07/13/2010 - Toronto, ON (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - With their nine-game losing streak now a memory, the Toronto Argonauts try to continue their strong play on Wednesday night as they host the Calgary Stampeders at the Rogers Centre.

Getting an early jump on the third week of the season, due to a soccer game set between Manchester United and Celtic FC on Friday, Toronto has plenty to be pleased about following its narrow 36-34 win over the Winnipeg Blue Bombers last Friday night at Canad Inns Stadium.

Quarterback Cleo Lemon threw for 162 yards and ran for a touchdown, while running back Cory Boyd carried the ball 19 times for 109 yards and a score. The win on the road came in a familiar place as Manitoba was also one of just two locations outside of Toronto where the Argos were able to pick up victories in 2009.

Kicker Grant Shaw was huge for the Argonauts as well, knocking through all four of his field goal attempts including a 13-yard effort late in the fourth frame to put his team far enough ahead to secure its first win of the season. Also on special teams, Chad Owens reeled in a missed 45-yard field goal attempt by Alexis Serna and raced nearly untouched 117 yards for another touchdown for the visitors.

As for the Stampeders, they too leaned heavily on their special teams unit as new kicker Rob Maver converted a 23-yard boot with 10 seconds left on the clock to secure his team's thrilling 23-22 win over the Hamilton Tiger-Cats on the road. Maver was good on all three of his field goal chances in the meeting, turning Calgary into one of only two teams in the CFL to start the season a perfect 2-0, the other being Saskatchewan which is also in the Western Division.

Henry Burris was a bit shaky at times, yet the quarterback still made good on 24-of-37 passes for 257 yards and a pair of touchdowns, while moving beyond his one interception and lost fumble. Nik Lewis and Romby Bryant caught touchdown passes of 15 and 17 yards, respectively, while Joffrey Reynolds ran for 98 yards on 15 carries, easily outgaining the entire Hamilton squad which finished with a mere 48 yards on 17 attempts.

An established champion in the CFL, Burris has been one of the most consistent passers during his career, especially in the last six seasons when he's thrown for at least 4,200 yards. Already having set the standard for the most passing yards and completions in a Stampeders uniform, Burris also notched the 200th passing score of his career over the weekend. However, even though the signal- caller has connected on 66.2 percent of his throws over the first two games, among the regular starters in the league, he is the only one without a completion of at least 40 yards. In fact, his longest pass to date has been only 28 yards and that might be something that the Toronto pass defense centers on this week.

Ironically Reynolds, who is third in the league at the moment with 214 yards rushing through two weeks, has a long run of 28 yards to match the effort of Burris thus far.

As for the running attack of the Argonauts, Boyd bounced back from a weak first game when he gained just 32 yards on eight carries, but if not for one 23-yard burst he would have the lowest average per carry among starting backs in the league in the early going.

With Lemon still learning the finer points of Canadian Football, the Toronto offense is only going to take what the Stamps defense gives it and that may not be very much this week. Nevertheless, chances are Lemon will still perform much better than the quarterback contingent that tried to move the ball for the Argonauts last season, a group of gunslingers who combined to rank second- to-last in the league with 4,128 yards through the air with a league-low 14 TDs and a lofty 25 interceptions.

Working in Lemon's favor is the fact that Calgary had one of the weaker pass defenses in the league last year, registering just 13 interceptions and permitting 408 completed passes (second-most behind Winnipeg).

In 2009 these two teams also met during the third week of the campaign, with Calgary crushing the Argos by a score of 44-9 at home. Six weeks later the matchup was much tighter as the Stamps slipped by with a 23-20 final on the road. As far as the regular-season series is concerned, Calgary has used a six-game win streak against Toronto to push its advantage to 41-36-1 overall, thanks in part to a 30-16 win in the first game of this season.

A short week to prepare probably doesn't help either team and the fact that Calgary didn't bother to return home after defeating Hamilton means the Stamps are following along what Burris referred to as an NHL schedule. But don't expect Calgary to be caught off-guard in this meeting, knowing that a win would put huge pressure on the rest of the division this early in the campaign.

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.

To visit this sportsbook got to MySportsbook.com for all your Sportsbook accepts Visa needs.

Basketball Betting

Basketball Betting

NBA Basketball Betting

Stamps seek 3-0 start in mid-week clash with Argos

Football Betting Lines

How to bet pro football