this distinct honor is just a certain level of petty that I will never understand. Like the fact that you can't remove your feeling from what the guy actually did on the field itself. And again, I'm the first person to say, I'm not as nuts about this because I do think there are some coaching precedents that don't make this as crazy as some other people do. But they all should be in. They all should be in. And Bill Belichick should absolutely be in on the first ballot as Vince Lombardi

15:30should have been as Joe Gibbs should have been. But there's, I mean, that's a, listen, what future's bet is saying is an opinion shared by many. But I'm curious if future's bet, if you were one of the Hall of Fame voters, would you have taken your opinion and prevented him from getting in on the first ballot? That's the difference, right? Would you have gone that far? Maybe you would have. I don't know. We just mentioned that the Cleveland Browns and hired Todd Monkin as their new head coach, which I'm sure has the people in Cleveland excited to just absolutely excited. I can't wait to hear Jensen's take on it later. Yeah, because it's a big prize. I see what Adam Burke has to say. Adam Burke too, yeah. So here are the jobs filled. Once again, there's the, uh, the A to jobs filled of the 10 vacancies that were that were there. On the left. It's the Fascade of Falcons. Mentor to the Ravens. Halfway to the Dolphins. John Harbaugh to the Giants. Mike McCarthy, still the most shocking to me to the Steelers. Solid to the Titans Brady, Joe Brady, yesterday here on the show to the bills and how Todd Monkin on the show today to the Browns, which leaves the Cardinals and the Raiders.

16:30Boy, Cardinals. I mean, I don't know why I feel worse about them, the Raiders. They're both it's bad and both, but the Raiders appear to be waiting for Kubiak. Yes, that's what it feels like. You have odds for both of these. Yes, uh, so Kubiak, uh, currently this morning, soft calcium, um, clincubiak is yes, minus 204, no plus 177 Davis, web is second at, uh, plus four 88. This is for the Raiders. This is for the Raiders. Yes. For Raiders, uh, next ice coach odds off Calchi. And then Mike LeFour is actually coming in third at just under, uh, 16 to one. Okay, what is it for the Cardinals? Is it is Vance Joseph for the favorite for the Cardinals? No, he is second. You want to see, we want to see you take another guess? I'm seeing your things first. Oh, uh, wait. I do know this. You know, it's not Vance Joseph. I'll know it as soon as you say it. Who is it? Mike LeFour. Oh, no, I wouldn't, I guess that. Mike LeFour is the favorite. Okay. Want to, this is the first time I've seen this up there. Third odds for, um, the Cardinals.

17:31Hey, next coach odds. Ron Rivera, nine to one. Oh, stop. Riverboat, Ron. What are we doing? No. What are we doing? Like, could you, is there a less inspired choices from a Washington fan? Is there a less inspired choice than Ron Rivera will be? Oh, Rahim Morris was who I thought you were going to say it was the first. Rahim Morris is fourth on that list at 131. Clint Kubiak, who is the favorite to be the Raiders head coach 24 to one? Clint Kubiak, given the choice. Ain't going to go to Arizona. So that's the thing is, is as bad as the Raiders aren't, there is something sadder about the Cardinals job. I don't know why that is because it's not even a brand name, right? So there's that. Wow. There's the Raiders list again. Nathan Sheelhouse also on the Raiders list. Didn't Sheelhouse turn down a job already too? He's like, yeah, it wasn't the Browns. How about the Jaguars coordinators, right? Odinski said to turn down the Browns. He took the offensive coordinator job back with the Jaguar. Yes. It's on the deal. So I saw when I was looking these up in type of last night and then

18:32updating the odds this morning. Odinski was, uh, wherever's he at. He was on the Cardinals until he pulled his name out. He was tied for second for Cardinals. So well, all right. So I'm not going to talk about halftime because again, I'm bad money and I'm not your guy. Sorry. I'll let y'all do. But national anthem. Charlie Puth is singing the national anthem. Now for those who don't know who Charlie Puth is. Charlie Puth is a multi-grammy award. I think he has multi-grammy. He's made me just making that up. But he is a huge hitmaker, young guy who is a musical savant. He's one of these guys that he sees. Not only does he see music in color, right? One of these savantes. But if you like right now, Danny, if I if I hit the desk or let's say you just, you know, you, uh, you hit your keyboard. Charlie Puth is one of these guys who he says, oh, uh, be flat.

