Prop Points | March 26, 2026

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1:01This is prop point on V-Syn, these sports betting networks. Welcome into prop points, Thursday edition here on V-Syn, these sports betting network, Dick Whale and Jeff Erickson, hanging out with you, and Jeff Erickson is wearing what I believe is that he, Joey Vato, Jersey? It must be opening day. It is. It is, Joey Vato, my only Jersey, so yeah, let's go. Man, I wish I wouldn't know it, dude. I would have pulled out the sabathea, maybe the Dantro Willis. I got something in the holster, man, and then maybe we'll have to bring out. Brewer version of those guys, I assume. What'd you say? The Brewer's version of sabathea, I assume? Oh, of course, of course. Of course. We'll bring that thing out. Maybe the Brewer's win today against the Chicago White Sox, but we had one game in Major League Baseball last night. We'll talk about a dominant win for the New York Yankees over the San Francisco Giants. We got 11 games coming our way, Eric Halterman from Roto Wires going to stop by to help us

2:05break down the entire slate, give out all of his favorite props. We got double guests for the second show in a row, John Henson from Field of 68 and of course, former North Carolina star, former Milwaukee Bucks stand out. He's going to join us for a sweet 16 breakdown, and then we will reveal our official plays for the V-Syn betting contest around out the show. Before we get into baseball, Jeff, just a reminder, download the prop point show in podcast form. You can find it on Apple on Spotify, wherever you get your podcast, you can find every V-Syn show in podcast form. So no games and action quite yet, Jeff. We are about 15 minutes away from Pirates Metz starting up. That is Paul Schien's going up against Freddie Peralta. One of the better pitching matchups on the board. We have a low total, open six and a half was up to seven and a half now down to seven at draft games again, about 15 minutes from first pitch. Is this the pitching matchup you're most looking forward to today, Jeff? It is. It is absolutely the pitching matchup that I think is the premier one on the docket there. I am looking forward to scubul versus Nick Povetta out in San Diego.

3:08I'm also looking forward to a vaulty versus Christopher Sanchez in Philly, Texas versus Philly. I think those are the three best pitching matchups. Looking forward to the whole slate though. I'm just looking forward to baseball that counts. I could not agree more, could not agree more. So I know you were not a fan of just the one game last night. I saw, saw a lot of griping about the presentation from Netflix last night, but nonetheless we had a seven nothing Yankees win to open the season. Not a great night for your judge. He goes 0 5 at the dish, four strikeouts did not have a single four strikeout game the entire 2025 season by the way, but Yankees put up five runs in the second, never really look back. Francisco to just three hits on the night ended up being a disastrous start, Jeff, for a guy who a lot of people in the fantasy community like this year and Logan Webb. Yeah, and it was seven strikeouts at least to ease the pain a little bit. But yeah, the ERA of over 10, a whip of two tough, tough, tough look. The only good thing is he spread that blow up over five innings.

4:08The true blow up disaster outings and they will happen to almost every one of our aces at some point. It's the one where they can't get out of the second inning, can't get out of the third inning. Those are the true disaster outings and those will happen. We'll be rostering those two. This one we'll get by with this, but it is tough. He got babbipped a little bit there like, for instance, Austin Wells single in the second inning. It was just a bleeder that got through because they had a big shift on him and Luis or I didn't have the range to get to that ball. I'm not sure any second base from didn't necessarily playing from the starting point where they are at, but there's a couple of those that just dropped in. And it just kept on allowing contact. Somehow got those strikeouts eventually and almost all of them were here and judge ironically enough. But yeah, it was a tough outing to start there for one of our puter to bases. Are you in a full on panic if you drop it there and judge in fantasy leagues, Jeff, is he watch out? No, every, you know, early season slumps mag to get magnified. You see this happen all the time, a lot of think pieces.

5:11What's going wrong? Also early season hot starts. I mean, how many, how many in-depth articles did you read about the torpedo bat last year? And then after about a month, you didn't hear anything about it the rest of the season. I think that's something that we're going to be looking at there as well. There's just a little little little story lines like that because we have nothing else to ground it to. It looks like it's a lot worse than it is because he's struggled late in the WBC in addition to this game yesterday. I'm like, what's wrong with Aaron Judges is vision off? Is there something wrong? Should he have not played the WBC? No, none of these things should apply. They'll be fine. So I mentioned Jeff and Milwaukee Brewers, one of the teams in action today. They'll start off at two 10 Eastern at home, again, Shane Smith and the White Sox. I woke up to terrible news on my phone this morning. Jackson, sure, not only going to miss the opener, he's had to the IL and set to miss at least two to four weeks. Now, you know, what, three weeks ago, we got news that he took a, took a ball off the hand during the WBC, everything seemed fine.

