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The Denver Broncos, Detroit Lions and Philadelphia Eagles are the three-most bet teams at BetMGM to make the playoffs.
The Broncos have roughly 89% of the tickets and 86% of the total money on them to make the playoffs at +140. Denver has seen its line move the most out of any team, with the number opening in February at +275 to make the playoffs.
The Action Network’s Chris Raybon is bullish on that line and would bet it down to +120 on account of Denver’s defense and easy schedule.
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Inexplicably, the Detroit Lions are the second-most bet on team to make the playoffs at BetMGM.
Their odds to make the playoffs as of Wednesday — a day before the start of the NFL season — are +700. Their odds to miss the playoffs are -1100.
About 98% of the individual bets and total money are on the yes on this line, while only about 2% is on the Lions to miss the playoffs.
In my estimation, the Lions win total at under five wins (-120) was one of the best preseason value bets on the table.
That line has since moved to u4.5 (+125) and u5.5 (-160) at BetMGM and u4.5 (+120) at PointsBet, but if you find a line that provides an under five win total at -130 or better I would 100% take that bet.
To me, it’s infinitely clear that this team won’t come close to making the playoffs.
The Lions only have nine winnable-adjacent games this season — with four of those matchups coming on the road against better teams. Those include games at the Bears, Vikings, Broncos and Falcons.
Eight other games are virtually guaranteed to be losses. Those consist of games on the road against the Packers, Rams, Steelers, Browns and Seahawks and home games versus the Packers, 49ers and Ravens.
The remaining five games on the schedule see the Lions host the Bengals, Eagles, Bears, Vikings and Cardinals. Even if Detroit goes 5-0 in those games, it’d need to pick up an upset elsewhere in order for the over to cover. If Detroit goes 4-1, it’d need two decently substantial upsets. You get the idea.
The Lions’ quarterback is Jared Goff without Sean McVay. Their coaching staff is below average and doesn’t have offensive pedigree. The offensive line is woefully average. Their No. 1 receiver in training camp, Breshad Perriman, has since been cut. Their only other offensive weapons are D’Andre Swift — who is dinged up — and T.J. Hockenson.
Matt Stafford, Kenny Golladay, Marvin Jones Jr. and Danny Amendola are all out the door. That offense finished in the bottom half in points and yards per game last season — and only nabbed five wins — but was still appreciably better than the product Detroit will have on the field this season.
The defense is a better unit than the offense, but it’s going to need No. 3 overall pick Jeff Okudah and company to substantially improve if the team is going to outperform its 27th-placed finish in DVOA last season.
Overall, -1100 on the Lions missing the playoffs is as much of a lock as I’ve ever seen, but I think there’s immense value on any under five win total that you can get your hands on.
The Eagles are the team with the third-most tickets at BetMGM to make the playoffs (+275). Roughly 94% of the tickets and 87% of the money is on the +275 line as opposed to the -350 no playoffs line.
The three-most bet on teams to miss the playoffs are the New Orleans Saints (-130), Dallas Cowboys (+105) and Pittsburgh Steelers (-200).
