NFL Betting Pick: Arizona Cardinals +12

Photo by Miles Sanders

Philadelphia snapped a three-game skid by beating the New York Giants, 33-25, last week. We (correctly) forecast that laying two touchdowns to the Giants was too big of an ask for a struggling Eagles squad, and so we endorsed New York for the road cover in Monday Night football action.

Looking ahead to week 17 action, Philly is laying double-digits for the second consecutive week, and for the second time this season, versus Arizona. We are still disbelievers. Accordingly, we're taking the 12 points with the Cardinals (granted, we have yet to cash with Arizona this season, despite well-founded rationales—see here and here examples of our misses backing the lowly Cardinals, however, discipline dictates that we go back to the proverbial well in week 17).

The angle indicated in the above graphic has proven good for a statistically significant (at the 95% confidence level) 20% long-term return investment.

We hypothesize that this system's enduring success owes to the market's preference for backing better teams, even when this supported is unwarranted. Supporting our thesis, we note that Humphreys, Paul & Weinbach (2013) found that NFL bettors demonstrates a "clear and predictable" pattern of siding with better teams. Conclusions in Shank (2019) likewise included the bettor preference for backing NFL favorites, particularly when the away team has lost recent games (the Cardinals have dropped their last two). Newell & Cortis (2021) also document a bias toward favorites in sports with only two outcomes. And a bias toward big NFL favorites was among key takeaways from Paul & Weinach (2021), as well.

We interpret losing three (or more) of the last five games as suggesting teams are not deserving of the high expectations conveyed by double-digit favor, and, as demonstrated above, objective gamblers have been well served, historically, to fade teams in this spot. Accordingly, our week 17 NFL betting picks feature the flier on the Arizona Cardinals for the road cover.

Interestingly, 58% of spread wagers and 93% of the ATS handle tracked by SportsInsights for this contest support Arizona. We can only hope there is safety in numbers.

Happy betting!!