6:12He played multiple additional games of the WBC, was back in Milwaukee, hadn't really heard anything about this over the last two weeks, but once this news came out, and we started to dive in a little bit more. And the report basically is that he played in an exhibition against your Cincinnati Reds, by the way, earlier this week and tweak the injury made it worse on a check swing. Yeah, that's right. And it's the lack of resistance sometimes there. You know, you see sometimes injuries happening like that, or you get hurt, you feel it like sometimes in your shoulder is usually where you feel it. But in this instance, there, it's the, it's the hand because it's a pre-existing injury there. And it's just too much force. I guess they're just trying to stop it. So, yeah, tough break. I had to scramble. I used RotoWire's My Players tool to make sure I didn't have Churu anywhere and I was like, oh, yeah, that's right. I had him in this keeper league. I had to scramble to get him out of the lineup just in time there. But you can check out all of our customization tools there. That really is a time saver, especially in season. My, my, my leagues, my players, you know, you can use that for also your free agent pickups

7:14as well in the course of the season. Very important. When you have big news like that, you have to be able to react to it. So, obviously, this is a blow for Milwaukee to begin the year. Not the two major. I don't think this is making you backtrack on, on the over 84 and a half wins. You should see Churio back out there in a few weeks. Does anybody benefits big time in fantasy, you know, if you're, if you're sitting out there saying, okay, how do I react to this news? Is there, is there anything actionable in the Milwaukee outfield? I don't think so. Maybe Jake Bowers is a guy who's batting fifth today. Maybe he does benefit a little bit by being moved up in the order. Yeah, the brewers are always a mix and match short of team. Garrett Mitchell is in the starting lineup in center field. Bowers is in left. So those two guys, maybe Bowers is the guy that benefits a little bit from that. I wouldn't be surprised that Christian LH plays more outfield. So if you have Christian LH, that's a good thing. Especially if you're in a league where, you know, you need 20 games last year or 10 games this year at a position to qualify for that. He played 19 games in the outfield last season, you know, which did. So he's DH only in most of our leagues.

8:15Maybe he gains that outfield eligibility this year because of this. So maybe the off season, but over on draft Kings football, never sleeps. Early bird best ball is back and you could get in now to compete for a share of $1 million in total prizes before the season even kicks off. Best ball is simple. You draft your team once and that's it. Each week, your high scores automatically count. No waivers, no trades, no line up setting. Just build your team and let it ride all season long. If you love drafting, this is your edge to get started early. Download the draft Kings daily fantasy app draft your early bird bestball lineup for a shot at a share of $1 million in prizes. Drafts stay open until the season kicks off. So now's the time to jump in. You draft it. We crowned sign up now to take your shot at a share of $1 million in prizes and draft Kings early bird bestball contest, gambling problem, call 1-800-gambler in New York, call 8-778, hope and why or you can just text hope and why in Connecticut call 8-888-7897777 or visit ccpg.org.

9:1618 plus in most states, restrictions apply. C terms over at draft Kings dot com sponsored by draft Kings. So Nick, we had a pretty big night in the NBA last night. A lot of like outstanding performances, a lot of wild games as well. Nuggets in the Mavericks. This was a fill up the score sheet type of game. The maps kept this close. I kept meaning that the Nuggets starters had to stay in longer. We saw a 142 135 game overbetter's delight. Yeah, this is one that that me and my guy Alex Baruta talked about on non-series XM last night in this this played out beautifully. We were we were riding the Dakota Yokech over 10 and a half assists. I have no idea why that number was lower last night than it was two nights ago because this Denver team is just kind of perfect right now for for playing overs because they're not playing well enough that they could pull away from some of these bad teams. But they're they're still an excellent offense. The defense is leaking out that they're giving up a ton of points. And like you said, the most important thing here is that they're keeping games close enough that Nuggets still has to play 35 to 38 minutes most nights.

10:17So yeah, it ended up being kind of a wild slate. You know, Miami had this this big back and forth game with Cleveland, where they jumped out to an early lead all of a sudden the calves erased that lead and then Miami pulls back out at the end of the game. We went to overtime in Atlanta and Detroit, Boston had a huge rally in the second half to to come back and beat Oklahoma City by double digits. But Jeff, the one maybe the craziest game of the season was Timberwool's Rockets and this was a big game for both teams, specifically for Houston because they had the Edwards was still out last night for Minnesota. So anything that happens without ants, you know, you always have that as kind of an excuse, but Houston, man, this team needs they need a feel good win. They almost had it last night. They go on a 13 oh run to begin overtime and then allow a 15 oh run by the Minnesota Timberwool's to come back and win this game. The wolves, by the way, blew an 11 point lead in the final three minutes of regulation for this game to even go to overtime. It was a perfect encapsulation, Jeff, of what exactly what you think a Minnesota Houston game would look like. Exactly. And I believe I coined this phrase.

11:17We're going to put this into the universe here on Vison as well. Both teams are freaky streaky, you know, they're teams that we just, you know, they're all over the place that, you know, you know, you know, that with with Houston that they can go on a scoring run, like nobody's business, but they don't play a whole lot of good defense there. And they just don't have that that thing that you know, you're going to get that stop against a good team, especially in the playoffs. You've talked about how if you're a West team, you want to get that three, six matchup against Houston. Absolutely. And look, I still think defense is going to be the calling card for the Rockets because for most of the season, they've been one of the five to seven best defenses in the league. That has evaporated over the last few weeks. Yeah, I think they're running into some depth issues. You know, I think the low hanging fruit, of course, is they don't really have a point guard. You know, we're starting to see you. May you, Doka, trust, recheppered a little bit more, but it still seems forced. It still seems like, all right, I guess I'll reluctantly play you 32 minutes. Like not really going out and replacing Fred Van Vleet, not bringing in reinforcements at the trade deadline. I think it's something that the Rockets are are ultimately going to regret.

