Sometimes your power ratings don't make sense: 420 Oak Under 43'

Sometimes your power ratings don't make sense: 420 Oak Under 43' I firmly believe that the lines, especially at this point of the NFL season, are pretty damn tight. That goes for sides as well as totals. But something seems so obvious to me in this game that I just don't get it. We know what we get with the Broncos. No offense, but they have no offense. The failure of Tim Tebow will continue for at least another week, and although Oakland's defense isn't as good as the Lions', there is now another 60 minutes of tape to watch of this joke of a quarterback. Remember, that comeback versus Miami had some serious ducks and other wobbly passes front and center, the football equivalent of 2-7 offsuit. The Raiders stink, too, of course. And what have we learned this season? The forced days off during the bye week because of the new collective bargaining agreement mean that bad teams can't use the bye to their full advantage. This is an absolute turd sandwich of a game. But if you've adjusted your power ratings for these teams' quarterbacks under center, as well as the lack of success of bad teams (remember, don't look at the Raiders' record to see that they are a bad team — they have no quarterback now and therefore are a bad team now, which is what matters) after the bye week this season, you certainly struggle to see it even at 33. What am I missing here? This seems like the total of the year.

It looks good to me. I did see it open at 45 though at Pinnacle so perhaps 1.5 pts slow but it is headed downward. And that 45 was very premium. It was worth a bet for me at 43.5. Thanks for sharing idea. What could you be missing? The obvious is with another 2 weeks Palmer is much better than he was. Perhaps Orton will be inserted into this game at some point. Or everyone is so bad there has to be some TO which are just deadly for creating at least some easy points. I recall slightly that in their first game of the year Fez had an under perhaps at 41.5.......It was actually a middle if we we were on the under at a good price and had played over the number he gave out to play under. There was a big playback to the over I think it was before this game bouncing from 39.5 all the way back to 43 and the game total finished 43. I can tell from your notes you're not a big believer in the Raiders as a team. And obviously with questions at QB it is even more warranted perhaps your skepticsm. But the Raiders do a lot of things correctly and good teams struggle with them to beat them. It starts with special teams and they might be the best there is out there with SJ and SL and the return game they have. This puts pressure on teams. I don't know the stats off the top but it would just seem the Raiders with their kicking game must be getting the best of field position and with Janikowski kicking FG of over 45 it is just routine. They're comfortable going to 55 yard FG with him and more. The bar on Campbell really isn't that high that Palmer if he's actually healthy should be an upgrade at least eventually. I don't know if he will be but you would have to think he has a chance to be better. And if you look at McFadden and a few of their defensive guys like Seymour and McClain they have some talent here. The receivers look good for once with that rookie Moore and Schillens and Boss at TE. I don't know how they'll end up being but I'm not convinced they are one of the bad teams out there. They had a bad game vs. the Chiefs. They wouldn't need many more bad games for me to think they're bad but I definitely think this team can and should win more than half its games. 45 and even 43.5 are a touch higher than the numbers involved in the first game regarding totals. That game was Campbell vs. Orton so we know Fez liked under the first game at a much lower number and now with Palmer vs. Tebow it does seem that under these numbers makes some sense not to assume that I think that the first game can have a lot of relevance here but I thought interesting to note.

I appreciate your response. A few more thoughts you've brought to mind: The same matchup in Week 1 would have a lower total than Week 9 because of linesmaker adjustments. Sebastian Janikowski will be back this week after missing time with an injury. I haven't been able to determine yet whether he will be 100%. Same story with McFadden, more importantly, although Michael Bush could start on 20 teams. Heyward-Bey might have been a Top 5 receiver in October. I'm still in shock about this one. He's looked good. Palmer threw 20 picks last year. It's been a while since he's been better than average. All in all, I'm still excited about this game, but yes, the enthusiasm is tempered slightly.