Saved by two half point wins, analyzing our Week 5 picks

Sometimes you need a good kick in the rear just to be reminded that this betting stuff isn’t easy. There’s a reason the house almost always wins, even when you’re armed with numbers and data, sports writers who dedicate their lives to analyzing these games, you’re still nowhere close to the amount of resources that the real line makers have at their disposal.

So while a 2-and-2 week isn’t what we hoped for going into Week 5, staying without a losing week in the early going and getting at 12-and-7 on the year is nothing worth being ashamed of. Early on in the NFL season, there’s unreliability with the numbers and danger at every corner. As we’ll feel more confident with the numbers going forward we’ll take that record and improve on it.

There was something about the Week 5 numbers that just didn’t feel right, with some definite warning signs. Our YPP data only offered three games with differentials of 5 points or more and all big underdogs. Those games went 1-and-2 which isn’t great, but there were also two more games with differentials of 3 or more points and those games went 2-and-0. So while YPP is still finding its groove the raw numbers are beginning to work for us.

Our EW metric is going the other way, as we’d expect it to considering the further away we get from the preseason over/under numbers the less reliable they become. EW was 4-and-5 in differentials of 1.5 or more points but 4-and-3 with differentials greater than 2. So we shouldn’t disregard EW entirely but definitely take the numbers with a grain of salt.

Here’s how the games broke down to give us a 2-and-2 week.

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All that could go wrong did in Cleveland 

The New England Patriots didn’t just get back Tom Brady but it seemed their entire offensive arsenal returned in this game. We estimated New England’s offense with Brady’s return would be playing at a top five league average level and adjusted the numbers accordingly in our column. Despite all that the YPP numbers still suggested the Patriots were getting way too many points with an 11 point differential, something that EW was in agreement with as well.

None of that seemed to matter as the Cleveland Browns were down to their fourth-string quarterback while already being down 23-7 early in the second quarter. Talk about a recipe for disaster for a Browns offense that was actually looking good by the YPP numbers.

Once that happened you kind of knew this was over as Cleveland’s defense struggled mightily to stop the Patriots offense at full strength. We talked on the podcast about how really good teams with big fan bases will get more points then they should and the same can be said for bad teams, and how this can be a good way of going against public perception to win money. That didn’t work out in this case. There was always a possibility Brady came out with his mind set on destruction and that’s exactly what happened.

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The Bears had it until they didn’t

As a better, it’s easy to make everything about yourself, but boy did it feel like some of these teams were trying their best not to cover. A prime example is the Chicago Bears against YPP’s least favorite team, the Indianapolis Colts. Indy was a -4.5 point favorite in this game, which was back and forth the entire time.

After Andrew Luck pulled a rabbit out of his hat in the form of a 35-yard touchdown to T.Y. Hilton, the Bears got the ball back with a little over three minutes to go. As this happened, I felt fully confident they’d tie the game up with a field goal or take the lead on the ensuing drive, that’s just how the game had gone so far. Not so fast, as the Bears fumbled the ball essentially gifting the Colts the field goal to put the game away at six points. The Bears didn’t even have to score, they just needed to avoid turning the ball over in field goal position for the Colts to lose by 3 and get us the win.

That’s football for you.

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Always pay attention to the half points

Our two wins are by a slim margin. We had the New York Giants +7.5 at the Green Bay Packers and the San Diego Chargers +3.5 at the Oakland Raiders. The Raiders won by 3 and Packers by 7, that’s about as slim a margin of victory as you’ll find for two games.

But that’s part of why we picked these teams, a half point can be everything in these cases and it certainly turned out to be. The Chargers once again pulled off their late-game “magic”, managing to throw away yet another potential win. San Diego could have won outright but just blew too many chances by fumbling and missing field goals at key times of the game.

The Giants, on the other hand, did not play well, being thoroughly outmatched by the Packers most of the game, while New York’s offense struggled to get going as Green Bay’s pass rush turned things up a few notches this week.

However, Eli Manning and the G-men came through at the end, by getting the back-door cover with a touchdown scored at the perfect time, with 2:54 left. Just enough time for Green Bay to run the clock out and get us the second win of the day.

As we said in the week, Green Bay just hasn’t won many games by more than a touchdown and that bared out again. While San Diego and Oakland have only played in close games seemingly and that proved to be true as well. While it seems lucky, those 0.5 points can be the difference between winning and losing. Worth paying attention to.

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An early look at our EW suggested spreads for Week 6

After a .500 week, it’s never too early to look ahead a the coming slate of games to get back to our winning ways. EW continues to be an accurate predictor of the spread with five spreads almost exactly the same as the actual lines (within 0 to 0.5 points differential) and two more with a differential within 1, which is negligible. That’s half the spreads that are almost exactly in line with what Vegas is saying. Here are the numbers and stay tuned for our Week 6 picks, YPP analysis, and podcast breaking it all down throughout the week.