The Indianapolis Colts appeared to be set for the future when they had an impressive 2012 draft class that was highlighted by quarterback Andrew Luck. They enjoyed three straight playoff appearances and back-to-back undefeated seasons in the AFC South. But Indianapolis has missed the playoffs in each of the past two seasons, and the rest of the division slowly is getting better, from top to bottom.
The Colts have Luck, the Titans have Marcus Mariota, and the Texans might have their quarterback of the future in Deshaun Watson. Which team in the division has set itself up for long-term success with the way it is building its overall roster?
The Titans have done an excellent job of surrounding quarterback Marcus Mariota with quality players at running back and on the offensive line. AP Photo/Mark Humphrey
Mike Wells, Colts reporter: I don’t think anybody would have picked any team other than the Colts a few years ago, but I’m going with the team down Interstate 65 from Indianapolis, the Titans. Tennessee general manager Jon Robinson did something former Colts GM Ryan Grigson should have done for Luck a long time ago. He put a solid offensive line (seventh-fewest sacks allowed in the NFL last season) around Mariota and two quality running backs in Murray and Henry to go with him, so the young quarterback doesn’t always have to carry the team. Robinson also addressed the defense during the offseason. The Colts and Titans are in the best position of the four division teams, but Tennessee currently is a step ahead for long-term success.
As soon as the news broke that wide receiver Torrey Smith will be released by the San Francisco 49ers, the biggest question among Baltimore football fans on social media became: What are the chances that Smith will reunite with the Baltimore Ravens?
The answer: It likely depends on Mike Wallace’s future in Baltimore.
It doesn’t make sense for the Ravens to add another downfield threat if they keep Wallace to go along with Breshad Perriman. But if Baltimore doesn’t pick up Wallace’s option this week, that could pave the way for QB Joe Flacco throwing the ball deep to Smith again.
Could Torrey Smith, who was released by the 49ers, return to Baltimore? Jasen Vinlove/USA Today Sports
Last week, coach John Harbaugh said he anticipates that Wallace will be on the team in 2017. But economics, especially for a team looking to maximize every cap dollar, can alter plans.
Wallace, 30, is scheduled to make $5.75 million in 2017 (which includes a $1 million roster bonus) and count $8 million against Baltimore’s cap (fifth-highest on the team). If Smith’s price would come in lower after two disappointing seasons in San Francisco, the Ravens would have to seriously consider swapping Wallace for one of their playmakers from the 2012 Super Bowl team.
Smith, 28, averaged 897 receiving yards over four seasons with the Ravens and Flacco. Smith averaged 465 receiving yards in two years with the 49ers.
In those four years with the Ravens, Smith produced 44 catches of at least 25 yards and 11 touchdowns of at least 25 yards. In his two years San Francisco, he managed 10 such catches for five touchdowns.
“Joe’s a quarterback you want to play with, you want to play for,” Smith told Glenn Clark Radio in Baltimore on Monday. “You know he’s going to have your back, regardless, and you’re going to have his. He’s laid-back, to a certain extent, but he’s a heck of a competitor. He works his tail off. I think for a player, he’s a guy you can rally around and you want to play well for him.”
A 2011 second-round pick of the Ravens, Smith went to college nearby at the University of Maryland and became entrenched in Baltimore. He will hold his annual charity basketball game in the city’s downtown arena on March 19.
While nostalgia is on Smith’s side, that shouldn’t overshadow the impact Wallace made last season. Wallace totaled 72 catches for 1,017 yards and four touchdowns in his first season in Baltimore. That’s more receptions than Smith had in any single season and more receiving yards than in all but one of Smith’s six NFL seasons.
The Ravens have never brought back one of their top players after they have gone elsewhere. General manager Ozzie Newsome has had a good feel for when to let players leave.
But the Ravens haven’t been presented with a situation like this one. The team has to explore a potential move, and many in Baltimore are rooting for it to occur.
