Colts Boosts Oakland In Season

Football Betting Lines

Kickoff Returners: Thomas began the season as New York's primary kick returner and averaged a respectable 24.3 yards per attempt for the year, but was taken off the assignment in November after experiencing some ball security issues. Rookie receiver Jerrel Jernigan (23.3 avg.) has been the main man as of late and performed steadily, though the Giants finished just 20th in that category as a team prior to the postseason.

 

Special Teams Defense: The Giants' coverage corps was solid during the regular season, limiting teams to 9.9 yards per punt return and 22.9 on kickoffs while not allowing a special-teams touchdown over the course of the year, and certainly made a difference in the narrow win over San Francisco in the NFC Championship. Rookie linebacker Jacquian Williams came up with the critical strip of the Niners' Kyle Williams in overtime and recorded a team-best 17 special-teams tackles for a group that also received noteworthy efforts from two other 2011 draft choices -- safety Tyler Sash (15 tackles) and linebacker Greg Jones.

 

The 62-year-old will guide a defense which finished the 2011 season third in the NFL in points allowed (266) and yards allowed per game, also racking up the most sacks (48) in the AFC.

 

Pees also coached the linebackers at New England from 2004-05 before taking over the coordinator's position -- which he held until joining the Ravens following the 2009 season. The Patriots' defense allowed less than 20 points per game in every season under Pees' guidance.

 

Allen, who spent this past season as defensive coordinator of the Denver Broncos, reportedly reached an agreement with the Raiders and new general manager Reggie McKenzie earlier this week.

 

Allen was named defensive coordinator of the Broncos on January 24, 2011. He had been with the New Orleans Saints the previous five seasons, serving as assistant defensive line coach from 2006-07 and as the secondary coach from 2008-10.

 

Allen will become Oakland's seventh different head coach since Jon Gruden left after the 2001 season. Bill Callahan spent two years as head coach and guided Oakland to the Super Bowl after the 2002 campaign, losing to Gruden's Buccaneers, but the Raiders haven't had a winning season since.

 

Cincinnati, OH (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Former Cincinnati Bengals quarterback Greg Cook, whose brief career was cut short by injury, died on Thursday night from an undisclosed illness. He was 65. "I've lost a good friend," Bengals president Mike Brown said on Friday morning. "Greg had a good heart. He never lost his interest in quarterbacks and he would come into my office and visit with me and we would talk about prospects. He was a great quarterback. He could do it all. He was mobile, big, strong, accurate. It was the kind of injury that today could have been repaired just like that."

 

He burst onto the scene, leading the AFL in touchdown passes as a rookie with 15 in only 11 games, adding 1,854 passing yards.

 

The former Minnesota Vikings head coach was an offensive coordinator for the Philadelphia Eagles under Andy Reid.

 

The Vikings fired Childress as head coach and replaced him with Leslie Frazier in November 2010 during his fifth season at the helm.

 

Bill Polian, who shaped the Colts football operations and drafted Manning upon arriving in Indianapolis in 1998, was the first to go after the team suffered through a 2-14 season without the injured four-time MVP. Head coach Jim Caldwell soon followed after Ryan Grigson was named the club's new general manager.

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Big Ten Conference odds

Teams that should be in: Michigan State, Indiana
Work left to do: Illinois, Purdue, Michigan, Iowa

Behind the big two, the pecking order might be in a bit of flux. Has Michigan State passed Indiana after handling the Hoosiers in East Lansing? Where is Illinois in that mix? What looked like a four-big league last week could be morphing into five -- and even six is not unthinkable at this point if everything breaks right.

Should be in:

Michigan State [21-8 (8-6), RPI: 20, SOS: 15] The Spartans made it four-for-four on the homestand, a gigantic accomplishment that leaves them in extremely good shape. MSU is only 1-6 on the road and is at Michigan and at Wisconsin to close things out, meaning the date with the Wolverines on Tuesday looms very, very large. Beating Texas early will hold up well, as will the rout of Bradley and the win over BYU, but will 8-8 be enough? It very well could be, as the computer numbers are good, but why chance it?

Indiana [18-9 (8-6), RPI: 24, SOS: 32] Hmm ... good thing the last two are at Northwestern and home to Penn State, because IU might want to get both to feel completely safe after dropping its third in the last four, fading after halftime at Michigan State. Who knew the best nonconference win would be over Southern Illinois, which is a gift that keeps on giving for the Hoosiers. The win over Wisconsin also looks good on the mantel.

Work left to do:

Illinois [21-9 (9-6), RPI: 31, SOS: 25] A good performance at Penn State leaves the Illini in pretty good shape. Can they go to Iowa and take care of business to really look on their way? That's a huge game, as there is a possible cluster of teams that will end at 9-7. Illinois beat Bradley, but has lost to Xavier. A 9-7 mark and a semifinals trip in Chicago could be enough with the computer profile hanging in there, but it would be better not to mess around, clinching at least a tie for third.

Purdue [18-10 (7-7), RPI: 47, SOS: 28] Couldn't get it done at Iowa, but did win at Northwestern to put 9-7 squarely in sight. Where does that leave the Boilermakers, though? Even if they beat Minnesota and Northwestern at home, that won't help the computer numbers. Nonconference wins over Virginia, DePaul and Oklahoma are solid, but not spectacular. The Boilers very well might need an upset in the B10 quarters to have a legit claim.

Michigan [19-10 (7-7), RPI: 55, SOS: 53] Well, Michigan did what it needed to do, winning at Minnesota to take control of its fate. The Wolverines have Michigan State and an already-wrapped-up-the-league Ohio State at home to close, so the chances are there. Win both and we can talk. There is no marquee win yet in the profile, and the Wolverines were splattered in several games against name opponents. A mediocre computer profile fueled by a lack of road wins isn't helping, either.

Iowa [16-12 (8-6), RPI: 80, SOS: 64] For the sake of being complete, we'll add Iowa, this season's Stanford. It's plausible that the Hawkeyes could get to 10-6 (at Penn State, vs. Illinois left), but where does that leave them after a gruesome nonconference performance where the best win was over ... Toledo? Iowa State? Cornell?? If they get to 10-6, we can start to look at what they need to do in the B10 tourney, although my gut sense is that they would need to make the final and have knocked off Ohio State or Wisconsin on the way to have any real claim.

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