Morning Coffee: Overs Dominate Week 1 Of NFL Pre-Season

We are 24 days away from the start of the 2022 NFL regular season.

While I’m looking forward to betting on the games that actually matter in the standings, I can’t complain about the early results betting the NFL pre-season at FanDuel.

I am 3-0 with my pre-season recommendations, which don’t include the handful of overs that I jumped on Saturday and Sunday as the offences went to work around the league.

Including the Hall of Fame Game, the over has gone 14-3 at FanDuel so far this pre-season.

There has been a nearly even split between favourites and underdogs so far both straight up and against the spread, but with scoring up it will be interesting to see how FanDuel adjusts.

Based on the early numbers available right now for the first couple of Week 2 pre-season games, it looks like their traders are accounting for the offensive bump we saw in the opening week of exhibition games.

Here’s the TSN EDGE Morning Coffee for Monday, August 15th, 2022.

Scoring Up In Week 1 Of NFL Pre-Season

The average total points per game so far this NFL pre-season is 41.94, including the Hall of Fame Game.

That’s about seven points higher than the average closing total at FanDuel in Week 1 of the pre-season.

 

It’s no surprise that the traders at FanDuel have adjusted.

The Chicago Bears and Seattle Seahawks will kick off Week 2 of the pre-season on Thursday night.

FanDuel has the total for that game at 39.5.

Next up, the New England Patriots will host the Carolina Panthers in the first of three games on Friday night.

 

FanDuel also has the total for that game at 39.5.

We’ll have to wait and see what the rest of the NFL pre-season slate looks like once the numbers are posted, but the numbers for the first two Week 2 pre-season games illustrate how FanDuel has adjusted to a high-scoring start to the exhibition slate.

Pickett Shines In Pre-Season Debut

The Pittsburgh Steelers committed to quarterback Kenny Pickett with the 20th overall pick in the 2022 NFL Draft with the hope that he could become their franchise quarterback.

So when he absolutely went off in his first pre-season game, the reaction was expected.

Pickett went 13-of-15 for 95 yards and two touchdowns in Pittsburgh’s 32-25 win over the Seattle Seahawks on Saturday, including a game-winning drive that ended with a 24-yard score with three seconds left on the clock in the fourth quarter.

FanDuel has Pickett as the favourite to win Offensive Rookie of the Year at +900.

However, the Steelers haven’t committed to Pickett as their starting quarterback, with Mitch Trubisky still No. 1 on their depth chart.

Speaking of rookie quarterbacks that stood out in the pre-season, Desmond Ridder went 10-of-22 for 103 yards and two touchdowns with 60 rushing yards as the Atlanta Falcons beat the Detroit Lions 27-23.

 

Ridder is currently +2500 to win Offensive Rookie of the Year at FanDuel.

Rourke Leads Epic Lions Comeback

The BC Lions trailed the Calgary Stampeders by 12 points entering the fourth quarter of their Week 10 showdown.

It was no big deal for Nathan Rourke, who knew what he had to do to lead his team to another impressive victory.

 

The Lions outscored Calgary 20-7 in the final frame for the 41-40 win.

Rourke went 39-of-52 for a career-high 488 yards and two touchdowns.

 

He connected with Bryan Burnham on eight catches for 164 yards and a score, while Dominique Rhymes went for seven catches, 101 yards and a touchdown.

BC improved to 7-1 straight up – the second-best record in the CFL behind the Winnipeg Blue Bombers at 9-1.

 

The Blue Bombers are still the Grey Cup favourite at FanDuel and the obvious team to beat, but the Lions have certainly been the most intriguing team to watch with Rourke and an explosive offence that leads the CFL with 295 points scored this season.

CFL underdogs went 2-1 in Week 10, with the Montreal Alouettes matching the biggest upset of the season with a 20-17 win over the Winnipeg Blue Bombers as a nine-point underdog at FanDuel.

The Hamilton Tiger-Cats beat the Toronto Argonauts 20-17 in a game that closed as a pick’em at FanDuel.

The over went 3-1 and now leads 23-15-1 this season.

Royals End Dodgers Win Streak

The Los Angeles Dodgers to cover the run line has been one of the best bets in baseball over the past month.

However, their win streak finally came to an end with a 4-0 loss to the Kansas City Royals on Sunday.

 

The Dodgers, which have covered the run line in 43 of their previous 47 wins, had their 12-game win streak snapped with a rare shutout loss in Kansas City.

They’re back in action against the Milwaukee Brewers tonight for the start of a four-game series.

As of this morning, FanDuel had the Dodgers as a -172 road favourite.

LA -1.5 is -102. 

 

The Dodgers have a chance to become the first team in baseball to hit the 80-win milestone tonight.

LA has lost back-to-back games only once since late June.

The Dodgers have also won each of Julio Urias’ last 10 starts, so I’ll bet on them to extend that streak tonight.

I’ll make LA -1.5 -102 my FanDuel best bet for tonight’s MLB slate.