Notre Dame Didn’t Make The Playoff And Somehow It’s Everyone Else’s Fault

Cold streaks don’t scare us; they sharpen the edges. We open with a hard look at last week’s 1–7 thud and why process, timing, and line movement matter more than one ugly card. From there, we light up our Stay Frosty segment with Kevin Stefanski’s job security and a deeper critique of talent evaluation in Cleveland, including how the Shadur decision became a public mess that bled into on-field results.

College football brings shock and opportunity. Indiana’s rise from decades of losing to Big Ten champions is more than a feel-good headline; it’s a case study in the right hire, NIL alignment, and cultural overhaul. Then we turn up the heat on Notre Dame’s playoff complaints. Head-to-head results, two losses, and the tight squeeze created by SEC and Big Ten weight tell a simple truth: join a conference or own the at-large gamble. If you care about futures and value, understanding these structural levers is the difference between chasing noise and owning the window.

The NFL slate is where market memory gets punished. The Chiefs look broken, the Bengals are effectively out, and the Bears lose by the hook in classic fashion. We break down why the Chargers plus the points in Kansas City has merit, why the Rams number still feels short, and why Miami offers sneaky value in Pittsburgh. We even entertain a delicious theory: Phillip Rivers’ comeback as a Hall of Fame clock reset while chasing Big Ben on the yardage list. Whether you buy it or not, narratives move numbers.

Bowl season strategy lands with a clear heuristic: fade the name brands when opt-outs and coaching churn sap motivation, and back programs like Boise State that treat the stage like a prize. We close with the card: New England as a live home dog, Miami to spoil a streak, group locks on totals and sides, and our flag-plant pick—Denver on the moneyline at altitude behind an elite defense. Ride the edges, not the logos. If this breakdown helped, follow, share with a friend who bets Sundays, and drop your lock in the comments so we can sweat it together.

Chapters

• 0:00 Cold Streak Recap And Contest Standings
• 1:22 Stay Frosty: Coaching Scandals And Stefanski’s Seat
• 7:26 Indiana’s Cinderella Run And Big Ten Shock
• 11:35 Notre Dame’s Playoff Snub Rant
• 17:03 NFL Week Recap: Chiefs, Bears, Bengals
• 22:08 Bad Beats And Monday Night Meltdown
• 25:05 Conspiracy Corner: Phillip Rivers’ HOF Clock
• 27:25 Bowl Season Angle And Boise State Pick
• 29:25 Week 15 Lines: Bears, Chiefs-Chargers, Pats
• 33:05 Rams Surge, Steelers Wobble, Miami Value
• 36:15 Group Locks And Read On Carolina
• 39:05 Host’s Lock: Denver Moneyline And Rationale
• 42:33 Wrap-Up And Social CTA

Transcript

Andy: 0:12

Hey everybody, today is Friday December 12th, and we are the Sportsbook Sharps. We're back for another podcast this week. We are in week 15 of the NFL, and the college football playoffs have been set. We'll get to all of that here in a little bit, but let's start with a recap like we always do. You know, if you listen to the podcast last week, I talked about how we went 6-2 over the week of Thanksgiving. We followed that up with a unreal one and seven. Yep. Unbelievable. I we just we cannot string two weeks in a row. Uncle John and I for the contest for the year are tied still at first. We both missed our picks last week. Every other member of the gambling group is under 500. We are horrible this year. Our overall record is 54 and 61. Just unbelievably bad. So but uh we're gonna jump right into it with our Stay Frosty segment. We got an update on a head coach. If you haven't kept up on social media this week, you missed a lot of activity. Uh Wednesday, it was announced that Michigan, and this is not our Stay Frosty, we'll have a Frosty one for you here in a moment, but Michigan head football coach Sharon Moore was fired for conduct. Now, apparently, uh some of the information is still coming out. We're not 100% on everything that happened, but he was apparently having an affair. He's a married individual. He was having an illicit affair with one of his assistants, a female assistant that worked for him. Uh apparently she got pregnant. Uh I don't it's unclear if he used his own funds or university funds, but apparently he uh either paid for or encouraged her to get an abortion. Um it's very uh still information coming out on it. Um in fact, even Wednesday night uh he was arrested. Apparently he threatened the the I don't know if there's an official police report out at this time, but he threatened uh his wife and said that he was going to harm himself, and then he drove over to the uh assistant's house or apartment or whatever it was, her dwelling, broke into the place and threatened to kill her and himself. Uh just tragic. Uh no harm was done. Luckily, the police got there and arrested him and calmed the situation down. But he has lost his job. He was arrested. There's a mugshot of him online, and I think the full police report might be out now on him, but uh just unbelievable, unbelievably sad. Uh I've actually met the man before uh in 2022. We went to a friend's co-worker's