 This is covering the spread here are your hosts Jim Saunas and Dr. Ed Fang What is going on everybody welcome on into covering the spread that's right here on the fan dual podcast network in numberfire.com Where today we are previewing the divisional round of the NFL playoffs with Kelly Stewart of Bleach Report Getting our thoughts on all four games and her favorite bets for this week. My name is Jim Saunas I am a senior writer and analyst for numberfire.com joined here as always by dr. Ed Fang you can find his work over at thepowerank.com and the wild car round lived up to the billing a Wild weekend capped off by a an absurd Brown's victory over the Steelers. How you do it today? I'm doing pretty well. I I was walking my dog during the start of that game So you check the phone. It's like 14 nothing Cleveland, huh? That's not good And you know you look at the phone. You're like, yeah, there hasn't been many yards in this game couple turnovers fine Check the phone again 28 nothing Cleveland And you know clearly turnovers played a big role in the game Cleveland was plus five But you know if you spot Cleveland a 14 point lead But you tell me that Pittsburgh is going to score 37 points in that game. I'm like No problem, right? They're going to win. They probably even cover the four or the six or whatever Massive fail by the Pittsburgh defense just massive. I mean a unit. That's just been awesome, right? Right. I mean, I think at some point the injuries just piled up too much to where they couldn't keep up because they lost a lot of Important players on the defense and that does not excuse what happened against Cleveland Uh, like that was outrageous and like kudos to Cleveland, you know, they stepped up with no Kevin Sifanski They played they did throw the ball more a little bit, you know As you had mentioned, uh, hopeful hoping that they would do so with no Sifanski, but they overcame a lot. Yeah, you know What's that? I was actually hoping they wouldn't I had Pittsburgh on score So but right so it goes But uh an impressive showing there and honestly just uh, it was It's been interesting to watch them because my my prior assumption Going into Cleveland after Odell Beckham got hurt was like, okay There's this narrative that because there's no Odell Baker's not forcing the ball to him that they will play better I thought that was a pretty trashy narrative and sure I don't know if I'm wrong in that but like The sample is getting larger of them playing really well with now without Odell now Correlation causation, you know, is that is that why they're playing better? Probably not I think it's a situation where they got more comfortable with Sifanski schemes Baker got more comfortable And it's the third year. I feel like it's more of those things, but uh, you know Reinvestigating previous priors for me with regards to that team with no Beckham They hasn't looked good. Uh regardless of uh, the way things play out. I don't know what the cause is but regardless I mean kudos to them for stepping up when they've been missing a really key piece that offense Yeah, for sure. I mean overall, I'm not too excited about Cleveland. Um, their past defense is terrible and uh And they're they're going to Arrowhead This weekend. So, um, I I don't think their playoff run is going too much longer And the Steelers have said the same uh, Chase Claypool was talking this week about how they're going to get clapped in Kansas City So, you know, you're the Steelers are on board at that They just keep on going even after the the season is over for them because why not we're going to break down the We'll go ahead Ed Oh, I said why not? Yeah We'll be talking about the divisional round here in a second and not discussing the Pittsburgh Steelers because they are not involved Ain't a little bit with kelly stewart. You can find her on twitter at kelly in vegas. Check her out a bleacher report wager talking Also, she's the host of the bet on it podcast We're going to preview every divisional round game with kelly get her thoughts and those and also how she alters her betting process When it comes to the playoffs when there's less to bet on and lines may be more efficient So we'll talk with kelly in just a bit But also we're going to go back through last week in the wild card round Go through what went right what went wrong. We had nick costos on to preview that we are down to once weekly podcasts here And covering the spread so to make sure you get those podcasts right as they are posted make sure you are subscribed on your Uh service of choice to search for covering the spread wherever you find your podcasts Make sure you are subscribed there and if you like what you hear leave us a rating review It may be just once per week, but still a lot of good stuff coming your way over the coming months It'll be talking plenty baseball basketball hockey whatever it may be We'll be talking to hear on covering the spread and plenty of more nfl To come as well before we get into kelly We got to go back to last week and check out what we got right and wrong for the wild card round and the national championship Covering the past So last week here on covering the spread we had nick costos on to preview the nfl wild card round And the college of football national championship You can find nick on twitter at the costos and check out his work on you better you bet on radio dot com Nick and i were both on the rams plus three and a half against the seahawks He said he didn't mind even if wolford uh wound up starting which he did wind up starting I was assuming golf would start that didn't happen So bad read by me in the situation The news broke about a half an hour before kickoff that wolford would start Still closed in seattle minus three But the rams defense was the lights out and that's part of the reason why I wanted to be on the rams there I thought the defense would play well against uh that that seahawks offensive line golf didn't play well after he came in but They also did enough elsewhere to win that game 30 to 20 So a cover even with the things breaking against the way I thought that things would break out But you know, I mean, I think that the thought process regardless was there They were getting injured whitworth back That's a big upgrade for the entire offense regardless of who's playing quarterback Cooper cup was back as well So the read on the injured situation Ed might not have been great for me But I think the the overall thought process and buying the rams against seattle made sense Yeah, and I think I think you got to think a lot of the same things this upcoming weekend against the Packers Uh, I just also know that erin donald didn't play for the majority of the second half And uh kind of didn't matter So I think there's I mean they they uh, I don't know if I talked about it But you know, everyone knows about jail and ramsey at the cornerback position But they got two other guys back there that have been