Did I say Dolphins +1.5?
I meant Dolphins +17.5. That “7”
key really sticks on my keyboard. It
looks like rather than offering my exquisite advice on the Dolphins/Cowboys extraordinary
preseason tussle, I should have offered that Ricky fella some companionship.
In reference to the Over/Under picks/rationale I gave
yesterday, if you’re looking for a fairly in-depth analysis of all of the NFL
team season win total Over/Unders (I gotta think of a way to shorten this
modifier) for this year, check out the B.S. Report podcast with Bill
Simmons. Part 1 of the 2 part series came
out yesterday, and I believe Part 2 comes out today. In Part 1, Bill and Cousin Sal break down the
Over/Unders for just the NFC teams. In
Part 2, they will hash out the AFC. Also, as the NFL season gets underway, usually
Monday or Tuesday of each week Bill and Sal will do their weekly “guess the
lines” B.S. Report podcast in which they discuss NFL results from the week
before, discuss Bill’s success, or lack thereof, with his SUPERCONTEST picks,
and then try to guess what Vegas will set all of the NFL spreads at for the coming
week.
Last year, as I started to look at matchups for the coming
week, I found it beneficial to guess the lines ahead of time myself. Early each
week, I’ll try to post my guesses as well as the actual lines and then give my
take on why I guessed what I guessed, if I was off by a significant amount, why
I was off, etc. If you’re keeping up
with the NFL, 80-90% of the time your guesses should be within 3 points of the
actual line. If you are further off than
that, you need to either do some additional research before you start deciding
which side of the line to hit OR heavily consider hanging up your gambling
shoes. Two of the biggest reasons I’ve
found for a large deviation between my guesses and the actual lines are 1) significant
injuries for 1 team or 2) one team matches up much better with the other.
With both of these, it is extremely difficult to obtain
perfect information. No matter how
players injuries are listed on the various sites that list NFL player injuries,
you’re never going to know the complete truth.
Players injury statuses aren’t accurate with respect to their actual
injury statuses. They are consistent
with how the front office wants to portray their injuries to gain an edge on
their upcoming opponent(s). Unless you’re
in that locker room or practicing with those players every day, you just don’t
know…but Vegas does.
The idea of matchup deficiencies follows this same line of
thought. No matter how well you think
you know the Chargers offensive line and special teams, Vegas has its laundry
list of metrics it will use to outsmart you a vast majority of the time.
In these 2 areas, Vegas WILL KNOW MORE THAN THE AVERAGE
BETTOR 99% of the time. Don’t get me
wrong. There are professional bettors
out there that are very much on top of their games and can gain an edge in this
department. But for you and me, if you
try to guess a line and completely whiff, give Vegas the benefit of the doubt
and favor the opposite side of the line.
Don’t act proud and stand firm with your judgment. Let Vegas do the work for you.
Drop by Tuesday or Wednesday of next week for the first “guessing
of the lines” blog post.
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