NFL Week 2 Betting Breakdown — Full Breakdown & Transcript

[00:00] Time to get ready for NFL Week 2 with your favorite crew. Bet on it is up next.

[00:22] We've got those primetime games coming up, as well as some barking dogs and backpacks to finish it all up. We're going to see if the belly is open because it's week two in the NFL. And, of course, we're going to go over all of the team plays and some teasers,

[00:36] maybe a little power rating talk with VR. But let's get right into it. Thursday night football, VR, you are up first. The Lions are a four-point underdog at the Bills, 53-and-a-half.

[00:48] Yeah, this is my TV game, and we have an adjustment. This is a great week. Week two is one of my favorite weeks in the NFL because it's the first true week where the bookmakers only have six, seven days,

[01:03] and it's the most overreaction based on the least amount of data, meaning we only have 60 minutes of football that's actually played in a regular season. And we have a whole week to discuss it, a whole week to dig into who's good, who's bad,

[01:18] draw some conclusions that we're going to change within a couple weeks for sure. But it's fun, and that's what everyone's doing. and that's where we're able to take advantage as sports bettors. That overreaction that isn't warranted, coupled with these lines haven't been up since May.

[01:35] The value hasn't been extracted. The wise guys haven't had a chance to do the damage that they do if those lines are up for a number of months. And we have a look ahead here where Buffalo was a three-point favorite. That's a key number, and it made sense around there

[01:49] because you figure neutral field, Buffalo may be a point better than Detroit. adding home field advantage, and yeah, put it up at the field goal and let the bettors decide. Well, they decided, and they've been betting the Buffalo side heavily,

[02:03] went through the key three, went through four, and now we're looking at five-plus. And the reason is twofold. Not only did Buffalo have the most impressive win pretty much of week one,

[02:17] like, listen, they were on the road against a Houston team that owned them of late, that favored to be in the playoffs, arguably knowing they have to beat Buffalo

[02:29] to represent the AFC. Buffalo's more or less one of the favorites. And they couldn't do it. They couldn't do it at home. Buffalo got the W. So that's a huge win for them.

[02:41] Do we adjust upwards? No, because they closed as the betting favorite in that game and they only won by one score. So there's some randomness there. There's no reason to adjust. What about the Detroit side? Any reason to adjust there?

[02:53] Not really. They did what they're supposed to. They didn't cover the spread, but they won the game. More or less, New Orleans lost the game. But they had a nice, comfortable lead and kind of sat on that 21-0 lead.

[03:07] And that happens a lot where teams get out 17-0. We used to call it the 17-0 jinx. If you go up 17-0, good luck covering that spread. It was a joke because so many times a team comes down.

[03:19] We already know in the NFL, the fourth quarter is what matters. I forget the exact percentage of teams that are trailing in the fourth quarter that actually win the game or cover is very high.

[03:31] And that's what happened here. So I don't really think we need to adjust on the Detroit side. Like, nothing really happened other than, again, we're going to look at the injury list, and it's Kirby Joseph, they say,

[03:44] and Brian Branch. and then on Detroit's safety. So there's going to be little nicks and injuries on all teams as the season progresses. Are any worth adjusting the betting line?

[03:58] Are there replacement players that we have to adjust for or anything like that? In this spot, here's what I see. I see an overreaction on Detroit looking awful. And let's not forget, you've got to remember,

[04:11] what did people bet? Detroit was one of the most one-sided bets on Sunday. people got a bad taste in their mouth when they didn't get that cover. If they'd have lost on the money line, we'd be getting even more points here than we should.

[04:26] Bottom line, I have Detroit still as the sixth best team in the NFL. I have Buffalo as the best AFC team, but the third best team in the NFL.

[04:38] They're very close to each other on a neutral field. I made Buffalo about a one and a half point favorite. I add 2.2, 2.3 for home field advantage. I can barely get the four, not even four.

[04:51] This one's at five, probably get the five and a half. Who knows? We may even get a six. It's Detroit or pass for me. Negative is we're seeing steam on the over. More scoring, more variance in scoring. But when you're getting points, that's not a bad thing.

[05:05] So I like Detroit plus money. We're always going to sprinkle when we're taking the dog. Detroit's live in Buffalo on Thursday night. I'm kind of jealous because Marco beat me into this game in the strips because I wanted to talk about what I thought was a crazy overreaction.

