Alabama Football: How Is Vegas Reacting to the Bama vs LSU Build Up?

Larry Burton (Syndicated Writer) The Vegas line started with Bama being either a 5.5 or 6.0 point favorite. Now that line is down to 4.0 at most places.

The quick early and big money went for Bama, now that more money is diving in and going for LSU, the line is going down.

The bookmakers and sports casinos don't care who wins, they just want to balance the betting as close to 50% betting on LSU and 50% betting on Alabama, then they take out their house cut and pay the rest to the winners.

But they do want to know what a good line is and who should be favored to win. Though there is a lot of other data they use, like injuries, (no real advantage to either team there) and other things that generally wash out.

But the main thing they use is a "Smart Chart" and here is  an actual smart chart used by one of the sports book houses.

SMART CHART
LSU		TEAM		ALAB
39.3		PTS FOR		39.4
11.5		PTS AGNST		6.9
27.8		DIFF.		32.5
183.1		PASS YDS		228.4
189.0		RUSH YDS		229.3
174.8		PASS D		135.6
76.6		RUSH D		44.9
-1.9		TO DIFF		-0.8

So it looks good for the Tide fans have good reason not to worry too much, since there is no category that Alabama doesn't get the nod.

It's interesting that the points scored is almost a wash, but Alabama allows 5 less points scored on them a game. Could that be the "tell" they're using for the point spread?

Another interesting fact is that Vegas sees Alabama as the BCS champion.

Right now, their odds of winning the title is even money. That's as low as it goes.

Here's those current odds.

(odds updated October 25th, 2011)

2012 BCS Bowl Game Champion Odds:

Alabama (even)

Arizona St +500000

Arkansas +20000

BYU +500000

Sounds like Vegas has made their mind up, now let's see if two teams involved oblige.