Posted on 10/4/2007 6:32:05 PM

NFL Betting Trends - Take the OVER on Detroit

By D. S. Williamson

When one thinks of the Detroit Lions usually one of three images comes to mind: Billy Sims writhing in pain on the Lions' artificial surface, Barry Sanders rushing past defenders, or Lions' players hanging their heads in frustration after another loss to a better opponent.

Of course, that was then and this is now. More importantly, that was the past few years and this is this year.

The Lions are for real. Mainly, because their offense is unstoppable and just got more unstoppable with Kevin Jones returning from injury. Now, they go two deep in the running back position, with Jones and former Denver ace, Tatum Bell, and three to four deep in the wide receiver position. Their quarterback, John Kitna, has always been somewhat underrated by NFL personnel managers and, on top of being an accurate passer, has become an effective leader.

The Lions' defense? Okay, maybe that's where the frustration begins. The Lions' D is terrible and won't get better any season. That will, eventually, be the downfall to this team. But, NFL bettors need not worry, because a bad D means gold to NFL bettors. There is a particular trend that started last year that is supported by both the Lions' potent offense and porous defense.

Football Betting Trend: The Over is 9 – 2 in Detroit's last 11 Road Games.

Because it is so early in the season, this trend points to a couple of things. First, that the Lions' offense was potent last year, on the road, and that their defense was bad last year, on the road. Now, taking certain factors specific to this season into account, namely the growth of John Kitna in offensive coordinator Mike Martz'es system, as well as the drafting of Calvin Johnson and the signing of Tatum Bell, and the trend becomes even more powerful. The truth is that the Lions' may be looking at an extremely rare 80% to 90% OVER Season.

What this means is that the total points will go over in 80 to 90 percent of the Lions' games. Why? Because no matter what happens to a team, basic NFL betting strategy says that it is difficult to reach that "college football" plateau of 60 total points. Odds-makers just can't let themselves put a large number, like 60, onto to the total of an NFL game. Yet, the Lions' D is so awful, teams merely need to play straight-up football and they are almost guaranteed 17 to 21 points in the game. Now, when these teams are home, they will score more and the Lions will score less, but when the Lions are home, they will score more and the visiting teams will score less - - or, the visiting team will still score more.

It doesn't matter. The Lions are the perfect over team.

Still on the Lions' schedule are the following teams: Denver Broncos, Arizona Cardinals, New York Giants, Green Bay Packers, Dallas Cowboys, San Diego Chargers, Kansas City Chiefs, and Green Bay Packers again.

They also have to play the Minnesota Vikings twice with rookie of the year candidate Adrian Peterson and get to play the Chicago Bears again who have proven that their defense gets tired in the fourth quarter.

Although not all of the teams above have bad defenses, they can give up a lot of points to a team with Calvin Johnson and Roy Williams. More importantly, they all have good offenses or at least they have offenses with weapons. That means the Detroit Lions will give up a lot of points on their own - - always.

There's a final reason to bet the Detroit Lions' games to go over the rest of this NFL season. The Detroit coaching staff understands how bad their defense is. They want to get into shoot-outs. That's the only way they can win.

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