wedding, and he was at the event. Uh, Darby reminded me we were talking about it Wednesday night, and she's like, Didn't we meet him at this wedding in the summer of 2022? And I'm like, I don't think so. Like, I don't, I think you're thinking of somebody else. And no, sure enough, it was him. We met him. Uh the groom and him worked together at Central Michigan, so just unreal, this story, uh, and tragic and sad. And so Michigan is looking for a head coach, but not for the normal reasons. So just wanted to give an update on that. It joins a long list of programs in college football that need a head coach. But for this week's Dave Frosty, it's got to be in the NFL, and it's got to be Brown's head coach, Kevin Stefansky, for multiple reasons. I have three reasons here for you. One, he's been in Cleveland since 2022. How long do you get to be a head coach in the NFL with just mediocre results? They've had very mediocre results. Now, they've been to the playoffs twice. The only reason I'm thinking that he's keep kept his job as long as he has this year is two times in Cleveland is like 15 times in most areas. So I two times in Cleveland is actually pretty good. But the uh just five years is a long time for anybody that's had a couple of seasons in a row. Uh this leads me to parts two and three. Two is uh last year and this year's results. Three wins last year, three wins this year. I I don't know if they'll pick up a fourth win. There's only four games left. They do not look very good. Uh they might get one, but in a down year in the AFC North, it's a very bad year. You gotta figure out a way to win more than three games. The leader of the AFC North right now, if you didn't know, is Pittsburgh at seven and six. Seven and six is winning a division right now. You gotta compete in that kind of conference. You cannot, if if you're gonna be a coach that's been in a program uh uh NFL program for five plus years, and then he's next year will be a sixth year there, you you have to compete in years like this. If you don't strike this year, when is Cleveland ever going to strike? Uh they seem to be trending in the totally wrong direction, and I think that's enough to get him fired. But then finally, reason number three, I think this is the biggest reason to fire him. He lacks an he has a total inability to understand and assess talent. I'm not a very pro-Shador Sanders guy, but look, he looks a thousand times better than Joe Flacco, he looks a thousand times better than Dylan Gabriel. The way that Stefansky's handled this whole Shador thing has been a media nightmare since day one. They made him third string, they didn't give him reps, the media was you know questioning all this stuff, questioning Shador, questioning all these things why he doesn't get a play. Uh and and Shador's outplaying those other two quarterbacks. Flacco was so bad that they traded him away to an in-state rival that's in the north, and Dylan Gabriel, he just straight up stinks. He shouldn't even, he shouldn't even be a backup quarterback in the NFL. He's terrible. I'd have watched way too many Dylan Gabriel games. Uh they need to fire him and build around Shador and try to make him QB1 for next year and see what happens. And I'm not saying that Shador's gonna be some great quarterback that's gonna save Cleveland, but he's way better than what they had. And that's the head coach's job to see that. I mean, I don't I don't understand why it took until a week ago. Shador started two games now. I don't understand why it took that long to move to him. They've been terrible all season. They were they had two wins. Uh he needs to stay frosty. Alright, other than the Michigan coach situation, no more coaches fired this week. So it's like I said, it's been a lot of coaches this year, um, but nothing more to add. Let's get into a recap for the college football season. The season is over. Indiana is king of college football, and as a Purdue fan, it makes me sick. I am beside myself. I'm jealous, I'm envious, sure. But I I you know I don't hate their head coach uh Signetti, Coach Sig. Uh I don't know if it's Purdue's total lack of even fielding a competitive football team or what, but I I was kind of happy for IU to see him win the Big Ten. I thought that was very neat. A bunch of my family was at the event. Uh, my brother and sister-in-law, a couple of my uncles, uh a cousin. Like it was pretty cool. That's cool. I'm glad they're all IU people, IU fans. Many of them went to IU. My two uncles and brother and sister-in-law, they went to Indiana University. So I think it's cool. Look, uh I had a lot of fun three years ago. You know, Darby and I, my wife made the decision to go watch the Big Ten Championship game, Purdue. Uh, this was back when they had the West and the East Division, uh, Purdue versus Michigan. And I said to Darby, you know, we waited up until I think the Thursday before the Big Ten championship game, and I'm like, the prices are pretty reasonable. This is probably it. Like, I, you know, I'm getting in my late 30s, but I don't know if I'll ever see Purdue. Once they get rid of these division things, I don't know if I'll ever see Purdue play