Paul Bessire's (@predictmachine) early college football analysis

[Beyond the Bets]

Did a Q&A earlier with Prediction Machine's Paul Bessire.

We talked mostly about sports betting and the handicapping industry in particular, but OF COURSE had to ask him for his early look at college football.

* * *

Q: Who is your pick to win the 2013 BCS national championship?

PB: USC. For the second year in a row, the most likely undefeated team from our projections will be a BCS team. Last year was Alabama. Given that the Trojans are likeliest to go undefeated and have a high profile team, they are the most likely to win it all because they have, by far, the greatest odds to make the BCS Championship game. Alabama looks like it has a better team right now, but has more potential pitfalls. With Syracuse, Hawaii and Notre Dame on the non-conference schedule and Oregon at home, the only real concern on USC’s schedule is at Stanford in Week 3. Stanford loses two elite offensive linemen and one of the greatest quarterbacks to ever play college football. Sixteen offensive and defensive starters, including the star quarterback, the best wide receiver tandem in the country, four offensive linemen and the entire secondary, return from a 10-2 team in 2011.

Next best: Alabama, LSU … then a huge gap, then a bunch of teams that have very similar odds including (in order right now, but could certainly change): Clemson, Oklahoma, Oregon, Texas, Florida State, Georgia, Michigan, West Virginia, Ohio State.

Q: Who is your college football darkhorse?

PB: Tennessee. The normal answer to this question includes a team that had a much tougher schedule last year than it will this year, was better ATS than straight-up and was unlucky due to turnovers, special teams plays, bad calls, etc. Tennessee does not quite fit that mold because the schedule is not significantly different than last year and, while the team was one fluky loss to Vanderbilt away from a 6-6 season, Tennessee was still just 4-8 ATS.

But, while the SEC West is clearly loaded again, everyone seems to constantly be searching for the SEC East’s likely participant in the SEC Championship and that could easily be Tennessee. Playing at Georgia and at South Carolina hurts, but the Volunteers get Florida and Missouri at home. More importantly, they get Tyler Bray, who looked like the best quarterback in the conference and a potential first overall draft choice through five games last year before getting hurt, and 18 other offensive and defensive starters back from a very young team in 2011.

The wide receiver corps looks like the second best in the country behind USC. The offensive line returns intact from last year and has 105 career starts. And the defense only loses two players overall; none from the back seven. A nine-win season certainly looks possible. Derek Dooley could stand in the way of a great season, which adds to the intrigue that the head coach of our most likely national champion also recruited many of the players on the top darkhorse team.

Others: Texas (Legit Big 12 title hopes), Michigan (Big Ten’s best), Washington State (3-4 win improvement), Louisville (Big East’s best), UCF (should win all but OSU and Mizzou), NC State (could steal wins from FSU, Clemson and Virginia Tech).

[ChiefZilla]

So, moral of the story: Lane Kiffin is a bada$$ recruiter.