The prevailing thought amongst NFL bettors over the years has been to avoid putting all your eggs in the basket or baskets of road teams. If you’ve ever been to an NFL game before with a packed crowd, you don’t need an explanation for this theory. For those who haven’t, the amount of crowd noise and hostility that an opposition faces by heading on the road can be daunting and very difficult to handle.
Having said that, I’ve never truly believed in that theory because it doesn’t fully account for games in which the road team takes on much lesser opposition. I don’t care if the game is played in North American, Europe or in Timbuktu, the much better team on paper should be able to impose their will and take out their lesser talented foes. I see three games this week that are good value for road teams taking on lesser opposition.
New Orleans (-4) vs. Tampa Bay
The Saints are dealing with some injury problems at the running back position and all the talk over the last couple of weeks has centered on the fact that the feared Saints offense is just not clicking as well as it did a year ago during the Super Bowl run. Bring in the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
Look, they’ve had a nice start to the year thanks to the play of Josh Freeman as their quarterback, but I’m still very skeptical about their overall talent level and the opposition in which they’ve gained their 3 wins so far this season. Wins against Cleveland, Carolina and Cincinnati don’t prove much to me, but their one game against top opposition was a 20+ point loss at the hands of the Steelers.
San Diego (-8) vs. St. Louis
There are lots of questions about the Chargers after their loss against Oakland last week. On the other side, there’s a lot of excitement surrounding the Rams (despite a 44-6 loss to Detroit last week) because of what Sam Bradford has brought to the table in his rookie campaign.
But there’s just too much talent on this Chargers team to lose to a young and inexperienced Rams team coming off a 1-15 campaign a year ago. If the Chargers can’t beat the Rams this week, we should stop talking about them as Super Bowl contenders.
Indianapolis (-3) vs. Washington
The theme for this pick is perception vs. reality.
All the talk surrounding the Colts has to do with whether or not the dynasty is starting to slowly crumble after getting off to a 3-2 start. In the past, the Colts would never have lost to the Texans or the Jaguars. They were even criticized for winning by 10 against the Chiefs last week because the margin of victory wasn’t as lopsided as we’re used to seeing.
The key to this game is simple. Even with all the talk of doom and gloom in Indy, the Colts still average 401 yards of offense per game. On the other side, despite a surprising 3-2 start under Mike Shanahan, the Redskins defense still gives up 410 yards of offense per game. But a lot of people don’t know that because of all the upbeat chatter coming out of the nation’s capital.