in the Big Ten football championship again. Uh, I never thought at the time that Indiana would ever play in one. Uh, they were stuck over in the East with, if you remember the way the East was laid out, I think it was Ohio State and Michigan and maybe even Wisconsin or somebody, or uh uh Penn State was over there. That was East was absolutely loaded. The West, there were many years that a mediocre to good team won the West. Um, but once the divisions were going, I knew that was gonna happen. Anyway, let's get back to IU. Talk too long there about Purdue. It I think it's nice because uh again, bringing Purdue back up, Purdue and IU historically have been big underdogs in football. Uh, and Purdue had some success in the 2000s with Drew Brees, some of the other quarterbacks that were there. But it it's nice to see programs like uh Purdue or in Indiana beat out the OSU in other SEC schools. Uh Purdue never was a number one team. Uh, it's very cool to see Indiana ranked number one. That's I mean, they don't make a bigger Cinderella than Indiana. I'm gonna give you some stats here. Uh this is a school that from 1995 through 2018 they had one winning season, and that was a seven and six season in 2007. For more than twenty years, their best year was seven and six. That's what I mean. This is big time, Cinderella. 18 year eighteen years, eighteen times during that, they uh won two or less Big Ten games, and twice they won zero Big Ten games. Even right before Signetti got there. Like if you're thinking, oh, they made the right hire and they were starting to build something. No. Even I mean, they made the right hire, but they were not building anything. They were they had to get a new guy in and start over. Uh, right before Sig got there, uh in the 21 through 23 seasons, they were uh Indiana was two and ten, zero and nine in the Big Ten, four and eight, two and seven in the Big Ten, and three and nine the season before he took over, they were one and eight in the Big Ten. So it's nice to see that making one coaching change can totally turn around a program. Uh gives hope to all those other schools out there. Like, if you just make the right hire and you put some NIL money behind him, you can make a big change. Uh congrats, Indiana, and getting to play in only their second ever Rose Bowl. The first Rose Bowl since 1967. So congrats, Indiana. Uh, speaking of Indiana schools, there was another big school from Indiana that made the news this uh past week, and that would be the folks from South Bend, Notre Dame. What a bunch of big whiny babies. They didn't get into the college football playoff, and they are big mad about it. They cried and complained it wasn't fair, they threw a big fit, and then they cried about how fair unfair it was that the ACC, uh, the ACC was unfair to them, you know, the media, the ACC media wasn't nice to us, ESPN was mean to us, they oh, they replayed our our game against Miami all week where we lost and it and it tainted the minds of the voters and all this stuff. Uh get over yourselves, all right? Uh you want to be in the college football playoff, maybe don't lose two games. How about that, huh? Back in the BCS day, there were a lot of time uh undefeated or one-loss teams got left out. Um and then even in the college football playoff, there were many years that one-loss schools got left out when there were only four teams in the college football playoff when it first started. So you were whining your two-loss team, uh, don't lose two games, and you're in. Uh there this year alone, there were one-loss schools, BYU, and missed out. So, like, I don't know what to tell you, man. Uh, one-loss schools miss out sometimes. You're a two-loss school, don't lose two games. Uh, the ACC was pretty bad this year. I know they're not in the ACC, but they play like five ACC games every year because of their weird contract. Uh, only Miami made it from the ACC as an at-large bid. Not even their champ made it. So that's how much disrespect they have. It's the top four ranked conference champs that make it, and Duke won their conference championship. I think they were seven and five. I talked about it last week. Seven and five Duke won. They beat Virginia, and because they weren't ranked, uh, actually another school jumped up ahead of them. So uh there's only 12 schools in the college football playoff Notre Dame. Uh, and ESPN has to try hard and push their SEC narrative all year long, and they try to cram in as many SEC schools. So you're fighting in an uphill battle. Uh maybe join a conference. I don't know. They SEC got in five, Big Ten got in three, that's eight schools. There's only four openings left. Two of those openings went to conference auto bids. So you only have two spots for Notre Dame. One went to Tulane, one went to Miami. You know, here's a novel idea. Maybe if Miami uh and Notre Dame uh played each other, we could use their head-to-head record to get the team in. Oh, oh wait, they did play? And Notre Dame lost? Oh, well then of course Miami goes ahead of them. They have the same record. I you put them in. You played on the field, Miami beat you. How silly would that look if Notre Dame