More Saturday college football betting action, and this game takes us down to the deep south as the Memphis Tigers take on the Mississippi State Bulldogs at Davis Wade Stadium in Starkville, MS.  Both teams are looking to rebound from back to back losing seasons.  Memphis went 2-10 SU/2-9 ATS last year, while Mississippi State went 5-7 SU/6-5 ATS.

Memphis Tigers at Mississippi State Bulldogs
September 4, 2010—4:00 PM Pacific

It’s not often we get to talk about Elvis Presley as part of a football handicap, but in this game at least it’s a perfect fit.  ‘The King’ was synonymous with Memphis where he lived for much of his life in the famous Graceland mansion.  He was born in significantly more humble circumstances in Tupelo, Mississippi—just over an hour to the north of the site of this football game.  By the early 1970’s, Elvis was the biggest star in the world and every now and then he’d fuel up his Convair 880 jet (‘The Lisa Marie’) and set forth on what he called the ‘Takin’ Care of Business’ tour.  The term ‘Takin’ Care of Business’ –and more frequently the abbreviation ‘TCB’ was a frequent motif in Elvis’ increasingly gaudy jewelry and apparel, and the logo with the iconic lightning bold was emblazoned on the tail of his jet.

For Mississippi State, the theme of this game will very well be ‘TCB’.  They’ve got a nasty scheduling stretch over the next three weeks starting next Thursday night against Auburn and continuing with a contest at LSU and then home against Georgia.  As a result, this game become far less meaningful  and presents the very strong situation where a big favorite will be happy to bank any kind of victory and won’t have much interest in covering a big margin.  With a nationally televised ESPN Thursday Night Game just five days away, the biggest priority will be to keep the starters healthy and get a win of any sort.

There’s plenty of rebuilding work to be done at Memphis, but they got things off to a good start by firing Tommy West—on a short list of the worst Division 1 football coaches in recent memory.  Just getting him out of town makes this team automatically better, and we generally like the hire of former LSU running backs coach/recruiting specialist Larry Porter (who played running back at Mississippi State in college).  We won’t have many opportunities to use Memphis this season, but against a sub .500 team which isn’t a good favorite to begin with (1-4 ATS/2-3 SU as a chalk L3 years) and in a perfect scheduling spot for a dog play this price is just too high.   The Tigers have always been competitive in this series from a pointspread standpoint (6-6 ATS L12 overall including 4-2 ATS at Starkville) and against a Mississippi State team on a 1-5 ATS run in non-conference games we’ll take the points.  Mississippi State will ‘TCB’ and get the win, but Memphis will do enough to cash our tickets.

Bet Memphis +21’ over Mississippi State

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