[05:20] Monday Night Football, I was on the two. And I couldn't believe the amount of love that the Colts were getting against the Ravens. I think it was like the sharp square side of the week,

[05:32] yet the squares just cleaned up on the Ravens on the road. Now you've got the Colts headed into Arrowhead, Marco. Six, six and a half here on the odds logic train. I don't want to take the Colts after what we saw on Monday night,

[05:47] but I feel like I have to take the Colts after what we saw on Monday night. Yeah, Kelly, you talk about overreactions, and there can't be a bigger overreaction than what we saw with what the Chiefs did.

[05:59] I mean, they look like, you know, the old Super Bowl Chiefs. There were a lot of question marks surrounding Kansas City coming in. Yeah, they got the new player in Dennis Walker, and what a game did he have for his Kansas City debut.

[06:14] But the question was going to be, what was Patrick Mahomes going to do coming off his first real serious injury? And we all thought, okay, he's not going to run the football. What does he do?

[06:26] He opens up the game with a big run for a touchdown. This is overreaction at its best. And it's my duty to say at this point in time, which I will say over and over at different points on different shows all year,

[06:43] no team is as good as their best performance, nor is a team as bad as their worst performance. And this is the poster child for that, because we're both coming in here off of lopsided games.

[06:56] One looks very good, one looks very bad. And that gives us value here. Now, with all of that value said, Kelly, and it's something that we talked about, One of the things I talked about on the show with a different game last week,

[07:10] but I did on the deli as well, when you go back to the Detroit-New Orleans game, that game was sitting at seven all week. We always talk about the key numbers, in which way does Vegas put the number,

[07:24] because we know if they make a move one way or the other, the Sharks are going to grab one of those sides. This game is sitting at six and a half, okay? because anybody really won Indianapolis after last week,

[07:38] and you know the people that love teasers are going to take the teasers and take Kansas City down to just win the game at home. Kansas City's not going to win at home. So why not have this at 7 or 7.5 in slow teaser stuff?

[07:54] They have it under the touchdown, and I think that's significant. I am going to go ahead and take this game. I'm going to take Indianapolis. I just think that that was such a high for Denver, or beating Denver last week, I should say, for Kansas City.

[08:09] Because remember, it was Denver that won the division last year. It was Denver that beat Kansas City twice. And that was the throne that belonged to Kansas City for how long?

[08:21] The AFC West. And it was a statement game for them. I just don't see them duplicating that performance this week and doing it on a short week, coming back in six days.

[08:33] They do catch a break. It's back-to-back home games for them. But it's also back-to-back TV games. And Vegas knows what the public's going to do on a standalone game involving Kansas City.

[08:46] And that's why this thing sitting at 6.5 smells even fishier that it's not the full seven, giving Indianapolis plus the points. Woo, Marco, I'm going to have to have a talk with myself.

[08:59] I think I can quite do that. I'm still concerned about Daniel Jones and if he's 100%. There's a lot of question marks I have. But, again, I wanted to break down that game because this game is tough. And I'm going, all right, there's a lot of narratives that we can go through here

[09:15] with either the Rams or, of course, those Giants that got the nice pass for me on Sunday night. The Giants look better than I believe a lot of people expected.

[09:27] However, we've got to talk about the Rams, who were the Super Bowl odds-on favorite, decided to fly to Melbourne, Australia 24 hours before the game because they did some scientific experiment in regard to jet lag

[09:44] that looked like it blew up in their face. But they fly back home. They stayed on Pacific time their entire trip. Now, they basically got an extra day of rest because of that.

[09:58] That's 11 full days. The Giants, on the other hand, play Sunday night. Now they go to the West Coast to play this game. I don't think that there's a lot that is in that mix,

[10:10] but I think that there is a lot of overblownness in regard to what the Rams did against San Francisco. Matthew Stafford, 15 of 25, 155 yards, threw a pick,

[10:22] And they just said, all right, we're going to figure out what's really in this book. This is a reigning MVP off a 46 season leading to 518 points in the team Now Miles Garrett keep a note there is on injured reserve and I think that that means a little bit something more Again Jackson

[10:41] Dart was at that point for us on Sunday night. 23-29, 230 yards, three touchdowns against the Dallas defense, but well, that's why we took the Giants, because of the Dallas defense.

