Historical precedent supports America's Team: Dallas Cowboys +9

Our power rankings work makes the Ravens somewhere between seven and 13 points better than the Cowboys on a neutral field of play for the last NFL contest of week 13. This output is not particularly instructive though as the current spread rests inside of this range. Fortunately, absent conviction from our primary framework, history is unequivocal in picking a side versus the number for this evening's action.

First, that a rested Cowboys squad is taking points on the road from a team that has not seen them in 20 years favors Dallas' effort. The public tends to overvalue the favorite in this spot, providing consistent opportunity for objective bettors.

Road dogs playing outside their conference after a BYE week have delivered a 9% return on investment (ROI) since 2003. This system is a perfect 3-0 ATS so far season.

Separately, the spread for this contest opened at Baltimore -7.5 at most shops. Consistent action though on the Ravens pressured the line up to as high as 9.5, despite the take being roughly evenly split (48% of spread dollars are down on Dallas, versus 52% for Baltimore). The bad taste of Dallas' uttter undressing by the visiting Washington Football Team last week might be lingering in bettors mouths this week. Such a pattern would actually be actually fairly normal. In fact, the betting public tends to get too sour on underdogs that were just blown out.

Teams hitting the road after a home stint punctuated by a loss by at least 20 points have been great ATS bets since 2003, good for a 14% ROI and a 7-2 ATS run this year.

Thus, while officially we are passing on this game given the absence of a definitive signal from our primary framework, we note that there does seem to be broad precedent for the road dog cover from this position. Accordingly, we might take a small (unofficial) stab at the Cowboys ATS just to make the game worth watching.

Happy betting!!