19:33And then he can, and if you do two sounds, you'll be like, oh, be flat. Uh, see, be flat. That's a C major chord if I add this and the like, so he's just this amazing guy when it comes to music. And he can create songs. He actually has hit records based on someone shutting a door. Like from that, he'll go on Jimmy Fallon. He'll just come up with songs. So he's got this amazing musical mind. He's got tons of hits, attention. Do you know that song? That's maybe his biggest hit. I'm going to be honest. I'm not the best with song names. So if I heard it, I probably wouldn't know it. You probably wouldn't know it. Yes. Darnell, you know that one, right? Jam. Darnell knows that one. By the way, he's just just incredible songs from, uh, from Charlie Puth. By the way, he often goes on Howard Stern and does a whole bunch of songs there. But, um, yeah, light switch was the one that he did off just like a door shutting. You made a hole hit out of that. That's awesome. Um, one call away. People would know Marvin Gaye is the name of one of his songs. Also, he did a song titled Marvin Gaye, um, lipstick. Anyway, point is he's doing the national anthem.

20:35And there is no footage of Charlie Puth ever singing the national anthem. But yours truly went on the old Charlie Puth deep dive last night to treat you. See if I could glean some intel about what Charlie's thinking about with a national anthem. And I have some quotes. You like to hear them? Yes. There they go. Charlie Puth quote, I'm going to put a lot of jazz into it. I kind of heard the whole arrangement in my head. And we'll see if it, and we'll see if what's happening in my head actually happens. He also describes the star-spangled banner as quote, the hardest song ever written. Noting its preposterous three octave range. You knew that, Danny. Quote, I just want to show people that I can do it. I feel like people don't really think of me as a standalone vocalist at times. It'll be pressure the week leading up to it and the hour leading up to it. He says, but once I'm there, it's going to feel so comfortable. And it's going to sound so good. Now he takes as his national anthem inspiration, Whitney Houston's amazing rendition

21:38before Super Bowl 25, right, as the Gulf War had broken out. Whitney Houston, for me, the second greatest national anthem all time. I leaned towards Marvin Gaye in 1983, 1983 NBA All-Star Game, but that's just me. Charlie Puth loves the Whitney Houston version. Whitney Houston was just shy of two minutes when she did it, just for comparison sake. But one of the other things that Charlie Puth also mentioned in addition to him wanting to jazz it up and that he's already got the whole arrangement in his head is that involved as well will be an orchestra in his national anthem and and here's the real point for all of this. This is the one that drove it home for me, a choir. There's also going to be a choir. Now, remember, this is going to be graded. These are available, either way, if you're wondering, where is this available? A wager on the internet is a place where it's available. Do you want to point that out? This is graded from a first note that he sings to the last, right? So the musical interlude at the beginning is not going to matter.

22:40But once he starts to the end, that's how it's graded. And if a choir is involved and he wants to jazz it up, my recommendation is over 122 seconds. Over two minutes and two seconds, Charlie Puth's national anthem. It's in his head. He's got the arrangement. He's jazzed it up. And there's a choir in an orchestra. He's not trying to do this in a speedy fashion. Over 122, your Super Bowl national anthem recommendation. Take your time, Charlie. Let him marinate. Coming back on a Numbers game with Nick Whale next. Numbers game. These sports Betty Network numbers game. Live from Circle Resort, Casino, downtown Las Vegas, Kill Alexander. Danny Higgins in for Kelly Bentley on this Wednesday. Jeff Levine on Twitter. Ega, I want to modify evaluation of Ega going forward from just her relative numbers.

