2005 Arkansas Razorbacks Handicapping Review

 

By Tom Wilkinson

 

The Arkansas Razorbacks entered the 2004 season as established winners, bowlers, and perennial SEC West Division title contenders. Arkansas was coming off a nice 2003 season in which they finished 9-4 straight up and won four of their last six games against the odds. The last payoff was a 27-14 Independence bowl win over Missouri as 2.5-point chalks.

Arkansas got off to a fantastic start in 2004 with a 63-13 blowout win over New Mexico State as 20.5-point home chalks. The win was a signal to many sports betting bloggers that the Hogs would again be a solid bowl team that might even contend for the SEC Championship Game. Although Arkansas lost their next game to Texas, 20-22 as 12.5-point home dogs, it was a good sports handicapping indicator that they could compete with the nation’s elite teams. At this time, however, as Arkansas gained the trust of many sports bettors and appeared on more and more lists of their football picks, their value became overpriced. Arkansas was installed as 30-point home chalks against Louisiana Monroe and won 49-20 handing sports bettors that overpaid a very bad beat. In their next game, however, Arkansas was again a reasonable sports handicapping value as they hosted Alabama, a name brand college football team that was playing well at the time, which made Arkansas a bargain as 5-point chalks. The Hogs got the money with a 27-10 win. At this point Arkansas was 3-1 both straight up and against the odds and again in good standing amongst the majority of sports bettors.

A great example of a sports handicapping trap, however, developed in Arkansas’ next game at Florida. The Gators were struggling and coach Ron Zook was under extreme and heavy fire. The talented Gators were written off by many sports betting bloggers who vowed to never again include them on their lists of football picks while Arkansas appeared to these folks to be an up and coming team. Florida was installed as a 7.5-point home chalk by the sports betting odds makers and covered 45-30 demonstrating Arkansas’ poor value at the swamp. Arkansas confirmed themselves as pretenders in their very next game at Auburn, where they were beaten 20-38 as 13-point dogs. Now Arkansas got some of their value back and was a bargain as 8.5-point home dogs against Georgia, covering in a 14-20 loss, which was their first of three consecutive wins against the odds before failing vs. the line in their final two games of 2004.