12:20Well, we'll try to sneak in a few more NBA plays for you. Only three games on the slate tonight. So we'll get to some of those later in the show. We got games starting up momentarily in major league baseball. Eric Halterman, one of our baseball experts at road and wire. He's going to join us on the progressive guest line. We'll be come back. He's got props. He's got sides. He's got totals for us on opening day. Let me get your attention real quick. Podcast listeners, it's March, which means the madness is officially upon us. And the folks at Veecin have really gone crazy with this one. I'm being told that for just $29.99, you could get unlimited access to Veecin pro through May 1st. I'm talking picks throughout the tournament, public betting data for every single game, plus sharp tools, projections, articles and more, which means every day you wait is an opportunity missed. Just click the link in the description to get started. It's March, baby.

13:20All right. Now back to the show. In 2024, a truck crashed into Cannot and more rescue where I work. 146 of our dogs needed homes fast. We asked for help on Facebook. Our stories spread through WhatsApp messages and Instagram reposts. Immediately people stepped up and just six hours later, every dog was fostered. I'll never forget how our community showed up for us. Learn how over 3.5 billion people connect to what matters with meta at meta.com slash community. Few things are as uplifting as the greatest moments in sports and nothing brings us together quite like team USA at the Olympic winter games from NBC Universal's iconic storytelling to the innovative technology across Xfinity and peacock. Comcast brings the Olympic Games home to America, sharing every moment with millions when team USA steps onto the world stage. We're not just watching. We're cheering together. This winter, we're all on the same team. Comcast, proud partner of team USA.

14:28You're watching prop points on V-Send, these sports betting network. Welcome back into prop points here on V-Send, these sports betting network. Getting you set for an 11 game major league baseball slate. We should be getting first pitch any moment, Jeff, between the pirates and the Mets, looking at the bets minus 122 on the money line Pittsburgh plus 102 at ESPN bet that is Paul skiing is going up against Freddie Peralta to help us take a look at the rest of the slates, the other 10 games. We got our friend Eric Halterman, our features editor, one of our baseball experts at roadwire.com. He joins us on the progressive guest line. Eric, the next game up for us, starting up right after we go off the air is White Sox Brewers. And, you know, we talked a little bit earlier about Jackson Churio, not being with the Brewers to start the year. He's going to miss a couple of weeks, not seeing that as a major impact as far as the pricing on this game.

15:29Brewers still have he favorite on the money line, total set seven and a half. Jacob Mizorowski going up against Shane Smith. I know you have a couple angles you like on the walkie side here. Yeah, I do. I figured I would make you happy here, Nick, for our first segment together this season, but this is not just a home or play for you. I think that the Brewers on the run line here, you can get them at slight plus money against the White Sox. This is last year's top record in the regular season against last year's second worst team. I think this should be a pretty clearly lopsided game in the Brewers favor, even without Jackson Churio, as you mentioned. The main reason is they have a huge advantage in pitching Shane Smith on the White Sox side. It's actually, I guess, a cool story that he was a rule five pick out of the Milwaukee organization last year. And now we guess based them on opening day one year later, but he is just a guy 381 ERA last year came with some ERA estimators in the low fours. Nothing really special on his deadline. He would know, be nowhere close to an open day starter on most teams in baseball.

16:31Meanwhile, Jacob Mizorowski, I'm a big fan of him this year was one of my top fantasy baseball targets. His ERA is a rookie, wasn't actually very good for 36, but that came with the ERA estimators in the 353, 360 kind of range. Strike out rate 31.9% would have been second among qualified starters last year behind only Terrick's Google. He walked too many banners, but if you look at it on a per pitch basis, rather than a per played appearance basis, his location plus, which is some fancy new model that measures where exactly did you throw the ball? That was actually good. His ball rate, which is just simply what percentage of your pitches were balls. That was league average as well. So I think there's a little bit more there with his control. The question here is how many innings is he going to throw per start? The brewers regularly capped him around five or so last year, but I think the fact that they're using him as the opening day starter means they know they're going to need to get more length out of in this season. And one of the things that I've looked at the most at preparing for today's slate is

17:32just how many pitches did guys throw in their final spring start? Mr. Rowski got up to 86, which means if that brewers won him to throw 100 today, that shouldn't really be a problem. I think that gives him time to hit some pretty high K props, at least seven or more strikeout should definitely be in play here today for Mr. Rowski. And if he goes six innings, I think the brewers are easily going to win this one by two runs or more. One of the better pitching matchups on the slate today is the Rangers and the Phillies where we got Nathan Evalty going up against Christopher Sanchez. Evalty went healthy was brilliant last year. You've got to play on the total in this game. Yeah, I'd be looking at the under on the run line. This one and I agree with you. This is one of if not the best pitching matchups on today's slate. I've got a lot of faith in both of these arms, Christopher Sanchez, an excellent choice for NLCI young this year. I think he easily could have won it last year in my biased Phillies opinion here. He should have won and he threw 14 more innings than Paul Schienz. It turns out it's easy to keep your ratios perfect.

