NFL Betting Angles

With the NFL regular season creeping up on bettors, time is running out to crunch all the numbers and run all the angles on Week 1. A lot of bettors don't bother looking at preseason results since the starters barely play and the games are pretty much meaningless. However, if you actually take a close look at some of the preseason betting angles heading into Week 1, they can actually tell you something. With one week of preseason games remaining, here's what to look for.

Most preseason angles have to do with teams either playing perfect and going without a loss in the preseason, or tanking it and going winless. With the final week of the preseason coming up four teams currently fit the bill. They are the Patriots, Browns and Bears, who are all winless, and the Lions - the only team remaining that is undefeated. (Seattle could also stay in the undefeated ranks if they beat San Diego on Monday night.)

The Lions may want to actually try and cap off their preseason with another win because teams that run the table in the preseason usually also fare pretty well in the regular season. Since 1988, a total of 40 teams have gone undefeated in the preseason. Of those 40 teams, 24 went on to post winning records, seven finished at .500 and only nine posted losing records. Three of those perfect teams also won the Super Bowl, while two others made it all the way to the Big Game only to lose.

The Patriots may also want to give it their all in their final preseason game because since 1988 no team that has gone winless in the preseason has gone on to win the Super Bowl. But two of them have lost the Big Game. In fact in those 20 years, only two teams made the playoffs out of the 35 teams that failed to post a win in the preseason. So if New England caps off the preseason with a 0-4 record, they may not be the best choice for your Super Bowl futures bets.

There's also another betting angle that follows the Patriots into their Week 1 matchup versus the Kansas City Chiefs. Right now the Patriots are a huge 16.5-point home favorite in that game. Since 1998 teams that have been favored by 13 or more points at home are 31-38-2 ATS. Last season this situation happened 11 times and the results were a 6-5 record ATS.

The Patriots not surprisingly were the catalysts of the big spreads last year, as they were favored by 13 or more points at home six times. They started off 3-0 ATS, but then dropped three in a row ATS to finish the season 3-3 ATS. If New England gets off to a fast start again, maybe this time they can buck the trend and keep covering throughout the season.

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