What this is
LockSZN posts model lines for NFL and college football — a spread and a total for every game we cover — before kickoff, then grades them against the closing number after the final. Nothing is edited after posting and nothing is deleted: the Record page is the full ledger, wins and losses both.
How the model works
Two models per sport, trained on play-by-play back to 2015. The spread model predicts the home margin from team form — drive-level EPA, QB play, opponent-adjusted efficiency, priors — deliberately market-free: no betting lines go in, so its disagreements with the market are real disagreements. The totals model predicts combined points from scoring form, pace, explosiveness, and drive finishing, plus venue facts (domes, and forecast wind for NFL). Win and over/under probabilities come from walk-forward calibration — every historical claim on this site was computed using only games finished at the time.
Cover probability is calibrated against the line you would bet into, not the one the game closes at. NFL: against Monday-regime opening lines (2018–25), where the record backs about a third of our disagreement — against the close, a sixth — so bet early; by kickoff the market has usually moved toward us and the stated edge shrinks with it. College: against the close, because there the disagreement is worth about 5% of itself against either line. EV is that probability at the best DK or FanDuel price on our number.
Predictions refresh daily (and after big line moves). A pick locks at kickoff, grades against the close, and the graded page stays up all season. Times shown are Eastern. None of this is betting advice.
Data & credits
the sources behind every number- nflverse — NFL schedules, play-by-play, and results. Used under CC BY 4.0.
- CollegeFootballData.com — College schedules, play-by-play, Elo ratings, rosters, and recruiting data.
- cfbfastR · sportsdataverse — College play-by-play archives with EPA and win probability.
- The Odds API — Betting line snapshots — the market numbers on the board and the movement charts.
- Open-Meteo — Weather forecasts transformed into NFL totals-model inputs. Used under CC BY 4.0.
- nfeloqb — QB Elo and projected starters, used to flag backup-QB situations.
- Over The Cap — NFL contract data for the offseason roster context.
Team logos are sourced from ESPN and CollegeFootballData; all team names and marks belong to their teams and schools. Historical opening-line research behind our methods also used Action Network's public scoreboard data (research only — nothing from it is served on this site).
Where a rule on the trends page was published by someone else, the credit travels with it — onto that trend's page and onto anything we post about it.
High totals go under — The rule was published for pro football by Rodney J. Paul and Andrew P. Weinbach. The idea is theirs; the college test and the live ledger are ours. Original paper.
Inter by Rasmus Andersson and Source Serif by Adobe are used under the SIL Open Font License 1.1.