[10:54] Of course, I'm going to just take the worst way out. I think This is a great buy low spot, a.k.a. a teaser spot for the Rams. I know, I know, I know. You guys are mad at me, and I don't blame you.

[11:08] But, again, I was late to the script, so I didn't get to talk about the game I wanted to talk about. And I just don't love this spot, and I need to see more from the Rams. I do think they will get a win here, though, on Monday Night Football.

[11:21] VR, let's keep that topic of teasers going. We talk about this every single week on Last Call, you and I do, in regard to it. And you said, hey, I only gave out one teaser to my clients, and that was Jacksonville and the Texans.

[11:35] If you got to the teaser market early like I did, the Panthers was a loser, the Packers was a loser, and then on Monday night, the Broncos was a loser. So let's kind of go through the teaser stuff here and what people need to know.

[11:48] the new way of doing the long teasers I think that you have established is absolutely excellent and it's going to keep people from doing bowhead things like I did and others did on Sunday.

[12:02] Also, please let us know your current top five in the NFL and give us a little preview of this week's team sheet from the team room on Sunday after last call. Indeed. Now, when it comes to the teasers, Kel, I've learned my lesson over the years.

[12:15] And for a number of years, waiting until closer to kickoff produced less bets and a higher return. And I stuck with that with subscribers for a couple of years before ever talking about it.

[12:30] And since then, I share the information and what's worked for me and anybody can use it. Again, this is what is reasonable to me. When you're betting straight bets, sides, totals, the goal is to get out ahead of the market.

[12:46] Just like a stock. You want to buy a stock that's undervalued. You want to buy it at $60 because you think it's worth $75 and you're hoping it gets to $100. Right? Sports, same thing. It's just a different market.

[12:59] You want to bet Buffalo at minus three, hoping it gets to minus four and a half, five, six, so that you know you placed a good bet, that you have a plus EV ticket in your pocket. Nobody could take that from you. Doesn't mean you're going to cash it, but you placed a good bet.

[13:13] You got out ahead of the market. That's how sports folks grade you and judge you of whether you're a danger to them or not. Not by how much money you beat them for, by your ability to beat the market, because they know then your mathematical certainty to turn a profit.

[13:26] So I took this logic and applied it to teasers, which are opposite of that. To cash a teaser, you need the final score to land near the number. That's how you cash your teaser. The most highest probability of that happening is when the number is its strongest, its most efficient.

[13:43] When is the number most efficient? Right before kickoff. Why? Because right before kickoff, we know what the sharps are on. We know who's injured, who's not. We know who's suspended, who's not. We know what the weather is. We know what the coaches said all week.

[13:56] We know what the players said all week. As much information as we could possibly have comes right before kickoff. So that line should be its absolute sharpest. That's what we want to tease. that sharp line, and we're hoping it's down in the favorite of 1.5, 2, 2.5,

[14:11] or a dog of 7.5, 8, or 8.5. I mean, a favorite of 7.5, 8, 8.5, or a dog of 1.5, 2, or 2.5. And we're simply trying to go through 3 and 7. But you've got to wait until closer to kickoff.

[14:24] Why? Because right now, there's a lot of teasers available earlier in the week. But as the line becomes more efficient, it may not fall under that line teaser where you're able to go through three and seven,

[14:37] which is the only reason we're teasing. We're not teasing because we think this team's going to win. We're not teasing because we think this team could keep it close and we want extra points. We're simply teasing for one reason and one reason only,

[14:49] because this points spread allows us to go through three and seven. Doing that at 130 or less, minus 130 or less, means I have a plus CB ticket in my pocket, means I have a winning bet. It doesn't mean I'm going to win, but I have a winning bet in my pocket.

[15:03] If I do that over and over and over again, when the dust settles, I'll be up money. It really is that simple. So for me, that's the takeaway. Wait till closer to kickoff.

[15:15] You'll have less bets, but you'll have stronger bets. And yeah, I like using that. It's worked for me. Real quickly, a couple of team plays for Sunday's action, NFL, over on Thursday night.