18:32If you keep getting pulled before you have to face guys a third time through the order. Sanchez, even with that higher workload, it was a 250 ERA, a 106 whip strikeout rate of 26% not quite as high as some of the best aces in baseball, but it could have been higher. He actually had a higher whip rate than Paul Schienz. He just gets out of at bats quicker because he also has one of the highest ground ball rates in the league. So I don't think he's going to give up many runs against a pretty poor rangers offense that was 25th by WRC plus last year. And I don't think Nathaniel Valdey is going to give up many runs as well. He would have been inside young contention if not for injuries limiting him to 22 starts. The 173 ERA and an O85 whip last year, a similar strikeout rate walk rate to Chris for Sanchez as well in a high ground ball rate, not quite the same, but still elevated there at 50%. He had sports hernia surgery in October, but he's been healthy since the start of spring. So I'm not worried about workload restrictions here. So I don't think he have all these going to give up many runs either.

19:33This Philly's offense is better than the rangers, but it's an aging lineup. It gets mediocre pretty fast. You got Turner Schwarber and Harper at the top, but then you talk an Alec Bohm, Bryson Stott, Adelis Garcia. It's just not very imposing for the bottom six hitters or so. So I think this one's going to be a pretty low scoring game. Baseball season is here in Vison Pro. Just made it a whole lot more profitable with the MLB AI player prop projections powered by Opta AI. We give it you data driven projections for both hitters and pitchers compared directly to draft King's line so you know exactly where the value is. And every day we break it all down into top value plays and strong plays, so you don't have to do the heavy lifting. You can get access now with a Vison Pro subscription. Go do that over at Vison.com slash MLB props, Eric Ultraman, one of our baseball experts at RotoWire.com, joining us on the progressive guest line. Still don't have first pitch between pirates and bets, a little bit of fanfare going on with these opening day games, Eric, but let's keep pieces through some of the games later

20:35today. You just told us you like an under in Rangers Phillies. You're also looking at the under in Arizona and LA where we have Yoshi, have a photo on the mound against Zach Galen. Yeah, and we could just look at the Dodgers here, although you're going to get a great payout on that one. The reason I'm looking at the under here is I have a little bit of faith in Zach Galen's velocity bump this spring. Galen was bad last year, it was a 483 ERA, although the ERA estimators were better in the low fours, nothing special. Not somebody you'd suggest would be pitching on opening day if he performs like that. Again, the strikeouts were way down for him last year. His first six years of his career, he was at 25% or above, but it fell to 21.5% last season. But with the Velo ticking back up, there's every reason to think that he can get back into that 25% plus range with the strikeout rate. The guy who Zach Galen was, his first six seasons of 3.29 ERA, a 113 with, but you trust him to keep the score fairly low, even against the Dodgers.

21:37Yoshi Yamamoto on the other side, I guess I'm a little worried about the fact that he only got to 68 pitches in his final tune up, so maybe he's only going to go 80 or so here. But the Dodgers have a good enough bullpen, and Yamamoto is simply excellent. One of the best pitchers in baseball, as we saw in the World Series, whip under one ERA 240 at 29% strikeout rate and elevated ground ball rate as well. I don't trust the Arizona bullpen. That's the only thing that gives me real worry about the under here, so you could look instead at the under in the first five innings or some other similar prop rather than looking at the whole game. Eric, let's talk a little Houston and the Angels. Hunter Brown going up against Jose Soriano, no Jeremy Pinyan, the lineup for the Astros. On opening day, you remember he's coming back from that injury there. I thought he might be ready for opening day instead. They got color's create shortstop today. You want to dive in though and on Hunter Brown and his strikeout prop.

22:38Yeah, again, you could just look at the Angels, but I likely pay out more on Hunter Brown to go over seven and a half strikeouts. Sorry, you could just look at the Astros, I should say. But if you're betting on the Astros, betting on Hunter Brown to strike out at least eight Angels seems like the smartest way to do it to me. Brown was seventh among qualified starters last year with a 28% strikeout rate. He also got up to 83 pitches in his final spring tune up, so I think he could get pretty close to 100 pitches here, which will give him time to get at least eight Ks. And the Angels are the easiest team to strike out in baseball. At least that was the case last season and it wasn't even particularly close. They had a strikeout rate worse than 27%. The Elts was over 26% only the Rockies and Orioles were within three points of the Angels strikeout rate last year. And it's swinging this issues up and down the lineup. Mike Trout strikes out way too much now, Zach Netto, his only issue is he strikes out a bit too much. Joe Adele, he's breaking out to a certain extent, but still with all the time, Logan O'Hoppy,

