NFL favorites are covering at an absurd rate

NFL point-spread favorites went 12-4 against the spread in Week 12, the sixth straight week in which they came out ahead.

This is good news for the casual gamblers who flock to the sportsbooks in Las Vegas, Nev., every weekend, as Joe Public tends to favor the favorites.

It’s not great news for the sportsbooks, who took a bit of a hit in October when the tide started to turn.

Starting in Week 7, NFL favorites have gone 54-24-7 against the spread, covering at least 60 percent of the games in each week. This 69 percent overall cover rate is an anomaly: According to Bet Labs, NFL favorites have covered the spread in just 49.9 percent of all games since 2003. In Weeks 1-6 this season, favorites went 38-52 against the spread.

Over the past two weeks, favorites have gone 22-7-1 against the spread, an absurd 75.9 percent clip.

“It’s not supposed to be this easy for the favorite-loving general public to cash so many tickets,” VSiN’s Jeff Fogle wrote recently. “But we have a unique situation where almost half the league is in the playoff chase, and must keep winning to have a chance at the postseason … while the other half is incentivized to lose for draft position. The market hasn’t been able to find the right pricing strategy when decent teams with good quarterbacks are facing non-contenders with bad or inexperienced quarterbacks.”

On Sunday, the books got a bit of a boost when the Chiefs lost outright to the Bills as 8.5-point favorites, but that was about all that separated the books from a truly dismal weekend.

“The public can always do the most damage. But at some point, the public is gonna take it in the shorts. Fortunately, they did with Kansas City,” Jay Rood, vice president for race and sports for MGM Resorts, told Covers.com. “To really crush us, they have to get it all right. Sunday was close to a complete disaster. But Buffalo outright was huge. The public was on Kansas City, and thankfully so.”

Something tells me the books will survive, however.

According to ESPN’s Purdum, the Nevada sportsbooks still won $31.4 million overall in October, their 51st straight winning month.