[15:29] They bet that over 51.5 Detroit Buffalo. once again no surprise they're on the Jets they bet the Jets every single week they took the Jets at 5.5 at 4.5 and went over 42.5 and 43.5 they went under 43

[15:41] in Pittsburgh and New England they hit the look ahead on Tampa Bay at minus 6 but that was it haven't hit it since Baltimore minus 7.5 got steam Philadelphia minus 4.5 and 5.5 and

[15:53] under 42.5 all the way down to 40.5 finally they hit the look ahead at Arizona plus 10 then hit it again at plus six, went under there, and finally, New York football giants, only the look-ahead got hit that 8.5,

[16:07] no surprise there for Monday Night Football. And, yeah, that's something that's off the scheme sheet for today. All right, let's get into some of those barking dogs. Marco, you went against your Pittsburgh Steelers last week,

[16:21] and no to a tag of my law. That's kind of the pitfalls of doing the show early in the week, to bring everybody the best of information. and sometimes we don't always have the information, like Tua Tagovailoa getting hurt at practice. That was strange.

[16:34] That line got seen. Pittsburgh looked awful, though. I had them in Survivor, and I thought, oh, my, what did I do? But they got the win, and now you like them as a barking dog this week.

[16:46] Yeah, Kelly, as we go to week two, one of the narratives that you hear a lot is teams that come into the season with a lot of hype and expectations,

[16:58] If they start 0-1, you're going to hear everybody say, we know 0-2 teams how hard it is to make the playoffs. And those teams sometimes get overvalued, especially if they look good in losing the game they lost in week one.

[17:15] Okay, well, cue up the New England Patriots. Here was a team that went to the Super Bowl last year. Here's a team that everybody expected to take another step forward after getting to the Super Bowl with a young roster like they did last year.

[17:31] They go to Seattle and have the Super Bowl rematch. They lead the game almost the entire way and then literally pee down their legs in the fourth quarter.

[17:43] Drake made three interceptions. The second interception of the game came immediately after Josh Dobbs dropped a pass right in his hands for a big game,

[17:58] which they wouldn't have been throwing on the next down in which he threw the interception. So many things and takeaways. New England looked good in losing. But I've got to bring up the other scenario.

[18:11] Lose the same game twice. All right? That was Super Bowl revenge. And I always tell you, revenge is the most overused term in sports betting. But there are certain times that revenge plays an important part.

[18:24] And when you lose in the Super Bowl, you've got that game circled. Especially once the schedule come out and you saw, you can get your revenge on the first week of the season, opening night, on a Wednesday.

[18:37] I just think that this is a bad spot for them. And let's talk about Pittsburgh. Yeah, Pittsburgh looked horrible last week. That's why I wanted to go against them. Because, I said, during the preseason, all of the key players in this new Mike McCarthy system, both offense and defense, didn't play in the preseason.

[18:58] I thought they would be rusty. Yeah, they were. They were out of position. They didn't look good. The only reason they won was Cooper Rush was god-awful. And the interception by T.J. Watt, what a play by him.

[19:12] But, my God, what was Cooper Rush doing on that pass? Kelly, I mean, T.J. Watt saved your survivor pick, or should I say Cooper Rush did, with a week under their belt and all the pressure of the home opener

[19:26] under the new coaching regime of Mike McCarthy being the Pittsburgh guy. A lot of pressure on him to win his first game in front of his hometown team. Now they're on the road.

[19:38] I think you'll see a better performance from Pittsburgh. I think you'll see those offensive weapons look better this week, and the defense with a game under their belt,

[19:50] learn the new systems and where they're supposed to be. I think Pittsburgh is a very live dog here. I don't trust New England. Last thing to throw out there, Kelly, we're putting all kinds of Marco-isms out there,

[20:03] but this one's not mine. This is one that's been around forever. The Super Bowl loser the next year. They're a phase. And I'm going to fade them here. I'm taking Pittsburgh plus the points.

[20:15] Line was 4.5. Looking this morning, it's up to 5 as people continue to want the New England Patriots. Give me Pittsburgh plus the points. And Kelly, that 5, 4.5, 5, 5.5, that's one of those numbers, those dead numbers in the NFL

[20:32] where the general public looks and says, oh, they're favored by more than a field goal. well, we're supposed to win this game, but it's less than a touchdown. You're in no man's land, and too often I see the dogs get the money there.

