The 2020 season brings new challenges to handicapping college football odds. With the uncertainty of players opting out, or being forced out due to COVID-19 or just being near someone who had COVID-19. It makes logical sense to me at least that you may not want to follow steam moves
At the end of the day what do we really know about these teams, the players, and how they will react psychologically if a player is out of practice, or a game. The distractions will be in abundance this year, along with the fact that most home games won't have as much home field advantage, but do players go into those games underestimating those home teams as an away team, because there won't be any fans? There is a lot to unpack, and the fact of the matter is, fading steam moves in college football during the early parts of the season has been extremely profitable. Why? It makes logical sense to me. There is no way a line could move 3 points due to 99% of the players in college football, but it happens all the time. Fading line moves over the last 3 years of 2-3 points would have gotten you a 64-46 ATS record. I didn't cherry pick the data. I haven't gotten a chance to go back to 2016 and beyond.
If you want narrow down data even more, Fading the steam move on an away under dog in week 1 1 has produced a 19-8 ATS record and when the closing line is less than 21 points, it's 10-2 ATS. Meaning if you have an away dog +10, and it moved to +7.5, you actually don't want to back that team. There is value on the favorite with that line move, and it makes sense, because the Oddsmakers really are not 3 points off on their opener, and "smart money" is not always right money, and we have seen it more and more over the past few years.
Home Favorites in week 1 are 11-23 ATS and when the closing line is 21+ points and when the line moves 3.5 points or more in their favor they are just 5-14 ATS. So if you have Georgia open up as a -21 favorite and they move to -25 point favorites, you are going to get better value on the road dog. You already missed the value in the number, DON'T CHASE!
I found this extremely interesting and plan on tracking it for 2020, and going back further. A lot of these large moves could be setups for bigger money coming back on the otherside or even a bettor attempting to get a middle. For Example, you know a team is going to steam, so you take Georgia -21 early, and then when it steams to -25 you come back in on the dog hoping for a middle.
