London is calling, four winless teams face off, and prop bets galore greet NFL Week 4 bettors.
As gamblers prepare, the Detroit Lions enjoy the weekend off after creating some separation in the NFC North on Thursday night. Their Week 4 opening 34-20 triumph over the Green Bay Packers gives them a 3-1-mark. That’s good for first place in a division they haven’t won since 1993 and it features a head-to-head victory over their closest rival.
Here’s the NFL Week 4 betting beat.
NFL London Games: Falcons vs. Jaguars
Bettors set their alarm clocks for a 9:30 a.m. ET Sunday start between the Jacksonville Jaguars and Atlanta Falcons from Wembley Stadium in London. It’s a bonus game for them, the sportsbooks, and the networks.
The Jaguars are becoming a British football tradition, much like the Detroit Lions hosting a Thanksgiving Day game.
Jaguars Enjoy De-Facto Home Field Edge in London
Jacksonville plays its 10th game in the UK on Sunday. Its performance is not especially noteworthy at 4-5. But the Jags have experienced the grind of flying several hours East and having both their body clocks and eating routines disrupted.
“You might as well consider it a home game for Jacksonville,” Johnny Avello, the director of race and sportsbook operations for DraftKings, told Gaming Today.
“Many of the same players have been doing this for several years. If you are looking for any type of home field or atmosphere advantage, that would be it.
“Atlanta has a few major players like Desmond Ridder and Bijan Robinson, who have not done this yet.”
Avello added that DraftKings likes having the early game. It becomes a mini-island-type placement. Las Vegas bettors have to make a 6:30 a.m. start time, but Central time bettors get 8:30 a.m. action and East Coast gamblers hit the 9:30 deadline.
“When I was operating in the brick-and-mortar world at Wynn, this game was always a low write for us,” Avello said of the Las Vegas property and this sunrise start time.
“But now that we have bettors across the country and in this digital format, I think it will do pretty well. And it is great to have something to talk about early in the day.”
Something else to talk about is who obtains their first W: the Minnesota Vikings, Carolina Panthers, Denver Broncos, or Chicago Bears.
Both road teams are the chalk.
The Vikings are significant road favorites over the Panthers, while the Broncos, despite suffering a 50-point blowout loss in Week 3, are favored by roughly a field goal over the Bears.
Only sports betting has saved these games from being irrelevant outside of their markets.
NFL Week 4 Betting News
Philadelphia Eagles Soar
As Friday dawned, the Philadelphia Eagles were surging at the sportsbooks.
Their betting line reached a whopping -9 in hosting the Washington Commanders.
Philly bettors push this development, as the Eagles notched 79% of the handle and 90% of the DraftKings tickets.
This is a high spread for an NFC East division game, even more so given that Washington beat the Eagles at Lincoln Financial Field last year. And Philadelphia hasn’t hit its 2022 performance level yet.
But bettors are riding Week 3. The Commanders were stifled 37-3 by the Buffalo Bills and the Eagles manhandled the Tampa Bay Buccaneers 25-11.
Bettors Love Winless Minnesota Vikings
Books and gamblers appear to expect the 13-4 Vikings from last year to return and put a hurtin’ on somebody.
Gamblers support the Vikings with 82% of the handle and 81% of the tickets against the Panthers.
Niners: How High Can One Line Go?
San Francisco extended to -14, even -14.5 briefly in some books, for its home contest against the Arizona Cardinals.
This is the largest line of the season and would be the biggest price paid, +600 on the moneyline, should Arizona spring the upset.
San Francisco is surgically methodical, prevailing behind sustained drives, all-world back Christian McCaffrey, and a punishing defense.
The feeling is that the Niners will win by as much as they want to. Bettors must decide if the Niners can win by more than two touchdowns against a team that looked revitalized in toppling the Dallas Cowboys last week.
NFL Week 4 Betting Sentiments
Bettors love the Over on two high totals.
The Las Vegas Raiders and Los Angeles Chargers, two teams known for moving the ball, corralled 88% of the handle and tickets to go Over 48.5.
Gamblers also back the Over 54, the highest on the board, between the Miami Dolphins and Buffalo Bills. This is expected to be one of the year’s most salivating shootouts and bettors back the Over with 63% of the handle and 75% of the tickets.
Will This Be Cleveland Browns’ Last Game Under the Radar?
As the Browns host the Baltimore Ravens in a battle of 2-1 teams, there could be a new sheriff in the AFC North.
So far, Cleveland rocks. It has the stingiest defense in the NFL, allowing just one touchdown. The two defensive scores the Pittsburgh Steelers notched on Cleveland are not on this defense’s watch.
No wonder the Browns are -3 against a very good Ravens team. And small wonder that the public takes the Under 40.5 with 88% of the handle.
While the heralded return of Deshaun Watson and the season-ending injury to Nick Chubb grab the headlines, this unit is grabbing defensive dominance.
It has held two highly-regarded quarterbacks, Joe Burrow and Ryan Tannehill, under 100 yards.
The Browns held the Tennessee Titans to a franchise-low 94 yards of total offense last week.
The Browns may become one of the league’s top stories. We’ll find out a lot this week.