On a late Sunday afternoon in January, his frustration peaking, a Las Vegas bookmaker left his office and headed home in the middle of a tight divisional playoff game between the Pittsburgh Steelers and Kansas City Chiefs.
It had been a rough couple of weeks for the house, and the level of the bookmaker’s discontent was palpable through his cellphone, as he drove and grumbled about the point spread that had attracted lopsided action on the underdog Steelers.
“I have no [expletive] idea how this game even got to [Kansas City] 2, 2.5 much less,” he said. “It’s ridiculous that the Chiefs are even the favorites in this game. We need them really bad.”
The Steelers won 18-16, and, for the second time in nine days, Las Vegas sportsbooks had lost millions.
Some books declared Sunday, Jan. 15, their worst day ever, the culmination of a rare hot streak by the betting public that produced massive parlay liability and had some bookmakers in no-win situations even before the Steelers and Chiefs kicked off.
By the time the playoffs were over, the betting majority had gone 9-1 against the spread, and Nevada sportsbooks had lost $8.25 million on football (college and pro combined) in January — the second-most costly football month during the season ever for the books. According to the state’s gaming control board, only Nov. 2005 (negative $11.2 million) was worse for the books than Jan. 2017.
“We weren’t sweating it,” Jay Kornegay, vice president of the Westgate SuperBook, said. “We were more just shaking our heads that things weren’t going our way. But we’re not looking for sympathy. We know things will turn around.”
Sympathy for the bookmaker is a rare commodity, and history shows that, by the nature of the game, things due to tend to work out just fine for the books in the end (college football, by the way, was excellent for them this past season). But it was an expensive start to 2017, after what had been a relatively dicey final two months of the NFL regular season.
Chalk spoke to bookmakers, analysts and bettors to try to figure out just what happened in a strange season for NFL betting.
A rough November for the books
After a typical strong start by the books, the NFL season turned in November. Suddenly, public bettors started winning, hitting parlay after parlay through the end of the regular season.
In November, the books’ hold percentage on football — the amount they keep from the amount wagered — fell to a minuscule 2.10 percent, a four-year low for a football month. Profits from parlays also were down sharply in November and December, 87.9 percent and 72.1 percent year-over-year, respectively.
“Hell, we had, I think, 11 12-teamers [parlays] hit,” Nick Bogdanovich, director of trading for William Hill U.S., said. “I don’t know if we’ve had 11 in the last 20 years hit. It was just one of those years.”
NFL favorites went 135-126 against the spread this past season, not counting pushes. It is the third-best mark for favorites in the last 14 seasons. And 141 games went over the total, with 124 staying under, the third-best mark for overs in the last 14 years, according to sports betting analytics site Betlabsports.com on Sports Insights. The betting majority almost always gravitates to the favorite and over, which makes it a bad combination for the books.
To boot, the New England Patriots, the consensus Super Bowl favorites throughout the season and a public favorite, went 16-3 ATS, tying the 1989 San Francisco 49ers for the best single-season ATS record in the last 40 years. In contrast, the Cleveland Browns, widely considered the biggest long shots in the league and the only team to be underdogs in every game, went a league-worst 3-12-1 ATS.
It got to a point in November and December, where Patriots and whoever was playing the Browns became staples on parlay cards. “And [opponents of] the Rams, and the 49ers,” Kornegay lamented. “It felt like we were giving away a free four-teamer every weekend.”
The lines back him up. From Weeks 7-15, a four-team parlay betting on the Patriots and against the Rams, 49ers and Browns would’ve cashed four times in six possible weeks (one team was on a bye in Weeks 8, 9 and 13). And the Rams, 49ers and Browns each had ATS losing streaks of at least seven games.
The betting public jumped on board, even as point spreads became inflated to a point where sophisticated bettors believed there was enough value to bet the Browns week after week.
“These guys are professionals. They are playing numbers,” Ed Salmons, assistant manager at the Westgate SuperBook told Chalk in December. “You want to gamble against the public, but at some point you’d like to see a team cover. It’s hard to be that bad and not cover, because the spreads get so inflated.”