really Really good this year and that has really driven Um the rams. Yeah, absolutely. And like you said, it's a fun match up with him against green bay this week because Green bay not a lot of depth that wide receivers of jail and rams He can at least kind of hold his own against divante adams could get pretty sticky But regardless, uh, I think that'll be an interesting one for sure with los angeles Nick wanted the under 44 and a half for washington against tampa bay I'm curious how he would have felt about this one if we had known on wednesday that taylor hynaki would start instead of alex smith Because with hynaki starting the total did go up a half a point it closed at 45 With hynaki being confirmed as a starter and they combined for 20 points in the fourth quarter The total finished there at 54 total points. So a loss on that one, but honestly, I thought that hynaki played kind of well I don't know like if he's an upgrade from alex smith, but like he kind of plays more towards ovars Just because he's less conservative than smith. So even if he's not a better quarterback He he would play against betting and under it seemed like Yeah, I thought he was phenomenal. I thought he threw the ball down field with accuracy um, not enough to get it done against the team that I really like, uh, and I see going pretty far, but Uh, great great performance. I mean and they needed every bit of it to to just cover, right? Right, right? And you had mentioned this is uh unrelated to to hynaki, but you talked about when we were doing the episode with just the two of us about how the Buck's offense had untapped upside They kind of showed that in that game They played really well despite facing a really tough pass rush some of the brady had struggled with this year And we'll have to compete with once again this week. So we'll talk about that I'm sure we talked about bucks versus saints. Nick had the Ravens minus three against Tennessee I thought this one might move toward Tennessee But it did close at baltimore minus three and a half and that was for a good reason because ravens went down 10 nothing early But the defense clamped down They bottle up derrick henry the titans insisted on running the ball even when it was clearly not working Uh, and the ravens wound up winning and covering 20 to 13 in that game Nick was on the bears saints over 47 and a half that one closed at 48 So a half point of movement in his favor and the bears Just never were able to do anything Which is not a surprise. I guess uh finished with just 30 points there. Uh, that was an under that hit there I mean like The bears offense just I think that performance pretty predictably bad in that game Right, and then the guy drops the the touchdown pass right leads them even further and I mean, nothing went right after that. Yeah, I was worried about the bears because of trabisky and obviously The supporting cast was the bigger cause for the the bear struggles here than trabisky But regardless not ideal, but hey ryan pace and uh, and matt naggy back again for 2021 So what could go wrong there finally both you and nick wanted the over for ohio state versus alabama Close to 74 it was 74 and a half and we talked close to 75 and uh, we talked about this in the show But when nick came on He said what's what's the total for that game? I want the over and you were like, yeah I agree that sorry to view this thing and we got the over early in the fourth quarter Najee harris had to touch down to put in 76 points with 13 minutes left There were no points the rest of the way, but hey a no sweat bet can't complain about that That's definitely a good way to for things to break on a monday night. We can just enjoy the game for the final court Yeah, it was it was a minimal sweat game. I would say but um, you know, there could there should have been more points At the end of that game, you know a house they brought it down I thought they uh, got the short end of a call within a lobby touchdown Um, and then kind of the end of the game running the ball running it out kind of kicked in But you know, the only thing that made me feel uncomfortable is that my dear friend John Sheeran had had was leaning towards the under at 74 and a half I kind of thought I saw like a 76 At fan duel before the game started. Yeah, um, but you say close at 75. That's what I had It's possible that it didn't It was somewhere or different somewhere else or different at a different time But I had at 75 when I when I checked last Okay. Yeah, so, um, I I don't think john and his team take as many stands on on college football games As they do on like an nfl side Uh, but yeah, I was I was uh, you know, we talk I mean, I bet that's so early and then we talked about it really early, right? I mean almost on wednesday Yeah, six, I guess five days before the actual game. And so you're sitting there waiting for To see what's gonna happen with uh, with with line movement and stuff like that So that was just kind of a long wait, uh, especially through all the nfl games that happened over the weekend But it worked out pretty happy with it. Yeah, and obviously a good bet It paid off and that alabama team man like I know Ohio State's defense specifically the secondary is not the most elite unit, but like Does it even matter at this point like alabama Like I was reading some bill connelly stuff about comparing them to previous championship teams specifically lsu last year like That's a really good football team And I feel like it's gonna go overlooked in like the grand scheme of things because it was the weird pandemic year But like what a disgustingly good team alabama was this whole year Yeah, I mean, I've been kind of asking a lot of my college football people whether they're This was nick sabin's best team ever and I think that goes in the I mean, if you're nick sabin's best team ever, you're in the conversation for just Best team ever. I think they probably are. I mean, there wasn't the best defense They've ever fielded But uh, yeah, just super impressive. Um speaking of Ohio State's defense I actually thought Sean Wade the cornerback from Ohio State played played pretty well Uh, wasn't wasn't the disaster that that was the Clemson game on a lot of plays So his draft of stock might go up a little bit, but um You know, I thought just some fields could have played a little bit better too You know, I think that game's a little bit closer Uh, if he can play a little better and then if the defense can just get a couple stops It probably would would could have been a little closer, but but it wasn't and uh, I think we should celebrate this Bama team for what they are, which was just excellent Yeah, I think that fields will be a very interesting discussion heading into the draft assuming he goes in because I mean, how does he play? I mean, I would I mean like When they were talking about forcing the big 10 like suing the big 10 to play like you know That was the reason so that they