Sports Interaction betting analyst Frank Doyle looks back on Week 9 of the NFL.
It was honors about even in Week 9 of the NFL in the eternal struggle between player and bookmaker. Favorites have been extremely reliable to win and cover this year, but players were let down badly by some marquee teams this week.
The single greatest disappointment for players was Baltimore getting turned over at Cincinnati. The demise of the Raven run defense is not fully public news just yet so, when Sports Interaction set Baltimore as a three point favorite on the road the public ate it up, and were still chomping up until the kickoff. But that’s not how it worked out and Cincinnati’s win presents us all with a toothsome line-making dilemma for the Bengals' visit to Pittsburgh.
Green Bay suffered a really bad beat at Tampa Bay. There was a lot of public money on the Packers to avenge themselves on the Bucs after the Favre homecoming didn’t go the Packers’ way, and Sports Interaction saw more action on a road team to cover a big number than is usual for non-marquee – Saints, Colts, Vikings - teams. I don’t think we’ll be seeing as much as action on the Packers for the rest of the season, as their inability to protect a quarterback who might hold on to the football a little too long in the first place is beginning to kill them.
Sports Interaction didn’t see as much action on San Diego at the Giants and Houston at Indianapolis relative to the public prominence of the games would suggest. The reason for that is that you can’t really count on any of the teams to be consistent. You don’t know who’ll turn up.
The Giants are in freefall but the Chargers have never had the reputation of guys that go into biker bars and order glasses of milk, just to see what will happen. Equally, while the Texans might have had their best start in their short history, the public will not trust them with hard cash before they close out deals like last Sunday. The line might have been a little high on the Colts but any lower and the public would have swamped, because of the perception the Texans have as a team that doesn’t deliver.
The two night games went well for the book. The public favored Philly over Dallas because the Eagles were at home and their victory over the Giants was seen as of greater worth than any of the Cowboys’ victories. The Cowboys will be a road favorite at Green Bay this weekend, I think.
And on Monday Night, Pittsburgh proved their class once more. The weight of money with Sports Interaction was on the Steelers as they were proven commodity and they delivered. All the hype this week will be about the New England and Indianapolis rivalry but there is no way the road to the AFC Championship is not going through Pittsburgh. Again.