FOOTBALL NFL ARTICLES

It’s not a surprise seeing the New England Patriots in the AFC Championship Game since this is their eighth straight appearance. But it is rare to see them as the underdog. The Pats opened as a 3-point dog at BookMaker.eu for the AFC Championship Game against the Kansas City Chiefs on Sunday. The Chiefs, meanwhile, put their playoff jinx behind them by knocking off the Colts in the Divisional Round to reach their first conference title tilt since the 1993 season and just the second in team history. Ironically, the AFC champion receives the Lamar Hunt Trophy, named in honor of the former Chiefs owner, yet his team has never won the hardware. ... 

Homefield advantage has meant everything in the NFL Playoffs over the last five years. The No. 1 seed in the AFC has gone on to make the Super Bowl in each of the last five seasons, while the No. 1 seed in the NFC has made it to the grand finale in four of the last five. That puts the teams that won on Wildcard Weekend at a significant disadvantage, and they will be out to make some new history this weekend. Now, let’s look at the totals for all four games.... 

The legend of Nick Foles continues to grow for the Philadelphia Eagles. Extending his and the team’s postseason winning streak to four straight, the Eagles can thank Cody Parkey for the gift they got in the wild card win over the Bears. Their next task is travelling to the Big Easy to take on the No. 1 seed New Orleans Saints. And if the Eagles need any added motivation, they can look back at their Week 11 blowout loss to the Saints that left them on the verge of being out of the playoff picture... 

You can call it poor timing on the part of the Los Angeles Chargers. They tied for the best record in the AFC, but because they lost the tie-breaker to Kansas City, the Bolts were relegated to the No. 5 seed in the playoff rankings. And for the second straight week, the Chargers will make a cross country trip to face a team they had a better regular season record than. Last week, the Bolts knocked off the Ravens in a wild card matchup. Now they will try to prevent Tom Brady and the New England P... 

The Dallas Cowboys’ duo of Dak Prescott and Ezekiel Elliott has accomplished plenty since joining the league in 2016. They were missing one element for their collective resumes, but that changed last weekend when the Boys defeated Seattle in the Wild Card Round for the team’s first playoff success in four years. They stay in the NFC West this week for a confrontation with the division champion Los Angeles Rams. The teams were fixtures in the NFC playoffs, meeting eight times between 1973 and 198... 

The Indianapolis Colts may be the most feared team in the playoffs after their dominant performance in a wild card victory over the Texans last week. And that’s not good news for the Kansas City Chiefs, who have the AFC’s No. 1 seed but have stumbled in the postseason recently. Of course they didn’t have Patrick Mahomes during those previous outings and the likely MVP will be ready to face a defense that has been one of the best over the second half of the season, leading the Colts to wins in 10... 

It did not take a lot of time for the Arizona Cardinals to determine that Steve Wilks was not the answer to their head coaching needs as they fired Wilks after his only season on the job after the team finished 3-13, which was the worst record in the league. Retired coach Bruce Arians certainly left big shoes to fill and Wilks was not up to the task. New England Patriots... 

The Miami Dolphins have continued to wallow in mediocrity since the 2001 season as they have made the playoffs only twice since that year while going through a total of nine coaches in that span. The latest coach to get the gas in Miami was Adam Gase, who faded badly with 6-10 and 7-9 seasons after leading the Fish to the playoffs in his rookie season as head coach in 2016. In... 

The Green Bay Packers coaching search has seen New England Patriots offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels emerge as the top favorite. It would make sense that McDaniels would be a top betting favorite as regardless of what anyone says Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers will have influence over the pick and he certainly wants a coach like McDaniels that can relate to a top ... 

The four teams favored at the top of the odds board to win Super Bowl LIII will be in action this weekend for the Divisional Round games. The New Orleans Saints locked up the No. 1 seed in the NFC with a few games remaining in the regular season and haven’t played a meaningful game since then. They hold down the top spot on the updated odds list but must contend with Nick Foles and the Eagles, who pulled off the biggest upset of Wild Card Weekend by taking down the Bears in Chicago as a 6.5-poin... 

The first weekend of the NFL playoffs certainly lived up to its name with three of the four road underdogs winning their Wild Card game outright. It wasn’t a surprise to see all four home teams favored, but it was watching three of them lose with none of them covering the final spread for a second straight season. In a single-elimination game there is more emphasis on having home field advantage, but that hasn’t been the case over the past two seasons. ... 

Who will be the next head coach of the Denver Broncos? You can bet on who you think GM and President of Football Operations John Elway will choose to lead the Broncos next season right now at BookMaker. Chicago Bears defensive coordinator Vic Fangio is the favorite at odds of +700, while former Indianapolis head coach Chuck Pagano and current Los Angeles Rams quarterback coach Zac Taylor are the co-second choices at odds of +800. Let’s look at the odds and contenders.... 

Who will be leading Baker Mayfield and the Cleveland Browns next season? You can bet on who you think will be the head coach of the Cleveland Browns for the 2019-2010 season right now at BookMaker. Current Cleveland offensive coordinator Freddie Kitchens and former Green Bay Packers head coach Mike McCarthy are the co-favorites at odds of +800, while Brian Flores, Gregg Williams and Matt Eberflus are the co-second choices at odds of +900. Let’s look at all of the odds and the contenders.... 