23:40To that plus the fear in her eyes, not just frustration. He says when things turn bad, she's had zero good karma recently. No fight just flight. First of all, how dare you say this about the six-time Grand Slam winner who was going for her career slam yesterday? I would actually say that she just got beat yesterday. I actually wasn't, you know, to me, she was just not the better player. Rebokina went on with the serve and she was with the serve. We'll get a lot of free points. And yeah, no, I'm not going to say you're completely wrong about that looking Ega's eyes because I know what you're talking about. But let's have a little pull a little more spet on her name. You know what I mean? James Fessler on his numbers game punch guard. How many more fillings does Danny Higgins need before he becomes producer number RG-3? That's great. Great use of what we were talking about last week. RG-3 who wore the number 10 for the wash and in redskins? The next producer will be producer RG-3. That's right. I produce a number RG-3. Three Jack H-3131.

24:41Gil, maybe whoops, Peterson needs to revisit some old Vegas lifestyle podcasts for tips and tricks from Ace. Grab Pagolette plus 180 this morning after I wiped away my Musetti tears. The number feels disrespectful. Yeah, it is disrespectful. And again, I'm trying to sort of be light about the Musetti thing because if you don't laugh, you cry. That's just the worst thing that could pop. I was really, that's how we lose. I said, as it was happening. I'm like, is this how we're going to lose this on an injury one set away from winning the quarter? A brown data juggling land. I'm so glad you included a quick side note about all time anthem rankings. Marvin at the 83 NBA All-Star Game is the greatest rendition of all time in a landslide, the definitive historical moment that defined cool. A brown down in Juggling. I am with you as great as Whitney Houston's was. And no one can deny Whitney Houston's voice as the greatest of all time. And her rendition was spectacular. It's goose bumps and a goose bump inducing. But Marvin Gaye putting on the drum machine and doing it Marvin Gaye style 1983 NBA All-Star Game.

25:44Spectacular. My dad hated when people messed around with the anthem when they put their spin on it. You know, what is he doing? Just seeing the anthem. I thought it was spectacular. I'm with you down in Jugglingland. Nick Whalen joins us now, ladies and gentlemen. He is part of the roto wire crew. He's a senior writer over there and has been kind enough to join us all football season. And along with our buddy Jeff Erickson is about to resume their co-hosting of of the show that follows what doesn't follow us. Follows money moves. No, it follows us. Prop points. Okay, right. Instead of prop points or prop points will be instead of the John Hansen version, it will go to Nick Whalen and Jeff Erickson. Nick, I asked this of Jeff Erickson last week or two weeks ago. I'll ask this of you. A peaceful transfer of power. Yes. Yeah, I would say so. It's certainly not hostile. You know, I think hosting the show during the late or kind of spring through the summer. Cater's a little bit more toward our expertise. I'm a big NBA guy. Jeff, of course, is a huge baseball guy.

26:45Hansen mostly focuses on football. So yeah, I would say it's been a peaceful transfer of power heading into year two. I like how you answered that literally. If there was a struggle for a coup d'etat was not necessary is what you're saying. No, no coups, unfortunately. You were you were just on with Ed Lowe on draft Kings talking about NBA. Can we can we get some highlights from that as well? I know you're you love the association. Let's start with some of your bets that you're thinking about tonight or beyond. Yeah, we got a fun slate tonight. I feel like we've had a lot of like smaller slates over the last few weeks, but we got nine games tonight. So a few that I like here, we got Lakers calves in Cleveland. And the expectation as of now is that we see both LeBron and Luca out there for the Lakers. They're still without Austin Reeves, but two big injuries on the calves side of things. No Darius Garland and now no Evan Mobley, who I think is going to be out through the all-star break with a calf strain. So if you look at some of the on-off data at Roto Wire, when Garland and Mobley are off the court,

27:45Donovan Mitchell sees about a seven and a half percentage point jump in usage. He averages 10.6 more points, six and a half more field goal attempts, three and a half more free throw attempts and 3.3 more three point attempts per 36 minutes. So there should be a huge spot for him. His points prop last I checked. I think it's all the way up at 32 and a half. Jared Allen should also get above. He sees about a 7% usage rate jump without Mobley on the court, specifically brings in about two more rebounds and about five more free throw attempts per 36, which is interesting. But I think a sneaky props bot in this game, guys, is Jalen Tyson over 16 and a half points. He's already averaging over this number in his last 10 games with Evan Mobley on the court. I think he's one of those secondary options, who they'll turn to in this game. Lakers continue to be terrible on defense. I know they got to win over the bulls the other night. They are 25th excuse me in defensive rating over their last 10 games. Caps are about five points per 100 worse on defense with Evan Mobley. So I think this could be a higher scoring game.

