Carlton The Doorman: Kentucky Is A Wild Ride For the Florida Gators

By CARLTON REESE

The Real Carlton

Remember when the annual trip to Lexington was a visit to the theatre of the absurd? Bill Curry was such a super nice guy in the 1990s and even rolled out a quarterback named Pookie. Then in 1997, Mr. Curry exited stage left to make way the game’s own Marcel Marceau – that would be Hal Mumme playing the role of Bip the Clown.

Mumme, with offensive coordinator Mike Leach, made his “Air Raid” offense famous with QB Tim Couch at the helm. All the while, Mumme seemed rather pleased to lose by four touchdowns if the box score showed his team outgained the other.

Into the 2000s we were graced with two seasons of Guy Morriss, who introduced us all to the

“Hefty Lefty” Jared Lorenzen. After a rare winning season in 2002, Morriss left for Baylor where he would never enjoy a winning season.

Rich Brooks had a pretty good run with bowl appearances in each of his final four seasons at UK then gave way to Joker Phillips, who failed to keep that momentum going. Good thing for the Wildcats, because that meant bringing in Mark Stoops who has been the greatest thing to happen to Kentucky football since Bear Bryant walked the sidelines 60 years earlier.

Under Stoops, the terms ‘Kentucky’ and ‘football’ do not juxtapose. He beat Florida once and we’ll likely never hear the end of it… unless he somehow beats UF again. Truth be told, the UK’s win in 2018 was no fluke, but four losses to the Gators during the span may have been. Outside of the Gators’ blowout win in 2016 and last year’s game in which UF led by just four at halftime,Stoops has his teams prepared for Florida like no one else. Always outmanned by a fairly wide margin, Kentucky under Stoops has looked like the better team against Florida more often than not.

All this means nothing to Carlton The Doorman, whose algorithms don’t take into account Stoops’ obsession with beating Florida, perhaps the reason UK only beat a hapless South Carolina team by just six points last week. No, one must stick with the numbers no matter what,and those numbers say Florida by 13.5. Ergo, give Kentucky the 8.5 and take Florida.

I fully expected at some point in my discussion with Carlton The Doorman he would be hitting me up for a loan. His vaunted road dogs that had been treating him so well came up with rabies last week.

Quite proud of the Rutgers and N.C. State covers (“no brainers” I believe was the terminology espoused), his overall 3-6 record did not break the bank, but only gave hope as he claims to be a big believer in the numbers reverting to the mean. I suppose that is a statistician’s way of saying the law of averages is now working in his favor.

So what do the algorithms tell us this week? If you like betting against Florida State, which definitely has the law of averages working in its favor, The Doorman says you’re in luck as Syracuse is a heavy favorite based on the numbers. Take Syracuse and 4.5 points. The system’s trend bets on home underdogs are 15-7 this year, so I’m told to lean in that direction. That would mean taking the points with the following teams: Oregon State (plus 2 over Washington); East Carolina (plus 4 over Tulane); Buffalo (plus 6 over W. Michigan); Rutgers (plus 15.5 over Ohio State); Akron (plus 9.5 over Ohio); Georgia Tech (plus 3.5 over Pitt).

This week, the computer says:

Georgia by 15 over Arkansas Missouri by 10 over Tennessee Alabama by 9.5 over Ole Miss Troy State by 3 over South Carolina Florida by 13.5 over Kentucky Texas A&M by 14.5 over Mississippi State Vanderbilt by 7.5 over Connecticut LSU by 1.5 over Auburn Miami by 10 over Virginia Syracuse by 26.5 over Florida State Clemson by 6.5 over Boston College Michigan by 6.5 over Wisconsin Penn State by 18 over Indiana UCLA by 12 over Arizona State Cincinnati by 6 over Notre Dame SMU by 29.5 over South Florida FAU by 20.5 over FIU

Carlton The Doorman’s Top-10 Computer Rankings:

1. Alabama (110.5) 2. Georgia (108.5) 3. Ole Miss (98) 4. Oklahoma (96.5) 5. Iowa (96) 6. Cincinnati (95) 7. Penn State (92.5) 8. Ohio State (90) 9. Texas (85) 10. Arkansas (84.5)