Super Bowl 51 Preview: The Early Betting Outlook

The week of madness begins! Six days of build-up all leading to the best season finale on television (sorry Game of Thrones, you know I’m right)! While I should perhaps be a little tentative in my proclamations that the game will be good, considering how truly boring most of this NFL postseason has been, it’s hard not to get excited about the matchup in Super Bowl LI in Houston, Texas, this Sunday (6:30 PM Eastern).

Who’s playing in this game, you may ask? Well, had you listened back at mid-season, you would’ve known exactly who. It’s the New England Patriots. It’s the Atlanta Falcons. Great defense vs great offense. Experience vs untried. North vs South. (Hmm… maybe that’s not the way to sell this game?)

There’s so much to unpack in this game, it would be impossible to get to all of it without crashing our server with a 25,000-word piece. But to help all of you make betting decisions on both sides, here’s a collection of arguments for and against each Super Bowl participant.

And if the following betting talk is confusing you, check out our simple guide to betting the Super Bowl here.

Super Bowl 51 Line

Atlanta Falcons vs New England Patriots (-3, 59 o/u)

How they got here

New England Patriots (16-2, 15-3 ATS)

If you just let out a long, exasperated sigh upon seeing the Patriots are a Super Bowl participant this year, you likely aren’t alone. New England will be in the big game for the seventh time in the last 16 years, meaning that, since Tom Brady became a starter, nearly 44-percent of Super Bowls have featured his smug, chiseled face.

But it’s also not a surprise that Brady was on a warpath this season after he spent the first four games at home, serving a rather unjust suspension for his “role” in “Deflategate.” New England was able to prove they aren’t just reliant on no. 12 over that stretch, and actually finished the year with the league’s top scoring defense, as well as a top-seven run game.

Upon his return, though, Brady went beyond his usual brilliance and set a league record with a 14:1 touchdown to interception ratio as the Patriots rolled to the league’s best record and homefield in the AFC once again. The year wasn’t without obstacles for New England; they lost star tight end Rob Gronkowski for the season in Week 12. But they still finished the year on a nine-game winning streak and had a top-three scoring offense.

Now, Brady and Belichick can eliminate all doubt that they are the best in their respective fields with a fifth championship. And even if you can’t stand the Patriots, you have to give them credit: they play exciting Super Bowls. Each of Brady’s six prior trips to the big game were decided by four points or fewer.

Atlanta Falcons (13-5, 12-6 ATS)

Going off at anywhere from 40/1 to 66/1 to win the Super Bowl before the season, there wasn’t much belief in this team coming off a disappointing 8-8 season. The 2015 Falcons were far too reliant on Julio Jones, targeting their star wideout on a third of all passing plays. But after adding solid secondary options like Mohamed Sanu, Taylor Gabriel, and Austin Hooper in the offseason, Kyle Shanahan’s offense took off, to historic levels.

Atlanta finished the year with the most yards per play (6.7) since the 2000 Rams, the seventh most points of all time (540), and Matt Ryan became the first quarterback to throw a touchdown to 13 different receivers in a campaign worthy of MVP. Third in passing and fifth in rushing, this unstoppable offense carried the team to the two-seed in the NFC.

Then, instead of crumbling in the playoffs like many anticipated a Ryan-led team would, the Falcons made quick work of the Seahawks and Packers, winning their two postseason games by a combined score of 80-41.

Now the Falcons are in just the franchise’s second Super Bowl, and they won’t be happy with just being there anymore. This team is getting much more than the puncher’s chance the Dirty Birds got back in 1999; they have a real opportunity to bring the Lombardi Trophy to Atlanta for the first time.

Why you should bet them

New England Patriots

The Patriots aren’t new to this whole Super Bowl thing, but there’s enough new blood in the locker room to remain hungry. Only 23 players remain from their Super Bowl 49 roster, and only seven of their current starters were starters in that game.