[20:46] Michael already just took my first sentence right out of my mouth. This is the Washington Commanders last week opening up its five-and-a-half point underdogs. It's my favorite spread in the NFL. No man's land, underdog land, whatever you want to call it.

[20:59] We saw Washington down the stretch did the cover But if you actually watch the game or if you even just look at the box score you see that Washington held the ball for 33 and a half minutes

[21:13] They had twice as many first downs as Philadelphia, and yes, they ended up losing, but they got the cover. Jaden Daniels looked healthy, 18 of 34, 164 yards, two touchdowns, no interceptions.

[21:26] That is something that I want to see from a quarterback that is coming off some injury issues. Dallas, on the other hand, never once led New Jersey. It was a rocking chair winner for us on Sunday night.

[21:40] I hope my clients were happy with that one because everybody loved Dallas, and I felt like I was on an island there with the Giants. Now, Dallas had to run it a ton of times, and that would make sense,

[21:52] but they gave up 394 yards and 165 on the ground. They did not get to Jackson Dart one time. They did not benefit from one single takeover. That is that same defense that last season allowed 511 points, the most, in the NFL.

[22:09] Now it's down. DeMarvion, O'Shawn, Malik Hooker, both added to the IR. Maris Leofel was already out. So the Pro Bowl, Lascar down two.

[22:21] Tyler Smith injured reserve. He's not going to be back until at least week five. We'll see how this ends up playing out for the Dallas Cowboys. They do have Dorrance Armstrong. He's coming off his suspension there, and he's been in Dallas for six seasons.

[22:35] So nice to have a veteran back for the Cowboys. But I do not trust this Dallas defense whatsoever. I'm going to take the commanders as my barking dog. We've seen as of late the Cromies be able to go into Dallas and spring the upset.

[22:50] I think this one is another one right for the pickings. All right, D.R., you have the stinkiest, grossest, ugliest barking dog this week. I could not even stomach this one.

[23:02] Tell me why on planet Earth you are betting on the Tennessee Titans. I'm going to keep it real with you, Kelly. I haven't gotten to the window yet with any NFL. Very patient.

[23:15] I've learned through the years to be patient. And more importantly, yesterday I was taping all day at UFC 5Gate. Put these in on Monday. With that said, my numbers aren't going to change between now and Sunday.

[23:29] It's just a matter of do I have enough conviction as I handicap it more to get to the window and bet it. Because the numbers show that this is an overreaction. And I'm actually fading the steam.

[23:41] Now, you've got to remember, the steam got in on Philadelphia at a better number than where it sits now. I shared it in the steam when I gave out the NFL. They got down at 4.5. They got down at minus 5.

[23:54] This is a much different number at 7 juice. And we're seeing 7.5 already at the polymarkets and the towel sheets. That's a different number. And I do think that's an overreaction.

[24:06] Now, the negative is obviously it's Tennessee. and I told myself like this year in circuit contests I won't use those bad three teams the last three teams on my power rating I'm just going to avoid them those tend to cost me the most year

[24:20] after year because slush tend to think they're undervalued on the numbers but it just doesn't play out well more times than not and I do have Tennessee as the 31st best team in the NFL only

[24:34] one team they would be favored over, but the spread becomes a great equalizer, and Philadelphia is not a top 10 team. They are not in my top 10. That's where they stand right now. In fact, they're not even a top 15 offense yet, and if you're going to cover a touchdown,

[24:52] you've got to be a top 5 offense to cover that, especially on the road, at a conference. Where's the motivation? On the flip side, again, I'm not going to argue the Tennessee side.

[25:05] Like I said, only one team may be favored over. We project them to be about 30th in offense, about 28th defensively. So they will be at the bottom.

[25:17] But, again, the spread becomes a great equalizer. And point spread-wise, we make Philadelphia a 7.5, close to an 8-point favor on a neutral field. You give Tennessee 2.2 points for home field advantage, and what do we get?

[25:32] Should be about a six-point favorite, 5-5.5, right where it was, and right where the first number the Shrubs got under, 4.5, actually gave them a point of line value, which is more than enough in the NFL, rest assured, to place a wager.

[25:48] And now that it's at 7-7.5, I've got to look to the dog, and when we're going to bet a dog, we're going to sprinkle it as well, especially at home. So Tennessee, my ugly dog for week two.