“I would say 100 percent [the sharps] struggled,” Bogdanovich said.
The Browns finished 1-15 straight up, covering the spread just twice during the disastrous season. For reference, the 2008 Detroit Lions, the only team to go 0-16 in a season, went 7-9 ATS during that campaign.
Saul Loeb/AFP/Getty Images
Bad lines?
The 2016 NFL season did feature some statistical anomalies, but they didn’t lead to more inaccurate point spreads than usual:
• In the second season since the NFL moved the extra point back to the 15-yard line, kickers converted 93.6 percent of attempts, the lowest since 1979. There were 105 two-point conversion attempts, the most per game since 1998 and more than double the amount attempted in 2011. According to Guglielmo, these factors helped produce the most non-traditional team final scores (15, 18, 19, 22, 25, etc.) in league history.
• While non-traditional scores increased in 2016, the most common margins of victory remained, in order, 3, 7, 10, 4, 6 and 14. In 2015, nearly 17 percent of games (43 of 256 games) were decided by three points; on 2016, only 12.5 percent of games (32 of 256) were decided by three points.
The above anomalies, however, did not cause the oddsmakers to post inaccurate lines in relation to the margin of victory.
In fact, during the 2016 regular season, the margin of victory was closer in proximity to the closing point spread than in any season since 2000. On average, 2016 NFL games in were decided by 8.9 points of the closing line. Only one other time in the last 17 seasons (2005) has the spread differential been less than 10 points, according to data provided by Massey-Peabody and TeamRankings.com.
The increased accuracy of the line to the margin of the victory actually backfired on the books in some cases, especially on teaser bets, a form of parlay wager that allows players to adjust the point spread generally six points.
“Teasers were bad, real bad this year,” Bogdanovich said.
Bad bookmaking?
While the point spreads were more in line with final scores, the lines — and in some cases how the books managed those lines — did not divide the betting, especially in the playoffs, which led to bigger decisions.
Guglielmo reviewed betting data provided by William Hill’s Nevada sportsbook from this year’s NFL playoffs and the college football championship game and estimated that three of the five most-heavily bet games during that time period featured the most lopsided action. Those big decisions didn’t go the book’s way.
“The data tells us the only game the public lost was Seattle-Atlanta in the divisional round, when 53 percent of the money was on the Seahawks,” Guglielmo said. “So the only game the books won against the spread, they barely won anything, and when they lost, they lost big.
“By leaving themselves exposed to such a degree, rather than balancing their bets, the bookmakers effectively bet the other side in all 10 of those games. If we assume there’s a 50-50 chance of either team winning against the spread, then the probability of the books losing all 10 of those games is one in 1,024, or about 0.1 percent.”
The lopsided action, in part, was caused by a philosophy that’s been increasingly used by the books over the last few decades. Instead of moving the point spread based on the money bet at their individual books, bookmakers often will now adjust the line without even taking a bet, if they see the overall market moving.
For example, if a point spread moves at one of the prominent offshore sportsbooks known to cater to sophisticated sports bettors, a Las Vegas sportsbook may move its line as well, even if doesn’t take a bet on that particular game and even if it has more money on the team that the line is moving against.
It’s a strategy known as “moving on air.” The idea, for the books, is to end up rooting for the same side as the sharp bettors, but it can lead to unbalanced action.
“I’d rather book toward the sharp play than the public play,” Kornegay said. “Over the years, it’s proven to be the right thing to do.”
Rufus Peabody, a professional bettor and predictive analytics experts for ESPN, says “moving on air” is a sound strategy for the books.
“I don’t really think it’s a bad strategy at all for the book to take lopsided action, if they’re getting the best of it [the point spread],” Peabody said. “In fact, I think that books are usually way too conservative in that they move too much with money.”
Regardless, when the results were finalized after the divisional round, the books had been crushed.
