Patriots Odds and Betting Trends

Bet on the New England Patriots

Just imagine: An entire generation of NFL bettors has never seen a truly inferior New England Patriots team. NFLbets is hear to inform the young whippersnappers that, from the merger through Victor Kiam’s ownership, the now-feared Patriots were very (very!) often an afterthought, if not a laughingstock… 

The New England Patriots

In The Beginning … well, the Boston/New England area went mostly unloved by professional football interests. Whether due to the overwhelming obsessions with the Red Sox and Bruins or the dominance of the Ivy League college game, after the Boston Football Braves moved to Washington, DC, in 1939 and the “Boston Yanks” went defunct in the mid-40s, Beantown was bereft of NFL football for a decade and a half.

By 1960, Boston ranked as the USA’s 13th-most populous city and was home to another fledgling sports legend: A little franchise known as the Boston Celtics. Ergo, Beantown made for an easy choice to establish a franchise in the brand new American Football League in 1960. The Boston Patriots ascended to the AFL championship game following the ’63 season but were crushed by the San Diego Chargers, 51-10.

That would be the team’s last appearance in a title game for 22 years. In fact, after the 1964 AFL Championship Game, the Patriots went on to post losing records in 10 of the next 12 seasons and run up a cumulative mark of 49-100-5 SU.

New England caught lightning in a bottle in 1976, but the dumb luck that followed the Patriots’ red-stockinged city mates was just beginning. After going 11-3 in the regular season (a mark which would remain the franchise’s best until 2003) with the NFL’s second-highest point-scoring offense, the Pats were denied their first-ever playoff win, thanks to a phantom “roughing the passer” call in the Oakland Raiders’ favor in the fourth quarter of the divisional playoff game.

In 1985, sophomore sensation Tony Eason led the plucky Patriots past Dan Marino’s daunting Dolphins and into Super Bowl XX. There was New England crushed by those immortal Chicago Bears, 46-10; Eason turned in what is still the single worst Super Bowl performance by any player – and certainly any starting QB – ever.

Even this tiny taste of fleeting success portended disaster, though. Businessman Victor Kiam liked the team so much, he bought New England Patriots Football Inc. – sadly, Kiam knew more about hocking razors than messing around in sports. By 1990, head coach Rod Rust “led” the team to 1-15 SU (and 4-12 ATS – seriously easy money, that was) plus multiple allegations of sexual harassment of female reporters. The next two seasons saw the Patriots go a combined 8-24 SU/15-17 ATS.

Since the bottoming-out of the early 1990s, however, the Patriots have ultimately become a model NFL franchise. Over the 30 seasons following 1992, the Pats have employed just three head coaches, all Super Bowl winners (though not necessarily with New England): Bill Parcells, Pete Carroll and Bill Belichick. Parcells and Carroll enjoyed four playoff runs between them – including the appearance in Super Bowl XXXI – in seven seasons. It was during this run in the 1990s when Patriots football history nearly changed forever.

In the tradition of the time, franchise owner Robert Kraft decided that his now-winning team should have a spiffy new high-tech stadium. Near the conclusion of the 1998 season, then-Connecticut governor John Rowland publicly announced plans to invest up to $1 billion (at that time, a would-be record figure) into a 70,000-seat stadium in Hartford as a prelude to the Patriots’ relocation for the 2000 season. Rowland went so far as to claim that Kraft had signed a contract. However, by March ’99, the proposal was dead thanks in large part to an environmental report stating that extensive cleanup of the proposed site would be necessary. Oops.

So the Patriots stayed in the revamped Gillette Stadium, drafted the most under-the-radar superstar ever in the sixth round of the 2000 NFL Draft and pulled off the win as 17-point underdogs in Super Bowl XXXV. The reast is history – instant history much of the time. Cue “We Didn’t Start the Fire.”

Spygate. Back-to-back Super Bowl wins. Brady’s rivalry with Peyton Manning. 18-0, then The Helmet Catch. 18-1. The New York Giants beat them in the Super Bowl again. Coming back from 21-3 against the Falcons. Losing a Super Bowl in which two teams combined for the most yards of offense in a game *ever*. Beating the L.A. Rams with no offense. The Brady and Belichick divorce. The Cam Newton Year. Mac Jones, the future.

Since the AFL-NFL merger, quite a few franchises – and particularly those of the AFC – have enjoyed a Golden Age of perpetual competitiveness for a decade of two. Think the Denver Broncos, Buffalo Bills, Pittsburgh Steelers, San Francisco 49ers and the like. The question for the Patriots is whether succeeding in the 2000s and ’10s translates into perpetuity.

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Summary

For a more than 20 years, the New England Patriots have become a weekly consideration for the NFL bettor. In fact, about the only disadvantageous time to bet on the Patriots is in Super Bowls: Historically, they’re just 6-5 SU/4-6-1 ATS – though 3-1 SU/ATS since 2015. And in AFC championship games, they’re a big 11-5 SU/8-8 ATS. Suffice to say, New England should be a profitable wager for NFL bettors for some time to come…