28:45And I do lean toward the Lakers getting points here on the road. I know they're a very difficult team to trust, but Caps are an NBA worst eight in 19 ATS at home this season. Okay, but the official play is on the total. I like, I like the Jalen Tyson prop the most and over 16 and a half points. And then yeah, if you over 235 and a half and then Lakers plus two and a half is what I like in that game. Okay. All right, what else do you like nine games total? What else do you like? Yeah, Hawk Celtics is another one that caught my attention. I would lean over in this game as well, total sitting at 230 and a half. We have an interesting contrast in terms of pace. Yeah, I like to look at the last 10 games to try to gain kind of a clearer sample. And Boston is playing at the second slowest pace in that time. Atlanta is playing at the second fastest pace. So I think we settle probably somewhere in the middle. Last meeting between these teams a week and a half ago, Boston put up 82 points in the first half. These these teams combined for 98 three point attempts in that game.

29:45And Boston could be without its starting center. And Nima is Cata. He is doubtful right now. Luca Garza is also on the injury report. So I think that does open things up. Perhaps for Annika Kung-Boo on the Atlanta side of things. I like the over 15 and a half points there. Went for 21 points on 14 shots in the last meeting. He's taking about seven threes per game over the last 10. And both the Hawks and the Celtics are allowing a ton of threes every single night. So of course, it's always a matter of how many of those are actually going down. But I think we could see a back and forth higher scoring game there. And then you have to like Sam Hauser over two and a half threes. Given what I just talked about, averaging close to four makes per game in January and the Hawks specifically give up a ton of catching shoot threes, which is what Sam Hauser does. 27 catching shoot three point attempts per game given up by that Hawks defense. All right. This kind of analysis and props that you can expect from Nick and Jeff Erickson. Once their version of prop points begins on February 10th, let me just ask you this, Boston Celtics. They're going to be the Eastern Conference Representative in the NBA finals in your opinion.

30:47I think there's a reasonable chance. I really do. And we're seeing those those odds start to drop, you know, Celtics to win the finals, Celtics to win the East. I did a little video for our site earlier this week about that. You know, they were plus four 25 at that point, I believe, to win the Eastern Conference and look, no disrespect to the Detroit Pistons. They're sitting at 34 and 11 right now. They're clearly the best team in the East. Boston with Jason Tatum back, I don't think they're overly scared of the Detroit Pistons. You know, a team that that still has plenty of holes offensively and defensively for that matter. They got to figure out what they're doing with Jay Nivey. They need to figure out if they should upgrade at the deadline. Not enough shooting to me on that Detroit roster. You know, it comes down to what version of Jason Tatum are you getting? But to me, even if you get 80% of peak Jason Tatum was a top five player in the NBA, that's a massive addition. That might be the biggest addition that any of these Eastern Conference contenders gets when we get past the deadline. And I feel the need to also follow up on the thunder because we, you know, when they were going crazy to be any of the year, we had a lot of people saying they were going to, you know, a lot of people were betting at

31:49least on them, breaking the record to 73 and nine from the Warriors to get the 74 wins. Now, I mean, look, that's not going to, that's already done that that's not going to happen. But then it was like, oh, well, at least the win 70. Yeah, that's probably not going to happen either. Are we sure they're going to see their season win total, which I believe was 62 and a half if I'm not mistaken. I wouldn't be sure. No, I, you know, I actually preseason was leaning under on that, which looked horrible. Of course, like the first month and a half of the season. But I, you know, I thought there was a case that, okay, C wouldn't be pushing as hard this season as maybe we wanted them to. You know, I know they are a younger team. They're a deep team. So it's not like they're, they're overextending like two or three guys every single night to push for the record. But now that the record's off the table, I just, you know, I think they're priority. Like a lot of teams that win the title, you know, that following season, you typically don't see them turn around and, and then put up an even better regular season. You know, they're starting to try to peak in in April and May and June as opposed to January and February and, you know, the thing that's happening with OKC now is like SGA is out there just

