Steele's "College FB Scorebook" and Lawrence's "Black Book" angle-packed

17 July 2008

By Howard Schwartz

Need the last 20 years of results of college football games, with spreads? How about a betting angle for virtually every team, each week?

Wonder who the coaches were years back or today? All this and more is at your fingertips with Northcoast Sports (Phil Steele) College Football Scorebook (375 pages, 8x11, plastic spiralbound, $29.95). Betting college totals? You have four years of results here, along with room to keep records on teams, and see what kind of surface they'll be playing on and even indications in many cases which games are designed as "Homecoming" battles. (Many bettors believe even the lowliest underdogs will try harder in front of family, friends and alumni.)

Too, the book reminds you about last year's games, where a key fumble or a late field goal impacted the score and the line. There's a thumbnail description of games from 2007 should you have missed them and think you might be on to a "revenge" game situation.

For those who think they're sharp observing the returning lettermen vs. early season upsets and success, Steele discusses it in detail along with a quick alert to which teams should show most improvement in 2008.

Steele examines which teams play the toughest schedule and when the season's over you can use the valuable Bowl Section to see past results of major bowls with the lines and results.

Overall, this is one really top-value reference guide and record-keeping resource.

Marc Lawrence's Black Book -- A Guide to Picking College and Pro Football Winners (108 pages, 8x11 plastic spiralbound, $29.95), offers a solid shortcut to trends -- and could be used by those who want someone else to figure out what happened in the past and what might repeat in the future. There are angles based on opening games, or after a double-digit loss or against a division opponent or after scoring 35 or more points. That's for the pros. For the colleges, you'll be able to quickly spot which teams are hot in their opening game or against non-conference teams or how they perform after a straight-up loss. Pro football coaches are also profiled and you can quickly isolate how a particular coach's team performs as a favorite, dog, on the road and which "role" (road favorite or road dog, for example) their team does best in. (New Orleans is 3-11 against the line as a home favorite with Sean Payton as coach and Tony Dungy as coach of the Colts is 10-5 as a home dog.)

This resource might be used to enter a weekly football contest or for a quick, lazy man's guide for a parlay card. New players, new coaches and their philosophies, plus the impact of injuries make "mechanical betting" a risky mode, but it can be fun if used in moderation.