Laying the Chalk with the Big Home Favorite: Kansas City Chiefs -10 -105
The Chiefs opened as double-digit favorites as hosts to the Carolina Panthers in NFL week 9 play. The Action Network reports 58% of spread wagers and 78% of of the dollars bet against the spread supporting KC as of the time of this writing, yet the line has held fairly steady at Chiefs -10.
Our power rankings work forecasts the defending champions are slightly better than 12 points better than Carolina on a neutral field this week. We pad this expected edge a bit though to account for the influence of the Kansas City fans who will attend this contest. Accordingly, if perhaps counterintuitively, we perceive meaningful value with the big favorites, and are betting the Chiefs win by better than ten.
A couple of historical setups validate our faith in the Kansas City cover Sunday. For one, teams on a roll, facing relatively unfamiliar competition have been solid bets in the past.
Teams facing non-conference opposition after winning their prior three games by an average of at least two touchdowns have delivered an 11% return on investment since 2004 (1-0 ATS so far this season).
A perhaps similar history-based system likewise recommends backing rolling favorites against unfamiliar, bad teams.
Teams on three game straight up win streaks laying chalk to non-division foes that failed to make last year's playoffs have delivered a 9% return back to 2003 (4-3 ATS year-to-date).
Thus, the combination of the forecast from our primary NFL handicapping framework, coupled with the support of the historical systems leaves us adequately confident in the prospects of the Kansas City cover to lay the big chalk.
Other Active ATS Trends:
* Chiefs 7-1 ATS this season,
* Chiefs 6-1 ATS as the favorite,
* Chiefs 5-1 ATS after a win,
* Chiefs 3-1 as home favorite,
* Panthers 3-5 ATS overall,
* Panthers 2-2 ATS as road dog,
* Panthers 1-3 ATS after a loss,
* Underdog 5-1 ATS head-to-head since 1985
Happy betting!!