Presented by BetOnline.AG
It’s that time of week again, where we look at that blinking $500 in your bank account and figure out how to morph it into a larger, more impressive number and just in time for the holidays.
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As always, the odds below come courtesy of BetOnline.AG.
Lock of the Week
This isn’t the best week for locks, with very few egregious match ups on the table, even when you factor in the 0-10 New York Jets. They’ve played a lot better with Joe Flacco in their last two games (not great, but better). They’ve scored 27 and 28 points in consecutive contests and are playing a Miami Dolphins team that just got dominated by the Denver Broncos to the point where head coach Brian Flores gave rookie quarterback Tua Tagovailoa the hook. In spite of the Dolphins being a -6.5 favorite, we’re steering clear of that. The chances of the Jets going 0-16 are nearly as astronomical as the Pittsburgh Steelers going 16-0. It’s that hard to do in the modern NFL.
Same with the Cleveland Browns at that same -6.5 spread over the Jacksonville Jaguars. Both the Browns and Dolphins are on the road. Miami showed last week they can’t be trusted and while Cleveland has a better track record this season, are you really ready to toss your cash on a Browns “lock?” Yeah, me neither.
Nope. When we’re talking locks we want to hone in on the Buffalo Bills at a -250 moneyline hosting the Los Angeles Chargers. Buffalo is 4-1 at home this season, with their only loss coming to the Kansas City Chiefs. The Chargers are led by a rookie quarterback (Justin Herbert), a good one, but still a rook, and one of the worst coaching staffs in the league. They’re traveling across the entire country and playing a 1 p.m. EST game with their West Coast 10 a.m. bodies.
And that’s not even factoring in the fact that Herbert let his strength coach give him a haircut that makes him look like he’s starting his first week of summer Bible school. That’s no way to win in the NFL.
Pick: $250 on the Bills at -250 at BetOnline.AG.
Teaser of the Week
If you’re a regular reader of this column, you know I like to use the teaser to add a little insurance to games I already like. For instance, last week I figured the Los Angeles Rams and Tennessee Titans would both win outright (spoiler: they did), but by sticking them in a two-team teaser, I was able to bump the lines significantly in their favor, meaning if either of them still lost, but kept it within a touchdown, money would be made.
Using that same strategy, let’s focus in on the New York Giants (-5.5) at the Cincinnati Bengals and the aforementioned Titans at the Indianapolis Colts (-3.5).
There’s good reason the Giants, in spite of their record, are favored over the Bengals. Cincy’s rookie QB, Joe Burrow, nearly had his leg torn off last week and will likely be out a calendar year. Meanwhile the Giants have won two straight. Of course, those wins were over the Washington Football Team and the Philadelphia Eagles, but they still count as dubs.
Tennessee is an underdog in spite of dismantling the Baltimore Ravens, 34-24, last week. Why? Because these same Colts did pretty much the same thing to the Titans two weeks before, beating them 34-17. Now, fun fact, this same Indy team was absolutely embarrassed by Baltimore three Sundays ago, 24-10. just in case you thought the NFL makes sense. I think the Titans are going to win this game. They’re the better team, top-to-bottom, and they have to come into this one not only confident, but looking for a little payback. An 06.0 teaser should cover our bases thoroughly, regardless and give us some breathing room in case Indy just has Tennessee’s number and Bengals back up Ryan Finley gets Freaky Friday body swapped with a QB that can actually play.
Teaser Pick: $200 on the Titans at +9.5 and the Giants at +0.5 at BetOnline.AG.
Prop Bet of the Week
Speaking of the prospect of the Steelers going 16-0 in the regular season, it’s a pretty tall order. Only one team has done it since the league expanded to 16 regular season games in 1978 and that was the 2007 New England Patriots. They couldn’t stick the landing, though, losing the Super Bowl to the 10-6 New York Giants. It was the first time, but not the last, that Maury Povich would open the envelope on live television proving Eli Manning’s paternity of Tom Brady.
Before that, you have to go back to the 1972 Miami Dolphins to find a team that went undefeated in the regular season, in their case 14-0. They did win the Super Bowl that year, besting the Washington (name withheld) 14-7 to complete the only perfect season in the NFL’s modern era.
Pittsburgh has six games to go, including a tough one against the Ravens on Thanksgiving night. Then they play at Buffalo on Dec. 13, host the Colts on December 27 and wrap up the season with what will likely be a meaningless game to them at the Cleveland Browns unless they’re actually going for that perfect season. It’s a tall order. It’s also why the odds of it NOT happening on BetOnline’s prop bet are at -1000.
But we’re trying to make some money here and since we’ve got our lock and teaser in place, no reason not to take a moonshot at +550 odds and see if we land in the Sea of Tranquility with a fat wad of cash to cushion our descent.
Pick: $40 on the Pittsburgh Steelers to go 16-0 at BetOnline.AG.
The Crazy, Longshot, Throwing-a-Dart Parlay of the Week
It’s 2020 and our mental wounds aren’t healing. Who and what’s to blame? We’re going off the rails on a crazy train so we might as well try to fill up one of those cartoon money bags with the dollar sign on the side as we do it.
We already like the Titans, so that’s an easy moneyline to take in a parlay at +170 over the Colts. The Arizona Cardinals are making a long trip to Foxboro to take on a New England Patriots team that’s wheezing and coughing blood into a handkerchief, but still might have all the mojo they need to shoot Johnny Ringo in the head. That’s a +118 moneyline.
But to get the payoff we want, we have to take some chances, so let’s think about the Atlanta Falcons at +145 hosting a depressed Las Vegas Raiders team coming off an elite performance that amounted to absolutely nothing against the Chiefs. On down the line, we have the Denver Broncos at a +220 moneyline hosting the Taysom Hill quarterbacked New Orleans Saints at Mile High. And while Hill played well last week at home against a familiar foe, maybe we don’t enshrine his bust in the Pro Football Hall of Fame just yet.
A $10 parlay bet on these teams pays $451.46 at BetOnline.AG.