could get him in the draft for this year with with a really good stock Because if he goes in with no tape from this year, it's going to be a tough sell But if you look at all quarterbacks drafted since 2010 Justin Fields faced the toughest schedule of any quarterback, which makes sense. There was no non-conference play He played a big 10 championship game. He played a semifinal and the national championship So it makes sense that he had the toughest schedule But like you have to take that into account too when you're analyzing Justin Fields Just know that he had the toughest schedule a drafted quarterback has ever faced since 2010 Like that's what I have data back to based on defensive sp plus numbers from Bill Connolly. So Take that into account when analyzing Justin Fields I'm certainly not any kind of draft expert or any kind of expert at like evaluating quarterbacks or whatnot, but I think you got to consider him for the top pick. I don't know if you take him as the top pick But I got to think he's in that conversation I think he's that good I wouldn't go first because The the value in predictability from large samples is huge in the NFL draft Which is why Trevor Lawrence makes a lot of sense is being the first overall pick, but number two He should be there. I think that both he and Zach Wilson are very viable for the Jets at number two and The dolphins of three Should look long and hard at those guys I love to a tongue of Iloa But like if you're in a position to draft a quarterback you have to do your homework at least Like I don't say not saying you have to draft them there But you got to do your homework, uh, maybe you trade down or whatever But like I think both Zach Wilson and Justin Fields are Deserving of being consideration for that number two pick behind Trevor Lawrence and well I'm sure we'll have some betting props on them on fangirl sportsbook soon. I did check Uh earlier this week nothing yet outside of Trevor Lawrence, so We'll we'll circle back to those once they are posted We'll also get into the divisional round here with Kelly steward in just one second But first the NFL playoffs are in full swing and fangirl sportsbook is making sure you have the Opportunity to get in on the action with some of the best possible odds on the market right now New users can wager up to five dollars on any team to win their divisional or conference championship game at plus 2,500 odds that is right a five dollar bet on any team to win any game before the Super Bowl can win you 125 dollars So you like the chiefs this week Five dollars gets you 125 dollars against the Browns bet the money line there Wildcard weekend is just sorry divisional round just a few days away So download the fangirl sportsbook app and make your first deposit to see the enhanced odds today Must be 21 plus and present in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Colorado, West Virginia, Tennessee, Iowa or Indiana new users only Must ways are wager and designated boost market Deposit are required max bonus 125 dollars See full terms at sportsbook dot fangirl dot com gambling problem call 1 800 gambler or in colorado call 1 800 5 2 2 4700 in West Virginia visit 1 800 gambler dot net or in indiana call 109 with it or in tennessee call the tennessee red line 1 800 8 8 9 9 7 8 9 let's get into kelly stewart and talk with her about the divisional round this weekend check kelly out On bleach report wager talk and also on the bet on it podcast. She is on twitter at kelly in vegas We're going to get her thoughts on all four games this weekend And now she alters her betting approach with the playoffs on the bet Covering the present Let's bring kelly stewart back into covering the spread to preview the nfl divisional round of the playoffs kelly It is a pleasure once again. How you doing today? Life is pretty good. Uh, we just need to have another weekend like last weekend and it'll be even better I mean six games was exciting and I was I was pumped for that But by the end and especially by monday night, I was kind of dead Like did you have a similar feeling where you were like so jack going in? But it was almost like I don't want to say too much because that that's complaining about a good thing Which I never wanted to do but I was drained by the end like it was it was a lot So I have to tell you I was on the east coast and I've never been on the east coast during football season And I was exhausted. I fell asleep during halftime of the football team bucks game and I fell asleep during halftime of the brown Steelers game that is no lie. So maybe I was exhausted, but I don't think it was from football fatigue Yeah, yeah, I mean that's that's very fair but like honestly like east coast is terrible for football so like, you know, vegas just stay there honestly because I was on the west coast come I've been east coast person. I've been here for a while I was on the west coast for an event And the baseball game starting at four o'clock. So like daily fantasy lock was at four o'clock I didn't want to leave for that reason alone like, you know, missing things when we wake up and stuff like that Like I think you've got it right. So I feel like, you know, if you ever do leave vegas I think pacific time needs to be in the criteria for moving I think it's like this. I'd rather just sleep till noon though and then just get up and start my day Go to bed at midnight. I'm kind of a night owl anyway, but it was really funny I think the day drinking watching football didn't help either Plus saturday was so awesome. You know to cash all three tickets I just felt like it was just one of those really fun days I was with my family walking up and down the beach checking scores stopping at a beach bar Seeing the Rams just absolutely dominating after that colts Exciting performance, you know grandma standing there at the bar with me And she's cheering so hard because she wants the bills to win And I'm going no grandma the bills can only win by less than six and a half This is how this works. You're picking up the tab, you know, so it's it's funny to Experience kind of those things because I really I can't tell you the last time I got to go out of town during football season. So Yeah, that's awesome that you got a chance to to head out so So kind of let's kind of take a look back at our season the regular season's all wrapped up Anything that you're changing with your process and what you've learned from football season 2020 I mean, let's be real all of us kind of had this moving goal post for the season, right? We I think you tweeted out something week three regarding home field advantage and it was like look Basically, we have less home field advantage than we've ever had before We all kind of knew that but your data proved it and so once we kind of got over that hump of saying Look, we're playing all these games on a neutral field of sorts where you had some teams that really had that home field advantage Like