23:41major with problems. There may in addition to this lineup, Josh Lowe, he strikes out too. So a very easy lineup to strike out against the pitcher who strikes out a ton of batters. I think the over on 100 browns Ks looks pretty good. All right, Eric, you got about 45 seconds left. We need a whole run prop for opening day. Who do you like? I know you have a name in mind for Red Sox Reds. Yeah, Wilson Contreras to hit a home run is my favorite home run prop on today's board. I like Contreras a lot this year. Now that he's playing in a hitters park for the first time in his career, he's had six different 20 homeers seasons, including four last five, and that's despite limited at bats due to catching and also the fact that he's been stuck at Wrigley and Bush Stadium. He'll be at in front of the green monster this season, which should be a great place to hit. But this game, he'll be in Cincinnati, one of the most home or friendly parks in the league, and he'll be going up against an extreme fly ball pitcher in Andrew Abbott. I like a few of the Red Sox Reds here, but Wilson Contreras is my favorite home run prop

24:44on today's board. Eric Ultraman, everybody, you can find all of his work for us over at rotawire.com. He'll be a frequent guest here on prop points throughout the Major League Baseball season. We are underway in Pirates Bats, already a couple runs on the board. Pirates getting to Freddie Peralta early on. We'll tell you about that. We'll be coming back. We got John Henson, former North Carolina star, currently an analyst for the field of 68. I'll put his break down this week's 16. It's coming up next. I'm Drop Point. You're watching prop points on V7, the sports betting network. Welcome back into prop points, opening day in Major League Baseball. We'll give you a quick update on the one game we have in action. Pirates jumping out to a two-nothing lead over Freddie Peralta and the New York meds.

25:45About to head to the bottom of the first inning, but Brandon Lau with a home run to score on Neo Crews. So again, two-nothing pirates getting to Freddie Peralta early, but three strikeouts through that first half inning for Freddie Peralta. We of course have the sweet 16 starting up tonight, four games tonight, four games tomorrow to help us break it all down. We welcome back in our friend, John Henson. Of course, former standout at North Carolina. Now an analyst over at the field of 68 joins us on the Progressive Gas Line. You can also catch him on the Tar Heal 24-7 podcast. John, speak it up the Tar Heals, but we need to get your thoughts. Obviously, as a UNC alum, on where they go from here, after officially parting ways with Hubert Davis earlier this week, sounds like they're more than willing to go outside of the UNC family. Do you think Billy Dottavan is a realistic target? Is there an active head coach elsewhere in the country who would make the most sense for you? Yeah. You know, it's kind of a sad day because obviously I know all those guys know their families

26:46like really close with them for over 10 years, so, but also an exciting day because, you know, now we get to kind of see what that brand is going to do, who's going to be interested. As far as the coaching search, I know Dusty Main, Tommy Lloyd's camps have called, right, with interest, you know, this is just kind of recently updated today. So I think those are the two guys, maybe that they're kind of looking at, but obviously they have games and they're in the sweet 16, so kind of got to meet with that. Otsoburgers was the guy we had on the radar as well, but I think him and the A.D. at Iowa are kind of super close, so he kind of rejected our impasses per se initially. And then, you know, in a dark horse, Billy Dottavan, I think those are the four guys that we've kind of grouped into that setting of, hey, look, these are the guys we want. Now if we get them, who knows, there's a lot of money buyouts, but it'll be interesting

27:47to see what guys are willing to leave their cushy situations to go to this Carolina, you know, or Carolina, you go to this university and coach. A lot of turnover in the triangle right now. Will Wade leaves North Carolina state after just one year goes back to LSU. What was your reaction to that? You know, I'm, I would say that we don't like losing the AC state more than Duke, so I don't feel bad for anyone over there. You know, you should have, you guys had a good coach and, you know, you guys had a good coach and whatever happened internally, you know, you let them get away. But I did hear there was some, some strife between him and the AC over there. There was some, some internal kind of things going on between him and the upper echelon management of the school. And then I heard LSU said, look, we'll give you all the money you want to come back to the school.

28:47Obviously, there's been a state thing going on. So there was a no brainer and, you know, another kind of blow to NC state, because I was like, listen, they got a good coach. They were top 25 throughout the year. They were coming. It'll be interesting to see what happens now, which it's still a really good job. But Will Wade also has probably humbled that university like, hey, look, maybe not as good as we think it is. Talk about John Henson, former North Carolina star, analyst for the field of 68 host of the Tar Heal 24 seven podcast. He joins us on the progressive guest line. John, I want to ask you about the NBA draft angle that we'll see in the sweet 16 over the next couple of days. A lot of big name prospects, of course, still in the tournament, headlined by Cam Booser. And look, you were a lottery pick yourself coming out of North Carolina. Do you have any concerns when you watch Cam Booser about how his game will translate to the NBA level? I know he's a much different prospect than you where you were more of a defense first guy. But you know, the evaluation process, I think has changed since you came out, you know,

29:49back in 2012, teams are, I think, are a little bit more, more willing to pick players apart. They're a little bit more willing to overlook college production and really try to focus on how a guy projects in the NBA. So how do you see that happening for Cam Booser as he goes through the draft process? I kind of treat it kind of like you got to be careful because, first of all, his dad was one of the strongest players I ever played against, right? So I'd imagine that's probably going to translate over to the next level in his career. So he's going to be able to bully cats a lot of nights when he gets of age and get strong enough. But I think he's going to be a solid NBA player. Like, I don't think he has a ceiling of a de Bonza or a Caleb Wilson, right? But I treat, I kind of treat like Dame Lillard. Like when I was drafted with Dame Lillard, I was like, we were kind of like, you know, obviously Dame was number 10, but he probably should went top five, right? If you could read draft. Um, Dame Lillard kind of was what he was because shoot the ball really well, it was really

