Longtime gaming reporter Bill Ordine recently looked ahead to the 2024 NFL season with PressBox, pointing out what futures bets stand out as intriguing and more.
PressBox: Is there anything you pay particular attention to when the NFL schedule comes out?
Bill Ordine: Certainly, you want to look at those games where you anticipate they’re going to be key games for a given team or both teams, and then consider what the game is prior to that — the so-called trap games. Let’s say we think that the Browns are going to be a decent team. If you look at that Baltimore-Cleveland game, you want to look at the game before that if you’re a Ravens fan or if you’re betting the Ravens. You want to look with a skeptical eye at the game prior to that. If the schedule can tell you anything at this stage of the game, it’s that it will show you where the trap games may be as you look at the schedules. I would do that. I think if you’re going to be a sophisticated NFL bettor, that is kind of like being one step ahead of things. Consider what the trap games are before it becomes obvious what the trap games are.
PB: How early is too early to look at Week 1 lines?
BO: Because the attrition issue is a big deal, unless you see some gaping hole that you want to take advantage of, it really does make some sense to wait until we get into training camp, at least a bit. You want to make sure that star players don’t get injured in training camp. For anyone who’s thinking about betting Week 1, it is prudent to get through at least a couple of weeks of training camp to make sure your star wide receiver doesn’t get a hamstring injury or your starting quarterback doesn’t develop a shoulder problem. It is prudent to wait until you can get a fair amount through training camp before you start betting on Week 1.
PB: The Ravens are +140 to win the AFC North, +950 to win the Super Bowl and their over-under win total is 11.5. Do you like any of those bets?
BO: The Ravens are a really good team. The thing that I really like about the Ravens is the defense. If you’re a Ravens fan, you know that they had by many measures the No. 1 defense in the NFL last year, even stacked up against San Francisco. By the way, the top three teams in terms of Super Bowl odds — Baltimore, San Francisco and Kansas City — were also the top three teams in defense last year. For all the talk that we do, me included, about quarterbacks, it is defense that still wins championships, and the odds reflect that. By the way, the Ravens still have Lamar Jackson. Anybody who has to win 12 games for you to win a wager, it’s going to be tough. That’s why you stay away from the chalk.
But among those three teams — the Ravens, 49ers and Chiefs — if I were going to put a Super Bowl futures wager down, it would be on the Ravens basically because they’re getting the better odds. They’re not better by a whole lot. San Francisco is the favorite at +550, Kansas City right behind them at +600 and Baltimore is at +950. Predicated on that +950, I think the best investment is the Ravens because of the odds that you’re getting. Of course to get there, they’ve got to go through Kansas City. They’re going to have to get through the Chiefs somewhere along the line. Maybe they’ll get lucky. Maybe somebody else will knock off the Chiefs before the conference championship game and the Ravens will end up in the conference championship game against Miami or Buffalo or even the Chargers.
PB: What team is your dark horse to win the Super Bowl this year?
BO: This team is a little less than a dark horse, and it’s Green Bay. I like Green Bay based on a couple reasons. First of all, I think the quarterback, Jordan Love, really came along wonderfully last year. I thought he did a really good job, and he put the ball in the air a lot. I know C.J. Stroud was considered the huge surprise of the season and quite the find and it’s true, but Jordan Love’s TD-to-interception ratio was [nearly] 3:1. He put the ball in the air a lot, and Stroud was probably protected a little bit more in the play-calling than Love was.
The Packers have three decent to very good wide receivers and a solid tight end, their defense is better than average, and they’re young. They’re at that kind of stage of development where they could step up the way Detroit did last year. … It’s not like they went 2-15 last year or anything like that. They had a good season. They went to the playoffs. Just looking at their Super Bowl odds, they’re +1900, which is pretty good. That’s 20-1. You’re getting decent odds on that.
Everyone is going to put a lot of stock in the coaching change [with the Chargers]. Interestingly enough, they did not have to draft a quarterback. They went out and got help for their quarterback. I like the Chargers as a dark horse in the AFC. I don’t know that they can battle their way through that conference in terms of getting to the Super Bowl, but I like them getting to maybe the conference championship game.
In both those instances, I like those dark-horse teams to do better than what the over-under is currently saying that they would do, which is 9.5 in the case of Green Bay and 8.5 in the case of the Chargers. I really like the Chargers.
PB: Does anything else stick out to you heading into the season?
BO: If you can ever bet against the Jets, I would do it. I am just stunned about how highly regarded the Jets are, predicated almost entirely on Aaron Rodgers. Certainly they have a great defense. I’m not overlooking that. That defense carried them however far they were able to go in the last couple of seasons. I’m not dismissing that they have had some great players on that team and they have played good defense, but that they would be +2400 to win the Super Bowl and the Dolphins are +2400 as well? I don’t get that. … If you want to be gutty against the Jets, I would do it right out of the gate and bet on San Francisco [to cover 5.5 points in Week 1].
If Baker Mayfield is really the real deal and he has matured into an NFL quarterback, the Buccaneers are another team that has a really good defense and has a really good coach. That’s a guy who keeps his cool and does a good job of keeping his team on an even keel. Tampa Bay is another team that I think game in and game out I would be looking to wager on, to tell you the truth. I love this over-under on the Buccaneers. They’re at 7.5. They don’t even have to have a winning season to cover that over-under, so I like Tampa Bay to do better than 7.5 wins.
You never really count the Steelers out if all they have to do is do better than .500 because we know what Mike Tomlin’s record is in terms of getting his team to .500 or better. They are at 8.5. That’s usually pretty bankable if all you need the Steelers to do is go a game over .500, so I like the Steelers at 8.5.
Photo Credit: Kenya Allen/PressBox
Originally published June 19, 2024