Week One NFL Preseason Handicapping Strategies

Added on Aug 13, 2010 by Jack Thurman in

NFL

It’s no secret that NFL preseason betting is a completely different animal from the regular season, and thus requires a completely different handicapping approach. Within the four week NFL preseason framework, each week has its own dynamic as well. During the current NFL preseason we’ll discuss some of the specific handicapping concepts unique to each week beginning with Week #1. Week 1 concepts also usually apply to ‘early games’ like last weekend’s Hall of Fame game.

Week 1 preseason games can be the trickiest to handicap since it’s not really possible to generalize about where teams are at and what their goals are. In Week #2, players are getting in shape and getting used to playing together and the coaches are finalizing their regular season depth chart. Week #3 is the closest thing to a ‘dress rehearsal’ for the regular season, and that’s the week in which you’ll see the starters play the most minutes. Week #4 is usually an exercise in futility for most coaches and fans, as more often than not they’re just looking to get to the regular season without any key injuries.

All that is needed to understand this concept is a look at the NFL lines for Week #1 preseason games—some movement notwithstanding, most are priced at or around -3 for home side with the total at or around 34. There are a few exceptions, but the linesmaker is essentially saying that at this stage of the preseason there are few qualitative differences between the teams—at least that the betting public perceives.

As a result of this uniformity in the lines, the best handicapping strategy for Week #1 is to look for situations where the mental, emotional or physical preparation to play NFL football is better or worse than the norm and bet accordingly. In last weekend’s Hall of Fame game, for example, it was evident that Dallas was better prepared than Cincinnati. This is information that was readily available to anyone paying attention—just reading the team reports on the ESPN website would have revealed that Dallas opened training camp four days earlier than the Bengals and that their practices had been intense. Cincinnati was also distracted by the traveling circus known as Terrell Owens and not on this game.

Another example occurred on Thursday night when New England hosted New Orleans. New England coach Bill Bilichick is one of the best preseason coaches in football for the simple fact that he expects his teams to play hard every time they hit the field. Including last night’s win/cover he’s got a preseason record of 35-23 SU and 34-22-1 against the pointspread. The Patriots would have been a good play in any circumstance, but New Orleans was not ready to play mentally or emotionally. They’d been forced to practice indoors for the past week due to the extreme heat in Louisiana, and they entered this game immediately after a trip to the White House where everyone told them how wonderful they were. The reserves made it a competitive game in the second half, but the Saints’ first team offense looked awful and New England led 17-7 at halftime.

Barring a drastic change to the structure of the NFL preseason schedule, this concept will continue to be effective in the future. The specifics may change, but the fundamental premise will always be valid. In a week where linesmakers are posting numbers that suggest that ‘all teams are created equal’, the successful handicapper will profit by finding ‘under the radar’ situations that gives one side a qualitative advantage or disadvantage.