{"id":23056,"date":"2022-06-30T19:50:25","date_gmt":"2022-06-30T23:50:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.betonline.ag\/news-room\/?p=23056"},"modified":"2022-06-30T19:50:27","modified_gmt":"2022-06-30T23:50:27","slug":"usfl-championship-preview-pick","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.betonline.ag\/news-room\/nfl\/usfl-championship-preview-pick\/","title":{"rendered":"USFL CHAMPIONSHIP PREVIEW & PICK"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

BY ADAM GREENE<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Well, we did it. While the stands may have been empty for nearly every game, those of us watching the USFL on our viewing devices and, maybe more importantly, those of us who placed bets upon the games made sure that the league would return for a second season.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Last week FOX announced that we were being blessed with another year of the<\/a> USFL. It will remain an eight-team league, with no expansion. What will change is that we\u2019ll get legitimate home games outside of Birmingham as each team will lay claim to its namesake as a home base, presumably.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s good news. The last three attempts at non NFL Europe spring football, two XFLs and one AAF. never made it to a second season. The AAF didn\u2019t get to complete its first. The second XFL was well received, but the COVID-19 pandemic shut it down too before it made it to the finish line.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What should be interesting next season is that we\u2019ll have two spring leagues, with Dwayne Johnson\u2019s version of the XFL kicking off the week after the Super Bowl in 2023. They\u2019ll be the only show in town until April, when the USFL makes its return. They should only overlap for a few weeks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To celebrate that, let\u2019s take a look at the odds, totals and lines for our first modern<\/a> USFL Championship game.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

PHILADELPHIA STARS AT BIRMINGHAM STALLIONS (-4.5, O\/U: 46)<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Stars used a fourth quarter comeback to down the favored New Jersey Generals 19-14 in the first round of the USFL playoffs. The Stallions dominated the overmatched New Orleans Breakers in their opening round playoff game, 31-17.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Case Cookus was pretty much garbage in the victory for Philadelphia. He completed 50 percent of his passes for 133 yards, no touchdowns and an interception. He rushed four times for 39 yards and a score. Diondre Overton caught two passes for 65 yards.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For the Stallions, J\u2019Marr Smith had a solid enough day, going 17 of 27 for 190 yards and a TD with no picks. He added seven carries for 48 yards and a touchdown on the ground. Adrian Hardy hauled in five passes for 74 yards. Osirus Mitchell had four grabs for 64 yards and a TD.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s a huge disappointment that the New Jersey Generals didn\u2019t make it to the final game. All throughout the second half of the season they looked like the best team in the USFL and picked up the postseason awards to prove it. Where they couldn\u2019t prove it is on the field. When it counted most, Philly had their number.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Birmingham made it all the way to Week 9 before losing a game in spite of playing at times like they couldn\u2019t wait to hang that \u201cL\u201d around their necks. Smith\u2019s play has been all over the place and if he was facing off against Luis Perez or De\u2019Andre Johnson that might matter. With Cookus taking the field for the Stars? Not so much.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019m riding with Birmingham in this one, but the spread is probably a little too large. Stallions 24, Stars 20<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Last week<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Straight up:<\/strong> 1-1<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Against the spread:<\/strong> 2-0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Season<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Straight up:<\/strong> 26-16<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Against the spread:<\/strong> 21-21<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Follow Adam Greene on Twitter <\/em>@TheFirstMan<\/em><\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Connect with us our socials on <\/em>Twitter<\/em><\/a> and <\/em>Instagram<\/em><\/a> for the latest sports news, viral moments, betting odds and the occasional memes.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

BY ADAM GREENE Well, we did it. While the stands may have been empty for nearly every game, those of…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":7606,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[129],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-23056","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-nfl"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.betonline.ag\/news-room\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23056","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.betonline.ag\/news-room\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.betonline.ag\/news-room\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.betonline.ag\/news-room\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/13"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.betonline.ag\/news-room\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23056"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.betonline.ag\/news-room\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23056\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23058,"href":"https:\/\/www.betonline.ag\/news-room\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23056\/revisions\/23058"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.betonline.ag\/news-room\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7606"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.betonline.ag\/news-room\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23056"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.betonline.ag\/news-room\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23056"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.betonline.ag\/news-room\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23056"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}