There are more bets on NFL games each week of the season than any other sporting event in the United States. Why? Because people love football. They love to think they know more than their buddies. And, it seems so easy. Team “A” scores more points every week than team “B” and also has a star quarterback, a great running game, and they are playing at home, so how can they lose, right?

Well, maybe they don’t lose, maybe they just fail to cover the point spread, and that's a bummer if you bet on them, but this isn’t all about picking the best team, this list of the Top Five NFL Betting Tips is about picking good games, not good teams.


Yes, there is a difference.

You can bet NFL games and playoff's in many ways, but the most popular is with a point spread. In this form of wagering, the team that is favored gives a set number of points to make the game closer. That means that if team “A” is a bit better and expected to win, they might be -3 points. For wagering purposes, the casino says the better team gives up three points and the worse team gets three points. The underdog can lose the game by a point or by 2 points and a wager on them still wins!

So, is betting all underdogs the way to win? Not exactly, because any point spread wager has an extra cost. You have to wager $110 to win $100. That means you have to win 52.38 percent of your wagers just to break even. And, if there are lot of wagers on one side, the casino will charge -1.15 for the same bet and you have to win 53.49 percent of your bets just to break even. What’s an NFL betting junkie to do? Well, following some simple betting tips is a good start, and staying away from totals and future's bets is going to help!

NFL Betting Tip #! - The Experts Are Right

No matter how smart you are, no matter how much experience you have or how many contacts you might have with inside information, the experts know more than you! Accept this fact and you are on your way to winning!

Football betters always see a half-dozen bets that look out of whack and they can’t wait to make their bets against the line. Of course even Albert Einstein said that doing that against the spread over and over and expecting a different result is crazy. That may be paraphrased, but stop doing what you do each year and try something different!

Sure, go ahead and make charts, set power ratings, watch games in preseason and do all your regular work, but accept that the experts know their job, and it’s not just choosing the best team!

NFL Betting Tip #2 The Line is set to Split the Bets

If you didn’t know it, the line isn’t set to choose the exact number of points the favorite will win by, it is set so that the total dollar amount wagered is close to even for both teams. That way the casino is guaranteed to win money. If there is $1 million in wagers on a game, they want $500,000 bet on each team so they can collect $500,000 from the losers and pay back $455,000 to the winners. Remember, you lay $110 to win $100!

Find lines that had to be set unfairly to get even bets and you'll win. All things related-to-skill being equal, which side is likely to have more money bet on it in a match-up, the Dallas Cowboys or the Kansas City Chiefs? Think about it.

The experts setting the point spread know they have to make the game attractive to both sides, and with more people betting the Cowboys, the line will be set higher to slow down wagering on Dallas and speed up wagering on the Chiefs. So a game that is Dallas -7 reflects the number the experts think will split the bets, not what they should really win by. Dallas is arguably the best known NFL team in the world, not the best playing team in the NFL!

If you've done your homework and think Dallas is going to win by 3 points, you are probably right. The difference is the casino enticing bets on the Chiefs by offering 7 points. Now maybe that's a good bet to take the Chiefs and the +7 points.

NFL Betting Tip #3 Lose Your Bias to Pick Winners

Let’s face it, nearly every NFL fan has a favorite team, favorite players, and remembers great games and winning bets. Unfortunately, that lends a bias to picking winners. You can’t let your own psychological biases dictate how you bet.

Just because you love the Steelers because your father was a huge fan doesn’t mean they can cover the point spread this week. Look at how each team matches up and make your wagering decisions on a sound basis, not because you love or hate a team. If you can’t keep your feelings out of your bets, you’ll lose money every year. If this is the case, don’t wager on any games that involve your home team or your favorite team.

#4 Bet the Same on Each Game

Walk into any sports book and you’ll hear bettors saying a game is five-star, or a triple-wager or some other silly thing. Are they saying that one game is so amazingly out-of-whack on the point spread that you should wager five-times more money on it? Are they saying that it is a 90 percent lock? Probably, but don’t believe them. If that was true, they would be rich and so would you!

Make your wagers the same amount all year, or build them slowly as a percentage of your bankroll. If you want to start with a bankroll of $500 and last all year, bet $25 a game. If you want to try and increase them, bet 5 percent of your bankroll on each game. If you are winning, you'll be making your largest wagers at the end of the year. And you have to be right often, because you don't have as many chances as with a basketball season with 80+ games!

#5 Bet Early

Since you know that the point spread is set to divide the total wagers evenly on both teams, you must also know that the ending point spread is the overall market of wagers from all sources during the week leading up to the game.

In other words, although the experts set the original line, it moves during the week according to what every handicapper with a few bucks thinks. If this is the case, then usually the final line is no bargain, but the early line might be. So, do all of your paperwork choosing winners and losers (and set your own point spreads) early, as soon as the games are over on Sunday, and be ready to make your bets late Sunday or early Monday morning.