Safety among prevalent issues for Goodell
Football Betting Lines
02/03/2012 - Indianapolis, IN (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Armed with labor peace for the next 10 years, NFL commissioner Roger Goodell discussed a number of topics Friday in his annual state of the league address.
Last year's session with the assembled media centered around the impending collective bargaining talks with the union. After a work stoppage was averted in the summer and in the wake of another successful 2011 campaign, player safety was at the forefront on Friday, while Goodell also spoke about recent rumors of expansion and more prime time games for the NFL Network.
"We are focused now on how to improve every area of the game, from the game on the field to the fan experience and everything in between," Goodell said as part of an opening statement before fielding questions for about an hour.
The prevention and treatment of concussions, as well as other ways to make the game less dangerous is paramount for Goodell and the league. There have been numerous concussion lawsuits filed by former players in recent weeks.
"We will always make sure player safety is a main focus," Goodell said. "We will continue to address medical issues. We will try to help our retired players, current players and future players by making the game safer."
Goodell said the league is using sideline replays to help doctors in their medical evaluations during the playoffs and indicated that it is a practice that will likely continue during the 2012 regular season.
"We're not going to relent on safety," Goodell added later, saying "medical decisions will override competitive decisions."
The commissioner said the league was at the forefront of concussion-related injuries and is always gathering more information.
"We're all learning [about brain injuries]," he noted. "What I'm proud of is the NFL's leading the way. This is a serious injury and needs to be taken seriously, not just in football, but in all sports."
Speculation about potential expansion is just that, Goodell noted, despite his remarks on Thursday that indicated the league would grow by two teams if it ever did consider the issue.
"We have not talked about expansion in the league at all," Goodell said. "It is not on our agenda. I do not see that in the foreseeable future. We want our teams to remain where they are."
He did, however, speak about the league's desire to return to Los Angeles, although whether that was through expansion or an existing team relocating was not clear.
"We've got to find a way to make it work for both parties," he said, adding that labor peace and the new television deals have made the concept more realistic. "We would like to be back in Los Angeles if we can do it correctly. I think that the [labor and TV] foundation can be helpful for coming back to LA. We now have a runway for 10 years. We know what our labor situation is and we know what our TV situation is."
As for television, Goodell announced that the league is expanding its schedule of games on the NFL Network from eight to 13 for next season. It will include more Thursday night games earlier in the season.
"We think that's great for fans and for teams to get that prime time exposure," he said.
Another question was raised about the potential of expanding the Monday night schedule to doubleheaders, but Goodell said that has not been considered.
As for expanding the season to 18 games, one of the roadblocks in the latest CBA talks last summer, Goodell continued to say it would have to be discussed again with the union.
Goodell noted that Indianapolis has been a wonderful host for this week's festivities and was asked about future Super Bowl sites, including more cold weather cities. The New York City area will host a Super Bowl in two years and the commissioner said the league would wait to add any potential non-domed cold weather sites until after the first one takes place.
"I'm a big believer the game is played in all elements," Goodell said. "It's a great part of our history. There's another side that believes when you get to the Super Bowl, the elements shouldn't play a part."
Other topics included the league's desire for more stadium upgrades or new construction, similar to Thursday's announcement of a new building for the San Francisco 49ers in Santa Clara. Goodell hoped the league could help San Diego with its desire for a new building.
Testing for human growth hormone, which the union agreed to in the new CBA, could begin this offseason. It was expected to start during the 2011 season, but the union balked at the testing process.
Goodell said the two sides have had recent positive discussions regarding the subject and those would continue in the coming weeks.
There wasn't much talk about the sometimes acrimonious labor issues from the summer, but it was brought to the commissioner's attention that the teams of two of the men who played such a big role in the outcome -- Patriots owner Robert Kraft and Giants co-owner John Mara -- were in the Super Bowl.
"Those two individuals deserve a lot of respect and appreciation," he stated.
