Oakland Raiders (1-3) at Atlanta Falcons (5-0)

Matt Ryan is 27-5 in his career at home, including 22-10 ATS and the Falcons are 5-0. The Raiders, meanwhile, are 1-3, coming off a blowout loss to the Broncos (before the bye) and have to travel to Atlanta and play a 1 PM ET game as a West Coast team. The Raiders, in particular, are 6-14 ATS in this situation in their since 2003. The Falcons should easily be able to cover the 9 point spread right?

Well, that seems to be what the public thinks as they are pounding the Falcons this week. I like to fade the public as much as I can anyway, but we’re also getting some line value with the Raiders. The difference between these two teams’ yards per play differentials is .6. An old gambling formula says to divide that by .15 and add 3 points either way for home field advantage, which would get us to a line of Atlanta -7, meaning we have 2 points of line value with the Raiders.

Why is this? Are the Raiders underrated. I don’t think so. A preseason overrated pick of mine, the Raiders have lived up to the billing and are 27^th in terms of yards per play. Instead, it’s the Falcons who appear to be overrated. Despite their 5-0 record, they have a negative yards per play differential. That might sound ridiculous, until you consider that this team could easily be 3-2 if it wasn’t for Carolina’s horrendous end game management, Billy Cundiff’s existence, and Robert Griffin’s injury. A 3-2 with a negative yards per play differential isn’t uncommon. They’ve needed a little bit of luck to stay undefeated.

On top of that, they’ve been very reliant on the turnover, part of the reason why their yards per play differential doesn’t match up with their points differential and their record. The Falcons lead the league with a +10 turnover differential. However, turnover differentials tend to be very inconsistent on a week to week basis. If you look at every possible turnover differential that a team can have, teams in each group tend to average a turnover differential of about +0.0 the following week, no matter how good or bad they were in this area the following week. You can see more, here. That’s why I prefer to use yards to help me identify the underrated and overrated teams.

That being said, Atlanta is the pick here. I think the public has it right. Atlanta is a 9 point favorite going into a bye. 7+ favorites going into a bye are 42-17 ATS since 2002 in the regular season. Teams tend to be extra focused going into a bye and crush teams they’re supposed to crush. It’s just not a big play. Atlanta is also my survivor pick of the week on a week where there aren’t a lot of good choices. Teams in that aforementioned situation are a whopping 56-3 straight up. Atlanta isn’t losing here.

Public lean: Atlanta (new thing I’m adding, siding with the odds makers on bets is not a bad thing to do since they make so much money, so I’m listing this here to allow readers to “fade” the public, if they so choose, in this example, the odds makers win if Oakland covers)

Sharps lean: OAK 7 ATL 14

Final update: No change.

Atlanta Falcons 34 Oakland Raiders 20 Survivor Pick (HOU, NE, NO, BAL, SF)

Pick against spread: Atlanta -9 (-110) 2 units

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