30:50good. And, you know, I think that's why he dropped, right? Because everyone's like, ah, what can he improve on, right? Now, fast forward, right, multi time all star, all NBA, right, franchise leader. I think, yes, Booser has limitations, but first of all, this is the best freshman class we've seen as a whole ever. He's still going to be in the top five. And if you look at the teams in the lottery, Pacer's Jazz, Nets, Wizards, Kings, Dallas, Memphis, these are teams he could probably go to, like, can you imagine him with Halliburton? Or can you imagine him with the Wizards with AD or, or, or Dallas or, Dallas with Cooper Flag or Memphis with John Morant? So I don't think he's going to be looked upon to be like, oh my God, carry us to the, to the promised land. But having a guy that's can shoot it, he can pass. He played point guard sometimes for his Duke offense. He screams. He rebounds. He can finish. He's got soft hands. Um, I think he's going to be really good. Now, like I said, maybe they don't have to cylinder those other guys, but that doesn't

31:51matter because if you can average 17 and 11 or 17 and 10 in NBA, you're going to play for a long time, make a lot of money and win some games. I'm going to talk with John Henson, uh, John Nebraska and Iowa played a night. Is Nebraska that looks more like the team that started off 20 and O than the team that finished six and six, at least in the first two games of the tournament? What version do we get tonight against Iowa? I actually mean the boys, man, we're probably going to take this one pretty good. We're going to run hammer this one. We love Nebraska. I don't know. Um, just off the strength of, um, they turned. I will over close to 25% of the time in the last two games. Now they did split. But if I got to take a team, I'm going to take a team that has a better defense and has turned his team over consistently, um, for the Grudge match because if Iowa, obviously, that's going to be an emphasis. Let's take care of the ball. But Nebraska's defense and how they play, I don't think it's going to matter. I love Nebraska in this spot.

32:51I love the line as well. John, looking at the Iowa State Tennessee game on Friday, Joshua Jefferson considered a game time call. Really hard to project at this point if he's going to be out there, but let's say he sits. Is this a game that you would, you would confidently say Iowa State can win without him? Uh, I wouldn't confidently say I was taking win this without him, um, the splits are kind of crazy. When you look at him without, you know, I'll stay with him without him. I mean, I think it's a 15 plus point kind of difference on Kim Palm. He's like the second most player to his team, the second most important player in the team to his team in the country. Um, so something to look at, but I do think they can beat Tennessee without him. I'm, I'm not super worried about Tennessee. Um, then I am about the next round when they got to play those guys, but, uh, if he does play, I don't think he'll be 100% they're probably going to, you know, shoot the ankle up. He probably not going to feel anything, but I don't think he'll be able to move and play as effectively as he would healthy.

33:54I'm super pumped for, uh, the Illinois Houston game tonight, the Houston invitation against three big 10 teams, basically, but, uh, the Illinois, they have this link. They have this that causes problems for everyone there can Houston avoid that dreaded scoring drought that they seem to get in some of these big games? You know, I lean, yeah, I lean Illinois on this one and, you know, it's, it's pop matchups. I think this is a team they got the size Houston is 169th. I believe how can we confirm that one 169th in the country and defensive rebounding. Illinois is third in offensive rebounding percentage, um, so they can feast on the glass and people are like, oh, well, you know, Houston turns you over. Well, Illinois is going to get offensive rebounds. That's better than a turnover because you're getting new possessions by the rim, um, with a defense scrambling. Um, and then on the big side, they have the size, Tuggler and cycle tinting in the foul trouble a lot. And they're so guard reliant on Houston is it, everything screams Illinois, but it is

35:02the Houston invetational. And if you look at what Houston does in Houston, they don't lose and they shoot the ball really well when they're playing at the Toyota Center. So, um, I lean Illinois, but this is the game, but tonight I can't wait to watch. They're with you. John Henson, everybody, you know, from his days, of course, at North Carolina, you can catch him over at the field of 68, as well as as the host of the Tar Heal 247 podcast. Find him on Twitter at John Henson 31 John, appreciate the time and enjoy what should be another fantastic weekend of college hoops. Appreciate it. John Henson, everybody, again, check him out on Twitter at John Henson 31. We're going to take a break, but when we come back, we'll give you an update. Our runs on the board in pirates bets were about a half hour for first pitch between the white socks and the Milwaukee Brewers. Jeff and I get to reveal our five picks for the decent March Fetting Challenge on the other side. We'll have our best bets of the night as well to watch the top points here on the sports Fetting Network.