the bills did versus teams that really didn't like the chargers, right or the Rams So it was kind of just one of those things we started to to figure out But I tried not to change too much too quickly I tried not to overreact and I think that that's where I did really well Is trying to find those spots where the market did overreact And that was like one of the number one things early on I'd say the first six to eight weeks was really great And then as you know, the NFL market is one of the sharpest markets And so it kind of adjusted itself And I really started to in about mid-october start to look for certain spots every single week that were working for me And those were dogs between one and a half and two and a half Whether they're on the road whether they're at home two team six point teasers There was six weeks in a row where we hit these teasers and It's really important to make sure that I remind people you're not laying over a dollar 20 for those teasers If you're laying 140 or so on depending on which book you shop at At that point in time, they're not really worth it If you could find 110 somewhere God bless you because those those days are pretty much gone But those kind of things and then third one of the things I really Started to pick and choose was every single week you could find two or three divisional Dogs that were absolute and utter money And I had my good buddy Ralph Michaels pull the stacks for me And divisional home dogs ended up only being 33 and 30 on the season Against the spread, but if you actually look at them winning outright They did better In that terminology as far as so if they were a two and a half point home dog They're actually winning the game outright So if you're actually placing a moneyline wager instead, they were more profitable Now, I don't know how exactly to take that into the 2021 season What what are we going to see next year, you know, you and I we guys we're all talking about Hey, what what's the future look like? Hopefully next year fans get to be at the games Hopefully there is normal as humanly possible and we can kind of go back to things we've seen But this year was definitely a unique year and and I just really tried to adjust without over adjusting too much I think that's always a key trying to keep yourself grounded taking the information that you can Adjust to that but also make sure you're not overreacting like that's something that can translate beyond To 2075 not just 2021 for sure. That's always a good lesson for sure But I've been in the playoffs and there aren't a lot of games to bet obviously Usually we have 16 games to pick from we can ignore half those a lot of the time and not bet those at all Here there are just four, but we still want action. You know, we're we're bored people We want to have something on the line here But they're also really sharp lines because there's so much money. There's so much market concentration on these games It's tough to find good lines So how do you alter your process when it comes to betting in the playoffs? Are you betting different markets? Are you more into player props? Or is it large is still the same for you as far as which markets are going into versus the regular season? I honestly love the playoffs The wild card weekend is my favorite weekend of the year because there is such an influx of public money That does influence the market people tend to bet so much more than they normally would during the regular season Plus there's last games, right? And so you have I feel like a competitive advantage as somebody who has their own numbers built in the Colts being one of those Games the Washington football team and the Rams all three on Saturday I had the Rams as a one-point underdog when they were at three. I said, look, this is crazy You had Washington football team after alex smith got announced out the line moved way too much You have to understand that the difference between a starting quarterback sometimes in a backup mainly be one point maybe two points and when the market tends to Really kind of go crazy on it. You can find that value as we saw it landed on the original opening number of eight The bookmakers did a really good job because well as you mentioned, this is a really tight market So I actually love these weeks and I do think you can find some loopholes I wish that I could had time to get into the player prop market During the regular season college football and nfl is such a main focus for me And once I realized that college football outside of a couple of Conferences was just too much for me this year. I was really focusing on the big 12 in the big 10 a little bit of scc Just given the current landscape and games being canceled It felt like every single week two or three games I really liked got canceled So I really started to just hone in on a couple of conferences that I knew I had a decent grip on that I could also get good information on That was really that and so I was able to focus a lot more on nfl But you know player props is such a huge market, especially with your guys's sponsor fan duel I mean look these these guys do such a great job They have same game parlays where you can parlay all these different player props together I love it. It is something that I need to start to focus on But when Your nfl market is doing so well, you tend to not want to get out of your your comfort zone, right? Why add something else into the mix especially if you have friends in low places where hey, we can we can Share some information. Oh, you like these three player props. Okay. Well, here's the the two sides and the total that I like Yeah, kelly, you bring up a really good point too Also, but with just the public money coming in I had Chris Andrews on Football analytics show this week and he was saying exactly that like that changes a lot of things because You know the books need to balance their action And I think that's a good thing for everyone to be thinking about over the next couple weeks Let's get into a couple games. We have rams at Packers Packers are a six and a half point favorite with a total of 45 and a half I feel like this game comes down to evaluating the impact of Injuries on jared golf and erin donald and and cooper cup. How do you see this playing out? No, you're absolutely right. Those are my three main notes. How is jared golf going to respond? Three weeks post-surgery now. Let's just be honest We just talked about drop-off and quarterback play as we saw not much of a drop-off So jared golf. I kind of have a big line through him I don't think it matters whether he plays or not one of my favorite mantras Embedding is take the better defense plus the points The rams are by far the better defense here Not if erin donald doesn't play point blank period the end He is to me going to be the difference maker in this game If he can get to erin rogers if he can get him off his game I think the rams are a live dog if he doesn't play. I want