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Wunderdog NFL Picks and Pro Football Predictions 2002 Weekly NFL Picks Regular
Season Week 16 Welcome to the 2002 Week 16 Wunderdog Paid Subscription NFL Newsletter A second-straight dominating week for favorites didn’t bode well for a tried-and-true backer of the Dogs. Wunderdog was 2-4 in week 15 putting me at 39-29 for the season, with 9 winning weeks out of 14. Despite its record, I feel last week’s analysis on-target as three of the four losers (Cleveland, KC and Houston) were each one play away from covering and winning their respective games. QUESTION OF THE WEEK: SHOULD I PLAY THE MONEY LINE? Now if this bet paid even money, you would simply pick the favorites each week, win more than 50% of your bets, and laugh all the way to the bank. That’s why, of course, this bet doesn’t pay even money. If you select a favorite to win straight up, you need to put down more than you would win. If you select an underdog, you need to put down less than you would win. Let’s look at a couple of examples for this week: Miami Dolphins -3 over Minnesota Vikings On the first game, one popular sports book has set the Money Line at -180 for Miami and +150 for Minnesota. That means that if you want to bet Miami to win straight up, you would need to lay $180 to win $100. If you want to take Minnesota to win straight-up, you would lay $100 to win $150. For the second game, the bookmaker has set the money at -300 for the Pack and +230 for Buffalo. The larger numbers reflect the larger spread. If you can pick a 6.5 point underdog to win straight-up, you would win $230 for a mere $100 bet. Got it? Good. What you may have noticed is that if you can successfully pick underdogs to win straight-up, you can win a lot of money without risking nearly as much. I like this fact about the money line. And, if you combine money-line picks into parlays, you can really hit the jackpot with a small investment. For example, if we parlayed Minnesota ML and Buffalo ML in the above example, a $100 bet would yield $725 in winnings. Throw in a third team (say, the Giants at +4.5) and a $100 bet would win $2,169. Obviously, it is harder to pick underdogs to win straight-up, right? Yes, but maybe not as hard as you initially think. As I have mentioned in an earlier newsletter, the spread doesn’t come into play about 84% of the time in the NFL. In other words, the team that wins the game doesn’t cover the spread only 16% of the time. Also, since you win more than you bet when picking dogs with the money line, you have to win a much smaller % of your games to break even. The particular percentage depends on the spread in the games you pick (the higher the spreads, the fewer games you need to win since the money line pays more for higher spread dogs). For example, let’s imagine you were to pick 100 three-point underdogs to win straight-up at a money line of +150. In this scenario, you would only need to win 40% of those games to break even. On the 60 losses, you would of course lose 60 units (there is no juice on money line bets). On the 40 winners you would win 60 units (1.5 x 40). If you were to pick 100 6.5-point underdogs to win straight-up at a money line of +230, you would only need to win about 31% of your bets to break-even. So, there is an opportunity to do well with the money-line if you can select enough dogs that win straight-up. Which begs the question: How have Wunderdog’s picks this year done on the Money Line? Let’s see: There have been 68 underdog plays with spreads ranging from +1 to +13.5. The average spread was +4.4 which equates roughly to a +1.75 money line. At these average figures, we would need about 37% straight-up winners to break even. In reality, 41% percent of the Wunderdog underdogs have won straight-up for +18.9 units or a 27% ROI. These stats show, for this year at least, the money line has been extremely profitable. On to this week’s power ratings and selections… The Week 16
Matchup Power Ratings are posted. As a reminder, these
ratings highlight for you the games in which the
lines-makers have set the line incorrectly, BASED ON THE
STATISTICAL PERFORMANCE OF THE TEAMS. This can be for good
reasons (i.e. injuries) or bad reasons (the public’s
perception is way off). The underrated team is the one
the statistics point to as the play. Be aware that these
ratings are statistically driven and do not account for
other important handicapping elements such as motivation,
injuries, and situational trends. There are times I actually
play against the ratings due to the other factors. Next week’s newsletter will talk about how Wunderdog picks the postseason why I actually lean towards the favorites in January… The Wunderdog Week 16 Selections: The Wunderdog has been experimenting with selecting some favorites this season (off-line) and feels he has figured out some excellent profitable situations. I will include favorites in the last two weeks of the regular season if they fall into these situations. This week’s picks include two favorites. JACKSONVILLE +3 OVER TENNESSEE Mark Brunell is playing very well, with a 2.8 to 1 TD to INT ratio this year. The Jags have the 6th best scoring defense in the league and a top 10 rushing offense! The Titans are in a similar situation as the Jets last week. The Jets fell to a “poor’ Bears squad as a 6.5 point favorite. The Jets were simply playing too good for their talent, having won 5 out of their last 6. Their luck had to run out. The Titans have won eight of their last nine and can’t continue at this level forever either. Teams and human beings get tired and Tennessee just isn’t as good as their recent record reflects. Divisional home dogs do very well against the spread in December, covering 7 times out of 10. While most of the world will be on Tennessee in this game, the Wunderdog smells upset. Statistically the Jags are better than Tennessee and if the Titan’s weren’t on such a roll, Jacksonville would be favored in this game.
