All right, NFLbets’ll admit it. After cleaning up on Sunday in Grey Cup betting plus winning bets on the New England Patriots and Cleveland Browns, we ruined a pretty decent week by going one bet too far on the Monday Night Football game, with only ourselves to blame. What folly, betting the under in 2018!
Nevertheless, NFLbets is feeling pretty good about a 8-4 week when Sunday was quite wacky, indeed: A ho-hum Thanksgiving slate preceded an 11-game Sunday on which four SU favorites lost outright and six lost ATS – though to no one’s surprise, the league’s SU/ATS bottom-feeders – the 49ers, Cardinals, Jets and Raiders – dutifully lost both ways.
Below runs a complete list of results for week 11 in NFLbets’ standard format, i.e. adjusted for the point spread; all results listed in boldface indicate games in which the SU winner did not cover the spread. Comments, questionable humor and the occasional salient point courtesy NFLbets writer/editor Os Davis.
• Chicago Bears 20 at Detroit Lions 16
• Dallas Cowboys 24, Washington 23
• New Orleans Saints 19½, Atlanta Falcons 17. Going 0-3 in over/under bets this week implies that perhaps NFLbets needs to stay away from these wagers through 2018, when it’s been damn close to impossible to guess this correctly. Case in point: Thanksgiving, when the Dallas/Washington game, with the lowest over/under of the day, was the sole over to come in.
• Seattle Seahawks 30 at Carolina Panthers 24. Three weeks ago, the Seahawks were perceived of as lost in the shuffle while the Panthers sat in the no. 3 (or, pragmatically, no. 5) spot in the NFC. And now … hey, how much do you think Ron Rivera regrets throwing away that PAT attempt against Detroit…?
• Cleveland Browns 34 at Cincinnati Bengals 20. About the only thing more baffling was the Bengals’ installation as favorites in this game are the new rumors that, should Marvin Lewis get the sack at season’s conclusion (ha ha), Hue Jackson is the replacement. Hell, maybe the Bengals should be vetting Condoleeza Rice.
• Denver Broncos 24, Pittsburgh Steelers 14. Could the final playoff spot in the AFC actually be determined by the Cleveland at Denver game in week 15? Wacky!
• New York Giants 22 at Philadelphia Eagles 20½. Who else figured for a good 75% of this game that the Eagles would lose SU? No matter: the ATS loss sinks Philadelphia into last place on NFLbets ATS standings board.
• Minnesota Vikings 20½, Green Bay Packers 17. Spare us the Kirk Cousins talk: This Vikings team is primed to go down with other supposed juggernauts of the past; just ask a lifelong Minnesota fan how likely is a wild-card game in which the Vikes choke away an OT game to the Cowboys. On second thought, don’t do that. He/she has suffered enough.
• Tampa Bay Buccaneers 25½, San Francisco 49ers 3
• Baltimore Ravens 21, Oakland Raiders 17. Let’s say Jimmy Garoppolo never properly comes back from injury and Mark Davis doubles down on disparaging Raiders fans in Oakland. Will anyone notice the Bay is bereft of football in 2020? Will anybody care?
• Buffalo Bills 24, Jacksonville Jaguars 18. A rumor that we just made up says that Shahid Khan last week offered to relocate his franchise to St. Louis last week, only to be turned down.
• Miami Dolphins 24 at Indianapolis Colts 18. The preseason proposition bet that NFLbets can’t wait to see: over/under Colts wins for 2019 – should be verrrrrrrrrrrrry interesting.
• Los Angeles Chargers 31, Arizona Cardinals 10. Independent estimates put the attendance of this game at around 14,000. Who knows how they drew that many…?
• New England Patriots 17 at New York Jets 13. Here’s the difference between NFL bettors and football fans. New England’s schedule down the stretch runs vs Minnesota, at Miami, at Pittsburgh, vs Buffalo and vs the New York Jets. Fans reckon the Patriots are good for four or five wins to finish 12-4 or 13-3. The bettor is vulturing already, getting ready to bet the opposition ATS at least once in this year’s playoffs.
• Houston Texans 29½, Tennessee Titans 17. Naturally, NFLbets was happy to cash in on the Texans win ATS this week, but we’re well more stoked about our wager on the Texans to win the AFC at 8/1 odds…
For an updated version of the NFL standings by ATS record, click here.