“We had a very solid college football December, and we actually lost on the NFL,” Kornegay said. “We all know that sports is headlined by the NFL, and the NFL just hasn’t been that good to us.”
The aftermath
By the time the NFL playoffs kicked off in early January, multiple Las Vegas sportsbooks had already launched internal studies, examining why their bottom line wasn’t where they had hoped it would be. Some shops looked into who was beating them: Was it the sharps or the squares? Others considered whether their betting menu had become too broad and wondered if some of their softer numbers on low-profile games and events were being cherry-picked by sophisticated bettors.
“It is probably the worst football season I remember in a long, long time,” said Bill Sattler, a 30-year Las Vegas sportsbook veteran now with Caesars Entertainment. “Mainly NFL, but if you take in Clemson-Alabama, that was the worst loss I can remember on any college sport. That was brutal as well.”
It’s not unusual after a bad run for book managers to embark on such reviews. An examination of bookmaking strategies, at minimum, shows the bosses that they’re not just sitting back losing money, but such studies rarely identify glaring flaws in the process. After all, the books haven’t exactly struggled over the years — they’re up $3.7 billion since 1984 — so making significant changes to their fundamental approach based on a bad stretch doesn’t make a lot of sense.
Clearly several factors contributed to the bad stretch, including factors out of the books’ control (Pats going 16-3 ATS, while the Browns and other cellar-dwellers lost week after week), along with a bookmaker strategy that has historically led to record profits, but due to variance, worked against the books in January to produce a giant loss.
But don’t lose too much sleep over the books’ rough NFL stretch. Nevada sportsbooks won $91.2 million on football, both college and professional, in 2016, making it the second-most lucrative football year ever. And, in January 2017, the month the books suffered the $8.25-million loss on football, they won $18.17 million on basketball and ended up with a $7.95 million net profit.
“We’ve got our business model, and we stuck to it,” Bogdanovich of William Hill said. “We’ll win with it and we’ll lose to it. Big decisions are just part of the deal.”
The NFL’s wounded workforce is strong, athletic and wants to exhaust all medical deductibles.
For every young and healthy star bracing for life-changing money when free agency kicks off Thursday, dozens of others battle injury stigmas that will affect their bottom lines.
That doesn’t mean these players can’t find quality jobs. ESPN’s All-Wounded Free Agency Team is stocked with playmakers pairing past accomplishments with past-their-prime joints. Teams must decide how much these players have left.
Former team: New York Jets Age: 26
Ailment: Torn ACL in October
Buzz: Smith has created minimal buzz in the national quarterback discussion while nursing a torn ACL that ended an uneven career in New York. But Smith believes he was poised to break out before the injury. “My mistakes were shown on the field the first two years, and then me getting better has kind of been behind the scenes,” Smith told NFL Network. “The next time I step onto the field, it’ll be what they expect.”
Outlook: Someone will take a chance on Smith as a backup. He still has transferable traits, including arm strength.
Geno Smith has thrown for 28 touchdowns and 36 interceptions in his NFL career. Rich Graessle/Icon Sportswire
Ailments: Knee history includes torn meniscus in 2016 and torn ACL in 2011.
Buzz: The Vikings are basically waving goodbye to Peterson from the balcony. General manager Rick Spielman lauds a deep running back draft class and said Peterson will “always be a Viking.” Meanwhile, Peterson turns 32 in a few weeks and thrives off antiquated I-formation sets — not exactly a winning free agency formula. But Peterson won the rushing title two years ago, and the last time he wanted to prove doubters wrong coming off knee issues, he went for 2,097 yards in 2012.
Outlook: Peterson is an attractive option for teams with a quality quarterback and a we’re-one-piece-away belief. Peterson could sign an incentive-laden contract worth $4-6 million per year in base money. Aaron Rodgers wouldn’t mind faking play-actions with Peterson on third downs.