no part of this game I do know that the under did get steamed by a couple of sharp groups that I get a lot of good information from And I know that the books are going to need the rams. That doesn't mean I'm going to get to the window with the rams I think the play here for me is the packers in a teaser and I'll tease them with another game We're going to talk about here in a minute. I really would love you guys know. I love those dogs I would really love to get to the window with the rams and I'm going to wait Coming off that key number of seven. I'm going. Okay. Some sharp group played this rams team What am I missing? I think the line's a little bit high. So I think the packers in a teaser is the right spot for me Let's say that we get news on thursday because that's when the injured report comes out erin donnell has not practiced yet So far this week, but shawn mcvay has said he's gonna play Let's say erin donnell gets into full practice on thursday Is that a situation where you'd feel comfortable betting the rams plus six and a half? Or do you think the only play for you will wind up being the packers in a teaser? I have a really good feeling. I'll end up on the rams. It comes Saturday I know how this how my brain works and and at times I tend to be very contrarian um I'm technically rooting for Some packers futures in my household if that gives you any inclination So I may end up on the rams as kind of an emotional hedge there, but yes, you're correct if erin donnell There's a full go. I do think that this could easily be a three-point game the packers When late, I really do think this defense can get to him that my one question is You know, I saw Todd Furman tweeted this out earlier and it was funny about Under freezing temperatures for the packers and I I immediately pull up the weather and it says 35 So me being my smart alec self. I'm like Todd. It's going to be 35 in green This stat doesn't count and obviously it will be colder come game time Especially in the second half and you do have to kind of wonder how warm weather teams are going to perform there Let's use jared goff for an example You know, I'm not that old, but let me tell you when it gets cold outside Some of those old nagging injuries start to hurt a little bit I'm sure that they can find something to get goff through the game with his thumb But something to kind of think about there As well, but yes, I'll most likely I have a feeling end up on the rams come kick off, but Being it's wednesday. I'm not ready to commit just yet Understandable, especially given, you know, just that mental block of betting on jared goff on a wednesday It can get to you for sure. I understand that if someone has been burned financially by jared goff A thousand times in the past I can empathize for sure It was very hard for me to take the rams on saturday Because I had just taken them versus the seahawks a couple of weeks prior And I had them the teaser plus eight and a half So all I needed them to do was just either not let seattle score that late touchdown Or just get through the back door and they couldn't get it done for me It was uh, it was rather frustrating to say the least I can relate believe me. I can fully relate Let's move to the ravens and the bills a saturday night game bills here are two and a half point favorites The total is 50 and a half and this ravens offense has been looking pretty good recently But they've largely done it against lower level defenses tennessee one of the worst defenses in football I think that that you know last week came back from a 10-nothing deficit the bills aren't delete though either Uh, can they do enough here to slow down lemar jackson in this game? One of the things with the bills that's interesting and I noticed this was at week three They played the rams the bills cannot seem to stop the run and I can't figure out why they may stop the run for two quarters They may stop the run for three quarters and then all of a sudden They just can't stop the run and I don't understand why and it infuriates me when I bet on the bills It doesn't infuriate me last like last week when I bet against the bills Look, I think what we saw last week was the bills kind of on the ropes for the first time in a few weeks Right. This has been a team that has been on fire against the spread. It was a freight train I was very nervous to step in front of but I said look philip rivers in the colts had not been an underdog all season This is downright disrespectful I'm going to take the points here and they had a chance to win it there at the end. They couldn't get it done The bills got that monkey off their back, right? They got to win a playoff game There are 6700 fans of the stadium were like it was a full stadium. They were going nuts and I was really happy for them Um, this line is really fishy to me. I don't think it should be two and a half I'm really confused by it opening at three. I think that's why we saw Uh, probably somebody with a ton of money take that three and I don't blame them. I wish I had a three in my pocket What I'm going to do here is I'm going to take the ravens in that other part of the teaser with green bay I think I'm also going to end up on the ravens plus two and a half I'm curious to see how the weather is going to play out But I I do think lemar jackson's going to have to play a really good game if they want to win this game He's going to have to to limit his mistakes and that defense is going to have to get to josh allen point blank period the end I mean Stefan digs has been such a great weapon for josh allen this year That's what I really think has been the difference maker on that offense because he's able to Basically be patrick or mahomes esk and pole plays out of absolutely utterly nowhere There are times where I think the play is dead and I'm going how did he just do that? And usually it's the one I'm on the other side That being said Again, I'm going to keep an eye on the weather. Look at things I have a feeling this could be even if bad weather snow wind We know as a factor in regards to the total. I have a feeling this could be an over type game I think we may see some turnovers And it could be one of those really fun snow games if it ends up getting that type of weather Yeah, the josh allen plays used to be where he'd turn a good play into a bad play And he would turn the bad plays into good plays too Now he's cut out the bad plays and it's kind of weird It's like it's kind of like, uh, you're just waiting for something to happen Like you're waiting for the pin to drop and it just never drops It's very strange because I live in syracuse. We see all the buffalo games I watched a lot of josh allen and I just keep waiting for the implosion But it never happens and it's been weird this whole year To just be waiting like it's like a bass drop in a song. It just hasn't dropped all year It's been very strange to watch. Yeah, and josh allen like the fact that I