was in the same record Miami and that, and they pulled one school and they said, okay, that you guys played head-to-head, but we're going to take the team that lost. I don't get it. You went in the college football playoff, win all your games, or heck, even only lose one game, because a one loss Notre Dame gets in almost every single year. That would be unbelievable if they didn't get in with one loss. Or, and here's a clue that 120 plus other schools have figured out. Join a conference. Four conference winners get in. You know what would have happened had you actually been a full member of the ACC? You would have played in the conference championship against Duke. So fully join them. You played Virginia and beat Virginia, or maybe if you even made the conference championship and narrowly lost or lost in overtime to Virginia or something, maybe you still get in over Miami because they like to not hold the conference championship loss against the team as a loss. So if you're in the full conference and you play in the game, I uh maybe you would have got in. I don't know. Uh but them crying, now they're not going to play in any bowl games. Who cares? We we won't miss you. We we don't miss you. Uh good riddance, Notre Dame. Uh I'm glad I don't have to watch you again this year. Uh we'll talk more college football playoff in the future episodes. No games this weekend for college football playoff. Uh, but I gotta say, five SEC schools is too many. I got that's my last comment on this whole thing. Uh, we need to cap these conferences out somehow. I don't know or if we expand, I don't really want to expand, but if they expand, then maybe we can leave five in. But three or four, I think, is a good number. I I don't know what the number is. Three or four. Um if you finish fifth in your conference, you're not worthy. Like, I I would have put BYU in before Oklahoma. I I'd rather have the second best Big 12 school in than the fifth best SEC. And I know some people that's sacrilegious to say that the 10th SEC school couldn't go undefeated. Oh, and hypotheticals they could go undefeated in the Big 12. Whatever. Like, you finish fifth in your conference, you shouldn't be in a college football playoff. The college football playoff is supposed to be the best 12 schools, and you're a fifth in your own conference, get out of here. Alright. NFL talk recap from last week. Biggest NFL story of the week. The Colts lose again. They lose quarterback Daniel Jones for the season. But the biggest part of the story is that they sign a retired, for many years, quarterback to replace him, Phillip Rivers. He is 44 years old and a grandfather and has come out of retirement for one last run. I I love this. It's literally the plot for Rocky Balboa, the sixth Rocky movie. Rocky's been retired for years. He comes out of retirement for one more fight. I hope that Rivers starts this weekend and I hope that he beats Seattle. They're like a 14-point underdog on the road. I hope that happens. Uh update on the Kansas City Chiefs. The Chiefs are dead. They are not making the playoffs. R.I.P. in peace, the Chiefs. They lose to the Texans by 10 at home. They look beyond broken. I'm officially calling it. I said last week, let me see if you know if they can beat the Texans, they can go on this run, they could win. I it wouldn't have surprised me if they won five in a row. They just rolled over last week, lost by 10 at home. They're done, cooked, finished. They would need an absolute miracle the last four weeks to make the playoffs, and I don't think I don't think they have it in them to win four games in a row. This doesn't look this is a very flawed team. I I it's unbelievable. I I I've not seen a team drop that has been to so many Super Bowls. You know, maybe New England, but I don't even think they dropped off that much. They had some years where Tom Brady got injured. They had other things. Like Mahomes didn't really get injured this year. I I just I don't I don't get it. On paper, they look very similar. They're just a year older, but like, you know, I've talked about this a lot on the podcast. They're very surprising that they're not going on that run. You know, I talked about it at the Thanksgiving Cowboys game. They didn't have that run at the end of the game that they're traditionally always have. They're just they're broken. Uh yeah. Uh the Bears lose by seven at Lambo. My lock, of course, was Bears plus six and a half. Absolute heartbreak. Look, I get it. Lambo, Green Bay, tough place to win. Uh, and Green Bay looked good. Just wildly disappointed because of the way it ended, too. The Bears were driving down seven, got into the red zone, but didn't score. I think Calen Williams on fourth down ended up throwing a pick or something, or as the clock expired, threw a pick. It didn't matter. Uh the time was up, or the it was fourth down. I can't remember what the situation maybe both. Uh they probably would have gone for two. I think uh I think. Ben Johnson, their coach, I think he's a guy that goes for two there. He doesn't want to go into overtime at Lambeau, so I think it would have covered. They either get the two and win, or they