What if we told you before the NFL season that the reigning NFC champion Los Angeles Rams would be only a three-point home favorite against San Francisco in early October?
How much would you have bet on the Rams?
Don’t lie!
Avoiding overreaction is one of the most important principles to remember during the extremely volatile NFL betting season. One or two games can completely swing the perception on any given team. Obviously, nobody is as good or as bad as they look over an extremely small sample size.
Yet the San Francisco bandwagon got even bigger after they blasted the preseason darling Browns on Monday Night Football. A 31-3 ass-kicking on national television definitely opens up eyeballs around the world. The Niners (4-0 SU, 3-1 ATS) have also beaten an up-and-down Tampa Bay team, an atrocious Bengals bunch and the Steelers with backup quarterback Mason Rudolph.
Los Angeles Rams -3 vs San Francisco 49ers
Now Kyle Shanahan and Co. head to L.A. on short rest — without both starting tackles — to face Aaron Donald and that standout defensive line. Woof. The market was Rams -5 Monday morning, -3.5 before MNF and after the aforementioned Browns beatdown, it’s now -3. This is an incredible buy low spot on a really good team with a really good coach.
And Sean McVay has never lost three straight games as a leading man.
OTHER MARKET NOTES:
Before their Sunday Night Football loss to Indianapolis, Kansas City was a 7.5 point home favorite against Houston. Mix in Deshaun Watson’s Herculean performance last weekend and now the Chiefs are as low as -4 at Arrowhead. Seems a little low, doesn’t it?
Speaking of Watson, he’s 12-to-1 right now to win the NFL MVP at the Westgate SuperBook. Only three players have better odds: Patrick Mahomes (+100), Russell Wilson (+550) and Christian McCaffrey (+1000).
Look at the movement on this Patriots total. It’s only Wednesday and this bad boy has already plummeted down from 46.5 to 41. That’s the third time this season that big time bucks have bought into Bill Belichick’s extremely formidable defense.
Expect fireworks at the Cotton Bowl. The Red River Shootout has already been bet up from 73.5 to 76.5 at Circa Sports — and it’s likely not done climbing.
There appears to be sharp money on both sides of this Penn State-Iowa tilt Saturday night in Iowa City. Circa opened Penn State -2.5 on Sunday morning, it got bet up to -5 by Monday night, now the consensus number is -3.5. If you’ve never been to a night game at Kinnick Stadium, you haven’t lived.
And finally… some respect for Baylor! The undefeated Bears opened up as a 10.5 point home favorite against Texas Tech. After making BU a home underdog against Iowa State (straight up win) and a short dog at Kansas State (straight up win), oddsmakers have learned their lesson.