Handicapping the NFL part 5: Totals


Totals (or Under/Over as many call it in England) handicapping is generally tougher then sides handicapping.
This is both a bad and a good thing. Bad because you have to work harder at it, good because the lines are generally just a little easier to beat.

There is a lot I could write about totals betting but a lot of it will be similar to things written about sides betting, so I'll go through the same stages as I did for the sides, but within one article.
 
1. Key numbers:
 
This is one of those things that are obvious as soon as anyone mentions it, but can easily be overlooked. There are key numbers in totals betting as well as sides.
The average total of a game is almost certainly somewhere over 41 these days and maybe even as high as 44.5. Ever changing playing styles make it a little hard to assign an actual number.
Oddly though, the most common total is 37 points. This is a standout number and should be a big consideration if you're expecting a slightly low scoring game.
It's pretty much accepted that 41,44,45 and 47 are also important, and after that, ideas vary. 48 is important, some like 33 (personally I think that 33,34,35 are similar enough as to be a key area rather than number) as are some numbers in the 50s. I confess to not putting heavy work into games that score over 50. I've read others say 51 and 54 are important but that's not the result of my own work. It's certainly worth the time to do the high totals better but I've always deemed it not quite worth it enough to wade through the smallish sample. Maybe this year.
 
Anyway, as a result of the above if you start off with capping your games at one of 34,37,41,44.5,47.5 or 51 then you've got yourself a starting point.
 
Just to mention at this point that if you're looking at odd/even betting, remember overtime, and the mechanics of last second field goals gives odd totals the edge. It's not as random as odd/even in many other sports. (This principle applies to Baseball too).
 
 2. Previous games.
 
Yet again you should be using your own notes on games wherever possible. In the case of totals betting though; incredibly the score is not what you're really looking for.
Clearly it is key to know whether teams have good offense and defense but the real trick is looking for whether teams like to run or pass. You can obviously get some feel for this by looking at stats but because the nature of the game changes depending on whether a team is losing or winning, it is very helpful to have notes explaining why a team rushed or passed so much in their previous games.
 
The good news is that for once the stats provided by the NFL are a little less useless for gambling than usual. If a team tends to get stuffed a lot, they tend to pass more often. This means that the stats, more by accident than design, of things like "Total passing yards" actually reflect what you'd like to know to some degree.
 
3. Gameplans.
 
In my opinion this is the key to good totals betting. Having assessed the relative strengths and gameplans of the teams for your sides line, you can now try to picture how the game might play out. Getting a feel for this is very rewarding. It's one of the better feelings in gambling to have spent 10-15 minutes trying to picture likely ways an NFL game will play out and seeing it happen in front of your eyes. Even when you lose, there are times you know you had the best of it because you predicted everything but the miracle ending (and so on).
 
So, enough waffle, what do I actually look for?
 
Firstly I think of a number based on the offense and defense of the two teams. Obvious and unrevealing though that is, you have to have a starting point or you end up going around in circles.
Secondly I look at whether I have made one team a big favourite for the game or not.
 
If one team is a big underdog then the game follows a pretty formulaic course. The team that is the underdog will try to limit the possessions of the good team by running the ball the best they can. This is where there is money to be made. If the bad team happens to be less bad at running than the rest of their game, then the total can be lowered significantly. If you feel that they just happen to have the game to run at the opponents and make a few first downs and keep within two TDs for 40 or so minutes, you'll often be able to get a nice parlay on unders and underdog (Almost all American facing books take this double, where most UK ones won't). You'll also often be able to take the unders as a straight bet.
You should consider some other things too. Maybe the underdogs have a pretty good pass defense (ideally for the favourites they'll pass to get as many possessions as possible, much like the underdogs run to do take time off the clock). Look for how the underdogs will try to approach the game and then their likely level of success.
Don't think in terms of the underdogs winning the game, just how long they can stay in it for. They're big underdogs for a reason.
 
As you get nearer and nearer a level game, the more teams will tend to play to their strengths rather than trying to kill the clock. The art in this part of the capping is trying to foresee how much running and passing there is likely to be. All I can advise is that you need a combination of good stats, good notes and a little wit/experience here. The old Gary Player quote about "The more I practice the luckier I get" applies here (Although as he's got ancient it seems to have got less true... I assume that will also be the same when I'm 74 years old as well)
 

 
4. The weather.
 
Hopefully this section of this article is where I give some reward for the people who've stayed along this far in the series. I've kept a lot of stuff general as obviously it's not just punters that read these boards and if some compilers want to put in the large amounts of work I've implied they'll probably just get told off and told to copy Vegas or Betfair anyway. I do feel though that I ought to drop one nugget into the mix.
 
There's a lot of stuff posted about bad weather and the total. Most of it is true and most of it is well known. If you're one of the first to spot a change for the worse in the likely weather for a game, the total will not have adjusted enough. It's not that the oddsmakers don't notice, it's that in American facing books they still keep the age old tradition of actually basing the odds to some degree upon the customers. If people are still betting the overs, why lower the total?.... especially if those people are outweighing the shrewder customers.
While that is well known, what I believe isn't so well known is that the type of bad weather is very important. A bit of snow or a bit of rain certainly impacts the game, but it's not always negative.
The high scoring game at Wembley last year was a classic example of how factors can be misread (I got this one wrong too, so it's not a gloat).
The turf at Wembley was pretty poor for American Football. It was hard to get a grip. Without putting enough thought into this, it was easy to assume that it would lower the score of the game. After all Runningbacks wouldn't be able to turn so easily. Quarterbacks might not be able to get set very well, and so on.
What actually happened was, that in a game with two strong passing teams anyway, the strategy was to try to hurry the opposing Quarterback. The lack of grip made it difficult to generate a pass rush and the score went sailing over as the strong passing teams had plenty of time to connect.
 
Taking that extra moment to consider the gameplan in with the conditions would have probably led to a decent winning bet here. Analysing the game and reading the reports after the game will at least mean I don't get that particular situation wrong again should it ever arise. Making the most of a bad job and not blaming bad luck can also be important.
 
Anyway, where's this nugget I promised? Well I'll let you look for yourselves and see what you think, but I concentrate on the wind speed more than snow, rain, whatever. The two often come together, and obviously heavy snow and heavy rain are still crucial to lowering the totals, but the wind alone can wreck a game. I look for a starting point of a touch under 20mph before I get excitable. Don't blindly bet unders if you see this, but the wind impacts every aspect of high scoring and because it's often with rain or snow I believe it's something that may still not be factored into the lines quite as much as it should be when the other conditions are absent. If you need any convincing at all, find a video of the Bills' field goal attempt vs the Patriots last season.
 
You probably already knew the wind was important and are disappointed with that. All I can suggest is add a little more importance to it and see how you get on. As usual, you should ultimately make up your own mind though.
 
Oh, and for goodness sake...if you're new to this.... make sure the game is not in a dome!

Lori