NFL Betting Advice: Blowout Victims May Present a Wagering Opportunity
By Charles of Predictem.com
I bet you have, at times, looked at teams who appeared so bad, so inept, that you felt you couldn’t possibly go with them the next time they took the field, and in fact, committed yourself strongly to go with the other side.
C’mon, admit it.
There’s no shame; after all, who’d expect a horrible team to have such an about-face from one game to the next?
Of course, since we’re dealing with pointspreads, we really don’t have to be talking about a complete transformation, but merely a performance that exceeded expectations. DO NOT write off a team that stunk out the joint in its last game.
This is clearly where the distinction can be drawn between the NFL and college football. In the NFL, there are equalizers in terms of the composition of teams. For example, there is a draft that distributes talent in a certain way. There is a salary cap. What we’re trying to say is that there is never going to be that huge a difference between the top and bottom teams in the NFL, not like there is in any conference in FBS (Division I) college ball. Alabama would be more than a 40-point favorite over a team like Kentucky in an SEC game, but you’d never see that kind of number in pro football.
Look at what happened in a game during the 2012 NFL season with the Jacksonville Jaguars, who gave about as gutless an effort as a team could give in losing 41-3 to the Chicago Bears, AT HOME, in Week 5. That happened to be their third loss at AllTel Stadium by 17 points or more. They went into a bye week with one straight-up win, then played Oakland into overtime before losing, but covering. After that, and having lost Maurice Jones-Drew, who is probably more a part of his offense than any running back in the league, they were given 15.5 points by the oddsmakers at BetAnySports at Green Bay.
Here’s where it gets interesting. Jacksonville was in the game all the way, and finally succumbed by a 24-15 count, which easily beat the number.
It wasn’t a fluke either. The Jaguars held Green Bay to 238 total yards, and got 117 more passing yards out of Blaine Gabbert than the Packers got from Aaron Rodgers.
You say the Packers were flat? That could be, but that’s one of the things to take into consideration when dealing with teams that have looked very bad. The opponent may not be playing with all of its focus, and will probably be overpriced to boot.
What Pete Rozelle said about one team being able to beat another “on any given day” is not far from the truth. Generally, a team that loses badly is not really as horrible as it looked, and the team that beat them may not be as devastating as they appeared. You just have to put the whole thing in perspective. The Bears, who looked like they could walk on water in that 41-3 shellacking at Jacksonville, had to get a field goal at the gun just to come out with a straight-up win over Carolina, against whom they were laying heavy points.
Remember that these guys are all PROS. As we mentioned, the level of talent is generally in the same hemisphere. There’s a lot of pride on the line, on the part of the coaching staff as well as the players. Keep in mind that the public often looks at the results from the game before when making their wagering decisions, so you should have an opportunity to find some value in the line on many occasions. Blowout victims may indeed offer a “buy” signal the next week, so don’t discard them automatically!
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