Almost refused to bet against josh allen right now is just the weirdest thing of 2020 Uh, 2021, um, I was looking I was really surprised when I was looking at the bills today If it weren't for the hail murray They would have they would be on a 11 game winning streak right now So it just shows you like what they've been able to do josh allen's been a huge part of it Um, and um, yeah, let's move on to the next game. We got browns at chiefs Uh chiefs are 10 point favorite, uh, a total of 57 and a half, which has moved up recently Browns, you know got the win last week with a plus five turnover differential against pittsburgh But chiefs should be the super bowl favorite. So what are you seeing in this game, kelly? You know, the chiefs are basically the super bowl favorites This is a really tough one. This one is begging for me to take the double digits here with the browns This is the first time that they've been even a touchdown dog Let alone a double digit dog All season long and we know can the city is atrocious against the spread you pay a premium each and every week They're on pins and needles trying not to lose games that they should be blowing teams out Ah cleveland on the flip side. They just got their monkey off their back times two They finally won a playoff game and in pittsburgh with no head coach Oh This is kind of one of those games where I think If cleveland happens a score first or happens to get a turnover like they did early on against pittsburgh They go up seven nothing. Maybe they go up 10 three. You might look for a canva city money line in game I don't think i'm going to get involved. I think if if I bet this game It's going to be in game and i'm going to be looking for a spot here I just there are so many conflicting things here that I already mentioned that are dragging me in one way Like I said, it looks so easy for me to take cleveland so easy And I think the reason why the line is as high as it is at nine and a half is because the bookmakers know That the whole world will have canva city in a teaser. So they said fine. We're going to make it nine and a half We're going to make it 10 and just kind of cut that whole deal out If you want to lay minus 150 for a seven and a half point teaser, then you go right ahead and uh That's really why I think we're seeing this line this high because to me this is a seven and a half eight point game Um on paper so at nine and a half 10 I have me looking towards the browns I just I don't know last week. Is there such thing as a letdown spot in the playoffs? Yeah I mean, I feel like with the animosity towards Pittsburgh. Sure. I could you could pitch me on that You could sell me on that for sure Yeah, it'd be a fun game I think that the browns an interesting team for sure like when I look at my stuff It says I should bet the browns, but like there's such a big mental block It's like it is like we're talking about before like I don't want to bet on jared golf because it's birney so many times I don't want to bet against patrick mahomes out of like principle like it just feels wrong to root against him at any time So I understand where you're coming from there and I think the no play from a mental sanity perspective Probably the right way to go here So let's finish up with the bucks at the saints the saints three point favorites here a total is 51 and a half We've actually seen this matchup twice so far this year But a lot earlier in the year it was in week one and week nine in the saints Took care of business and both those games Is that something you care about when you're trying to diagnose a third match up between teams or Do you think it could over influence the line? What does that factor into your process? You know, that's really interesting because I like to put aside the regular season here I did have The saints week one versus the bucks I could not wait to get to the window and bet against tom brady And then week nine I took the bucks at home at four and a half and when it closed at three I knew I had a loser I remember sitting in front of my camera before I had to give my best bet for a bleacher report I was like don't bet this it's going to be a loser and everybody's like why would you say that? And I go I could tell you by the line move the reverse line movement on the saints I knew I was absolutely dead in the water. What are you going to do at that point in time? It's too late to bet off. You don't want to middle yourself It is what it is But I think it's important to put this aside because I think this bucks team since That week nine blowout has showed a lot of promise now. We joked about tom brady's bedtime. This is a real thing tom brady Oh four and one against the spread in prime time night games On either thursday sunday or monday night two and three straight up and one of those They probably should have lost to the giants. They did squeak out a win against washington football team I really don't think there's a lot of line value here and what I ended up doing And I was glad that one of my co-hosts on bet on it Yanni corralis said this on our show today. I had already bet saints money line I laid 160 and that's not something I would normally do But I feel like you're right the three being such a key number I feel like this game could land three, but I do think that the saints will win this game I know that they have kind of that negative narrative about their home playoff games, especially in recent years But if we learned anything from that bear's game, I do think that they have the refs in their pocket Somebody wants true breeze to get a little bit farther in his last year as as a starting quarterback That's just really all I've got on this game. I really I could see the bucks coming out and having a huge game and some revenge type situation I saw on twitter earlier That people were trying to argue back and forth about how hard it was to beat a team three times in a year I don't think that's really the case I think you have to take this as a one game sample size for what it is And not bind it too much of what happened to the regular season Well, I think the tougher part about two is it was such different contexts for both those games because week one is the first Time that tom brady is playing this offense week nine is the first game with antonio brown Like it doesn't matter like it effectively. So I think that you throwing those out is the right way to play things because they It's a different offense. It's not the same team right now And I think that like if you're trying to look at numbers for the bucks It makes sense to kind of throw a lot of the season out because they're just a different offense right now So it'll be fun to see how things play out and you've got the saints minus one sixty six in the money line Or you had minus one sixty there for that, but it should be a fun weekend of games That's kelly steward. Make sure you check it out on twitter at kelly in vegas kelly. We appreciate