Here’s the official NFLbets Pick of the Week for Super Bowl LIII
NFLbets will say (write?) this from the go: Our Pick of the Week for the Super Bowl and most subsequent recommendations on the game are the result of backward logic. The premise is simple: The betting opportunities on the New England Patriots just aren’t that interesting or lucrative.
Without further ado, here’s NFLbets’ Pick of the Week for Super Bowl LIII: Take the Los Angeles Rams +2½/+3/+3½ vs the Patriots.
We’re also advising NFLbettors to take the Rams money line (ML), currently fetching from +115 to +130 and only going up before kickoff. Here’s why: Since ballooning from Rams -1 to Rams +2 on January 21, the point spread hasn’t moved since Rams +2½ in most Vegas sportsbooks as of Thursday evening before the game, and only now is Rams +3 beginning to show its face at the bigger online sportsbooks. Some 75% to 80% of the money continues to come in on the Patriots, which to NFLbets implies that the bookmakers still consider this more or less a pick ‘em, anyway.
In short, if you’re covering the Rams at +2½ or less for a -110 payout, you may as well cover that ML and put the odds on your side. (See what we meant by the lucrative and interesting bets on the Rams’ side? And by backward logic?)
So what needs to happen for the Rams to pull off the upset in Super Bowl LIII and bring things full circle back to 2002?
The Rams defensive line needs to dominate the Patriots offensive line. Tom Brady has been tormented in Super Bowls before – recall how the line on the 18-0 New England side gave up five sacks (and, essentially, the game) against the Giants in XLII – and we daresay the Patriots haven’t faced a front like that of Donald-Suh-Brockers in years, certainly not in 2018-19.
The Patriots OL has been middling this season, allowing an OK 21 sacks, but it doesn’t seem to matter to Ndamukong Suh, who loves blowing up New England lines: In eight career games against Belichick-and-Brady, Suhs destroyed the middle for nine QB hits. And Aaron Donald is Aaron Donald, the best player in this Super Bowl right now.
C.J. Anderson must continue producing – but more importantly, wearing down the middle. Recall that the Patriots have faced just one A-list running back in 2018-19: Kareem Hunt in week 6, who torched them for 185 total yards and a TD. Anderson’s unimpressive-looking 44 yards in New Orleans did not indicate the punishment he doled out on his 16 carries, mostly in the second and third quarters, that softened that Saints D enough to allow Jared Goff three lead-changing scoring drives late.
And just imagine if the Rams running game looks more like that of the divisional round game. Against the Dallas Cowboys, the combination of Todd Gurley and Anderson went for 38 carries for 238 yards and 3 TDs against a run defense that was statistically and reputedly better than the Saints’. This is the kind of attack that is indefensible, even if the opposition head coach somehow knows what’s coming.
Of course, the question of whether the Rams can win without a big day from Anderson may soon be moot; if Gurley isn’t playing or clearly can’t go, Los Angeles absolutely positively *needs* a *monster* game out of one of the great NFL late-season pickups in quite some time.
Three words for the defense: Bend, don’t break. A Belichick staple! At their best, e.g. in most of the Saints game, the Rams defense can stop anyone inside or just outside the red zone. A dude like Corey Littleton (a safety disguised as a linebacker) has the correct skills to flourish in a short field and has done so lately, and the shortcomings of Marcus Peters are greatly reduced.
Plus, just in the simplest terms, i.e. our kicker and punter are better than yours, Sean McVay would kill to turn this game into a punty-punty field position battle determined by a late long-ass field goal. We believe the longer the Rams keep a Patriots touchdown off the board, the likelier their chances to win.
And NFLbets really likes their chances: The Rams will win Super Bowl LIII.
The trappings and stats indicating a healthy Rams win are all in place. Though this game in Detroit represents just the second trip east of the Mountain Time Zone for the Rams, playing inside certainly won’t hurt an offense scoring nearly 35½ points per game. If you’re really looking for the silver lining, one may point out that the Rams’ first away game in the east was also played in a dome and saw the Rams topped by the Saints, 45-35. Of course, the 2018 Detroit Lions are not the 2018 New Orleans Saints.
(NFLbets’ recordkeeping on ATS marks is somewhat subjective in that the line is frozen for our purposes when we place the bet. Individual sportsbooks may have the Rams as good as 6-5 ATS or as poor as 4-7 ATS, both just as nuts as our reckoning…)
The last time the Jets were favored in this biannual meeting of AFC East “rivals” was back in week 2 of the *2008* season. You may recall that as Matt Cassel’s second start for the Patriots at quarterback; the Jets and head coach Eric “The Man Genius” Mangini of course had Brett Favre at the helm. As 1-point home favorites, the Jets lost that one SU, 19-10.
Todd Bowles? Worse. Going into Sunday’s game, he’s 21-31 ATS; more relevant for our purposes, his Jets are 1-5 SU and 4-2 ATS against the Patriots. Both of those ATS losses have come in the past three games, in which the Jets have been outscored 91-26. And Bowles’s sole SU win against New England came in the 2015 season’s week 15, an irrelevant game for New England.
Despite NFLbets’ so-so record and low earnings on Canadian football betting this year, we’re going to miss the CFL over the next six months badly. Regardless of how much fun the NFL in 2018 is, as the sports world’s talking heads so gushingly exhort to us, the CFL is always a breath of fresh air away from the stolid and conservative American game. This Thanksgiving weekend, NFLbets is thankful for another great season of CFL football – and that we came out ahead.