miss the two and lose by one. I would have covered, but just super disappointing. Speaking of teams that are done, like the uh Chiefs, the Bengals are done. Uh lost to Buffalo after being up ten in the fourth quarter. I don't think mathematically they're done, but they're they're done. They're all but eliminated. They're down three games with four to go. I think if they were to win out and like they would need Pittsburgh to lose out, because I don't think they have the tiebreaker with Pittsburgh. Like, there's so much that has to happen. I think on paper, technically, they're not eliminated, but they're eliminated. They're done. Um another game, a Denver game. If last week you had on your card Denver minus 7.5, I feel bad for you. I had it in my little weekly locks pick that my wife and I do, but thankfully I didn't have money on it. I didn't have it on my gambling card. Denver's up ten with like 58 seconds to go. Las Vegas gets the ball back 58 seconds to go. I'm sorry, yeah, Denver up 10. 58 seconds to go. Las Vegas gets the ball. They're out of timeouts. Five seconds left. They've driven part way down the field. They hit a pretty long pass. I'm not sure exactly where they get down to the 33-yard line. Five seconds left, out of timeouts. The Denver player that tackled the receiver bats at the ball in his hand and it pops loose a little bit. The ref throws the flag, calls delay a game, decides on that play to call delay of game on the defense. It stops the clock, and of course, Las Vegas, down 10, decides to kick a game-ending field goal. And of course they hit it right down the middle. Good distance, everything. Unbelievably bad beat. I cannot believe that the ref threw the flag there for delay game. The guy was like pushing him off of him on the pile, and he just kind of like swatted a little bit at the ball and it jarred loose. I couldn't believe it. I could not believe it. The game should have been over. They should have won by 10. Uh terrible bad beat. Monday night football. Chargers 22, Eagles 19 and overtime. Now, this was not a good game. It was a close game, but it was not a great game. We watched all of it. My wife and I. Those two offenses stink. Turnover City. Jalen Hurts is a bum. The Eagles are hard to watch this year. He had four picks. One of them he sailed he sailed it so high above A.J. Brown. AJ Brown on a crossing route. AJ Brown catches almost everything. Brown had to jump almost eight feet in the air just to get a fingertip on it. He was wide open. If Hertz even throws that anywhere near him and he hits him in stride, he probably picks up an easy 30 to 40 yards because he was wide open. I don't know what Hertz was doing there. He scaled it way over him. The Eagles, they have a real problem. Their offensive line doesn't run block well, and Hertz stinks. He's not a good quarterback. I've said this last year. I said that they were a mirage. I didn't think they'd win the Super Bowl. I said they got hot late. This happens sometimes with teams. Sometimes they just get on a roll and win a Super Bowl. I mean, it happened twice. Look at those two Giants teams that beat the Patriots in the Super Bowl. The Giants, if you look at Eli's career there, they're not very good. They barely made the playoffs most years. I think they missed the playoffs more than they made it. Just two years they got on a wild card spot and just got on a hot streak at the end of the season and won a Super Bowl. And I feel like the Eagles are that kind of situation. Hertz sucks. He's not a good quarterback, and I don't think he'll ever win another Super Bowl. He's a bum that rode Saquon Barkley last year. They had a great offensive line last year, and he rode Saquon to a Super Bowl. The Eagles are going to make the playoffs because that division that they play in the NFC East is terrible. The Cowboys would have to. The Eagles would have to lose two out of their last four, and the Cowboys, I think, would have to win out. Or the No, the Cowboys would have to go three-and-one, I think. Cowboys could go three-and-one, Eagles go two and two, or the Eagles could go. No, wait, that's not right. If they go two and two, the Cowboys have to win out. If they go one and three, the Cowboys have to go just three and one. Anyway, not much hope in Big D for a playoff appearance. Uh they need a lot of things to go right. But you know what? If the Eagles keep playing like this, maybe it's a possibility. The Cowboys have the Vikings coming up this week. Uh oh, I don't know. We'll see. Um that's gonna do it for the recap part. Now we're gonna get into the old man yells at cloud. But this week, I have no old man yells at cloud. But what I do have is a conspiracy theory for you that is absolutely incredible. And I found this on Twitter. So let me just pull up uh conspiracy theory. Here we go. Let me just pull it up here. Uh grab that roll of Reynolds wrap. It's uh tinfoil hat time. This is a conspiracy theory brought to you by at for whom J. Bell tolls. Jeff Bell. Um conspiracy theory. This is about uh Philip Rivers. Philip Rivers knew he was in a tough spot on the Hall of Fame ballot. Drew Brees, Eli Manning, and Rivers are all