the time Thank you so much. Hopefully we can make divisional round as profitable for you as wildcard round was as well Yeah, thank you guys for having me on and look forward to talking with you again soon. Awesome. Thank you so much Covering the future Big thank you once again to kelly steward for swinging by and breaking down the divisional round and chatting about all things For all four games this weekend Make sure you follow kelly on twitter at kelly in vegas and check out all of our work at bleacher report wager talk and the bet on it podcast Let's move now to our covering the future and stick with the divisional round this weekend We're gonna stick with sunday's game ed. You want to talk bucks versus saints. What are you seeing in that one? Yeah, I think all the metrics point to a pretty tight game between in my mind to the primary super bowl contenders My, you know, my my best numbers have norleans by 2.4 points Um, that's certainly not the biggest, uh, you know, the the market's at three that's certainly not the biggest discrepancy in uh between my predictions and the market But this is the game. I like the most and and I think you have to look behind what simply my numbers say and Um, so let's dig into it. I mean, I just believe in Tampa Bay more than I do new orleans Um, you you had mentioned that I talked about the higher upside that they have on offense. We've started to see that Um, I think since I talked about it. They've looked pretty good Um, if you want some quantitative, uh support for that, you know, let's talk about their pff Pastor grades, right? So brady is 92.6 the second in the nfl way higher than drew preese at 73 and I think scheme is playing a big role in this evaluation Um, you know brady has the the highest a dot or average of the target in the nfl It's 9.1 yards and this is what you expect from a bruce area's offense They're going to try to take shots down the field and they have the receivers like mike evans and chris godwin Despite all those drops he had in the washington game Uh to get that done right and in contrast like norleans has really been a dink and dunk kind of offense with drew breeze And you've seen his uh a dot his average depth of target just decreased over the last couple seasons 7.1 in 2018 6.4 in 2019 and 6.0 this year So, you know tampa bay is promising a more explosive offense Um, you can also look at the the pass defense Uh, that's the other reason and and in general like when I when i'm looking at games I'm almost exclusively looking at quarterback and and how good the coverage is So norleans actually has a better pass defense when I look at my adjusted success rate. I'm passing plays their fourth Uh, whereas tampa bay's eighth. So both good. Um Definitely seems like new orleans is better. Um, but you know, tampa bay definitely has a better pff cover grade So there are six in the nfl compared to 18th for new orleans Um, I've definitely had my doubts about marshan landmere. Uh, a guy who came in four years ago and was like a big boon You know, basically norleans defense was awful until they drafted him and I'm not saying he's the only reason why they've gotten better Um, but they got good when he came into the league and his cover grade at pff has really dropped every year Since he's been in here and and now into his fourth year Uh pff doesn't really like either their other cover guys. So and and we know tampa bay's defense is good. Um, and And I think above and beyond that there's something that I can't quite put my finger on about Kind of the upside of tampa bay and like a little bit of doubt about norleans I mean, I I remember talking to dr. Eric eager before the season even started and we were talking about You know, just, you know, yeah norleans looks good by the numbers But there's just something not quite right about them. I had chris angers, uh, the director of the south point casino sports book uh on my podcast and he you know, he said the same thing It's it's it's hard to describe exactly what, um, we're trying to get at in this game But I think they I think that feeling definitely points towards tampa bay So I hope I've made a pretty good, uh argument, um, numerically for why I'm favoring tampa bay But there's also some undescribability in there as well Yeah, and I think that we saw some of the like we talked about before some of the Validity for that thinking last week because I know The game against washington wound up being Kind of close in theory like the final score was kind of close But the the numbers that tom brady put up in that game Were really good when you look at them on a on a per drop back basis And I would argue if you adjust for opponent probably his best showing of the entire year Potentially and that's kind of what you want to see and it makes sense too because I was worried about them going in because for the full season brady to really struggled against Defense that could generate a pass rush washington. Obviously, that's their strength. That's what they do Is generate a pass rush, but in that game 0.42 expected points per drop back for tom brady. That's an unreal number He had been a negative 0.09 against top 10 pass defenses prior to that game But they also hadn't faced a lot of good pass defenses since antonio brown is fully integrated in the offense So you get them At full strength with more time in this bruce area's offense It makes sense tom brady to have a shorter learning curve for this this area's offense Then guys like james winston did even carson palmer makes sense tom brady If you a little bit better with regards to those things than those guys would and I think that that kind of Justified your argument that this offense has upside because they played well Against a tough defense at a time when you would expect them to do so So I thought that that really did validate your thought process in In saying that they had upside that they hadn't shown previously And I think that that if you want a quantitative way to look at this offense Leaning heavily on what we they did against against washington would be your best route for doing so Yeah, no, I definitely think that's part of it. I mean probably brady might have had his worst game against this new Orleans defense in the middle of the season too I don't put too much stock into that. I think you know, like if you if you let him play again He's gonna have a pretty good game Basically with his skill with the receivers that he has the magnitude of the game Yeah, I think they're gonna be just fine The only negative here is that the sleepy tom brady narrative might come into play It's a 640 kickoff and he goes to bed at eight. So second half Tom might just tank. Yeah, it's I mean if he pushes it back to nine for you know They've been in a bunch of prime time games this year. So he's probably had to adjust a little bit No, no, give him some extra avocado ice cream. He'll be fine. So, uh, that that'll keep him up Keep him up for an