Unlikely NFL Teams Help Ease Pain at Sportsbooks

Posted on: October 26, 2020, 10:50h. 

Last updated on: October 26, 2020, 12:38h.

Bill Huber Read More

Expertise: Sports Betting, Sports.

Two of the worst teams in the league helped save the day for sportsbooks on the seventh weekend of the NFL season.

With a 1-5 record, the Washington Football Team opened as a 3-point underdog against the Dallas Cowboys but moved to a 1-point favorite at kickoff. The Cowboys attracted 76 percent of the spread money at PointsBet. Washington won 25-3.

With an 0-5 record, the New York Jets opened as 13-point underdogs against the Buffalo Bills. The spread was down to 10 by kickoff.

Buffalo garnered 88 percent of the spread money at PointsBet. The Jets, who not only were winless overall but winless against the spread, lost only 18-10.

‘Underwhelming Day’

The day took a turn for the worse in the afternoon games. As 4-point favorites against the Las Vegas Raiders, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers had 86 percent of the spread money. As 7-point favorites over the Jacksonville Jaguars, the Los Angeles Chargers had 74 percent of the spread money. As 7-point favorites over the Denver Broncos, the Kansas City Chiefs had 89 percent of the spread money.

Bettors won handily, with the Bucs winning 45-20, the Chiefs 43-16, and the Chargers 39-29.

It was a pretty underwhelming day for us,” said Andrew Mannino, the senior sports content analyst at PointsBet, to Casino.org. “Washington and the Jets winning sort of kept us alive. The Packers and the Bucs both winning their games hurt us pretty bad. The Steelers winning hurt us pretty bad. The Cardinals bailed us out at the end of the day and prevented it from being a much worse day.”

In the night game, the Seattle Seahawks were 3.5-point favorites over the Arizona Cardinals. The Seahawks had 76 percent of the spread money but lost in overtime. The result was the best of the day for PointsBet and helped negate some of the afternoon losses.

The Cleveland Browns closed as 3.5-point favorites over the Cincinnati Bengals, with 83 percent of the spread money on Cleveland. The Browns won 37-34 on Baker Mayfield’s touchdown pass to Donovan People-Jones with 11 seconds remaining. The extra point failed, so Cleveland failed to cover the spread. PointsBet offered Browns bettors a “Good Karma” refund.

At BetMGM, a Las Vegas bettor placed 23 NFL bets worth $2.56 million, according to ESPN, and won a net $2.3 million.

Bears at Rams on Monday Night

Week 7 ends on Monday night, with the Chicago Bears playing at the Los Angeles Rams in a battle of two of the NFL’s surprise teams. The Rams are consensus 6-point favorites. The total is 44.5.

Bettors like the Bears in a big way tonight, so we’ll be rooting for the Rams and for the over for the first time in a while,” Mannino said.

As of midday Monday, 85 percent of the spread money was on the Bears, and 70 percent of the money was on the under. That put sportsbooks in the rare position of pulling for the favorite and the over.

The Bears (5-1) have posted a pair of big fourth-quarter comebacks, rallying from 17 down in Week 1 vs. Detroit and 16 down in Week 3 vs. Atlanta. Despite the excellent record, they’re in the middle of the pack at +3,300 to win the Super Bowl.

The Rams (4-2) are led by defensive tackle Aaron Donald, who has a league-leading 7.5 sacks, and quarterback Jared Goff, who has an NFL-leading 141.1 passer rating in the fourth quarter. They are +2,500 to win the Super Bowl, only a slight improvement from the start of the season.