Playoffs Or Bust

Football Betting Lines

12/22/2006 - Philadelphia, PA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - The final two weeks of the regular season are upon us, and now is the time to bet against teams that already have locked up playoff bids.

Indianapolis and Seattle combined for a 1-5 ATS mark in the last three weeks of last season, and back in 04, four division winners (Colts, Eagles, Packers and Falcons) combined to go 2-10 ATS in the final three weeks of the regular season. Just something to keep in mind as this year winds down.

There are a few match-ups that follow that trend this weekend, and one of them comes from East Rutherford, New Jersey, where the 7-7 Giants host the Saints. New York shot itself in the foot last Sunday, losing to Philadelphia, 36-22. The Giants now are tied for the final wild-card spot with Atlanta, although they do have a win under their belts over the Falcons. Green Bay, with its win over Minnesota, is now 7-8. Three teams stand at 6-8, so a loss to New Orleans would be devastating for New York.

The Saints clinched the NFC South after the Falcons lost to the Cowboys last week. New Orleans hosts the Panthers in its final game. If Carolina loses at Atlanta this week, then the Panthers will have nothing to play for in their game vs. New Orleans. So the Saints could still finish with 10 wins and get a first-round bye.

This game means the world to the Giants and not as much to the Saints. Making the playoffs is a little more important than fighting for homefield advantage, so Big Blue has a decided mental edge heading into the game. Sometimes thats all a team needs during the last couple of weeks of the regular season.

There are a few more games of this nature on Sunday, starting with Baltimore at Pittsburgh. The Ravens have clinched the division and more than likely will be a little less intense than they have been in previous weeks.

Pittsburgh, surprising as it sounds, is still alive after winning its last three games. The Steelers are making one final push for the playoffs, and since this is a 1 p.m. Eastern Time start, they won't know if they are out of the chase until after the game. In addition, they have defeated the Ravens each of the last four years at home

Seattle takes on San Diego, and the Seahawks have yet to clinch the NFC West. The last two games have seen the team give up a combined 41 points to Arizona and San Francisco.

At first glance, trying to hold down the Chargers seems like an impossible task. SD has ridden the LT Train all season long, to the tune of 12-2. However, the Bolts pretty much have clinched a first-round bye, especially since they host Arizona for their final game. Seattle needs a win in the worst way, not only to clinch the division, but also to restore a winning attitude among last years NFC Super Bowl representative.

Finally, New England travels to Jacksonville, another team fighting for a playoff spot. The Jaguars were humbled at Tennessee last week, despite holding the Titans to only 98 yards of total offense. Tennessees defense was the story, scoring three touchdowns in the team's fifth straight win.

The Jags have to go to Kansas City for their regular season finale, so a win this week at home is a must. They have been unstoppable at ALLTELL Stadium this year, winning and covering six of their seven games and outscoring their opponents by an average score of 27-9. The Patriots do not have as much to play for since the AFC East is all but wrapped up. They are also 2-5 ATS in their last seven games.

To recap, go with the Giants, Steelers, Seahawks and Jaguars.

Two other contests feature major mismatches on paper, as the 10-3 Colts play the 4-10 Texans, while the 2-12 Lions host the 12-2 Bears. I recommend playing the home-town underdogs in these contests, but not as heavily as the four choices listed above.

THIS WEEKS TOP PLAY

Just like last Sunday when the Giants were 5 1/2-point favorites over the Eagles, I don't understand why the Cowboys are such heavy favorites this week over the E-A-G-L-E-S. Philly is playing as well as any team in the NFC right now and usually holds its own with Dallas. The Eagles have won eight of the last 11 match-ups, failing to cover only three of them. They are also 3-2 SU in Dallas in the last five years and one of the losses came by two points.

Take Philadelphia plus the seven and you'll have a very merry Christmas.

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SPORTS BETTING - Tennis is an underrated and under-utilized bettors' sport.

Ten years ago, at just about this time, I called Alan Boston in Vegas and left him a voicemail that went something like this (abridged version): "Hey Alan, Chad Millman from ESPN The Magazine calling. I want to do a book about wise guys, you in?"

A couple weeks later I got a message back (abridged version): "I don't know, maybe," Boston said. "Call me and we'll talk about it. But not later today. I got $1,000 on Andre Agassi to win the French Open at 40-1, and he's in the finals."

Here's what happened next (abridged version): Agassi won his tourney. Boston won his $40,000. I wrote sportsbook.

In the ten years since, how much has been wagered on the big-time tennis events? Put it this way: The Nevada Gaming Commission doesn't even track the number year by year because it's so small.

"Tennis makes up about one-tenth of one percent of our take," says Lucky's bookmaking boss Jimmy Vaccaro. "The last big golf major we probably had $100,000 worth of bets. In tennis, we might have written two big tickets."

Tennis' lack of popularity amongst the American bettoratti is no surprise, really. For starters, the biggest sports betting holidays -- the Super Bowl, the NCAA tourney -- are must see TV. People, at least the degenerates I know, plan vacations around watching those events in Vegas sports books.

But Wimbledon? Doesn't exactly reel in the whales. "Seriously, it's the nuts as an event," says Boston. "But who even knows when it's on?"

Here's another reason that helps explain why golf gets traction, something I call "The Bubbe Theory." My Bubbe is pushing 95 and has cataracts so bad that, to her, even the most crystalline Chicago day is mostly cloudy. But she still listens to the Cubs games, and she still calls me in a fit if she disagrees with something Rick Telander writes in the Chicago Sun Times. She's a sports fan. If she doesn't know you, you're just filling a niche. And niche players, even historically good ones like Roger and Raf, don't drive betting volume. Only the highest profile names attract square money, which inflates wagering totals like a shot of saline to the lips. Bubbe, and the public, loved Agassi, tennis' last cross-the-rubicon, mainstream draw. She also has a crush on Tiger. She's given me standing orders to put a sawbuck on the big cat whenever I walk through a sports book (or mistakenly tap into one via my Internet machine.) That explains why the Masters is getting $100K in action at some books while the four tennis majors might not get that combined this year.

This isn't a case of tennis being a difficult sport to bet. In fact, in Europe, it's probably the second most popular sport for gambling after soccer. Granted, as the WSJ football betting last week and The Mag's Shaun Assael examined in even greater depth last year, that might be because gamblers across the pond see it as an easy game to fix. But it could also be because, over there it holds the kind of sway the big two do over here.

Street corners in Spain are peppered with public courts and kids doing their best Raffy impressions. In some war torn parts of Eastern Europe poverty-stricken kids view tennis as an escape route, like football or basketball here. A couple years ago The Mag's Lindsay Berra wrote a great piece about Belgrade's Jelena Jankovic, Ana Ivanovic and Novak Djokovic. They learned the game as kids while bombs were raining down on their homeland. They practiced in drained swimming pools. Not exactly Nick Bolletierri conditions.

In the United States, casual fans think tennis is played four times a year. But on the tightly packed European continent, national interest in homegrown talent runs deep every weekend. Of the ATP's current top 20 players, only two, tennis betting and James Blake, are American. Fourteen are from Europe, representing six different countries.

No wonder fans from Lisbon to Bhudapest get jacked up for the net game, whether it's Wimbledon or a low-level tourney like the Estoril Open in Portugal (congrats to Spain's Albert Montanes for winning that one, btw). Chances are good that someone representing their flag will not only be playing, but have a shot at winning.

And that's all any bettor can ask for.

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