NFL Football Betting – Week One Odds – Tampa Bay at New Orleans
BetUS NFL betting odds: New Orleans -3.5
NOTABLE STAT: Tampa Bay allowed 170 ypg passing last year (1st in NFL)
KEY NFL FOOTBALL BETTING TREND: New Orleans is 5-16 ATS last 21 as home favorite
A division online football betting matchup kicks off the 2008 NFL season for two of the NFC South’s hopeful teams, as the New Orleans Saints (7-9 SU, 6-10 ATS in 2007) play host to the Tampa Bay Bucs (9-7 SU & ATS in 2007 regular season) in the opener, scheduled for Sunday, September 7 at 1 PM ET at the Louisiana Superdome in New Orleans.
Here are some NFL football betting trends as they relate to this sports betting matchup:
* TB has lost four of its last five games SU
* TB has covered one of its last five games
* TB has played five of its last six games OVER the total
* TB has covered two of its last six road games
* TB has lost four of its last six road games SU
* TB has played five of its last six road games OVER the total
* NO has covered three of its last 14 home games
* NO has covered five of its last 21 games as a home favorite
* NO has played its last five games OVER the total
* NO has played its last five home games OVER the total
* TB has won four of the last six meetings SU
* TB has covered five of the last six meetings
* The last five meetings have gone OVER the total
* TB has won five of the last seven meetings SU as the road team
* TB has covered the last five meetings as the road team
You have to hand it to Jon Gruden in the job he did with the Bucs last year. He has a dink-and-dunk offense as it is, without much in the way of threat at the wide receiver spot. And Tampa Bay lost all its running backs early, including Cadillac Williams. But they find a way to make things work, behind Jeff Garcia, who wound up going to the Pro Bowl, and a patchwork ground game that turned Earnest Graham into an 898-yard rusher. With Williams still recovering, Graham is joined by Warrick Dunn this year as the Bucs continue to go conservative.
To a certain extent, Tampa Bay will live by its defense; last year that stop unit ranked first in the league in passing yards allowed, and second overall. Gruden will design a scheme to make Drew Brees find a second option on the outside, as Marcus Colston is pretty much alone. That’s a key, because with Deuce McAllister just coming off a torn ACL, and Reggie Bush having demonstrated that he is not the “every-down” running back the Saints thought he might be there will be little choice for Brees than to go to the air. And the former All-Pro had better be a little more accurate than he was last year, when these factors, in part, led to 18 interceptions.
We understand that the Saints have added people to the defense. Jonathan Vilma, Dan Morgan and Randall Gay, along with rookies Sedrick Ellis and Tracy Porter, will give this defense a new look, for sure. But frankly, that might take a while. And New Orleans has something else to overcome – they just do not beat the number at home. The Saints have covered just five of its last 21 as a home favorite, so we will not rely on them here in laying the 3.5 points. We like the more solid Tampa Bay team, an underdog in the BetUS NFL football betting odds.
JAY’S PLAY: TAMPA BAY (+3.5)
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