This Week in Auto Racing November 1 - November 4

Autoracing Betting Lines

10/30/2007 - Philadelphia, PA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - With IndyCar and Formula One seasons over and the Champ Car Series decided and irrelevant, it will be all NASCAR all the time until the end of the racing season.

NASCAR

Nextel Cup

Dickies 500 - Texas Motor Speedway - Fort Worth, Texas

Jimmie Johnson's second consecutive win, and series-leading eighth of the season, cut 44 points off his Hendrick Motorsports teammate Jeff Gordon's lead to close within nine points of the four-time series champion.

But Johnson wasn't as dominant as he had been the week before at Martinsville. Instead, he did it with smart decisions from crew chief extraordinaire Chad Knaus and taking advantage of being in the right place at the right time.

It's a familiar refrain for the No.48 Lowe's Chevrolet team. They are frequently not the best car at the start of a race. But the team works and works on their car and by the end of the race they are usually one of the best on the track.

"Today wasn't the best day for this Lowe's car, it was decent but a fifth to eighth-place car " said Johnson, who won both Atlanta races this season. "Circumstances at the end really worked out for us and we took advantage of it...When I left pit road and there were five or six cars behind us on two tires, I knew we were in great shape."

Then when race leader Denny Hamlin stalled on the restart, Johnson was right there to jump on the opening and he took the lead. On the final green-white- checker restart he had a great jump and even if Dale Earnhardt Jr. hadn't crashed it was unlikely that Carl Edwards could have caught him.

It's now on to the Texas Motor Speedway and the two-man shootout for the 2007 Nextel Cup title continues. It's not a fluke that Gordon and Johnson are here. The statistics bare out that the two friends should be there.

Gordon has six wins, 20 top-fives and 27 top-10s in 33 events. He has led a series-leading 1,280 laps out of 9,669, (13.24%). He leads in pole wins (7). He has finished worse than 12th just four times all season.

Johnson has eight wins among his 18 top-fives and 21 top-10s. He is second to Gordon in laps led with 1,225 (12.67%).

By contrast Clint Bowyer, who is in third place overall -111 points back, has just one win, five top-fives and 17 top-10s.

Surprisingly, despite 81 career wins (sixth all-time), Gordon has never won a pole or a race at the Texas Motor Speedway. He did finish second in April 2002 and has six top-10s in 13 career starts.

Johnson has similar statistics at TMS - no poles, no wins, but six top-10s in eight career starts.

It appears that Gordon and Johnson will mirror each other all the way to Homestead where the championship will likely be decided on the final lap of the final race.

Busch

O'Reilly Challenge - Texas Motor Speedway - Fort Worth, Texas

Carl Edwards continues to stumble down the stretch, but it makes no difference in who will win the drivers championship. The No.60 Roush Fenway Racing drivers still leads the Busch Series championship by a whopping 531 points with three races remaining on the schedule.

But it would have made a nice finish to a tough week which started with his very public display towards Nextel Cup teammate Matt Kenseth.

"It was a very frustrating race, but I feel good," said Edwards on his team's website. "The silver lining is that David Reutimann won the race and he's a heck of a guy. So, that's good for him. But that's just racing. We got caught up in some stuff. We had a great race car."

Assuming Edwards starts the final three races, he has already clinched the title. But in a sport where people crash into walls at very high speeds, anything is possible. Therefore, to mathematically clinch the drivers title Edwards has to finish in 36th place or 38th if he leads at least one lap.

"You can't count on anything until it's done, Edwards added."We'll keep digging and head to Texas next week and do everything we can to get this team back into Victory Lane."

In April, Edwards finished third at TMS behind Matt Kenseth and Denny Hamlin.

While the driver's title has been essentially clinched, the owner's championship is a much tighter race, one that Edwards's No.60 Ford doesn't even lead.

A combination of drivers for the No.29 Richard Childress Racing team hold a 36-point edge on the No.20 Joe Gibbs Racing team and 42 points on Edwards' team.

Craftsman

Silverado 350K - Texas Motor Speedway - Fort Worth, Texas

The Nextel Cup races may get all the publicity, but the two-man race between Mike Skinner and Ron Hornaday Jr. has been every bit as exciting as the Jeff Gordon-Jimmie Johnson matchup. The two have been at each other almost the entire season.

Skinner has been either first or second in the standings since the second race in late February.

Hornaday Jr. and the Kevin Harvick Inc. team took a little longer to get it going and he took over second place in race number seven at Mansfield, OH. Since then he has been either first or second. For the past five races, the pair have exchanged the lead back in forth each week.

Last week was Hornaday Jr.'s turn to take the lead. Following a second-place finish at Atlanta on Saturday, Hornaday Jr. took a four-point lead over Skinner, who finished fifth.

A caution flag with 25 laps to go (Jack Sprague accident) set up the final stops and the run to the checkered flag. This time the No.33 KHI pit crew did the job and Hornaday Jr. beat everyone back onto the track.

Hornaday Jr. got a good restart, but the man on the move was Kyle Busch who charged through the field like a hot knife through butter. He was fourth with 18 laps to go and second with 16 laps remaining. Benson fought back and retook second, but Busch still held the inside lane and wasn't giving up.

A dozen laps to go and four trucks were left with a chance for the win - Hornaday Jr., Johnny Benson, Busch and Mark Martin. A caution flag on lap 118 when Chad McCumbee's truck left some fluid on the track to slow the race to a crawl.

They restarted on lap 122 and Busch charged to the lead building the margin to four lengths with six laps to go. He kept it going and flew to the checkered flag unchallenged the rest of the way. Skinner, who had to make an early unscheduled stop dropping him back to 17th place, fought back to get a top- five, but had to hand the points lead to his rival.

"We never did really get the truck fixed like we wanted it," said Skinner. "It was really, really good yesterday (during practice), but we struggled today."

"Kevin and DeLana Harvick have given us everything we need and more," said Hornaday Jr. after last Saturday's race. "The way we're going to beat him (Skinner) is just to race as hard as we can."

Now it's on to Texas where in June Skinner finished second and Hornaday Jr. fourth.

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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.

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