NFL Week 4 Injury Updates
Jaylen Waddle, out with a concussion last week for Miami, is expected to return this week in Buffalo. Waddle, Tyreek Hill, Tua Tagovailoa, Josh Allen, and Stefon Diggs, just to name a few, are expected to shine.
Anthony Richardson, sidelined after a Week 2 concussion, is expected to be back for the Indianapolis Colts against the Los Angeles Rams.
Bryce Young, who sat out Week 3 for the Carolina Panthers, is expected back when they host the Minnesota Vikings. The feeling among bettors and the books is that Carolina is better with his replacement, Andy Dalton, than with Young. But the Panthers are going to take their growing pains while he gains seasoning.
NFL Week 4 Prop Riches Loom With Enticing Wager
Some props need an abundance of good fortune to collect.
Here’s one that only needs a little, but pays a lot.
Will every team in the NFL get a field goal in the 1 p.m. games?
There are similar wagers about whether every team can notch a touchdown, but this one is always a contender and pays well when it hits.
“We put that out there at about 50-1,” Avello said. “It’s a big liability for us, because people are piling on the bets and it doesn’t take a lot for this to come in.
“It’s a great bet because it puts the gamblers in action all day. We know there is some jeopardy for us with this, but it’s a great wager for the players and we love putting that kind of bet out there for them.”
This is an intriguing wager because most teams will convert a field goal. But there is usually one team that won’t and it’s not always the prime suspects.
In Week 3, that one was the prolific Los Angeles Chargers. With Justin Herbert quarterbacking a team that routinely hits the mid-to-high 20s, even higher, each week, they figure to gain many scoring opportunities.
The Chargers did score four touchdowns but no field goals. At least they tried a 53-yard field goal, but it was missed.
Books have staved off paying this bet too often because the law of averages says there will be at least one team that doesn’t boot a field goal.
But it’s often just one.
Every team to score a touchdown is another good one. Low-scoring teams are challenged in this one. Again, the irony is prevalent.
In one set of games two years ago, every team scored a TD except the team most expected to do so. The only team that didn’t were the high-scoring Dallas Cowboys. They lost 19-9, gaining only three field goals in a setback to the Kansas City Chiefs.
Two-Point Conversions Lessen the Push of 7
Fewer games are landing on the classic push number of 7 now that two-point conversions are being used prominently throughout the entire game.
Through three weeks, only two games have ended with a seven-point difference.
The number 3 remains the prominent push number, all by itself, but even that has become diluted. Seven games have ended with three-point differentials this year, but the mobile-betting age keying colossal bet totals has given books the confidence to shift numbers quickly.
Customers don’t have to wait long for the number to be taken off 3. Given their apps, they can then pounce on a favorable number.
“One” meantime, has not been a lonely number in the outcomes. Five games have already been decided by one point this young season.
The Packers and Saints have each played two of them, going 1-1. That leads to a quirk, the Packers’ betting shuffle.
We often talk about timing being everything.
The Packers went from slight favorites to slight dogs on the final wagering day in Weeks 2 and 3. That proved beneficial to bettors who waited on them. Green Bay covered as a favorite-turned-dog in a one-point loss to the Atlanta Falcons and a one-point win over the New Orleans Saints.
Bet the Packers three days before both of those games, and it’s a loser.
Bet them on Sunday, and it wins.
The beauty of the mobile age is that sheer volume forces spread changes that bettors can use to their advantage.
DraftKings Bettors Nail It With Packers vs. Lions TNF
A cascade of Lions betting shoved Thursday’s line from Green Bay -1 to Detroit closing in the neighborhood of -2.5 across the sports-betting landscape.
What a call.
Gamblers were all over it in Detroit’s victory.
They also scored substantially with Amon-Ra St. Brown notching the first touchdown of the game. He returned +850 to tally first and +130 for the anytime score at DraftKings.
It was the most highly-played prop in the touchdown-scoring category with 23% of the tickets.
Reading Between the Lines of FanDuel Prop
Bettors may analyze a nugget depending on how they interpret this prop at FanDuel.
NFL Week 4 Highest Scoring Team
- San Francisco 49ers, +750
- Buffalo Bills, +850
- Los Angeles Chargers, +950
A little further down is the Miami Dolphins, +1600. They are not projected to be one of the leaders, but they are in action against Buffalo.
Perhaps there’s a feeling that the Dolphins are spent from their 70-burger last week against the Denver Broncos. If they are due to level off for one week, that may be a sign for bettors to jump on Buffalo in this game.
It will be interesting to see where this ends up.
New York Jets vs. Kansas City Chiefs Props
- Travis Kelce to score first, +400
- Kelce to score no TD, +105
- The Chiefs to amass 150 or more rushing yards, +420 (this is an assumption of a game being out of hand)
- Jets are shutout, +3400
NFL Week 4 Betting Sample (BetMGM)
The Eagles ran out the clock against the Bucs, when they could have exceeded 25 points.
Hence a prop on the Eagles’ projected points this week. The total is 27.5 (Over +115, Under -150). There is value in the Over for bettors who like that one.
Jalen Hurts and Sam Howell (-115 on both sides) have respective yardage targets of 232.5 yards and 215.5 yards.
Howell’s 31.5 pass attempts has the same price.
Hurts (Over -110, Under -120) has a target of 30.5 throws.
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