You can bet on who you think will be the next head coach of the New York Jets at BookMaker. Former Green Bay Packers head coach Mike McCarthy is the current betting favorite at odds of +900, while current Oklahoma Sooners head coach Lincoln Riley is the second choice at odds of +950. Expect the odds to change over the next couple of weeks as acting owner Christopher Johnson and general manager Mike Maccagnan begin interviewing candidates. Let’s look at the odds at BookMaker on who will be the he... 

All the Philadelphia Eagles wanted was a chance to defend their Super Bowl title. And they got it thanks to the Chicago Bears, who upended Minnesota on the final Sunday of the regular season. The Eagles won their matchup with Washington to sneak into the postseason and they can thank the Bears in person when the teams meet on Sunday at Soldier Field to conclude Wild Card Weekend. This is the only wild card game that isn’t a rematch from the regular season, though both teams are very familiar with each other. ... 

The teams met in Week 16 of the regular season with the Baltimore Ravens in the middle of a run that got them the AFC North title. They stifled the Los Angeles Chargers with a smothering defense that limited the Bolts to fewer than 200 total yards while pestering Philip Rivers all afternoon. Rookie Lamar Jackson has been sensational since taking over, saving the Ravens’ season and John Harbaugh’s job in the process. Jackson literally ran the Ravens to the playoffs, now he’ll look to get past the Bolts for a second time in three weeks. ... 

The NFL’s top running team against the league’s rushing leader should amount to plenty of attempts on the ground when the Seattle Seahawks and Dallas Cowboys meet in the first NFC Wild Card game on Saturday. Both teams had already qualified for the postseason ahead of last week’s games and they won their finale, but the Cowboys might have a little more momentum after a stirring comeback over the Giants. Meanwhile, Seattle struggled to beat the 3-win Cardinals at home. ... 

After tying for last in the AFC South last season at 4-12, the Indianapolis Colts and Houston Texans completed the turnaround on Sunday, winning their season-ending games to return to the postseason. The Texans were already in and needed a victory to clinch the division title. They beat the Jags to do that. Facing a win-and-in game against another division foe, the Colts won for the ninth time in 10 games to claim the final wild card spot. The teams will get the race to Super Bowl LIII started on Saturday from Houston. ... 

The playoff field is set and the updated Super Bowl LIII odds have been released at BookMaker.eu. Not surprising, the New Orleans Saints at +200 remain the favorite after holding down the top spot for the past several weeks. And it’s also not much of a surprise to see the two best teams from each conference holding down the top four slots. Having a first-round bye doesn’t guarantee a path to the Super Bowl, but it makes the road a lot less treacherous and that’s why the Saints and Kansas City Ch... 

It was another strong week for the favored teams as they won 12 of the 16 games straight up on the final regular season Sunday. It marked the second straight week teams laying points on the final NFL betting line went 12-4, closing out the regular season with a record of 165-86-2. Covering the spread proved to be more of a challenge, however. The Week 17 games were split evenly against the line at 8-8, giving the underdogs five straight non-losing weeks against the line. Overall during the 2018 ... 

You play an entire season and it comes down to one game. The winner of the AFC South battle between the Indianapolis Colts and Tennessee Titans will live to play another game while the loser gets an early start on the offseason. And there are some nervous folks in Nashville considering the status of Marcus Mariota is up in the air after he was hurt last week. Given what’s at stake, it’s hard to imagine Mariota not playing if he can throw a football, and a return to practice during the week was a... 

With teams jockeying for playoff positioning and others out of the picture altogether, there have been some reactions on the NFL betting lines ahead of the Week 17 matchups. The Dallas Cowboys are locked into the No. 4 seed in the NFC and will host a playoff game on Wild Card Weekend. Playing starters and risking health is a concern and we saw the line open with the Giants as a 3-point favorite. And it’s already moved three points in favor of New York. The Saints secured the top seed in the NFC ... 

The New Orleans Saints returned to the Superdome and worked out some of their offensive issues against the Steelers on Sunday, securing the No. 1 seed in the NFC with their 31-28 comeback victory. The Saints have been dominant on the fast track of the Superdome and with the playoffs running through the Big Easy, the Saints improved their odds and put some distance between themselves and the other favorites on the updated Super Bowl LIII odds board at BookMaker.eu.... 

Yes Marion, defense is still played in the NFL. Or it could be some inept offensive teams still exist. A mix of both was on full display in Northern California over the weekend. The Bears can do some damage in the playoffs with their smothering defense and they locked down on the Niners to secure an under win for us on the total. That was one of our two winning tickets we had in the three weekly plays. We didn’t have a lot of confidence in Josh Allen on the road against the Pats, even though New... 

Teasing the lines perfectly last week allowed us to cash a winning ticket on our four-team card. We’ll look to close out the season on a strong note by beating the house again in Week 17. What makes last week special is that three of the four games we teased would have won without moving the line or spread. The Ravens were a 4.5-point dog on the opening line and they won outright, so we didn’t need the extra points. We also took the under on the Bears-Niners game, which easily fell below the tot...