Sports Handicapper ASA's Picks & Predictions

ASAwins NBA play on LA Lakers -9.5 at Utah Jazz, 8pm ET - I hate to be a ‘square’ today but even they win at times so give us a ticket on the Lakers -9.5 at Utah. We are betting a premium price here but the rest trends outweigh the number. The Lakers fall into a 61-24 ATS trend as they have been off since November 18th against this same Jazz team. The Lakers won the most recent meeting by 14-points and have won 5 of the last six against the Jazz. We know L.A. should get plenty of good looks in this game and will knock down shots with their #1 rated team FG% at 51.1%. The reason we know this is because the Jazz are 26th in FG% defense allowing 48.9%. Utah will have a tough time scoring with an offense that ranks 21st in oEFF scoring 1.149-points per possession, going up against a Lakers D that is 9th in dEFF. The Lakers should also have an easier time covering double-digits against a Jazz team that has allowed 140 or more points in 3 straight and 132 or more in four in a row. With 3+ days rest we like the Lakers big in this one.

#685 ASA PLAY ON Utah State -7.5 over Davidson, Sunday at 9 PM ET - Utah State is currently rated as the best team in the Mountain West and 39th in the country per KenPom. That’s nearly 30 spots higher than last year’s team that went 26-8 and made the NCAA tourney. The Aggies have a number of key players back from that team including 4 of their top 6 players. They are 5-0 on the season with all double digit wins with the exception of their 3 point win over a very good VCU team. How good was that win? The only other loss VCU has this season was @ NC State (ranked 19th per KenPom) by just 6 points in a game where the Wolfpack made 15 more FT’s. Davidson is also 5-0 but they have yet to face a top 100 team. They are coming off a win here in Charleston on Friday over Boston College. BC shot only 14% from 3 in that game, made only 57% of their FT’s and turned the ball over on 24% of their possessions. The Wildcats lost most the key players off their 2024 roster returning only 1 starter (4 new starters are all transfers) and a few lightly used reserves. They are due for big time regression from 3 point land both offensively and defensively. They currently have made 42% of their 3’s (14th in the country) on the season while limiting opponents to 23% (7th) from beyond the arc. The Cats are facing a USU offense here that ranks 13th in FG% and is averaging 88 PPG. The Aggies should control the boards vs Davidson, who is a poor rebounding team and USU creates turnovers at almost a 22% rate. Not great for a Davidson offense that ranks 248th in offensive turnover percentage. We like USU by double digits.

#260 ASA PLAY ON New Orleans Saints -1.5 over Atlanta Falcons, Sunday at 4:25 PM ET - The betting markets indicate that the Saints are the play in this NFC South showdown. The tickets are on the Falcons, the money is on the Saints. The Falcons are in a tough scheduling situation here as they played two weeks ago and went into OT only to lose to the Colts. Last week they were home against the Panthers and lost again…in overtime and the defense has played 179 snaps in the last two games. That’s not ideal when they’ve played 6 straight weeks (1-5 SU). Atlanta lost starting QB Penix to a knee injury and will also be without, arguably, the best WR in the NFL this season, Drake London. Sure, Kirk Cousins is an experienced quarterback, but he didn’t play well in his start against the Dolphins (lost and produced just 10-points) 21/31 for 173 passing yards. As for the Saints, they are coming off a bye week and should be well prepared here. The change at QB for the Saints has been an upgrade with Tyler Shough coming off a solid game against the Panthers two weeks ago in a 17-7 road win. Shough was 19/27 for 282 yards, 2 TD’s and a 128 passer rating. New Orleans just 1-5 SU in their last six games but all four losses came against teams leading their division with a combined 30-11 SU record. We like the Saints to win this by more than a FG.

