NFL Wild Card Weekend: The Best Football Bets, Odds and Expert Picks
The absolute best bet, teaser bet, prop bet and parlay bet for NFL Wild Card Weekend, according to the experts at BetOnline.
This is it. We’ve reached the NFL postseason where many a fortune has been made. You’ve got that $500 bankroll in your pocket and, if you’ve been following along all season, it should be considerably bigger by now.
If not, and you’re just now dipping your toe into sports betting, this is absolutely the time. BetOnline will make the whole process easy for you and even boost up your account with a $1,000 bonus if you join today.
As always, the odds featured below are courtesy of BetOnline.AG.
Best Bet
Back during the season we used this section for our “locks,” but when it comes to the postseason there’s just no such thing. You might look at the 7-9 Washington Football Team hosting the Tom Brady-led Tampa Bay Buccaneers as an easy win for those Brady Bucs, but pump the brakes.
Twice before teams made the playoffs with just seven victories, the 2010 Seattle Seahawks (7-9) and the 2014 Carolina Panthers (7-8-1), and hosted Wild-Card round playoff games.
Both those 7-win teams won and neither game was particularly close. The 2010 Seahawks knocked off the Drew Brees-led New Orleans Saints a year after the Saints won the Super Bowl, winning 41-36. You might remember that as the “Beast Mode” game where Marshawn Lynch blasted his way through every single New Orleans defender on his way to a 67-yard touchdown run that caused the crowd to react so loudly it registered on nearby seismographs.
In 2014, the Panthers hosted the 11-5 Arizona Cardinals in the Wild-Card round and delivered a 27-16 beat down. Arizona was held to just 78 yards of total offense and their only second half score was a safety in the final three seconds of the game that Carolina intentionally gave up to keep from punting from their own end zone.
The coaches in that 2014 Cards at Panthers game? Bruce Arians (Arizona) and Ron Rivera (Carolina).
How about the Chicago Bears at the New Orleans Saints as a solid alternative? Nope.
Brees still isn’t 100 percent, Alvin Kamara might not play since he was on the COVID-19 list in Week 17 and New Orleans is 0-2 in their last two home playoff games, losing in overtime to the Los Angeles Rams 26-23 to end their 2018 season and to the Minnesota Vikings 26-20 to end 2019.
So who gets the call? Why it’s the Buffalo Bills, who looked like the best team not only in the NFL, but the entire universe over the last two months of the season. Their only loss in the last 11 weeks was thanks to a freakish Hail Mary pass hauled in by DeAndre Hopkins on November 15. They’re playing an Indianapolis Colts team that they themselves knocked into the playoffs thanks to a 56-26 curb stomping of the Miami Dolphins last Sunday.
Pick: $250 on the Bills at -290 at BetOnline.AG
Teaser of the Week
Here is where we’re going to get downright larcenous thanks to a two-team teaser that you need to jump on quickly because both of these lines could move all over the place before kickoff.
Why, you ask? Because in one of the games, a head coach and multiple members of their coaching staff will be sidelined thanks to positive COVID-19 tests. I’m talking, of course, about the Cleveland Browns who are, as of this writing, +6 dogs to the Pittsburgh Steelers.
The Browns already had a tough row to hoe as they narrowly beat this same Steelers team last Sunday with Mason Rudolph at quarterback. Cleveland’s defense has been a sieve all season and surrendered 315 passing yards to Rudolph, a career day for a QB who was benched multiple times last year for a guy named “Duck.”
What are we sticking with this? The team that’s found themselves back in punditry and the books’ good graces thanks to a month of bulldozing AFC losers. I’m talking about the Baltimore Ravens who enter their game against the Tennessee Titans as -3 favorites. If I’m Tennessee, that bothers me a tad.
The Titans not only ended the Raven’s season last year in the divisional round in a game that was never in question, they beat them 30-24 in their match up this season, in Baltimore on overtime. For the second time in less than a calendar year, the Poe Birds heard Maury Povich read their paternity results aloud and learned that Derrick Henry is, in fact, their father.
The dude just ran for 250 yards and two touchdowns against the Houston Texans. He eclipsed 2,000 yards in a season, just the fifth player to ever do it. Ryan Tannehill has put up Patrick Mahomes numbers this year and A.J. Brown will be the best wide receiver on the field. Are they kidding with this Ravens -3?
I like the Steelers. I like the Titans. I like them even better with a 06.0 tease.
Teaser Pick: $200 on the Steelers pick-em and the Titans at +9 at BetOnline.AG
Prop Bet of the Week
We’ve been able to slide in a prop for a while on the early Super Bowl conference winner, but I’ve avoided it. No more.
The Kansas City Chiefs and Buffalo Bills are the best teams in the league and it doesn’t look close, barring some kind of coronavirus or injury disaster.
The hook is gone in the AFC vs NFC spreads and you’ll get no better odds than that as the playoffs roll on.
Pick: $40 on the AFC -3 to win the Super Bowl at BetOnline.AG
The Crazy, Longshot, Throwing-a-Dart Parlay of the Week
How I’m feeling and my pride is the one to blame. ‘Cause I know I don’t understand just how your love can do what no one else can. Got me looking at a Crazy Parlay right now.
Just because we’re down to six games doesn’t mean there isn’t an eye-popping parlay to take advantage of here. First off, let’s toss in the moneylines for the picks we’ve already made; Titans (+153), Steelers (-165) and Bills (-290).
Now, let’s look at some totals.
The Bills have scored 48, 38 and 56 in the last three weeks. You like that over 51 (-108)? I sure do. How about that Ravens at Titans game that went into OT the last time they played. Tennessee has scored 31, 46 and 41 in their last three victories. Baltimore scored 47, 40 and 38 in three of their last four wins. That over 54.5 (-115)? I love it.
That Rams at Seahawks over/under of 42.5? In their last three contests they combined to score 40, 39 and 29 and that was with everyone healthy on both squads. Two of those were Rams wins. I like that under at -110.
A $10 parlay bet on these moneylines and totals pays $314.08 at BetOnline.AG
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