Vegas Money Moves - Divisional Playoffs
By Micah Roberts
VegasInsider.com
Las Vegas sports books haven't even seen 10 percent of the action they'll take in over the weekend in the four NFL divisional playoff games, but early indications show it’s going to be a teaser kind of weekend for bettors.
And why not?
The spreads on the games are perfect for the teaser with a couple of 7’s and a few dogs crossing key numbers. Best of all for teaser bettors is they have some recent history on their sound during this round. How does the all-way side teaser going 7-1 in the Divisional Playoff round last year sound? How about 19-5 in the past three years?
The sports books set some nice numbers where all eight remaining teams usually play to their true ratings. The reflection of how good those numbers are is what happens if you add 6-points to each side. Last season three of the four divisional games were all-way side winners.
Can you imagine that? Just walking to the betting counter this week and saying, "I’m betting the line is perfect and I’ll take both the Patriots and Chiefs in a 6-point teaser." Then the Patriots win 20-16, and you cash. Don’t try that, really, it’s not a strong betting move, but it’s an example of what has been happening lately in this round. These spreads are tight.
The one spread that still has some loose ends is Sunday’s game with Pittsburgh at Denver, where most sports books kept the game off the board all week until posting Broncos -7 on Friday. Will Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger (shoulder) play? That is the main question.
"We didn’t post a line until today (Friday) on the Denver game because there was too much uncertainty with the Steelers key performers," said South Point sports book director Bert Osborne. "Antonio Brown is now out, Roethlisberger hasn’t thrown a pass in practice yet (through Thursday) and (DeAngelo) Williams is likely out. That’s basically their entire offensive attack in limbo."
Osborne is still waiting on any Roethlisberger news, but posted Denver -7 (no total) Friday without the news just because of all the weekend action that has started to heat up. It’s the NFL playoffs. People are excited and they want to bet all the games.
CG Technology books have been playing the wait and see game with Pittsburgh while posting a number for low limits -- wise guys get only $1,000. They were one of the few books in town in town with a number posted all week.
"We opened Denver at -6 on Monday knowing there we’re lots of injury issues surrounding the Steelers and we we’re steady at -6.5 for most of the week and got mostly Denver money," said Jason Simbal, VP of risk management for CG Technology.
"So we moved to -7 on Thursday, then when Brown was ruled out Friday we moved to -7 -120 and then someone immediately took +7 EVEN, so we’re down -7 -115 now."
Low limits or not, CG Tech books have already established that they’ll need Pittsburgh on Sunday with their small sample size of action. They have the total posted at 39.5, along with the Westgate SuperBook and Coast Casinos.
The big news Simbal and every Las Vegas sports book is waiting for is how Roethlisberger looked in Friday’s practice, and most of all whether or not he even threw a pass. He participated in Thursday’s practice, but only practiced hand-offs and didn’t throw.
"Initially, I was thinking the Broncos would be -9.5 if Ben doesn’t play, but combined with Brown being OUT and Williams most likely OUT, that deserves to be represented more in the number, so I’m looking at -10 or -10.5 if Ben doesn’t play," said Simbal.
Las Vegas oddsmaker Kenny White said the drop off from Roethlisberger to back-up quarterback Landry Jones is worth about 5-points to the number.
Brown isn’t quite worth a full point, but as the best receiver in the game he’s worth about an eighth of a point. White also said Peyton Manning is an upgrade of almost 3-points over Brock Osweiler, so when looking at the number of Broncos -7, it’s almost a halfway Big Ben in/out number. If everyone was healthy, Denver might have started about -5.
Sunday's early game features the No. 1 scoring offense against the No. 1 scoring defense and the number has been on a roller coaster ride.
"The game we’ve had the most fun with booking this week has been Carolina and Seattle," said Simbal. "We opened Carolina -1.5 (Sunday night) and we had some large wagers lay it and also lay -2. But when we got +3, we started seeing large action come back on Seattle taking us back down to where we started."
It’s not unusual to see sophisticated betting groups seed an early point-spread at a few books around town to help set the market hoping other books follow and then they can come back strong at many more books at the optimal number, which in this case was getting Seattle +3.
"We just don’t want the game to land ’3’. We started at -3 and we’re at -1.5 now," said Osborne, who doesn’t want to get sided.
Many books opened the Panthers money-line at -150 (+130 on Seattle) and it’s down as low as -125/+105. The total is consistent at 44.
The CG Tech books also have another rooting interest in the Panthers game because of their stance on Super Bowl futures.
"We do extremely well with the Panthers (+430) to win the Super Bowl. It‘s our best decision," said Simbal. Hardly anyone had been betting them during the season, while Seattle (+430) has been the most popular to where they are our biggest risk."
The Patriots opened as 5-point home favorites over the Chiefs for Saturday's early game and that number has dropped to -4.5.
"We’re seeing equal action on straight bets and parlays with the Patriots and Chiefs," said Osborne. "The big thing that stands out on this game is the Chiefs money line (+190) and also teasers with the Chiefs."
The casual teaser bettor might say, "what's wrong with taking +10.5 with Kansas City on an 11-game win streak while our last image of the Patriots in action was getting outgained by 242 yards at Miami in a 20-10 loss when home field was at stake. Plus, how's Rob Gronkowski doing?"
The Cardinals are 7-point home favorites over the Packerson Saturday night, and its been the most steady number of the week.
"Parlays and straight bets are down the middle with the Cardinals and Packers, but were loaded on Cardinals teaser action," said Osborne, who Friday dropped the total from the opening number of 50 down to 49.5.
"Our biggest teaser risk of the weekend so far is with Denver and Arizona," said Simbal.