semifinalists. Breeze is a lock. Eli has postseason success and the Manning name and two Super Bowls. Next year, Rothesberger becomes eligible. Numbers, postseason success, Super Bowls, and then it's Tom Brady, who's an absolute lock, and Matt Ryan up on the Hall of Fame ballots. Then it's a big cliff. Rogers and Stafford are coming up. Otherwise, it's unlikely there'll be any quarterback up for the Hall of Fame until Mahomes or Allen retire and they're up for it. Rivers is 648 yards behind Rothlisberger. He can grab one more shot at postseason success, pass Rothlisberger in the process, and add a crazy final chapter to his story while also resetting his clock and having less competition on the Hall of Fame ballot. Rivers could stay retired and risk sitting on the ballot for multiple years, and by then people are really gonna start asking, like, okay, he's been on the ballot so many times, should he really be in? He was fifth all time in passing yards when he retired. Now he is seventh. Matthew Stafford is 277 yards away from passing him, so he's almost gonna fall to eighth. And Rivers is 650 yards behind Rothelsberger. So if he plays in a couple games this year, gets those yards, jumps ahead of Big Ben there. Uh, just hilarious that this guy thinks that this is actually a way for him to reset his Hall of Fame ballot clock and push it back five years when there's not as many quarterbacks of fame going up for the Hall of Fame. So just an incredible, like I said, you gotta kind of have your tinfoil hat. I don't think he probably was even thinking of that when he came out of retirement. He's probably thinking this could be my shot. The Colts are very good. If I can be even mediocre at quarterback, we might make some noise, maybe even get to a Super Bowl. He never played in the Super Bowl, he played in one AFC championship. So I don't know. Alright, time to talk about some of the big games this week. College football bowl season is here. There's only one game this weekend: the LA Bowl, Boise State, and Washington. Washington is a nine and a half point favorite. Um, in this day and age, bowl games are very hard to pick. Uh my general rule of thumb is to pick against the heavy favorites and the big name schools. Um, a lot of those big name schools have a ton of players that sit out, you know, the big SEC schools, the big 10 schools with the transfer portal and everything. There's so many coaching changes. Uh kids just don't want to play in these games, especially people that are earning multiple millions of dollars in NIL money, they don't want to play in this game. Even if they stay at the university, they don't want to risk you know getting hurt and losing out on that all that future money. So and there's really uh with the all the coaching changes, there's not a focus on these bowl games like there used to be. Um I uh but I also almost always pick Boise State. Uh so I will I will take them as big dog underdogs here. Uh almost 10-point underdogs, nine and a half point underdogs. I'm gonna take uh Boise State, but that's it. That's the only bowl game you get this weekend. So on Saturday, enjoy it. Uh Cleveland at Chicago. If speaking NFL now, Chicago seven and a half point favorites. This is a one o'clock game. But the rumor is, I guess 12 in Chicago, you could see with the wind chill temperatures of minus twenty. That is a darn cold game for one o'clock. I can't even imagine if it was later in the day when the sun was down, how cold it would be there. I love the Bears here. I think they bounced back, uh, like I said last week, they barely missed it, and they missed it by half a point. Uh Cleveland's season's over. Uh, you know, I put their head coach up on Stay Frosty. I think that Cleveland just kind of goes through the motions with the players, trying not to get hurt these last four weeks. It's gonna be super cold. They're on the road. Cleveland, like uh Cleveland's gonna just kind of pack it in, get out of there as fast as they can and get warm. I I think the Bears roll here. Um I like the Bears a lot. Chargers at Kansas City, Kansas City minus five and a half. Um I said earlier Kansas City's done. I I don't Chargers just beat the Eagles. Eagles and Kansas City both don't look as good as they did last year. I I don't understand it. So the Chargers just beat the team that beat Kansas. I I don't I know it's a different year, but like they just took care of business against the Eagles. The Eagles are looking better, I think, than Kansas City. I I I think they cover here. I don't know if I don't know if the Chargers win. It's at Kansas City. I'm always hesitant to pick uh, you know, moneyline dog at Kansas City. That's a tough one to do. Um but I I I would I'm picking Chargers plus five and a half here. I don't think they I don't think Kansas City covers that. You know, I'm gonna say all this stuff. I'm gonna say I'm gonna be the one that you could take a clip of this, uh, you know, Kansas City's dead, Kansas City's done, all this stuff, and then they're gonna rip off four in a row and somehow make the dang playoffs and and make it to the Super Bowl. This is just what's gonna happen. But I think they're