32:51about every night. But they have two, three, four role players out. It feels like every single game, like missing Isaiah Hardstein for the last few weeks has been brutal for them. They're the worst rebounding team in the NBA since he went down. Caruso's missed a ton of time. James Williams is out indefinitely. We probably don't see him until after the All-Star break. So, you know, with that chase for the record now off the table, I don't really see an impetus for for OKC to, you know, be stepping on the gas every single night. I mean, we've seen this team just be brutal against the spread against these big numbers. They failed to cover again last night against the Pelicans. I believe that's now eight of their last nine games as a double digit favorite. They have not covered. Can we squeeze in one more prop in a certain NBA game before we go to break here? What else you got? I will say I like the Hornets tonight. Just a big mismatch with how the Hornets are playing right now. Number one in offense. Number five in defense. Plus 13.7 net rating on the road against the Grizzlies team. That is not very good. And I do think this could be a raptor spot tonight. Go at home against the Knicks. I know they're coming off a long West Coast road trip,

33:53but they have not played since Sunday. It's the second night of a back to back for the New York Knicks who have been the worst road cover team in the NBA and they are two and four ATS on back to back to see. Well, that's interesting. I got some random text from somebody I really get that text from. I like how the Raptors only two point favorite star. So that's a thing for sure. More in Nick Whalen on the other side, including Super Bowl 60 right here on a numbers game at Visa. The numbers told the story now is now. It's one of those idiots who believe in analytics. This is a numbers game with Gill, I like Xander. Gone Visa. Our number three of a numbers game at Visa. These sports betting network visa.com game. Plus I heart radio YouTube TV. Serious XM Channel 158. However you're taking us in. I am most grateful sincerely. Gill Alexander. Danny Higgins in for Kelly Bidlin. Hopefully Kelly feels better with his migraines. This plagues him from time to time. He suffers from migraines.

34:53I would at first speak with him yesterday. I would upgrade him a little bit from actually not questionable. Today, I'd say he looks like he'll should be that probable, probable, probable. Yeah, we're going to go probable. Danny Higgins giving a probable designation. If Kelly doesn't show up tomorrow, that's on me. That's the guy you blame right there. Probable designation. We get tweets at being in the book on Nemo. Ryan's voice. You know what Nemo, you're correct about this. He says, guys, can we be a little more sensitive about the dead cat? There has to be at least one listener out there that woke up to a dead pet, poor fella. No, you're absolutely right. And also we don't explain it every time we do it. But this came up yesterday when one of the great tweets ever were brought back to 187, I believe, he said, are you familiar with Schradinger's cat? Because we had Alina Svitalina in the middle of the night. And he was relating it to this 1935 experiment Schradinger's cat. Because again, not only we have the best listeners in the game, we have the most intelligent listeners in the game. So there was this experiment, cats in a box. And the theory is, you do not know if the cat is dead or alive until you observe the cat after you open the box.

35:55And so this was related to the Svitalina bet. He didn't know if it was a winner or a loser until he woke up in the morning. And so now for a whole two days now, everybody's been tweeting about the dead cat. So that's what that's about. So yes, please, we're not trying to make any fun of anything. Tom Mast 313, by the way, it's a perfect segue in a war and sharp here. We're talking about the vacancies that still exist with the Raiders and the Cardinals at Head Coach. Yeah. Do you know about the Jets? The Jets, this is from Tom Mast points out. This is a rich Samini tweet over a DSP and he says, the Jets have coaching vacancies. Is this true? At offensive coordinator, defensive coordinator, passing game coordinator, quarterbacks coach, defensive line coach, linebackers coach, assistant defensive backs, and defensive assistants. I didn't know it was all those. Oh my God. Wow. Ladies and gentlemen, he's kind enough to join us each and every Wednesday at this time. Do start the hour to celebrate a great season on Vison Warren. Talking about Warren Sharpe has decided to give everyone his in-depth Super Bowl report for free.

