With little or no club football to speak of this week, Liam and I decided to take a week off from The Gambling Corner Podcast and instead leave the NFL picks I usually provide to go out in blog form. That being said we’ve still got 5 picks to go over this weekend to hopefully help you win some money, as the tag line to our podcast goes, we dive into the stats so you don’t have to!
Whilst doing my usual digging for NFL bets, which starts straight away after the Sunday night game, those of you from the UK who are reading this will understand what ungodly time of the morning that is! I’ve found some interesting year to date stats.
Road teams are 37-27 ATS. Favourites 26-38 ATS. Road underdogs 25-14 ATS. 63% of all NFL games YTD have gone under. Road favourites 14-9 ATS
Week 5’s slate sees 10 road dogs, if this trend continues you could reasonably expect to go 6-4 on your bets, a 60% win ratio even the pros wouldn’t turn their noses up at.
Pick 1.
The Giants roll into AT&T Stadium boasting an ATS record of 11-2 in their last 13 road games. QB Daniel Jones last time out against New Orleans had his highest number of passing attempts, completion percentage, yards, passing touchdowns and QBR. Previous to their overtime win last time out Jones had been averaging 260 yards per game, he threw for an additional 142 yards last time out.
John Ross finally being healthy for the Giants means they now have a legitimate deep threat to their passing attack, a wideout that can take the top off a defence. Add that into the mix with Saquon Barkley getting stronger and more effective each week as well as big money free agent signing Kenny Golladay, Darius Slayton, Sterling Shepard and Evan Engram mean Jones is spoilt for choice when choosing his targets.
In Vegas this line was Dallas -8.5 last weekend, it’s since been bet down to -7.5 and currently sits at 7. The total being bet up from 49 to 52. 73% of the cash is on Dallas, which I like because Dallas are a hugely public team.
The Cowboys have covered each of their spreads this season so far, that’s a factor to take into consideration when deciding which side of the betting coin you fall on, but I just couldn’t ignore the Giants ATS road record and the record of road teams as underdogs.
New York averages 28 points per game in their last 3 road games and Dallas are averaging 24.5 points per game in their last 3 home games. Giants lost their opener to Denver by 14 but the 3 after that have been decided by 10 points combined.
There is of course the possibility that this is a blow out in Dallas’ favour, given their strength on offense and Dan Quinn’s rapidly improving D, but I like the Giants to keep it close, I think Dallas win outright but New York covers.
Pick 2
Despite Green Bay being blown out 38-3 against the Saints on opening day, Green Bay find themselves only 36 yards of total offense behind Cincinnati, the big narrative has been how good Joe Burrow and the Bengals have been offensively.
Aaron Rodgers was 15/28 for 133 yards and two picks against New Orleans, in the next 3 he’s gone 65/96 764 yards 8 touchdowns and no picks. Rodgers seems to have fallen in love with football and has left the Jeopardy job behind him. The Packers have 3 touchdowns on the ground since week one, 327 yards rushing as well as averaging 30.6 points a game.
When we compare that to the Bengals, they’ve scored 92 points across their 4 games, with Burrow throwing for 988 yards and 9 touchdowns. Joe Mixon has Cincy’s only two rushing tds on the year, he’s been banged up and limited in practice all week, so just how fit is Mixon is a big question, if Mixon doesn’t rush well Cincinnati doesn’t have a run game, Mixon has 353 yards on the ground when compared to their next leading rusher who has 28. Not a good time to be going up against the 12th rated Packers rush D.
I do also like the under 50.5 on offer in this game too, but why muddy a pick by adding the under or over to it. I have some stats that might help with your total bets on this game if that’s your bag.
3/4 Bengals games have gone under the total by an average of 6 points a game. Green Bay are 2-2 on over/unders, the unders by 4.5 points per game, and overs by 5, and the under has hit 5/8 occasions over the 8 games played by both teams.
Games involving these two teams have averaged 42.25 points a game. Packers games average 48.75 points per game, Cincy games average 41.75.
Green Bay Packers on the money line is my pick, but as stated I lean under 50.5.
Pick 3
A lot of my handicap for this game is the availability of Christian McCaffrey, he’s been limited in practice and doubtful to play, a huge plus if he can play as the Eagles are ranked 31st in rush D, giving up 150 yards on the ground per game.
Cluster injuries on the Eagles offensive line and likely to be without Brandon Graham, arguably their best D lineman. Carolina has improved their defence greatly, but they’ve allowed a touchdown on every one of their opponents Redzone drives this year couple that with the Eagles giving up a td on 78.6% of opponents Redzone trips.
The Eagles come away with points on 92.3% of their Redzone drives 69.2% of the time they come away with a touchdown, Panthers score on 87.5% of Redzone drives and 62% end up with a touchdown.
Combined the Panthers and Eagles games are averaging 47.75 points a game and we’ve knocked off a 3.5 points off the current total of 45.5.
Eagles have given up 100 points in their last 3 games, after only giving up 6 points the the Falcons, I think this is a sneakily high scoring game, probably under the radar for most.
Before the Titans lost to the Jets last week without AJ Brown and Julio Jones, this line was Titans -8.5, and quickly got bet down to 3.5 and had settled to -4, and now finds itself at -4.5 at most places.
With all the distinction in the Jaguars organisation I was trying to find ways to bet against Jacksonville, with coach Urban Mayer deciding he’d go for lap dances after his teams loss to the Bengals, add that mess to an 0-4 Jags and the 30th rated defense and 23rd on offense, all that made me want to find a way to fade the Jags.
AJ Brown is back but Julio Jones is still out, last week in the loss to the Jets, Tennessee ran 36 more plays, 30 first downs, and the Jets D were on the field for 41 minutes. What hurt the Titans was being 5/19 on 3rd down and 2/5 in the Redzone, losing 45 yards on sacks and 98 more on penalties. All that and it took a missed field goal in overtime for the Titans to lose.
I don’t get why the Titans are -4.5 to the winless dysfunctional Jags, giving ourselves 2.5 of extra cushion in a game where Derrick Henry and the Titans could win this by double digits.
Pick 5
Sunday night football sees the Bills travel to the Kansas City Chiefs, with a +3 current spread, the Bills are the highest rated offense and KC have the lowest rated D, KC always have the chance of a blow out so I like that we’ve got extra room to wiggle if KC get up in the game.
Cleveland go to the Chargers, a few have LA as a Super Bowl contender, the one area where the Chargers suffer defensively is stopping the run, the Browns have such a strong run game and an incredible defense, I think this will be a low scoring game and likely the public will be on the over, how healthy is Baker? I think if he’s any way hobbled you have to look at Chubb over rush yards, if you can get it under 90 I’d suggest firing on it, nice little bump too on Cleveland who I also think will win the game outright.
And finally to round out our 3 team teaser, on the 7 point teaser cards, I’ve teased the Vikings down to -1.5, the Lions are still playing hard and I don’t think it’ll be as cut and dry as many think, how healthy is Dalvin Cook, the heartbeat really of the Vikings offense, does Zimmer and the Vikings really care about getting separation, the Vikings should and will win this game, but I think 8.5 is too many points. One to look out for is Adam Thielen anytime touchdown scorer, nobody has scored more touchdowns than him in the Redzone since 2019.
Good luck with your bets everybody, we’ll be back in audio form for The Gambling Corner Podcast, we’re available on Spotify, Apple Podcasts and wherever you get podcasts!
Fat Lad Sports 