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How to bet pro football
There is little doubt that the NFL is where the sportsbooks see the most action and also make the most loot. The NFL possesses betting friendly attributes that are unlike any of the other major sports. First off, there are relatively few teams to keep track of in comparison to college football betting or college basketball. And second, these teams play only once a week which makes staying on top of the results much easier than it is in the daily leagues such as the NBA, NHL, and MLB.
These dynamics, along with the sheer excitement of watching and wagering on football, brings more square action to the table than any of the other sports. Almost every Tom, Dick and Harry in America is an NFL expert in their own mind and that is precisely what the oddsmakers prey upon.
Understanding who bets the games is just as important as understanding which teams are playing the games. The market at times will dictate price, which in the betting world means the oddsmakers cater to the public rather than reality.
Knowing the market inside and out is the basis of our NFL handicapping model. That is, our approach to NFL handicapping is of the contrarian or value seeking variety. We will at times place a higher premium on public sentiment than on the fundamentals. This strategy dictates playing dogs and/or lesser competent teams, or teams the public wants nothing to do with. Or better yet, fading the teams the oddsmakers want you to bet on.
Along these same lines, we carry a similar notion that the first week of the NFL season presents one of the ripest opportunities for the astute gambler. This conflicts with conventional wisdom and/or handicapping lore, as most would say it is better to watch a few games and assess each team before jumping in with both feet. That’s all fine and dandy, but there are some interesting trends to exploit in Week 1 and we’d be remiss to ignore them. Let us quickly explain.
Gone are the days of dynasties, where the same core players stay intact and dominate the league year after year. Free agency and player movements can completely transform teams from one season to the next. In today’s parity-driven NFL, poor teams typically don’t stay poor for all that long and excellent teams must constantly reinvent themselves to stay on top.
The temptation might be to assume prior year results are the best indicator of who is going to cover in Week 1. To Joe Public, playoff teams from the prior season, home teams, favorites, and so one, look even more enticing than usual since there is no current season performance to judge them against. But the question begs: are the oddsmakers setting a trap?
To find the answer, we culled five years worth of Week 1 NFL data. As always, all of our analysis is done from an ATS perspective. The purpose here is to share the most important angles we unearthed and try to explain the logic behind them. So strap on your helmet, throw on your shoulder pads, and follow our lead as we expose some rare holes in the oddsmakers’ line of defense.
Home vs. Away Teams
Over the past five seasons, NFL home teams in Week 1 are just 31-42-7 ATS (42 percent). This of course implies that roadies are a 58 percent winning proposition during this time. The public at large has a tendency to overvalue home teams and this is especially true in Week 1 when there is no current season data to make predictions from. Consequently, the oddsmakers almost surely shade the home teams, by and large making road teams the choice for the value player.
Conclusion: Look long and hard at road teams first when handicapping the opening week.
Price ranges
Favorites are just 31-42-7 ATS (42 percent) in the opening week over the past five NFL seasons (Coincidentally, home teams hold the same ATS record as noted above). This means that underdogs bark at a 58 percent clip. Mid-range favorites performed the worst among our specified price ranges. In particular, favorites priced between –3 1/2 and –6 1/2 are only 8-15 ATS (35 percent) during this time.
The same basic pattern holds true when looking at home favorites (road favorites gravitate towards a 50 percent mean). Home favorites indeed are just 21-32-3 ATS (40 percent) in the first week of NFL action since 1999. Again, mid-range favorites are similarly the poorest performers when we look at home teams. Consider that home teams priced between –3 1/2 and –6 1/2 have stumbled to a 6-13 ATS (32 percent) mark in Week 1 games the past five seasons.
Conclusion: Like home teams, favorites and particularly mid-range favorites are generally overvalued in Week 1.
Playoff teams
It might surprise you to learn that playoff teams from the prior year versus non-playoff teams from the prior year are a mere 16-23-3 (41 percent) ATS in NFL Week 1 games over the past five seasons. Home teams which made the playoffs versus teams which did not make the playoffs from the prior season drop to a meager 7-14-1 ATS (33 percent) during this time.
Why are playoff teams, and in particular those at home, such bad bets the past five openers? Just as the case with home teams and with favorites, oddsmakers intentionally overprice playoff teams in the opening week to compensate for the public’s propensity to over bet them.