[26:02] That dog is more than ugly, VR. That dog has fleas, mange, probably heartworm. I don't even want to know. There was not a team that looked worse last week than the Tennessee Titans. Marco D'Angelo, your deli.

[26:16] I said this in the college segment, so if you guys missed the college show, I already yelled at him over there. So feel free to go and watch me lecture Marco. We're 5-0 last week in your standalone video here on the Wager Talk YouTube channel.

[26:29] Kudos to you. Give me your sandwich game of the week here since it is week two. Yeah, because I've been in your doghouse all week, man. I can't stay out of trouble.

[26:42] Yeah, the Marco's Deli every Friday, 6 p.m. Eastern. It goes live. Don't forget, if you're an insider member, you get it early. find out those plays and, you know, maybe get ahead of the line move.

[26:56] But it will be live this Friday at 6, and boy, we're off to a great start. By the way, last week on the deli, first two weeks were winning shows as well. We are now 9-2 for the season three straight winning weeks on there.

[27:12] Be sure to check it out. But for this week's deli, we don't have the sandwich in the deli. We got the trap. and this is not your usual trap style for me. Actually, you probably would think I would be on the other side maybe in this one

[27:27] because it doesn't sound like a typical Marco play. We're going to look at the Baltimore Ravens, and I've talked about all season long, you know, they're one of the teams that have been hyped coming in during the offseason.

[27:39] New head coach, Lamar Jackson's now happy, everything else, they're going to roll. and what you see last week, the Sharks, including myself, like the Indianapolis side, and Baltimore just ran roughshod over them last week.

[27:55] So coming back home off of a big blowout win on the road, that's not something I normally do, but I am going to do it here. And the reason for that is I think that this Baltimore team is better than I expected.

[28:12] What I saw coaching-wise with the new head coach, this team was playing hard, not making mental mistakes. And the fact that it is their home opener kind of erases some of those flat spots.

[28:26] Because normally, coming back home off of a big blowout win, it's an inflated line. I would look to the value to the road team, but not because it's their home opener. I'm going to say you're going to see a big effort here.

[28:40] The other reason is I got to talk about the opponent. And New Orleans was one of the games we gave out on the deli last week. And why? Because I thought they could stay with Detroit. And it was a sneaky number.

[28:53] It was sitting there at seven, then six and a half. And they got the job done. It was scary. Did you see the first half? They were down 21-0, were the Saints.

[29:05] And they battled all the way back to send it to overtime. In overtime, Detroit scored first. With the rule changes that we had a couple years ago, they got a chance to get the ball back. Normally the game would have been over at that point.

[29:18] But they got their chance, and they scored the touchdown. Now they had the decision, do we kick the extra point? And the best we could do is play for a tie, because at that point there was only like a minute and a half left in the game.

[29:33] What's going to happen is either it's going to be a tie, or Detroit's going to drive down and get a game-winning field goal. No, they opted to go for the win. They went for the two-point conversion. They missed.

[29:45] That's tough to come back off of. And I say it all the time. Big dogs that Slater gets out and come up short. And can you come up any shorter than losing by one in overtime?

[29:58] Oftentimes have a flat game the next week. And they're playing back-to-back road games. I'm going to go with Baltimore. I think this is one of those spots. It may look square on the surface,

[30:10] but I think Baltimore is a bet on team in this one. I think they can win this one by 17 or more, really. I look for a step back from the Saints.

[30:22] Let's go ahead and lay it with Baltimore in their home opener as they go to 2-0. Well, Ariel Epstein would love that. That would be a great birthday present for her. All right, let's get into some of those best bets now, of course.

[30:38] VR, you are up first. Tell me why you like the Vikings against the Bears. Because it's one of the biggest overreactions. And, again, it's not a reason I love Minnesota in this spot.

[30:53] But the bottom line is we're seeing an overreaction to the betting line, and I don't think it's warranted just because of the quarterback situation with Carson Wentz over Murray, regardless of who goes. And that's the bottom line.

