Stephen A. Smith on Notre Dame: What the hell have they done?

Hi, I’m Ben Fawkes, and welcome back to my weekly sports betting mailbag. With March Madnessbest sportsbook promos the state of Michigan has to offer.

This week, we turn our attention to college football and the newly announced shakeup to the College Football Playoff. Let’s get to our first question.

Notre Dame had similar title odds of around 25-1 entering last college football season, but it’s important to note that these are odds to win the title, not to simply make the College Football Playoff.

I think it will be a little while before we see sportsbooks put out odds on teams to make the playoff because there’s no big rush and because they don’t want to be burned by putting out a bad number on a team. In general, I believe the expansion is a good thing for Notre Dame simply because a bigger playoff means more opportunities to make it in the bracket.

Notre Dame has plenty of tough games on this year’s schedule (at Texas A&M, Louisville, Florida State and at USC), but the opportunity exists to get into the playoff with a few losses -- whereas the Fighting Irish never would’ve had that chance in the four-team bracket and being an independent school.

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