Prime-Time Props — Thursday Night Football, Week 1
Prop God
We now have six full weeks of NFL action in the books. Week 6 started the bye weeks, which meant fewer games throughout the league. We had a lot of games come down to the final drive, even the final play, in order to get a winner or loser.
That just goes to show how razor-thin the margins are for victory and defeat — not only for these NFL teams, but also for the betting public. Here is how the numbers fell for Week 6 and the overall picture that is being painted thus far in terms of NFL betting.
Against-the-Spread Report
This was another very strong week for favorites. Entering Week 6, favorites had won two weeks, lost two weeks to underdogs, and finished tied at 8-8 in one week for a season total of 2-2-1. This week, favorites take the lead for the first time all season as they covered nine of the 14 games played. Minnesota opened as a dog, but ultimately closed as the favorite, won, and covered against the Panthers. Dallas pulled out a cover at -4 despite the game going to overtime. A lot of the other games were very one-sided with the Chiefs, Rams, Bengals, Ravens, Colts and Cardinals all winning by big numbers going away. Where is the value this week? Check out our NFL Power Rankings to see where the potential upsets may be.
NFL Underdog Record
In three of the first four weeks of the season, a flat one-unit bet on every underdog on the moneyline returned a profit. This strategy lost big in Week 5, and Week 6 was even worse. It was actually a disaster before the Titans won outright Monday night, but even that was too little to help stop the bleeding. Only three underdogs won out of 14 games played over the weekend. Jacksonville and Las Vegas were the only two on Sunday, and neither carried a big price. The Titans were a decent win, but it’s tough to have three wins make up for losing 11 units on the favorites that did win. After Week 6, we now have had the strategy of taking a flat one-unit bet on every underdog returning a profit in three weeks and a loss in three others. The bloodbath this week now turned this strategy negative on the year, as the losing weeks have been bigger than the winning ones. If you want to see which underdogs have a chance for week seven, check out our first look at the NFL opening lines video.
NFL Team Scoring
The unders have outpaced the overs through the first five weeks of the season. Last week overs cashed in nine of 16 games to edge out a slight profit. This week the books are the only ones who made money if people bet one unit on over or unders in every game as the final tally was 6 overs, 6 unders and two games that pushed the closing line. To see how any team is doing vs. the over/under total, check out our betting trends report here at FTNBets. A flat bet on either overs or unders this week lost to the juice and pushed the seasonal numbers to 2-3-1 for flat one-unit bets on the over. On the season, only 44.6% of games have gone over the listed total. 53.1% of games have gone under. That means unders are still the better plays, which makes sense as the betting public prefers overs and books shade that way because of it. A flat one-unit bet on every under this season at -110 would have returned a little over 45 units. The 42 overs would have a negative impact of 42 units lost, meaning that blindly betting every under is still profitable on the year. You would be up a little over 3 units on 94 units risked. Not the greatest ROI, but a profit is still better than a loss.