[31:05] Power rating-wise, Minnesota's above Chicago. Again, I started the season with Chicago about 16th in my power ratings, bumped them up a little bit to 14th,

[31:17] but the number, the rating number hasn't changed all that much. Let's not forget, this is a team that gave up a lot of points. This defense allowed a ton of points to a Carolina offense. Again if you got to put up 59 points to win football games or 40 to win football games in the NFL you going to have a hard time doing it And they had to put up 40 to beat Carolina who put up 37 That a problem that Chicago going to have to figure out because projection we have them 24th defensively

[31:49] There's only a handful of teams that are going to be worse than Chicago on the defensive side of the ball. Now, fortunately for them, they're top five offense, so they're going to continue to put up points, but now they're running into a team that's a top 10

[32:01] on the defensive side of the ball, like Minnesota is. Offensively, they're mid-tier. and I don't think the drop-off in the quarterback situation is all that big

[32:13] because all we have is the numbers to look at. And here's the bottom line. Over the last five seasons, Carson Wentz had 31 starts. In those 31 starts, he averaged 88.2 QBR.

[32:26] Murray, in his career, has a 91.5% QBR. That's only a couple points better than Wentz. That's the numbers. That's the data.

[32:38] That's not the eye test. That's not what we think. That's not what we see. That's just the bottom line. The quarterback rating has zero bias. It doesn't care. It just tells us how the quarterback performs.

[32:51] And in this spot, I think they're being downgraded too heavily. I don't think it's warranted. I think Chicago is being upgraded too quickly. I see the excitement in Chicago.

[33:04] I get it. They haven't had a championship there in forever. But this team, if they win nine games, like, have a parade. They're not winning 10. That's just the bottom line.

[33:16] They're not going to do it. They have a very difficult top 10 strength of schedule. And as I said, they're barely a top 25 defense. So, nice win for Chicago. Beautiful offense, putting up almost 60 points.

[33:29] But, you know, they're as phony as a $3 bill. They could win this game. They could win some football games. but they're not winning no Super Bowl. They're not getting into the playoffs winning eight, nine games tops.

[33:44] Don't get too excited. I don't want to see heartbreak in Chicago. Give me Minnesota. Plus the points. Sprinkle that money line. Haven't gotten to the window yet, but I don't see any reason I won't.

[33:56] I think I'll be able to get six with the Vikings. VR locks me. I have a parade. I cannot. You are going to have those Bears fans at her mentions yet again this week.

[34:09] They have nothing to celebrate. They have nothing but time on their hands. They can sit down and tweet at me all day. It's not like they're going to be playing any kind of playoff. Touche.

[34:21] All right, Marco D'Angelo, tell us about the Weekend Warrior over at wagertalk.com before you give us your best bet for NFL Week 2. Kelly, Weekend Warrior. It's available all season long at WagerTalk and all of our sister sites.

[34:37] $49, Saturday, Sunday. That gets you every college football play, every NFL football play from your favorite tapper. And, yes, if they have a 5%, it's included.

[34:50] 5% play sell for $35 by themselves. What a deal. $14 more you get every play Saturday and Sunday. Sunday. So head on over to WagerTalk. Lock it in

[35:02] and don't be afraid to lock it in early. Don't wait for the weekend because why? Well, every time a capper releases a play and loads it into the system,

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[35:26] and maybe the line moves. We'll tell you the play the minute it's released so you get the best of the number. Another reason why to sign up for the Weekend Warrior. All right, Kelly, and for me this week,

[35:38] my best bet, we're going to take a look at this Denver-Jacksonville game. And you know what? You know what I wouldn't want to be this week? I know as a kid everybody dreamed of playing in the NFL.

[35:51] I don't think I would want to be a Denver Broncos player this week because can you imagine Sean Payton all week in practice after the performance we saw Monday night against the Chiefs?

[36:04] They were abysmal. It was a good first quarter. It wasn't much after that. Kansas City just took them out behind the woodshed and gave them a good old-fashioned beating.

[36:16] I look for Denver to bounce back. And I know earlier in the show I talked about all the pressure on teams that are 0-1, they're not going to start 0-2. I think there's some subset here. We talked about that was a Monday night game.

[36:30] It was a home opener for Kansas City. It was Kansas City's statement game, as I said, because it was Denver that knocked them off their throne, beating them twice during the regular season last year

[36:42] and winning the division, a division that Kansas City had owned for as long as Patrick Mahomes has been the starter. I look for a better performance from them this week

[36:54] Because, to be honest, it can't look any worse than it did last week. Now, on the opposite end of that spectrum, what about Jacksonville? My God, should we print Super Bowl tickets after last week's blowout win?

