Art Aronson Handicapper at AAA Sports

This is a 10* on PORTLAND

The Knicks are 8-9 and holding down 8th place in the Eastern Conference, which is a lot better than where we thought they’d be at this point of the season. Generally regarded as one of the worst teams in the league coming into the season, New York has been an underdog in virtually all of its games thus far. They’d pulled three consecutive upsets prior to losing 103-94 in Sacramento Friday night. But one easy thing to note here is that they are last in the league in points per game. Portland, who is dealing with some injuries right now, is 8-6 and fourth in the Western Conference. They haven’t played since Monday when they were defeated 125-104 by San Antonio. The Blazers were supposed to face Memphis Wednesday and Friday, but those games had to be cancelled due to the Grizzlies’ COVID-19 issues. "Between getting extra rest and extra reps, the practices have been good for us,"Portland head coach Terry Stotts said. "It helped. There is no question that having extra time to work on things on both ends -- we need to adjust. Different guys will have different roles. From that standpoint, missing these two games was good for us." We’ll put our faith in what the coach had to say as it’s unlikely the Knicks can continue winning regularly. They are 2-6 ATS their last eight games in Portland. Play on PORTLAND

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This is a 10* on EDMONTON

Edmonton has just four points after six games as they are 2-4. While they were able to salvage splits against Vancouver and Toronto, they were swept by Montreal. Now it's onto Winnipeg where they’ll take on a Jets team that is 4-1 and second in the North Division (all Canadian teams). But the key to the Jets start is the fact they just played Ottawa three straight games and won them all. They were just in the Nation’s capital Saturday, so there’s no rest between games. Yesterday was a late game as is this one. Two of Winnipeg’s wins have been in overtime and yesterday they trailed 3-2 in the third period. They just made a big trade, dealing Patrik Laine to Columbus for Pierre-Luc Dubois. Because of quarantine rules, Dubois isn’t going to be available immediately. Edmonton has promised to shake up the blue line and they are the play here as the Jets record is a little phony. Winnipeg is 3-14 the last 17 times its played a third game in four nights, which is the situation here. Play on EDMONTON

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THIS IS A 10* ON SAN DIEGO STATE

By the time Tuesday rolls around, San Diego State and Air Force will have met in three straight games. Here in Colorado Springs, they are used to see things “flying high,” but in this case it’s the Aztecs who came in and took the first game 98-61 as 13-point favorites. That win snapped a 4-game ATS slide and was a nice bounce back for a team that has just gotten swept the week prior by Utah State. The Mountain West is shaping up as a fairly strong league this year with the likes of Boise State, Utah State, Colorado State plus SDSU. Air Force is simply not in the same class as those teams as they are now 0-5 against them with all five losses coming by double digits. The Falcons have won just one time in the last seven games and aren’t even averaging 60 PPG this season. No team in the country takes fewer shots per game. They’ve also given up 77 or more points in five of the last six losses. San Diego State is excellent defensively and is giving up less than 60 PPG on the road. They’ve covered 14 of the last 17 on the road. Five players were in double figures Thursday as the Aztecs picked it up with leading scorer Matt Mitchell on the shelf. More of the same Sunday. Play on SAN DIEGO STATE

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This is a 10* on OVER

The big question this week is whether or not Patrick Mahomes is going to play. He left the Divisional Round win over Cleveland with a concussion. Mahomes was practicing again Friday after taking almost all the snaps in practice on Wednesday and Thursday. So it sure does look like he’s going to be the man under center for the Chiefs Sunday as they face the Buffalo Bills in a rematch from Week 6 of the regular season. Kansas City won in Buffalo, 26-17, in what was a hastily rescheduled game played on a Monday night. Since that time, the Bills have been beaten just once in 12 games and that came on the “Hail Murray” vs. Arizona. With or without Mahomes in there (we expect him to play), expect this game to be higher scoring than the one from the regular season. The Bills are averaging 30.3 points/game this year while the Chiefs are at 29.1. Last week was not indicative of what we’re used to seeing from either offense. KC ran for a season-best 245 yards against Buffalo the first time. Meanwhile, Buffalo is as pass happy as it gets.The Chiefs defense is the worst in the league in the red zone, so expect the Bills to score touchdowns, not field goals, when they get there. The Over is 12-5-1 in Bills games this season, one of the higher percentages in the league. Play on OVER

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This is a 7* on GREEN BAY

We’ve backed Green Bay pretty religiously this season, including playing them in one form or another each of the last three games. They’ve won all three games by at least 14 points, so we’re doing well. Therefore, we can’t deviate from the script here in the NFC Championship vs. Tampa Bay. Aaron Rodgers and the Packers offense rightly get all the headlines for averaging 33.2 points during a seven-game win streak. But don’t discount a defense that has held five of its last six opponents to 18 points or less. The Pack’s only loss in the L10 games was at Indianapolis where they held a 2 TD lead at halftime. Now they look to avenge one of their other two regular season defeats, and it was the worst one, 38-10 at Tampa Bay. That loss came after a bye and Rodgers threw two interceptions, which is something that almost never happens. One of them was returned for a touchdown and the other set the Bucs up at the 2-yard line for another easy score. This time the game is in Lambeau where GB has outscored teams by 12.4 points/game this year. Remember that the Packers just put up 32 points last week on a Rams defense that was considered to be the best in the league. They’ve had one more day of rest than has Tampa Bay, whose win over New Orleans should be credited to a +4 turnover differential. Rodgers takes better care of the football this time and goes on to his second Super Bowl.

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This is a 6* on MCGREGOR

So this line has shot up, which was probably to be expected, so we’re glad to have gotten down on McGregor early. But the fact he is a very large favorite now doesn’t make McGregor any less likely to win. It only confirms our belief in this fight that he is likely to make short work of an opponent he easily defeated the first time around, needing only 1:46 to take care of business. Maybe this one goes longer, but the result will remain the same and that’s McGregor getting his hand raised. In his only fight of 2020, he won in just 40 seconds against Donald “Cowboy” Cerrone, so there is no reason to believe there’s any sort of decline. For all the talk about Poirier being “better” this time around, he’s clearly still not on McGregor’s level. Play on MCGREGOR

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