{"id":3643,"date":"2023-05-07T15:58:04","date_gmt":"2023-05-07T19:58:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/spartanshadows.com\/?p=3643"},"modified":"2023-05-07T15:58:04","modified_gmt":"2023-05-07T19:58:04","slug":"michigan-state-football-what-to-make-of-win-total-set-at-4-5-by-vegas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/spartanshadows.com\/?p=3643","title":{"rendered":"Michigan State Football: What to make of win total set at 4.5 by Vegas"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2>Caesar&#8217;s Sportsbook has set the Michigan State football win total at 4.5 for the upcoming 2023 season. What do we think of that?<\/h2>\n<p>Caesar\u2019s Sportsbook has released some early season win totals for college football. <a href=\"http:\/\/spartanshadows.com\/michigan-state-football-ken-talley-predicts-big-season-for-malik-spencer\/\">Michigan State football<\/a> is currently set at 4.5 wins. The over is juiced to -180, with the underpriced at +150. These splits would indicate the true projected number is probably closer to five.<\/p>\n<p>Before we get into whether or not there is any value in betting this, let\u2019s talk about what this means for Michigan State. In reality, it means nothing. Michigan State is going to get their chance to go and win all 12 games regardless of what Vegas thinks. Their projections have absolutely zero impact on the outcome of games.<\/p>\n<p>But there\u2019s a reason the resorts in the desert are so massive and the city keeps expanding. The house always wins. In other words, your average Joe sports fan isn\u2019t setting the line. Thousands of data points go into these totals. Vegas projections are noteworthy because they\u2019re usually pretty darn close.<\/p>\n<p>In that case, this is a pretty concerning number for Michigan State. Five wins should be the absolute floor for a school like MSU based on its baseline talent and schedule. Vegas is telling us that there\u2019s a chance they don\u2019t even get that many. It\u2019s hard to disagree. The Spartans were not competitive in a number of games last year and beat one team (Illinois) that finished better than 6-6. They\u2019ll be without their two leading receivers from last season and their starting quarterback. The defense showed improvement late last season, but still appears to be a ways away from being a dominant unit.<\/p>\n<p>Let\u2019s take a look at the 2023 schedule to see if we can find five wins in here somewhere.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Sept. 1: vs. Western Michigan<\/li>\n<li>Sept. 9: vs. Richmond<\/li>\n<li>Sept. 16: vs. Washington<\/li>\n<li>Sept. 23: vs. Maryland<\/li>\n<li>Sept. 30: at Iowa<\/li>\n<li>Oct. 14: at Rutgers<\/li>\n<li>Oct. 21: vs. Michigan<\/li>\n<li>Oct. 28: at Minnesota<\/li>\n<li>Nov. 4: vs. Nebraska<\/li>\n<li>Nov. 11: at Ohio State<\/li>\n<li>Nov. 18: at Indiana<\/li>\n<li>Nov. 25: vs. Penn State<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Personally, I always find it tempting to bet the over on low win totals because, well, you don\u2019t need as many wins to win your bet. Your bet stays alive for much later in the season &#8212; even if it seems improbable. On top of that, there\u2019s always the potential to cash it early in the season if the team pulls an upset or two.<\/p>\n<p>As far as Michigan State in 2023, I can\u2019t recommend laying -180 for this team to get to five wins. The juice is too much, so I\u2019d recommend waiting until we see some fives out there on other books. Even if or when that does happen though, I can\u2019t endorse it.<\/p>\n<p>Assuming Michigan State football beats Western Michigan and Richmond, we\u2019ve still have to find three more wins. I\u2019m going to go out on a limb and say Michigan State won\u2019t beat the Buckeyes in Columbus. They\u2019ll have a puncher&#8217;s chance against Michigan and Penn State because those games are at home. But I\u2019d still expect the Spartans to be at least two-touchdown underdogs.<\/p>\n<p>That leaves seven games. Can MSU go 3-4 against Maryland, Iowa, Minnesota, Rutgers, Indiana, Nebraska, and Washington? Maybe. But I\u2019m not betting on it. Maryland appears to be a program on the rise and handled MSU with relative ease in 2022. You know you\u2019re getting a tough Iowa defense in a place where MSU has struggled tremendously over the years. Minnesota took the Spartans to the cleaners in 2022. Nebraska should be improved with Matt Rhule in year one. The two easiest games on this schedule &#8212; Indiana and Rutgers &#8212; are both road games, where nothing is a given.<\/p>\n<p>Quite honestly, I think the season comes down to how Michigan State football plays in September. They have the benefit of playing four games in a row at home to start the season. If they can find a way to win three of those games, I think this cashes with ease. But if they come out at 2-2, with five of their eight remaining games on the road, then things get dicey.<\/p>\n<p>As of now, I\u2019m staying away entirely. Vegas was wildly wrong on Michigan State in 2021 with this same number of 4.5. They did not see Kenneth Walker coming. Maybe there is a difference-maker within the program of that quality. But I\u2019m not putting money down on it. As noted, MSU\u2019s baseline level of talent scares me off the under as well. Plus, that\u2019s just not fun to root for.<\/p>\n<p>Wait this one out for a better number and to see if MSU adds any unexpected talent via the transfer portal.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Vegas is not high on MSU.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":27,"featured_media":3656,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[173],"tags":[191,189],"class_list":["post-3643","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-football","tag-michigan-state-football","tag-michigan-state-spartans"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/spartanshadows.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3643","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/spartanshadows.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/spartanshadows.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spartanshadows.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/27"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spartanshadows.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3643"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/spartanshadows.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3643\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spartanshadows.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/3656"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/spartanshadows.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3643"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spartanshadows.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3643"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spartanshadows.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3643"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}