At AT&T Stadium in Arlington, TX last week, the Cowboys managed a field goal in OT to beat the Texans, but the 3 point win was inadequate to cover the 6 point spread. Also, The Falcons melted down in the fourth quarter at the Giants last Sunday, giving up 13 points and scoring none, and blowing their chance to win/cover (Atlanta lead 20-17 at the end of the third, up a touchdown when adjusting for the +4 spread).
Later that day though, the Bills notched their second consecutive win against the spread, beating Detroit outright with a field goal in the waning seconds of the game. And though San Francisco leaned on strong kicking and a bit of trickery to edge past Kansas City (22-17), the Chiefs +6 resulted in a payday.
Thus we were 2-2-last week. Line movement provided advance indications in the Buffalo and Chiefs wins (the Bills' spread tightened by 2.5 points by game time, while the Chiefs, also travelling dogs, experienced a favorable 1.5 point swing in the line. On the other hand, Dallas seems to have fooled the market last week, failing to cover despite the spread moving 1 point their way. There was no change to the spread on the Atlanta game.
We are 12-11 on the season -- admittedly, quite mediocre. We expect improvement.
Our quant overlay approach produced only two picks for week 6 -- both morning plays:
Miami Dolphins +3.5 vs Green Bay Packers (10:00am, Pacific)
Importantly, the Dolphins are coming off a week 5 bye. The legendary football mind, Vince Lombardi, reportedly once said that "Fatigue makes cowards of us all" .This quote from the renowned coach might be interpreted to imply that bye weeks matter. We agree. To make our case, consider that, in his book, Wayne Wilson asserts that teams perform, on average, 2.6 points better coming off bye weeks. Other researchers, such as Sung and Tainsky (2012), likewise document bye week-related inefficiency in the NFL betting market -- at least in limited circumstances.
SportsInsights reports Miami opened +4, but the line has been bid down to +2. This favorable spread compression is an especially compelling condition given that around 70% of bets tracked by SportsInsights and CappersMall favor Green Bay (per CappersMall, this is among the most heavily bet contests of the day).
Bottom line: in a tight game (as suggested by the the 2 point spread), we have no qualms with our system highlighting the home team coming off a bye, particularly when line movement and sentiment confirm the selection.
Buffalo BIlls +3 vs New England Patriots (10:00am, Pacific)
Buffalo is riding a two game win streak against the number and our system says their success will continue this week. Veteran back-up QB Kyle Orton, who started in place of E.J. Manuel, played solid football last week, registering 308 yards on 30/43 (with 1 interception). The QB position in Buffalo might face a bit less stress today, as the Pats run defense is only average, so ground ball might play more prominently in Buffalo's plan of attack. The Bills, conversely, sport a top-quartile defense, and are especially proficient against the run. This might pressure Brady.
The Bills opened +3, per SportsInsights, but are now +1 -- Buffalo experienced a considerable favorable line change, despite being almost entirely shunned by the public (close to 80% of line bets monitored by CappersMall and SportsInsights are on New England). We love when our quant system output is supported by reverse line movement, as is the case in both of our plays today!
Happy betting!!