This is the first of many helpful articles that will help you navigate your way through the NFL season unscathed, with your bank account intact!! One of the very first lessons to learn, when attempting to predict the topsy-turvy progression of an NFL season, is to not follow the herd! The NFL is by far the most wagered-on sport in America.
Therefore, is also the most closely monitored by the sportsbooks and casinos, due to the large amount of wagers for each game.
The fact that there are a maximum of 16 games per week, allows the them to more closely analyze each and every game, making it very difficult to find your advantages!! This is not College basketball, where there are 16 games every night! Plenty of time to analyze each game, each line, and look for their best opportunity to get your money! However, if the truth be known, your goal is not to outsmart the book, it is to recognize when the book is attempting to take advantage of you.
Due to the extreme amounts of money wagered, and definite patterns to public betting, there are opportunities to find inflated lines and take what is sometimes the unpopular bet.
Each week, there are several games on the slate that the line will be tainted.
This is not wrong; this is simply the sportsbooks knowing that the betting public is going to over-react to a hot or cold team.
It happens every week! Week two already had that scenario play out.
In week two, the Baltimore Ravens played the Tennessee Titans.
The Ravens were coming off a dominating performance against the Steelers, and the Titans had a disappointing loss to the Jags.
The results were stunning, but not entirely unexpected if you look a little closer.
The Vegas books set the line with the Ravens favored by 4 on the road at the Titans.
Public money pounded the Ravens and drove the spread to 5.
5 by game time.
Now you need to understand that 80% of the public money was wagered on Baltimore, while the smart money went on the Titans! The line was overloaded due to public perception.
The public bet heavy on the Ravens and the books cleaned house.
The Titans dominated the Ravens in Nashville.
The Titans out-gained their opponent by more than 100 yards, and held the ball for 11 minutes longer, dominating the time of possession and ultimately dominating the scoreboard 26-13.
A huge day for the Titans, the smart money, and the books1 and a terrible day for the Ravens and the confused public that over-reacted to the Raven victory over a Steeler team that had 7 turnovers!! Who can't beat a team that has 7 turnovers! That is a good question! Who was the last team in the NFL to win a game with 7 turnovers? The most turnovers in a victory that we can find, is 6.
That will lead us into our next update to The Sports Prophet NFL Prophecy, as we study the next phase of misleading public perception.