done. I think they I don't know if the Chargers win this game or not. Air Bear, he's he didn't look very good Monday night. He's got like a broken left hand. It's not his throwing hand, but I don't I don't know if Kansas City uh covers five and a half. That's an awful lot. I think the Chargers cover. We got a big matchup here. Buffalo at New England. New England home dogs plus one and a half. They only have lost two games this year. I I don't get the line. Uh New England's only lost two games. They've looked very good. I I think they win this game. I don't get their home dog. I think you pick them money line. Don't mess around with the points. I think New England wins this game. Uh, this was almost my lock. Um Buffalo has looked very up and down at times this year. Even uh needed a comeback at home against the Bengals last week. They were down 10 in the fourth quarter to the Bengals at home. Uh Drake May's been very good. I I think New England wins by more than four here. If you want to do the alternate line thing, you could do that. I I think if you're just looking to bet something quick, New England moneyline. I think that's your play on this one. Detroit at the Rams. Rams minus six. Um The Rams have looked like one of the best teams in football. Uh they've won seven in their last eight. Uh the Lions in their last four have been uh win in overtime at home against the Giants, loss to the Packers at home, uh beat the Cowboys without CeeDee Lamb. I I'm not impressed. Wait, I said their last four, I gave you three games. I don't know, I didn't take the right stats there. Uh that was their I guess I missed a game there. Anyway, uh they've been very choppy, is my point. Um you need overtime to beat the Giants. You lose the pack, and you beat the Cowboys. Okay, big whoop. Uh the Cowboys defense reverted back to its first three weeks of defense. I'm not impressed. Uh I think the Rams roll them here. I this was again another one. I was like, oof. Six. I think they roll him. I think they beat him by more than six. Uh Sean McVeigh is a very good coach. I uh I like it. I think they win by more than that. Uh Miami at Pittsburgh. Yenzers minus three and a half. Uh I love Miami here. I think they win. The AFC North can't have a win streak on any of its teams. None of its teams can seem to string together two wins in a row. Uh the Steelers won last week, so that's my thought process. I think that the AFC North is destined to try and get a division winner in the playoffs at eight and nine. I the Steelers won last week. I think they lose this week. I think it's just like you gotta just flip-flop it back and forth. You can't even flip-flop it if it's a loss. It's not even a guaranteed win because they've many times lost two in a row. But I don't know if hardly any of those teams in the North have won two games in a row this year. It's unbelievable how choppy they are. Uh also, Miami, they might be the most quiet six and seven team I've ever seen in my lifetime. If I had if you had told me that Miami were three and ten, I would have believed it. But they're not, they're six and seven. Six and seven, as the kids would say. Uh yeah, I I could have believed uh two and eleven, three and ten. If you told me any of those things, I would have been like, yeah, that sounds about right. Miami's not very good this year. No, they're six and seven. Uh no way did I think they were near 500. I put Mike McDaniel up on Stay Frosty in like week three, week four. Uh he might save his job again. If if he ends up pulling out, they're not gonna make the playoffs, but if he gets if he gets them to eight or nine wins, I don't know. He might he might save his job. So I I think I wouldn't be surprised at all if Miami wins this game. So that's what I think you play there. We got a couple of the locks for this week. We've got uh these are our locks for the week. Bengals, Ravens, under 51 and a half. That came in from Greg. He said it's gonna be sloppy Joe, uh, bad weather. Take the under in the bad weather, is what he's saying. I tend to agree with that. Uh Ethan's giving us Carolina minus three at New Orleans. Um yeah, I've been hot and cold on Carolina this year. I was very hot betting against them at the beginning of the year. Then they kind of woke up and and you know, I was like, oh, now you gotta flip it and bet with them. So uh and then they've kind of cooled, they've kind of gone choppy here in the middle again. Um I I mean, I think I backed the minus three. It's at New Orleans, oh man, it's always so tough though to do that at New Orleans uh win on the road in New Orleans. That's a very tough dome to win in, but the Saints aren't very good this week, or this week, whether not very good this year. Um but they did pull off the upset on the road last week uh at Tampa. I that's what makes me hesitant about this one. I almost say stay away from this one because I don't know. I don't know what Carolina team is gonna show up. The Panthers were on a bye. You know what? The Panthers were on a bye. I change it. Not a stay away game. They've rested up. I think they're focused, they're ready to make this four-game run. I think they make the