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37:34Welcome back into Proud Points, Dick Whale and Jeff Erickson, hanging out with you for 15 more minutes, taking you up to 2 p.m. Eastern Money Moose with JVT and Ben Stevens coming up next year on the channel. Still just one game in action, Jeff, in Major League Baseball, still in the bottom of the first inning, just one out. Paul skiing is laboring a little bit here, Jeff. Just walked to to load the bases, walked Luis Robert, so it's 2-1 pirates right now. After a bit of a shaky first inning for Freddie Peralta, he gives up a 2-1 homer, ended up striking out the rest of the batters he faced. Not exactly the pitching tool that we expected so far. No. So, Peralta gave up a 2-1 homer, Brandon Lau, and it was one of those wall scrapers, barely clear the right field wall in the corner. I think the wind might be blowing out a little bit today in city field there. But skiing, this is the thing I'm watching here, already 29 pitches still one out, two walks already in this one. Luis Robert, now that has got to be a Nick Whalen profile type of player, a guy that should be good at hasning in the last couple of years, that's right up in your way.

38:35And him being able to draw a walk, I mean, that's not what we're paying for him for. That's not what we're looking for. But that's a good development for him, actually, in real life, if not necessarily fantasy. But yeah, skiing is really kind of struggling a little bit there right now. And sometimes command is a little bit off in these early starts. Sent me out. It's a beautiful day in New York, as our man on the scene, Jason Collette, told us on serious acts of fantasy. I know we just had another big hit here for the Met's here, a triple by Brett Beatty to make this one 4-2. So big, big development going on in that game. Both starters, a little dicey in this first inning, which we thought was going to be one of the better pitching matchups of the day. So we're dropping here in judge and we're now we're cutting pole skiing to fantasy leagues as well, right? Yes. Panic drops everywhere. Absolutely. No, obviously not. But yeah, tough start if you started off with skiing like that there and he got a little babbipped earlier in this game. There was an infield hit that kind of set this up a little bit, made a good pitch, didn't get the result he wanted. And now 4-2 met. So the total in this game was six and a half, opened that. I think it got bet up to seven and a half and back down to seven.

39:37So depending on where you got it, you're already in play if you're on that there. If you got the under, tough look. Lived total out of draft games now 13 and a half, Met's just tacked on another run by the way. So they are four minus four and a half on the run line, minus 1,400 on the money line turning into a nightmare debut for pole skiing in the early going. All right. The recent March bedding challenge marches on. We're out of the sweet 16 four games tonight, four games tomorrow. So we need to make combined five picks against the spread. I don't know why this happened. I got to make two you got to make or I got to make three. Excuse me. You get to make two of our picks this weekend, not exactly rolling into the second week of the tournament, Red Hot, but feeling good about these picks for tonight and tomorrow Jeff. So I'll let you lead us off. You are joining our guide, John Henson on the align tonight. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Most other shops. I think the official line we have is two and a half, but you can find this at three and a half at hard rock here, Illinois plus three and a half.

40:40The line I linked, I think they're just going to provide a lot of trouble for this Houston offense. I know it. The narrative is going to be this is kelvin Samson's chance to finally win it. They're in Houston, all that Illinois. They're on the same plane as Houston. They are vastly underseated as a three. This is the tough break for Houston and get this draw here in this game. This should, this should be a regional final at worst. This is a really, really good Illinois team. Illinois should have been a two in my opinion. The roadwire smart money to the likes, the actual Illinois money line. There's been a lot of action on that Illinois money line. I'm going to take the simple way out though and just go ahead and take the points on this one there. The align I plus two and a half. Any concern about this game being in Houston for your Jeff? Sure. A little bit, but that's why we're also getting this line. I think this is, if this is neutral, this is like a pick up to me. I think that's really the point. I think you're right. I think you're right. Okay. So we are, we are officially logging Illinois plus three and a half in the contest. You are looking at the total Jeff and Alabama Michigan.

41:42Yeah. And I am. And again, we are stuck on a certain line here for the challenge. It's 175 and a half in the challenge. I still like the over in Alabama, Michigan, but you can find this at a lower price now over at draft Kings at 172 and a half. Give me the over on this one for sure. This is a question. Does Alabama think, can they slow down Michigan? Will they even try to slow down Michigan? Alabama likes to pay at play at pace. We've seen a lot of high scoring games with Alabama. I know with them missing players, they might be tempted to try to slow this one down, but I don't think they can't. Alabama has scored 90 plus and four of their last five. They throttled Texas Tech. They have looked as good as any team has the first two games of the, of the tournament. But I think this is going to be an up and down game. I think this is going to be a lot like Alabama Arkansas that we saw earlier in the regular season. Maybe I'm, I'm hope casting and placing the hopeium on this one here. Michigan is the team that scored over 90 plus in their first two games in the tournament as well. I like the over 175 and a half in this one.

42:44Are you still using your buddy's gut instinct as a betting strategy? Come on. You deserve better. Roll wire gives you the real tools, the pros use. We're talking right gigs, projections, breaking news updates, data that never sleeps. Whether you're setting your fantasy lineups, making picks or placing bets, road wires, award winning insights, give you a real edge, get started today over at roadwire.com. Just use the promo code visa BSIN, put that in at roadwire.com 15% off anything we offer. All right, Jeff, take it a look at my replays for the visa betting contest tonight. I will start us off. We're going to say John's Duke and I have two plays on this game. I like the total. I like a side on ride with the Johnny's at seven number seven in the contest. It's six and a half at most books right now. Look, I know Duke settled down in the second half against TCU. I'm still not 100% sold on this team. I think struggling like they did for 90% of that game against the end up. That's a little bit of a red flag. I think this is a tough matchup for Cam Booser. Duke does get the gong back.