Can they do it? Consider that they have won five of their last six since head coach Jim Fassel took over play-calling duties. The Colts are hot, too, also winning five of their last six. Their offense has finally been living up to the triple-threat billing behind Manning, James and Harrison. New York’s D has been pretty stingy as of late, giving up less than 20 points per game over the last seven weeks. And, their passing defense is third in the league, which might keep Marvin Harrison to only, say, 200 yards :) The Colts are tired after battling back from a 16-point deficit against the Browns last week. I expect them to have trouble playing at the level they have been. Statistically, these teams are a pretty even match but NY has two things I like to see in December: a better rushing game and a better defense (3rd in the league in scoring). The Giants also qualify for a somewhat obscure situational angle that affects teams that score the most points the previous week and win by a wide margin that is 44-18 ATS including 3-1 last year and 5-2 so far this year.
Neither team has much to play for here so I’ll keep the analysis short and to the point. My power ratings give Chicago a slight edge but I like this game primarily because Carolina qualifies for two negative situational angles that have been very successful this year and last: Small-to-medium home favorites giving up a lot of points their last two games are just 6-17 the last two years ATS (38-74 overall) and home favorites having lost 80% or more of their last ten games are 1-4 (11-28 overall) ATS. Admittedly this pick is pretty one-dimensional so if you aren’t a big fan of situational angles, you might chose to lay off this pick. In any case, I am going with Chicago.
Rich Gannon set an NFL record for 21 straight completions (and 29 of his first 30!) against the Broncos in their first meeting. Gannon will again be facing a lackluster defense that gave up nearly 500 yards to the Chiefs last week. The Broncos have consistently shown they can’t stop good offenses this year and Oakland’s is #1 with 397.2 yards per game. Despite a big win last week versus Kansas City, the Broncos are not a confident team right now. They were one play away from losing a game in which they had a 3rd quarter 28-10 lead. Despite Denver’s “potential,” Oakland has the much better team. My power ratings indicate they should be giving around six points instead of 3.5. Denver’s #2 rushing defense won’t really be too much of a factor as Oakland has done their damage through the air this year. Oakland’s strong rushing defense (#5 in the league) will most likely put the game on Griese’s shoulders and he doesn’t do well in that role. Oakland has the weapons to build an early lead and the Broncos have shown they don’t have the personnel and/or heart to mount a comeback. Given a lead, Griese is as good as they come. But he’s far from the comeback kid. The Broncos have been dismal this year coming from behind. A loss last week to a very good Miami squad and first-place in the AFC West at stake has Oakland plenty motivated to win this week and all-but-assure a playoff berth. Can Denver duplicate Miami’s successful aggressive defensive scheme? Don’t count on it. Denver doesn’t have the cornerbacks that can jam at the line like Miami does. Yes, Denver will come with something different than they showed last time but Oakland knows that as well. Sometimes a team just has another’s number. I expect a pretty easy win for Oakland.
Tampa Bay’s defense is a thing of wonder. Simeon Rice and Warren Sapp have combined for 20 sacks this season. This defense also boasts a league-high 27 interceptions and is tops in the league in scoring defense. Any wonder why they are 11-3? The Bucs endured last-week’s letdown situation against the Lions and pulled out the win. This week at home on national television, they will be sky high. The Bucs have won six straight at home SU and against the spread. As a favorite, this is the lowest number of points they have laid this season. Given that this is a Monday Night home game and the Bucs are clearly a superior team, I can’t understand it. If we assume the Monday Night home team has an inherent 3 to 3.5 point home field advantage, the lines-makers are calling this a pick-em. The stats paint a different picture … Tampa Bay’s offense is better than Pittsburgh’s defense in both scoring and passing. When Pittsburgh has the ball, it gets even better. TBs defense is better than the Steelers’ offense in every major category: Scoring, Rushing Yards, Yards/Rush, Completion Percentage, Passing Yards, and Yards/Pass. My power ratings say Tampa should be favored by over a touchdown in this game. But it doesn’t stop there, Tampa Bay qualifies for three separate situational angles that involve big favorites off a win that are a combined 58-5 ATS the spread over the last five years (6-2 this year). Go Bucs.
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