#256 ASA PLAY ON Arizona Cardinals +3 over Jacksonville Jaguars, Sunday at 4 PM ET - The Jags are vastly overvalued in our opinion. They are 6-4 on the season yet their point differential is only +14 which is 13th in the NFL. Their stats aren’t great and actually fairly comparable to this 3-7 Arizona team. The Jags are +3 YPG and -0.2 YPP on the season. The Cards are +0 YPG and -0.1 YPP on the year. The Cards have played a very tough schedule and they’ve been competitive for the most part with 5 of their 7 losses coming by 4 points or less. 6 of their last 8 games have come against San Francisco (twice), Seattle (twice), Green Bay, Indianapolis, and Dallas. We’re getting some line value here because Arizona is off back to back blowouts @ Seattle and last week here vs the Niners. Their loss to SF last Sunday we very deceiving as they lost by 19 points, yet outgained the Niners by over 200 yards and by +1.5 YPP. Their other 4 home games were all decided by 5 points or less. The Arizona offense has been much better since veteran Jacoby Brissett took over at QB. He already had over 1,500 yards passing (in 5 starts) and they are averaging 24 PPG (20 PPG prior to Brissett taking over). Since he took over they have outgained 4 of their 5 opponents including Indy, Green Bay, San Fran, and Dallas. Can’t trust Jacksonville laying points on the road. They are 2-2 away from home with losses @ Cincinnati and @ Houston and wins @ San Francisco by 5 (Jax had punt return for TD) and @ Las Vegas by 1. They were outgained on a YPP basis in 3 of their 4 road games. The Jags are coming off a blowout home win over the Chargers (also giving up some value here) and they have 2 division games on deck so a possible flat spot. Jacksonville was favored by only 1 point @ Las Vegas just a few weeks ago (won in OT) and now favored by a full FG @ Arizona who is better than the Raiders (Arizona 21st overall DVOA and Las Vegas 29th). This has upset written all over it.

#253/254 ASA PLAY ON Over 49 Points – Indianapolis Colts vs Kansas City Chiefs, Sunday at 1 PM ET - Always important to keep a close eye on the weather this time of year and it looks perfect in KC on Sunday. Temps in the 50’s, no precipitation, and very light winds for this one. The Chiefs have been very good offensively at home this season. In their last 4 home games they have put up 37, 30, 31, and 28 points. Patrick Mahomes should have a field day vs this Indianapolis defense that ranks 19th in total defense and 25th vs the pass. KC is 2nd in the NFL in points per possession at home and they score points on 49% of their offensive possessions (2nd in the NFL). Who is 1st in the NFL in that stat? The Colts who have scored points on almost 57% of their possessions this season. Indy has scored at least 29 points in 8 of their 10 games this season. In the 2 games where they did not reach that point total, the Colts had 9 total turnovers taking away many chances to score by limiting their total possessions without a turnover to just 14 in those 2 games. We’re looking at 2 top 10 offenses (Indy #1 and KC #7) and 2 top 5 passing teams (Colts #3 and KC #5). We think this game gets well into the 50’s.

#254 ASA PLAY ON Kansas City Chiefs -3 over Indianapolis Colts, Sunday a 1 PM ET - This is a gigantic home game for KC. A must win spot as they sit at 5-5. Much more important game for the Chiefs compared to Indy who has a 2 game lead in the weak AFC South. The Chiefs are coming off back to back road losses @ Buffalo and @ Denver. Mahomes has NEVER lost 3 games in a row in his career. KC has been much better offensively at home where they average 28 PPG (22 PPG on the road) and 380 YPG (349 YPG on the road). KC is averaging 3.11 points per possession at home which is 2nd in the NFL compared to 2.31 on the road (12th). They have better offensive AND defensive numbers this year with a 5-5 record compared to last season when they went 15-2. Crazy stat…KC currently has a +73 point differential with a 5-5 record and last year they had a +59 point differential with a 15-2 record! This team is better than their record. We’re not sure how good Indy is? There are very solid, however 6 of their 8 wins have come against the Titans (twice), Raiders, Dolphins, Cardinals, and Falcons who are all at least 3 games below .500 and have 13 total wins between them. The Colts are 2-2 vs teams that are currently .500 or better with wins over the Chargers and Broncos with losses vs the Steelers and Rams. We think there’s line value as well with KC at home as they were just favored by 2.5 @ Buffalo and by 4.5 @ Denver and now laying only a FG at home. Since 1990, there have been 14 times where a team with a 5-5 record or worse is favored over a team with an .800 or better record. Those favorites are 12-0-2 ATS. Let’s take KC in a must win spot at home.