43:45You know, they got him back for that TCU game. Should be a little bit more ready. I think that he was last weekend, but still needs to work his way back up to full strength at four turnovers, four fouls in just 13 minutes in that TCU game. I just think we have a St. John's team, Jeff, that's playing with a ton of confidence. They can't really shoot. Sometimes it just doesn't seem to matter night to night, but they attack the rim. They attack the offensive glass. They get to the free throw line. I think this is a spot where St. John's has enough confidence to hang around with Duke. They're not going into this matchup looking at, you know, Duke has this one C that you have to play a perfect game to go in and beat them. That's not really how I view this version of the Blue Devils. No, I'm with you on that one there. And in fact, many people in the ESPN brackets outright took St. John's over Duke. Even before we saw these first two games in the tournament there, I'm not surprised about that. Quick update, by the way, on Mets and Pirates, Paul Schienz did not make it out of the first inning. It gave up another double. It's five two in that game. Just hit a batter. He's out, which is half just recovering retiring two batters. Nick, let's talk about your next pick in this challenge.

44:45It's Iowa, Nebraska. It's the corn bowl. You do that. I like a high scoring game in this one here. So so my other two plays are unders here. I just mentioned I like the total in St. John's and Duke and I do like the under 142 in the contest. I like the under 134 and a half in Iowa and Nebraska. And this is one where you're looking at movement in the market. And you can take advantage of that in a contest like this where lines lock the numbers down to 135 and a half in market. So I think you have to grab the value on the 134 and a half. Two regular season matchups between these two teams, one went way under 109 total points, one went way over 159, but only 140 points in regulation. In the second meeting, we saw both teams hit double digit three is Nebraska made 20 free throws in that game. Still went only went over this total 134 and a half by five and a half. This is team number 231 and 261 in adjusted tempo on the year. One thing that does worry me here, Jeff is I do think that it starts has to shoot a better O of nine from three in that win over Florida. That does scare me a bit. But look, there's a ton of familiarity between these two teams.

45:48Third meeting of the season, I think this is kind of a feel it out game in the first half more of a defensive half court type of battle. Both teams comfortable shrinking this game, trying to win it, you know, limiting possessions late in the second half. So I will go under 134 and a half in Iowa and Nebraska. All right, and you've got an under in St John's Duke real quick. Yeah, yeah, like I mentioned, you know, I think this is a little bit more of a grinded out game. You know, St John's is a little bit more comfortable playing quickly. Duke wants to slow it down. They're outside the top 250 in tempo. Again, I said I'm worried about the shooting for St John's. They always find a way to overcome it. But again, they shot 36% as a team from the field in the Kansas game. Still won that game, they just find ways to hang around. But I don't see this as a spot where it's like a race to 85 by any means. So I think both of these teams are going to kind of beat each other up on the interior. I worry about Duke's ability to operate efficiently in the half court against the size and the physicality of this St John's team. So we'll tack on that under 142 to our official plays.

46:50Jeff, let's give out some best bets of the night before we say goodbye. You are looking at a baseball prop. I got something in the NBA. I'll let you lead us off. I think it's a good time to bet under on strikeouts. I'm going to do that with Jose Soriano pitching for the LA Angels going up against the Houston Astros. The total is four and a half strikeouts. It's minus 130 at DK. I'm still going to pay that minus 130 price. Houston Astros, one of the toughest teams to strike out. Plus, they have a healthy York Nalva res right now. That should make it even a little bit better just a heads up. No Jeremy Pena in the lineup for the Astros. I'm going to lock in that under 134 in Iowa, Nebraska. And we got to give you something in the NBA tonight. Only a three game slate. It's not a great slate by any means. But I'm going to keep Brian Palabancaro who's coming off of two of the best games of his entire season. Magic are down at least two starters again tonight. Maybe three if Jalen Suggs doesn't play. He is the entire offense against a very bad defense in the Sacramento game. So we'll go big hero over 24 and a half points in the NBA. But we back with you tomorrow at 1 p.m. Eastern reacting to the sweep 16

47:54frequent Friday's games. Buddy moves, Shabie T and Ben Stevens coming up next. Freight rail does more than move goods. It drives America's economy every dollar invested generates another $2.50 in economic activity spurring growth from farms to factories. And here's the best part. Freight railroads fund their own infrastructure saving taxpayers billions while powering the economy forward from reducing highway congestion to delivering goods safely and efficiently. Freight rail keeps America moving. Learn more at AAR dot org slash America's engine. Few things are as uplifting as the greatest moments in sports. And nothing brings us together quite like team USA at the Olympic winter games from NBC Universal's iconic storytelling to the innovative technology across Xfinity and peacock. Comcast brings the Olympic games home to America. Sharing every moment with millions when team USA steps onto the world stage.

48:58We're not just watching. We're cheering together this winter. We're all on the same team. Comcast proud partner of team USA.