extra hour and hopefully get that game deep enough to get a full tom brady I want to talk about the game earlier in the day on sunday and talk about The browns against the chiefs and I don't want to touch this spread. This spread scares me a lot I I I think the browns will do well in this game But it's really tough to justify betting them plus 10 because their defense sucks And I would need to count on their defense to make stops to bet them plus 10 And I have no confidence they will do that. So instead I'm going to bet them to go over their team total, which is 23 and a half at fangirl sports book Minus 108 on the over there and the reason for optimism there is twofold the first one is that This chiefs defense just kind of okay They definitely took a step back as the season went along They finished the year ranked 20th and schedule adjusted defense based on number fires metrics They were 15th against the pass and 29th against the rush and we know the browns can run the ball successfully I think they should be able to move the ball there But they can probably do pretty well through the air too because baker mayfield average 0.37 passing that expected points per drop back against Middling pass defense this year. He was solid against good defenses too So I would expect baker to be able to do something here And they're expecting a joel batonio back to this game. They're they're stud guard That's in addition to getting kevin stafanski back and kaderal hodge This will likely be the most complete browns offense that we've seen Since the old out beckham injury. They've had receivers be out left and right. They've had why a teller out They've had batonio out now They've had a lot of moving pieces But it looks like they should be pretty close to full strength or again One of the first times since beckham got hurt I would bet they'll be efficient on offense in this game And it's also a pace-up spot because the chiefs throw a tons They rank seventh in situation neutral pace according to football outsiders I don't know if the browns will cover here because I really don't want to Put any faith in this defense that scares me so much But I feel better about their team totals. So give me the over here 23 and a half minus one away for cleveland in kansas city. I think that's the safest route for Getting exposure to the browns while avoiding touching the defense ed What are you thinking about this game here? Do you think cleveland's offense moved the football here? Or is it just total domination on the part of the chiefs? I mean, I think total domination on the part of the chiefs But I mean, we did see cleveland I mean, maybe we should give some credit to what they did against, you know, the best defense in the nfl Last week it was ugly. They dominated. So they should get a little bit of credit for that Rashad fenton is has played really well in the secondary for the chiefs and he's listed as questionable. He I mean probably plays So again the importance of coverage guys in evaluating games. So that's definitely another Factor in your favor for liking the over. Yeah, we had talked about Tom brady against washington baker mayfield against pittsburgh 0.46 passing that expected points per drop back for him there So a really solid game against a tougher defense of what he'll see this week It helps that there won't be a full crowd in kansas city this week, too So it's not the full arrowhead effect working against the browns here. So Not expecting a win not banking on a cover either But I do think that they will at least at least give me to 24 points We can have a good weekend on sunday. That is all that we have for today once again a big Thank you to kelly steward follow her on twitter at kelly in vegas and check out all over work the bet on it podcast also a bleacher report and at wager talk Thank you to kelly once again ed. What is going on for you this week over at the power rank? Yeah, so uh writing my new Writing my free email newsletter. So uh sign up for that at thepowerrank.com Was really pumped to have chris andrew's bookmaker at south point casino in las vegas had a great conversation about all four games And then yeah, if you want my best predictions, uh, you can either become a member of the site But I've also have a separate product the nfl Playoff report So you can learn about both of them at the power rank dot net that'll take you a place on my site where you can learn more And since we don't have the wildcard games anymore, uh, you can use the code power To uh get ten dollars off the uh nfl playoff report So I'd obviously rather have you as a member of the site, but i'm pretty sure this is the least expensive, uh Any of my analytics have ever been on the site. So uh use that code power for ten dollars off All right, perfect. Check that out. Uh, have you read chris andrew's book? Then one day. Yeah. Oh, yeah, it's hilarious. Okay. I think that's my off season Yeah, I think I need to check that out this year because I haven't yet and I want to so I think that'll be on my checklist So, uh, check that out. But some of the things that bookmakers have done will Will Will put you into fits of laughter Well, I wanted to read it when we had them on the on our show I was like, okay, I need to read this but I never got around to it like we had a pandemic I had plenty of time to do so but like I did other dumb stuff instead to occupy my time But I think I needed, you know, I've got three months until baseball kicks up Might as well use that time to read that because it seems like a fascinating subject and chris himself a fascinating guy So, uh, definitely need to get into that and you can also again like ed said check him out on the football Analytics show. So that's my off season homework. Ed is then one day That sounds good. You should read then then one day because he's writing then one year which is uh kind of a life A year in the life of a bookmaker. Uh, and actually happens right through the pandemic. So So that's his next project. So he's got that and actually like a fiction book coming out too Really? So a lot of a lot of chris angers reading to be done Busy guy doing all that while it's running south point. So A busy guy. So check that out on the football analytics show I am on twitter at jim sonnis j i m s a n n e s our daily fantasy podcast going up tomorrow Myself and brandon gadula breaking down the divisional round Both the saturday and the sunday only slates and of course discussion the four game slay too So that'll be up on the number fire daily fantasy podcast feed tomorrow Roughly around 11 30 or so big. Thank you to calvin theobald our video producer for running the video side of things here today Thank you cal as always and thank you to everyone for tuning in Good luck to you with your bets for the divisional round back with you once again next week to preview The conference championships. This has been covering the spread right here on the fan duo podcast network