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| | Author: MasterBets
| NFL Handicapping Review - Week 4
It wasn't our best week by any means, but we managed to go over .500 with our NFL Week 4 Picks, and more importantly our overall winning percentage for this season is still the best in the business, with 65% winning NFL Picks in 2004. 31 Wins and only 17 Losses can be achieved (we're living proof of that), but only if you retain a sense of objectivity when analyzing the NFL.
We have to also be willing to make adjustments, which is another way of saying we make mistakes and need to be big enough and smart enough to rectify those errors. One such mistake: we thought the Giants would be awful this year. The truth of the matter is that they are the second-best team in their division, and better than a number of other NFC teams. Warner looks a lot better away from Martz, but who wouldn't, and the Giants are playing hard. Another team that we were wrong about are the Steelers, who have now beaten our picks twice in succession (although the loss against the 4.5 point spread by the Bengals was very unlucky - the Bengals were odds on favorites to lose by 4 until an INT was returned for a TD, which is the worst way to lose a pick).
Last week saw us pick a number of underdogs, including the Giants to beat the Packers, the Chiefs over the Ravens, and the Falcons over the Panthers. The Chiefs were better than their record suggested, but still not the team pundits imagined they would be before the season started. They will win their fair share of games though, as long as they stick to playing opponents with horrible QBs - the Chargers and Raiders come to mind.
We erred in picking the Bills to cover against the Patriots, although that game turned on a missed call by the officials that went against the Bills, and was then followed by an offisde penalty on a Patriots field-goal that resulted in a Patriots TD. The way betting works can be so painful sometimes: if the Patriots make a FG there they lead 20-17 and the game realistically ends with a 3 point margin of victory (the Bills could have settled for a tying field goal instead of trying for a TD of their own on 4th down and short, which in turn led to a fumble return and an inflated 14 point margin of victory). Nevertheless, bad teams like the Bills find ways to put themselves under pressure with penalties and turnovers, so the ultimate blame lies with us for picking them against a team that knows how to win.
There are some disappointing teams out there that need to be monitored closely in upcoming weeks: teams like the Titans and Redskins are underperforming, and in the case of the Titans the return of McNair could signal some betting value. The Redskins are not good, plain and simple, and the betting value lies in betting against them for now. The Jaguars might have lost to the Colts, in a game we picked correctly, but they also proved they are a genuinely good team, and will win a lot more games this year. As we stated last week, the Saints are highly overrated and they proved as much by getting schooled at Arizona of all places.
The class of the league is also clear: the Eagles, the Colts, the Patriots, and the Seahawks (who shouldn't lose a division game this season, with the NFC West pitifully weak) are well ahead of the rest.
The worst teams in the league are easy to identify, and punish accordingly when betting: the 49ers, the Dolphins, the Buccaneers, the Bills.
| Related Articles:
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| Last Updated
Tuesday, April 22, 2008 | | |
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