Former team: Kansas City Chiefs Age: 30
Ailment: Torn ACL in 2015, lingering swelling in 2016
Buzz: An all-the-way-back Charles can inject life into an offense, but playing a combined eight games in the past two seasons taints his value. The benefit of those missed games: If Charles’ knee returns to full strength, he’s awfully well-rested. Charles has 1,604 touches in nine seasons. DeAngelo Williams prolonged his career with Pittsburgh after splitting carries for nine seasons in Carolina. Charles might be best-utilized as a third-down playmaker with ability to spot-start games when necessary.
Outlook: Watch out for the Eagles, whose head coach Doug Pederson, a former Chiefs coordinator, has intimate knowledge of Charles’ skill set. Charles also would be an ideal complementary piece to starter Robert Kelley in Washington.
Jamaal Charles didn’t fully recover from a 2015 torn ACL, getting just 12 carries last season. AP Photo/Ed Zurga
Buzz: V-Jax finally showed signs of breaking down last season. The once-potent field-stretcher averaged a career-low 11.5 yards per catch before the injury. But Tampa Bay kept him in 2016 despite a cap hit of nearly $10 million because of his leadership and veteran savvy while giving Jameis Winston a No. 2 receiving option. As the wide receiver position trends younger, Jackson’s age/injury quotient will be tough to overcome.
Outlook: Jackson is more of a depth signing at this point. He will likely follow the path of other prominent 30-somethings rehabbing injuries: Wait until late spring or summer, see which teams have a playmaking need, then show off your health to those teams.
Former team: Pittsburgh Steelers Age: 26
Ailment: Torn labrum
Buzz: Wheaton has much to prove after his big contract year steered its way into the training room. After 97 catches from 2014 to ’15, Wheaton finished last season with four catches and never looked comfortable while fighting through the shoulder injury before surgery. The Steelers badly needed a reliable No. 2 receiver last year, too.
Outlook: Wheaton might have to rebuild his value on a two- or three-year bridge contract, but he can still play, and there’s enough money out there for receivers with adequate speed and good hands. He still must show he can consistently make contested catches.
Markus Wheaton averaged 17.0 yards per catch in 2015. George Gojkovich/Getty Images
Ailments: A reported four concussions in four seasons spanning stints in Cleveland and Miami
Buzz: For the second time in his career, Cameron enters unrestricted free agency with a “buyer beware” sticker on his helmet. Retirement might be a consideration for Cameron. But his talent shined through in his last contract: Miami gave him $15 million over two years despite well-documented concussion issues in Cleveland. And the last time he was truly featured in an offense, Cameron caught 80 passes for 917 yards and seven scores in 2013. This isn’t an athletic issue.
Outlook: Cameron will likely remain on the free-agency shelf early on while tight ends Martellus Bennett, Jack Doyle and Jared Cook get theirs. But contending teams will be intrigued while looking for value deals.
Former team: Minnesota Vikings Age: 27
Ailment: Underwent surgery in September to repair a torn labrum in his right hip
Buzz: Kalil had his turnstile moments in Minnesota, but the hip issue had lingered for a few years, so perhaps he’ll showcase more explosion off the ball in Year 6. Kalil has been training in California and has returned to his ideal playing weight of 315 pounds. He wants to return to Minnesota, and the team might be open to re-signing him.
Outlook: Kalil should benefit from a weak left tackle market. After Andrew Whitworth, teams won’t find many safe bets. If the Panthers want to rebuild a porous line, Kalil could join his brother Ryan in Carolina.
Matt Kalil, the fourth overall pick in 2012, was ineffective for much of his time in Minnesota before getting injured last season. Brace Hemmelgarn/USA TODAY Sports
Ailment: Underwent right hand surgery in September
Outlook: Warmack’s injury seems manageable, but more alarming is the Titans’ apparent reluctance to re-sign a former top-10 pick. The team didn’t pick up his fifth-year option in 2016, and the injury leaves Warmack grasping for second life in free agency. But Warmack was a beast coming out of Alabama, and athletic guard play is invaluable in today’s game.
