Best Bets in the Pre-Season
Preseason football betting can be a real frustrating game. The actual games mean nothing, and there’s been almost no correlation between how a team does in the preseason and how they perform in the regular season. But there are a couple things I like to remember when I’m wagering on pre-season football.
Which team’s players has more to prove? Sportsbooks don’t always pay attention to this little tidbit of information when they’re putting the lines out for preseason games. Teams with big names, good teams, those are the favorites in the pre-season. But sometimes there are big battles going on in camp between talented players. Quarterback battles are big, because coaches often like to give both QBs time with the starting offense. That means their #1’s will play longer. That team has an advantage.
Which team is deeper? Sports betting doesn’t always rely on how solid the back-ups are. Sure, depth is a good thing, but in the preseason, it’s a HUGE thing. Think about it like this. In the first preseason game, starting offenses might play 2 different series. Sometimes it’s just one. Back-ups will be playing most of the game.
Know which coaches care about preseason games. There are coaches that don’t care like Andy Reid (18-30), Ken Whisenhunt (5-11), and Jim Caldwell (1-7, which he learned from Tony Dungy (10-20). And there are coaches that think it’s important to win every game they coach like Mike Shanahan (43-21) and Jack Del-Rio (20-12). Then there are coaches that just win like Mike Tomlin (13-4) and Bill Belichick (25-20). First time head coaches seem to have a little more to prove in their first couple seasons of action.
These are all things to consider when handicapping on preseason football.
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