[37:06] Pump the brakes. That was against Cleveland. Cleveland, you know what? The season started in, I think, five minutes into the game.

[37:18] The Cleveland Browns were officially eliminated from playoff contention, in my opinion. They were bad, and they're going to be bad. So don't put too much thought in that. And I'm not overreacting to one week.

[37:31] Either way, a good team or a bad team. But those statements on Cleveland, they've got a lot of internal problems. They've got a quarterback that they're forced to play because they're paying them so much money, and the backups are no good.

[37:43] They have no options there. Jacksonville looks better because of the mistakes. And let's talk about revenge. and I don't like to harp on revenge, but I think there's times to point something out.

[37:57] And it's not really so much about revenge. It's about what happened, why a team might have lost the game that they lost last year. These two plays last year, it was in December, late December,

[38:10] and Jacksonville came to Denver and beat Denver. But you know what? If you go back and look at the schedule, circle that game, because look at the next game. That game was a Sunday. Denver had Kansas City on deck. Not only did they have Kansas City on deck, they had Kansas City on deck on a short week on Christmas Day. Yeah, I'm going to go ahead and say that Denver might have got caught looking ahead to playing Kansas City the week before.

[38:42] Coming off that embarrassing loss on Monday Night Football, that's another angle that was gold for years. Teams that look horrible on Monday night, you go with the following week.

[38:55] Teams that look great on Monday night, you go against the following week. Why? Because the entire world watched that game. It's a standalone game that everybody is home and watching on a Monday night.

[39:08] So you're going to get value and overvalue. Some teams will be overpriced. Some teams will be underpriced. And Denver at home, minus 2.5 on the south side of that key number of 3

[39:22] is because of their performance on Monday Night Football. Had they played just a normal type game, you would have seen them over a field goal in this game. But instead, you're getting them under a field goal, and that's a key number.

[39:35] Denver wins this one. I'm going to go ahead and call it Denver 24-17 over Jacksonville. I am also going to take a team under a field goal run. Don't walk because pretty much all the two and a half are already gone.

[39:51] Well, we're already too late to the party. But that's why we need OzLogic drinks, guys. OzLogic.com, backslash Kelly in Vegas. If you guys want a free week, you're welcome. It will make you a better, better, as well as a better shopper.

[40:04] Yeah, that's called girl math, boys and girls. We're going to get into some more math, and that is the Houston Texans being my favorite for week two. I know everybody bet Houston last week.

[40:16] It was that one and a half point underdog versus the Bills. I didn't understand the line. No one did. And the reality is the final result based on the final score doesn't tell you even how that game played out.

[40:28] Houston was up 31-30 with about three minutes to go and then ended up losing that game. They held the ball for 36 and a half minutes, ran 73 plays compared to Buffalo's 52.

[40:41] Josh Allen needed 7.9 yards per play and a 96-yard touchdown drive to secure the win. DJ Stroud, now I'm not saying write him that big fat check just yet.

[40:54] 26 of 38, 274 yards, two touchdowns, no interceptions, but he had two lost fumbles. I think he cleaned that up this week against Cincinnati, who we were on last week.

[41:06] And I was very elated to cast that ticket. I got to watch that one at the Hard Rock. So a lot of Bucs fans there were mad at me cheering for the Bengals. That defense came in clutch. Four forced fumbles from them.

[41:19] 24 of their 33 points were taken away from the Bucs. I love that. Jamar Chase, though, just two balls for 12 yards. Woo! Let's see how the Texans' defense plays this week.

[41:33] I expect a more lockdown defense against the Bengals. I'd lay the 2.5. I do think you can still lay the three. If it gets to 3.5, it's probably not going to. That would be a no bet.

[41:45] Let's see if you can still find yourself a 2.5 on the Texans. All right, guys. If you missed the college football edition of Bet On It, it is up right now on the WagerTalk YouTube channel. We appreciate you guys last week.

[41:58] You made us number one of all time at WagerTalk. Almost 73,000 of you watched this show. So whether you love us, you hate us, or somewhere in between, we thank you here on Bet On It.

[42:11] Until NFL Week 3, we're out of here. Let's bet on it.