Buzz: Warmack will get his chance to avoid draft-bust status, but he’ll likely have to wait behind Cincinnati’s Kevin Zeitler, Detroit’s Larry Warford and Green Bay’s T.J. Lang in the interior line hierarchy.
Former team: Carolina Panthers Age: 30
Ailment: Hamstring issues forced him to miss action in 2015 and 2016
Buzz: After averaging 10.5 sacks per year from 2010 to 2014, Johnson managed five sacks total the past two years while missing a combined 10 games. Older players sometimes struggle shaking lingering hamstring issues, and Johnson turns 31 in July. Johnson was a free-agency king in 2011 with a six-year, $72 million deal. He played five years on that deal, which is pretty impressive. He’s still a serviceable lineman but lacks the explosion that earned that deal.
Outlook: Teams won’t ignore good rotational defensive end help. Johnson should land a job somewhere. But his days in Carolina appear numbered.
Former team: Denver Broncos Age: 34
Ailment: Underwent back surgery to repair ruptured disk
Buzz: Ware can follow the blueprint of late-30s marvels Dwight Freeney and James Harrison by using savvy, leverage and strength to offset declining speed. Ware has remained productive into his 30s with nearly 0.6 sacks per game in three seasons with Denver. His recovery from the back injury will take time but shouldn’t be career-ending.
Outlook: Joining a contender as a situational pass-rusher is the ideal blueprint for Ware, who reportedly is leaving the door open for a return to Dallas. Denver appears ready to move on. Ware got three years and $30 million in 2014. He won’t get that now, but a one- or two-year deal will satisfy.
When DeMarcus Ware was on the field, he was a productive pass-rusher for the Broncos. Streeter Lecka/Getty Images
Buzz: Te’o was a steady riser in the Chargers’ defense and earned team captain honors in 2016. That’s why his injury is so unfortunate. He went from an attractive free agent in a middling inside linebacker market to a big question mark. Science and rehab advancements can help players recover from serious injuries (Demaryius Thomas and Brent Grimes are among success stories). Though regaining his first step is hardly a guarantee, Te’o plays more off instincts than raw athleticism.
Outlook: Te’o might have to settle for a short-term prove-it deal and re-emerge in a future year with a bigger salary cap. Watch out for Oakland, which has former Chargers coordinator John Pagano on staff. He’s got a linebacker background and worked extensively with Te’o for four seasons.
Former team: New York Jets Age: 31
Ailment: “Body’s breaking down”
Buzz: That’s not our assessment. Those are Revis’ words to Newsday back in October, shortly after he missed action with a hamstring injury. The past 12 months have been nightmarish for Revis, who was slow to recover from offseason wrist surgery, reported to camp out of shape, struggled to cover receivers one-on-one, got cut by the Jets and faces felony assault charges for his alleged role in an altercation in Pittsburgh. Revis has hit the trifecta of unattractive free-agency profiles — age, injury, legal trouble.
Outlook: Teams aren’t eager to even entertain signing him while his legal case continues. Yes, perhaps Revis can become a safety, a move Revis has publicly embraced. But Revis gets $6 million whether he plays or not. The Jets owe him that unless another team covers some of payout by signing him. How motivated will he really be?
Ailments: Pectoral, biceps and hamstring injuries since 2014
Buzz: What Amukamara does on the field isn’t the big issue. Staying there is. He has missed 27 games in six seasons, including at least two games in five of the past six years. In 2016, he signed a one-year, $5.5-million deal with Jacksonville to prove he could stay healthy, and he acquitted himself well in 14 games. Amukamara will have a market as a physical press-man corner with adequate size.
Outlook: Amukamara won’t break the bank in a crowded cornerback class, but he’ll get paid quality coin in the second tier. Watch out for a team such as Pittsburgh, which is close to a Super Bowl run but needs one more athletic corner.