playoffs. I I think you take Carolina minus three there. I changed it. I was gonna say stay away, I changed it. I I don't think New Orleans. Again, it goes back to the teams that streak two in a row. Do you really think New Orleans they've won three games all year? You think all of a sudden at the end of the year they're gonna start winning two, three games in a row? No. No. That's not gonna happen. So it's gotta be Carolina. I like that lock, Ethan. Uh, Uncle Mike gave us Vikings, Cowboys over 47.5. Um, yeah, have you seen that Cowboys defense? Cowboys gave up 44, I think, to Detroit last week. Now the Vikings aren't Detroit, but the Cowboys defense is not good again. I don't know what happened. They they beat Kansas City at Thanksgiving, and then they immediately revert back to their bad defensive tendencies. I I don't know. It's very disappointing as a Cowboys fan this season. It feels like another lost season uh for Cowboys fans. We've had a lot of those since the mid-90s. Uh just, you know, Chad Hutchinson, quarterback, uh Quincy Carter, Drew Bledsoe, Vinny Testaverdi, most of Romo's seasons. Like it just most of Dak's seasons. Dak's been there ten years now. Like it's just another lost season for the Cowboys with no hope of Super Bowl. So I don't know. Uh yeah, that defense probably gives up enough. Um alright, that's that's all we have. We're missing Steve, Matt, Scott, Uncle John's lock this week, but that's okay. We got we got three of them, and you got mine, most importantly. You got mine. Uh look, I had to think about this one a lot this week. I'm I'm in my own head. Like I'm I'm twisted up. I thought I had the Bears one last week. I thought I read that one right. The half point got me, the hook got me. The thing that really kills me, I think it was my Uncle John that pointed it out, if I had made the lock earlier in the week, the line was Bears plus seven and a half. And it even at one point had gone down to plus seven. But by the time I decided it and picked it, it was plus six and a half. So if I had gotten it earlier in the week, I would have covered. That's gambling. That's life. You don't know, like, do you get a better line on Monday or you get a better line on Friday? That's or Sunday, even. That's that's the joy of gambling in the digital age. Um, you have any opportunity to bet it at any time, and the line is always changing slightly, uh, sometimes just enough. So I'm in my own head this week, and I'm thinking, and I'm thinking, but I'm looking at the lines, and I'm looking at it, and again, I see another two loss home team, and they're a home dog. Just like New England earlier. I said I almost made that my lock, because I think New England. England wins outright. And I see it again. I'm thinking, what and so again, I'm in my head, I'm thinking, what do the odds makers know that we don't know? I I couldn't figure it out. So my lock this week, I'm giving you Denver plus two and a half, and I am telling you, forget the points. Moneyline, Denver. That's what you want here. They're at home. They're very good at home. They're very good, period. They've lost two games all year. They're a very good team. Their defense is unbelievable. And it's especially good at home. You want to sprinkle the under here? You probably get an under as well. But I I love Denver to just win here bigly. Packers on the road this year. They've lost to Cleveland. They tied at Dallas. They won by four at the Cardinals. One by ten at the Steelers. Seven at the Giants, seven at Detroit. The Broncos defense is leaps and bounds better than any of those teams I talked about. The Giants. Please. Giants stink. Cowboys defense, stink. You tied them? You tied them. Oh my. Cardinals, three wins all year. Steelers, I just talked about that AFC North. Nobody can win two games in a row. You beat them by ten? Like, you think you're gonna the odds makers are looking at this and saying, yeah, Green Bay wins by three or two and a half? On the road? No. No, no, no, no, no. Broncos defense, elite this year. I'm giving it the elite tag. Uh their offense is good, not great. But I don't think you need a great offense to beat the Packers. I think Denver wins this game. I think they win it by seven. Denver plus two and a half. That's my lock of the week. That's gonna do it. Oh, also against the spread. Denver at home. When they're or Denver on the year. I forgot one last stat. Denver as an underdog this year against the spread, three and one. Three and one. That's such a good number. I mean, four times. They've been an underdog. They've covered three out of those four times. I love Denver here. Yeah. Denver plus two and a half. That's my lock of the week. I already bet it in the app. That's my lock. That's gonna do it for this week's show. We have the dog picks still coming up on the old TikTok. Follow us at TSS Gambling. Uh we'll be posting the AI thing with the picks and everything. And then I'll try to get you Uncle John since he's so good this year. I'll try to make sure everybody sees Uncle John's pick because he's tied with me for first. So that's gonna do it for this week's episode. Thanks, and good luck gambling, everybody.