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Betting Tips for NFL Money Line Underdogs

 

Straight-up upsets happen every week of the NFL regular season. The parity among the 32 teams adds quite a bit of betting value to many of the teams getting points on the spread. The best betting value each week can be found on the NFL money line where you can earn a higher return on your wager for betting the underdog.

Winning plays on any money line bet are tied to the straight-up head-to-head result. While there is a greater financial risk for betting favorites, there is a higher reward for betting underdogs. If you are looking to maximize the value in betting underdogs on the NFL money line, here are three basic tips to improving your winning percentage.

--Make Realistic Wagers

As mentioned, upsets happen every Sunday in the NFL. However, you still need to be realistic when it comes to betting on them. A good starting point for betting underdogs on the money line is games where the spread is no higher than three to four points.

If you find a one or two-point spread for a game, that signals an automatic lean towards betting the underdog at plus money.

For example, if the Arizona Cardinals are 3.5-point road underdogs against the Los Angeles Rams in a tight NFC West matchup, you might be able to get Arizona at +170 on the corresponding money line.

Instead of paying the standard 10% commission or juice to get the 3.5 points, you can earn a 70% return on your money if you bet the game straight up. However, you must have the confidence that the underdog you bet can win the game outright.

Once the spread gets wider than four points, the chances of cashing in on a SU upset start to diminish with each extra point. You might be able to get Jacksonville at +700 on the money line as a heavy 14-point underdog. Yet, the chances of cashing that bet become rather slim.

--Look for Value in Home Underdogs

The best value in the NFL money line odds lies in home teams set as underdogs. Going through the betting trends for the most recent NFL regular season, the underdog has won 34.7% of the time at home. This translates to 3.4 SU upsets for every 10 NFL games where the road team is favored.

There can be a huge edge to playing at home for certain teams. This is where recent trends can have the biggest impact on the actual outcome of a game.

The first thing to look at is a team’s home record verse its record on the road. You will want to compare that to the opposing team’s home and away mark. Chances are each week that you will find at least one home underdog facing a team that has had some issues winning on the road.

--Shop Your Money Line Odds

Even if you place all of your NFL weekly wagers at the same online sportsbook, you should still shop the money lines across multiple books. This will give you a good feel for where the early betting money is going.

When betting underdogs, sometimes it makes sense to pull the trigger on a money line bet early in the week. If you have a good feeling about a SU upset, chances are the rest of the betting public may be leaning that way as well. This will drive the odds down as the week wears on.

Keep in mind that there is still a heavy bias towards betting favorites, especially when it is a high profile team. One of my biggest wins this season came in Week 17 with the Cardinals on the road against the Dallas Cowboys as 6.5-point underdogs.

Arizona desperately needed the win, but the public was all over the Cowboys as a very popular betting team. I settled-in early in the week at +185 odds on the NFL money line and cashed a winner in the Cardinals’ 25-22 upset.

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