This is a multi-part series of how I grade the home field edges. On the right-hand pages of the magazine for all 136 teams (Delaware and Missouri St added this year), I list the home field advantage. I think college football crowds are the best in sports and some teams have larger home field edges than others. In Las Vegas the standard is to give 3 points to the home team. I believe there is a large difference in home field edges in college football. Traveling to face Mississippi St and having to face the cowbell noise is a daunting task. Some stadiums that may not be 100,000 but are very loud like Oregon and Washington which are a lot tougher venues than traveling to Akron or Connecticut. Last year my home field edges in the magazine ranged from 2 to 5.5.
I have given you the straight up records of all 136 teams for the last three and five years excluding 2020. I excluded 2020 as most games did not have any crowd at all so there really was no home field edge. Also, teams played an uneven number of games ranging from a full slate to zero. The fact that no crowds were there made it abnormal and would have skewed the stats. My third home field blog I introduced the great equalizer: the Las Vegas Spread. In a perfect world Vegas gets 50% of its bets on one side and 50% on the other side and they collect the juice (10%) with no risk. Earlier I showed you that home teams win roughly 64% of their games straight up and some teams had a perfect record over 3 years. I gave a 6.0 only for 100% but in the ATS world I had to grade on a curve as not team could accomplish 100% as Vegas would adjust the lines each week to balance the action until they were overpriced. You will notice the Graded on a curve column has been added.
In 2022 three teams managed a perfect ATS record at home despite the 3 teams combining for a 4 straight up losses. In the straight up records, the teams at the top are almost always the powerhouses. Vegas evens things out so the undefeated spread teams were far from your normal blue bloods in Oregon St, Duke, and Louisiana Tech. In ‘23 only one team managed a perfect ATS record at home and that was Arizona at 6-0. Three teams had 6-1 marks, and they were Kansas St, Kansas and Jacksonville St. Last year Arizona St was the only team to be undefeated ATS at home (6-0 SU and ATS). Indiana was 7-1 ATS, Colorado 5-1, Baylor 4-1, Marshall 5-1, Ohio U 5-1, FIU 5-1, UTSA 5-1 and Georgia Southern 5-1 ATS. The teams at the bottom last year were both in the ACC as North Carolina and Wake Forest each went 0-7 ATS in their home games.
I include the spread in my calculations, not to figure out which are the best teams to wager on but those teams that lived up to or beat Vegas’s expectations on a weekly basis. Georgia which is an outstanding 31-1 Straight up Between the Hedges but is just 10-21 ATS so while they win at home they do not COVER! Last year the teams at the top of the 5 years ATS charts were UAB,
Let’s look at the last five years ATS records for each team at home.
Remember the last five years does not consider 2020 when games were played in empty stadiums. UAB was at the top of the chart in ‘23 with a super 21-6 78% ATS mark the previous 5 years. I mentioned grading on a curve. 21-6 in the Straight Up category would have been worth a 4.67 grade but in the ATS category since they are at the top of the chart, and I am grading on a curve they were a perfect 6.0. Last year UAB again topped the chart, but you could see the need for a curve as their five year ATS record of 20-8 is only 71.4% and would have only been worth 4.29 points for the number one team. The other teams at the top were Kansas St, Oregon St, Georgia Southern, Utah and Oklahoma St. While Georgia Southern went 5-1 ATS last year at home Vegas evened the playing field for the others ATS as the other five combined to go 12-19 ATS. This year The teams at the top are newcomer Delaware at 9-4 ATS with Oregon St, SMU, Kansas St and Georgia Southern all teams that are hitting 67% or better at home the last 5 years (not including 2000). Georgia is the name that jumps out at the bottom as I mentioned above with Stanford, Northwestern, New Mexico, Tulsa, Georgia Tech Vanderbilt, Missouri St and Northern Illinois all have a 33.3% or lower ATS win percentage at home the last 4 years.
While home teams win 64% of their home games straight up, the home teams are just 2121-2117 ATS the last 5 years. As I mentioned above Vegas’s goal is a 50% margin and they basically hit it with the home teams at 50.1% ATS over 5 years!
Unlike the Straight up records chart, the blue bloods that were at the top of that are more towards the middle here. I think the best value against the spread is playing the teams that not everyone follows. That is why my magazine is such a huge plus as I give the same amount of coverage to a team like Buffalo or Middle Tennessee St that I do to Alabama. The public knows about the Top 15 or Top 25 teams but knows very little about the rest of the 136. That value is reflected here as the top 17 home field records feature SEVEN Group of Five teams. Marshall went 13-5-1 ATS at home from 2013-15 but Vegas raised the prices on them at home and the next 5 years they are just 9-22 ATS at home. Now that Vegas has lessened the home field penalty they had a solid 5-1 record last year. Nebraska always has a full stadium but showing the disaster of the Scott Frost era, they were just 12-22 ATS his last 5 years of records (remember does not include 2020). Stanford was 13-7 ATS at home from 2013-15 but is just 9-22 ATS the last 5 years.
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Last year the VIP deal worked out tremendously well. All VIP members had access to the magazine two days after we sent it to the press, and they had EXCLUSIVE ACCESS to the digital magazine for two full weeks. The magazines were shipped priority mail to them as they rolled off the press and VIP members had the actual magazine in their hands about 3 weeks before it went on sale at Barnes and Noble. All VIP members received FOUR Free Issues of Inside the Pressbox and those 4 issues combined to go 16-9 on the Best Bets released over those 4 weeks for a very profitable bonus! Last year I added a Super VIP in which you get two magazines, and for the Super VIP’s, I gave away the full year of Phil Steele Plus access ($99 value) all for just $69 including shipping. Here is a link and we do send out the magazines on the FIFO method of First In (first ordered) First Out (first shipped). So right now, if you order your magazine will be shipped on the first day but that window is closing fast. Also, I may change my mind on giving away a full year of Phil Steele Plus with the Super VIP order but it is available at least thru March.