This theory holds true just looking at straight-up records from the past season as well. That is, home teams with winning records from the prior season vs. road teams with losing records from the prior season are just 8-13 ATS in Week 1 NFL games since 1999.
Conclusion: Playoff teams from the prior year and in particular, home playoff teams, are overvalued in Week 1 NFL games.
Scoring defense and scoring offense
Do good defenses and for that matter good offenses from the prior season fare better against the number the following year in Week 1 games? Well, sort of. Generally speaking, teams with a solid offense or defense from the prior season tend to do well in the opening week so long as they are on the road. As a host, however, the best offenses and best defenses from the prior year tend to be overvalued in Week 1.
Consider that the top five scoring defenses (i.e. points allowed) from the prior season are a nice 8-4 ATS (66 percent) on the road in NFL openers the past five seasons. Meanwhile, the top five scoring defenses from the prior season are just 3-8-2 ATS (27 percent) as a host in Week 1 during the same time period.
There is no discernable advantage or disadvantage for teams with a top five scoring offense (i.e. points scored) in Week 1 games. However, when we look at scoring offenses from the bottom up (isolating the five worst offenses from the prior season), the results are rather interesting. In particular, teams ranked in the bottom five in scoring offense from the prior season are 9-4-1 ATS (69 percent) when on the road in Week 1.
The logic is simply that the public perception is a poor scoring offensive unit from the year prior will have little chance of winning on the road in Week 1. In turn, the oddsmakers compensate for this perception and these poor offensive teams from the year prior carry extra line value on the Week 1 trail.
Conclusion: Teams with top-ranked defenses from the previous season are good bets when playing on the road, but poor bets when playing at home. Also, teams ranked among the bottom five in scoring offense from the prior season are generally a good value in their Week 1 openers, provided they are playing on the road.
Scoring margin
An exceedingly straightforward way of measuring scoring offense and scoring defense together as a whole is to look at a team's “margin." Margin is simply scoring offense minus scoring defense, which is a fairly clear-cut measure of how a team does on both sides of the ball. Typically, the higher the margin, the better the team.
In this regard, it might seem counterintuitive that teams carrying the higher margin from the prior season in week one matchups are merely 31-42-7 ATS (42 percent). Furthermore, road teams with the higher margin are 14-20-6 ATS (41 percent), while home teams with the higher margin are 17-22-1 ATS (44 percent). Once again, these results line up with the theory that better teams from the prior year are overvalued come opening day of the following season.
Conclusion: “Better” teams, which often boast a higher margin than their opponent, are overvalued the following season in NFL openers.
In sum
Oddsmakers cater NFL betting lines to match public perception and also to bait the public into poor bets. The temptation to use the prior year’s success as a buy sign for how a team will perform against the spread in Week 1 of the following season is an enormous trap.
The fact is, isolating road teams, road dogs, non-playoff teams vs. playoff teams, teams with a losing record or low margin vs. playoff teams or ones with a high margin from the previous year is where the line value resides. Quite simply, taking the road less traveled is your surest path to NFL betting profits.
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Huskers' Lucky hospitalized for undisclosed reason
LINCOLN, Neb. -- Nebraska running back Marlon Lucky was hospitalized Monday for undisclosed reasons after Lincoln police responded to a call at his residence.
The Nebraska athletic department said in a release Monday that Lucky was admitted Sunday night.
MySportsbook.com has the Cornhuskers listed at +2500 to win the BCS National Championship odds.
A nursing supervisor at the hospital said all questions about Lucky were being referred to the athletic department. The athletic department said there would be no further comment from the department or Lucky's family.
A Lincoln Police spokesman said officers responded to a call at Lucky's residence 11:30 p.m. Sunday. The spokesman said he didn't know Lucky's condition at the time he was taken to the hospital.
Lucky, from North Hollywood, Calif., started six games last season as a sophomore and was the team's second-leading rusher, with 728 yards and six touchdowns. He also caught 32 passes for 383 yards. He averaged 19.1 yards on eight kickoff returns.
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