36:55Don't cost you nothing. It's a 35 plus page PDF. Drops early next week breaks down all the key matchups to give you an edge betting the game, including sides, totals, derivatives, props. Just go to sharp dot football. Click the link that says Vison exclusive offer. Wow. Ladies and gentlemen, Warren Sharpe joins us now. courtesy of the progressive guest line. Good morning, Warren. Appreciate that offer for everybody. Yeah, I'm on 15 pages of the way through. And last year, I will say this last year, this report was 68 pages, I believe. It will not be 68 pages this year. I'm going to try to be a little bit more measured. But that's easy for me to say right now, because I still have days more research. I'm betting some props as I go. But this is really important to me to try to help kind of measure my whole angle of how I view this game and what I think is going to play out in this game. And we write that up and share it and form of this massive PDF. So always fun to work on this. And it does take about a week to do,

37:56but we're giving away for you guys for Vison listeners. Good on you for being this thorough, even as you're getting older, my buddy, Dr. Bob who comes on the show all the time. Bob, you know, Bob's in his 60s. And I'm like, Bob, you can't work to like three in the morning, handicapping the Sun Belt conference. He's like, I know, I'm going to shed sports. And then he turns right around and he breaks his own promise. And he does. So good on you, Warren. Appreciate that. Before we get into Super Bowl 60, I know you have thoughts on Bill Belichick not getting voted into the Hall of Fame on the first ballot, the six time Super Bowl champion, where at least 11 of the 50 folks who had votes decided not to put him in your thoughts, sir. Well, first of all, I think there's a couple of factors at play here that people need to be aware of. One is this potential for spy gate retribution retaliation is penance thing. Bill Polian doesn't remember whether he told people to do this or not. He doesn't even remember who he voted for yesterday. I don't know if we can put much stuck into what Bill Polian,

38:57who thinks Lamar Jackson still would be an excellent wide receiver in the NFL believes on this subject. But the bottom line is there's that at play. So I don't think people were not voting for Bill Belichick because they believe he's not Hall of Fame worthy. Some people were not voting for him because they were trying to punish him for what happened in 2007 for the spy gate situation, which Mayor may not have been worse than what was let out. Obviously, Roger could help destroy the tapes, huge conspiracy about that, et cetera, et cetera. The other aspect to this, of course, is they changed the rules of how this was voted for and how the votes were being able to be dealt by the 50 members of the media who were able to vote on this. And apparently, I want to say there was 150 total votes at play and you had to get, like you said, that 40 vote threshold. And so some of the people were trying to figure out how to disperse their votes. And apparently, this was the first year that they were doing it this way. And so there might have been some confusion

39:58with some of the voters. It's like, oh, I think Belichick is gonna get in. So let me make sure that I vote for these other guys to ensure they get in as well. And I don't really know if the way that they did the voting is the best way to do it moving forward. They might make some changes to that to try to help educate some of these voters on what to do. So there probably was a little bit of malicious intent. And then there was probably a little bit of confusion. And that's my thought as to why Belichick is not a first ballot Hall of Famer. Surely it has nothing to do with him not being worthy of being a first ballot Hall of Famer because I think anybody who's watched football over the last 25 years should realize that Bill Belichick is most deserving of being a first ballot Hall of Famer. And surely he will get there very soon. It's just, I think it went sideways with this voting process and then the punishment. It's a good breakdown. It's a hundred percent pettiness and but a good add on by you that format might have had something to do with it as well. Bill Belichick, by the way, didn't even point this out.

