InGame will consult with Fanatics Betting & Gaming trader Ethan Useloff each week to look quickly back and then ahead on what trends are shaping the NFL betting season. Useloff specializes in live trading. He’s appeared in outlets including ESPN, Fortune, ABC News, Fox Sports, USA Today, CBS Sports, Yahoo Sports, and Pro Football Network.
Rodgers Bowl I was a long time coming. Twenty-one seasons into his NFL career and two removed from his first not on the Green Bay roster, 42-year-old Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback Aaron Rodgers will face the Packers for the first time on Sunday night.
The game being played in Pittsburgh should take much of the emotion edge off, if there’s any left. A chance at history could further inspire Rodgers, though, as he could join Tom Brady, Drew Brees, Brett Favre, and Peyton Manning as the only quarterbacks to beat all 32 NFL teams.
But ultimately, Useloff said, this is a game where the Packers will be favored and expected to win no matter the amount of feels. NFC North-leading Green Bay enters 4-1-1 after edging Arizona, 27-23, on the road on Sunday. AFC North-leading Pittsburgh (4-2) was upended by Cincinnati, 33-31, on Thursday.
“The Packers are favorites. They’ll definitely close as the favorites,” Useloff said.
Green Bay opened as 3-point favorites and have been bet up to 3.5 so far.
“This Steelers team kind of is starting to get a peel back of the curtain in terms of what they really are,” Useloff said. “I think a team like the Packers are their worst nightmare because they have the offense to complement the defense.
“I think it’s hard to think that this is going to be a game that the Steelers can play their style of football. Their defense hasn’t been quite to the caliber you want, and if you’re letting an offense like the Bengals do that to you, having [Green Bay running back Josh] Jacobs and all of the receivers the Packers have with [quarterback] Jordan Love, it’s hard to imagine that offense not doing the same.
“Pittsburgh, it’s not a vertical offense that you need. They’re a lot of ground and pound with [running backs Kenneth] Gainwell and [Jaylen] Warren, and so, overall, I think that this team can’t really get down by double-digits and they did that against Cincy. They couldn’t come back and I think against Green Bay they’re going to be hard pressed not to be down at some point by this differential.”
Can’t leave those Lions
Tampa Bay — at least momentarily — boasts the best record in the NFC and a burgeoning Most Valuable Player candidate in quarterback Baker Mayfield, but bettors remain smitten with the 4-2 Lions as they prepare to host the Buccaneers tonight on Monday Night Football.
As of Monday afternoon, Detroit was a much as a 6-point favorite.
“It’s tough to shake the few-year stretch we’ve had with Detroit,” Useloff said of bettors’ sentiments for a team that is 41-9 combined in the last two-plus regular seasons. “Earlier in the week and last night there was a ton of money coming in on Detroit.
“In terms of line movement for that, we saw it open at 5, got back down to 4 1/2, got as high as 6 1/2 just two days ago.”
The Bucs moneyline opened at +200, peaked at +240, and was +228 at Fanatics on Monday afternoon.
“If you think that Baker is the MVP and that they can go into Detroit with their wide receiver core injured and all of that, there’s a lot of potential value to be had,” Useloff said. “I do think the Lions team is rightfully favored. I think that almost a touchdown spread is a lot to cover in a pretty high-scoring game that we’ve seen all the Bucs games be. And with this team, all their games have been one score, really.”
Bucking Broncos
Bettors hopping on the pro-Denver or anti-Giants storyline with the Broncos trailing, 26-8, were well-rewarded on Sunday. Denver’s moneyline odds reached +2500 before a 33-point fourth quarter culminated with Will Lutz hitting a 39-yard field goal for a 33-32 win with no time remaining.
“I think the consumer psyche, it’s almost like trying to time the market for a financial market,” Useloff said, “if you start to feel the momentum turn. But I don’t even feel like the momentum turned all that strongly. Denver, obviously, came back, but when the Giants had that penultimate drive with [quarterback Jaxson] Dart getting in the end zone, it didn’t feel like Denver had that much of a shot with no timeouts and 30 seconds to go to get into field goal range.
“Obviously, they did just that. The Giants felt like they were the better team for the large majority of the game because they were. But it didn’t feel like one where customers were going to just pile on at that +2500 mark. I’d guess most folks, if they did bet on Denver, that was not the mark they were able to get.”
AWS > ATS
Online sportsbooks including FanDuel and Fanatics were limited or shut down for at least some of Monday as part of the global glitch with Amazon Web Services, which provides quickly-scaleable cloud storage for online platforms.
CNN reported that the problem was caused by Amazon’s Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2) network improperly monitoring the load being placed on the system by customers attempting to access apps.
Standing Pat
Ninety-three percent of all bets on the New England-Tennessee game, won by the Patriots, 33-13, were on a Pats win. Several key factors — not withstanding the surprising Patriots preparing to go 5-2 to lead the AFC East — stoked the thinking, Useloff said: Patriots coach Mike Vrabel facing the team he coached for six seasons but fired him in 2024, and the now 1-6 Titans a week after firing his replacement, Brian Callahan.
“The reason why that’s high is because it runs through all parlays for us,” Useloff explained. “There are folks who are just going to parlay the whole slate, that have that counting as part of it. Also, the narrative, of course, in the media of Patriots undefeated on the road and Mike Vrabel revenge game and right after firing the head coach.
“There’s a bunch of intrigue for a game like this, even though it’s a random 1 p.m., not snoozefest game, but a game that doesn’t have the typical intrigue you’d expect. But the whole slate at 1 o’clock ended up being a little bit underwhelming with only two one-score games and the Panthers-Jets game not being the one-score game you would have hoped for.”