40:59Reportedly puzzled by this result. And apparently the quote that I heard was six super balls. What's a guy got to do? And he said it in that tone, I think, probably with that. So anyway, it is, as the kids say, it is what it is but it is just, I say it about Barry Barnes, I'll say the same sentence. Why do we even have a Hall of Famer if you didn't do that, right? If Bill Belichick isn't in it, why do we even have a Hall of Famer? So that applies to him as well. All right, two super balls 60 and he will get there just not on the first ballot but still a super bowl 60. Let's give the four minute breakdown of this if you will. Where do your eyes go with this? Well, I've started everything with the favorite of this game, which is the Seattle Seahawks trying to get an understanding of what they are most likely to do offensively in this game when they start the ball with the ball. If they get the opening kickoff, what is their first drive going to look like? What is their plan and philosophy going to be? More so the philosophy than anything else

42:01as to how to attack this Patriots defense. We know that the Seattle Seahawks are the fourth most run heavy team in the NFL in early downs in the first half of games, which is what I basically utilize when I'm trying to break down intent by an offense is what are you doing on those early downs in the first half? I don't want second half, that's a reaction. I don't want third down, that's a reaction. What is your game plan initially? They're the fourth most run heavy team over the course of the season. Interestingly enough, we know that the Patriots have an elite run defense, especially with Milton Williams out on the football field. They are by my metrics when Milton Williams is on the field. The number one best run defense in the NFL. Oddly enough though, teams that have gone up against the New England Patriots have run the ball on first half early downs at the third highest rate in the NFL. So they're going up and voluntarily running at a very high rate against a very good run defense. I looked at the other two teams

43:02that have high run rates against their defenses. The top two teams in the NFL. It is the Green Bay Packers and the Buffalo Bills. What those two teams have in common is they've been bad against the run. 27th for the Packers on first half early downs and 30th for the Bills on first half early downs. That is what those defenses rank. So it makes sense teams would run the ball a lot there. But why in the world are teams running a lot against the New England Patriots when the Patriots are holding these runs in check at like top five rates for every efficiency metric that I have, EPA per attempt, success rate, yards per carry, explosive run rate. The list goes on and on and on. The issue is, in my opinion, go ahead. No, go ahead. Sorry, I thought you were done. Go ahead. I was just going to say the issue. I think the reason that we're seeing this is because those quarterbacks have been terrible that the Patriots have gone up against. And as a result, those teams don't want their quarterbacks dropping back past a lot. They want to lean more into the run game even though those runs are not very successful. So one of my first questions is just,

44:04we know they want to run the ball. Are they going to try to run the football here despite going up against a good run defense? And will those runs have any success at all? So that's something that we're going to see answered early on in this game and how quickly they might pivot if that's not successful. And then the second question that I have in this game, when we're talking about COC starting with the ball. And again, I'll be here next Wednesday. We'll talk more about some of the other angles that I'm approaching with this game is, what defense will the New England Patriots utilize to cover the passing attack if the COCs do then flip into the passing attack a little bit more frequently? We know that the Patriots have utilized top 10 rates of man coverage over the course of the season. However, what I think a lot of people do is they look at like league averages from defenses. And they say, oh, yeah, the Patriots are a top 10 man cover team. But what you really need to look at is, how do defenses play the Seattle Seahawks versus how those defenses play every single other opponent that they face? And what you'll find when you do that is you'll see that teams play man coverage at a seven and a half percentage different lower rate

45:07against the Seahawks. Then they do against every other team that they play because they have gotten burned too often by JSN and they don't want to man up against JSN. So I'm envisioning that the Patriots will lean more into zone coverage in this game and not play as much man as they're used to playing. And that's going to throw a different spin into how people are breaking down this game. So that's a second question. How do the Patriots decided to play coverage when going up against JSN? I'm trying to read between the lines or dance between the raindrops, whatever the expression is. Does it feel like you're leaning Seahawks in all of that? I'm trying to glean what you're... Haven't gotten anywhere on the side, but under on Kenneth Walker rushing yards is where I'm getting out here. I think they might have to pivot a little bit more into the past. To be continued war next week, to be continued. And of course, Warren has other appearances here on the network as this week goes by as well. Thank you, Warren. Appreciate it as always. You got it, guys. Warren Sharp at Sharp Football, by the way, the Veeson deal at Sharp.

46:08Dot football. Toddie wish to have next. You're here because you want an edge. That's what separates listeners from winners, but let's be real mindset alone doesn't get Bet's home pros win because they've got the tools, the data, and the discipline. And now, so can you. Veeson bro gives you access to the same real time insights the sharps use, no secrets, no fluff.