The defense in particular underwent a major makeover, and should be the driving force in determining if New England wins a fifth title. As mentioned above, the Patriots’ 15.6 points allowed per game was tops in the league; that’s usually a good sign for Super Bowl success. The top scoring defense is 12-4 in the Super Bowl, all-time, and 4-1 when it goes up against the top scoring offense.

Since this is a Belichick-coached team, to go along with a great offense and defense, the Patriots have one of the league’s best special teams units. New England’s opponents had the worst average drive starting position in the league, with the Pats consistently pinning teams to their 25-yard line. Against a powerful offense like the Falcons, every extra yard will count.

The biggest reason to like backing the Patriots, though, is that they haven’t let bettors down this season. Covering 83.3 percent of their games, New England has the best mark against the spread since the 2004 Chargers. They also haven’t lost at an indoor stadium in five years (8-0 since then).

Atlanta Falcons

Experience will be touted as a reason to back the Patriots, but in recent years, it hasn’t mattered much under center. The last five times a quarterback with no Super Bowl starts has played a quarterback with at least one, the “inexperienced” QB is 4-1 straight-up and against the spread.

The Falcons players may – for the most part – lack big-game experience, but head coach Dan Quinn was on the losing side of Super Bowl 49 as Seattle’s defensive coordinator. While his defense did surrender 28 points, they were able to intercept Brady twice, and probably should have won the game, had the Seahawks actual head coach made a better choice on the one-yard line. Look for Quinn to trust the run game more than Pete Carroll did, particularly considering the Falcons are the only team in the league to start the same five offensive lineman in every game this season.

Less informed bettors may feel a pull to back the Falcons, either out of hatred for powerhouse New England or love of the underdog. No matter why you do it, a strategy like that has paid off well this millennium, as underdogs have covered in 11 of the last 15 Super Bowls and outright won eight of those games. The Falcons performed well as a dog in their own right this year, going 5-1 against the spread.

It’s reasonable to like Atlanta to keep this game close, and if it comes down to kickers, Matt Bryant (91.9 FG, 98.2 XP percentage) has been far more reliable this year than the Patriots’ Stephen Gostkowski (84.4 FG, 93.9 XP percentage).

Finally, since the merger, the NFC holds a 24-20-2 ATS advantage over the AFC.

Why you should bet against them

New England Patriots

So about that league-leading defense … those numbers might be a wee bit inflated. The Patriots tied for third-weakest schedule in the league this season, and before taking down Pittsburgh, hadn’t really played an offense worth a damn during their current nine-game winning streak. In fact, outside of Big Ben, the next best passer they played over that stretch, statistically speaking, was Colin Kaepernick.

Even with last week’s 36-17 drubbing of the Steelers, the built-in excuse of losing Le’Veon Bell in the first quarter took out some of the oomph from what should have been a statement performance for this D. Sure, you can only play the opponent that’s in front of you; but the teams that have been in front of New England can’t hold Atlanta’s jockstrap when it comes to offensive output.

If Patriot fans don’t appear too nervous about the Falcons, you can understand their calm. New England stopped an offense of this caliber back in 2001 when they beat that same “Greatest Show on Turf” which Atlanta gets compared to. But remember, this Falcons team is far more disciplined than that St. Louis team. Atlanta tied New England for the fewest turnovers in the league, and only averaged 0.5 more penalties per game.

So should this game devolve into a shootout, the Patriots will be in trouble. In the last three seasons, New England is 2-5 when opponents score 30 or more points. This season, Atlanta was 4-2 in games under those same circumstances. The Falcons are better equipped to trade punches, with an offense that averages big plays on 9.35-percent of all offensive snaps.

Interestingly enough, the Patriots have never covered as a Super Bowl favorite, going 0-4 ATS. Their only covers came as a massive underdog to the Rams and in a pick ’em against Seattle.

Atlanta Falcons

Strategically, the recipe for how to stop Brady has already been written; yet few teams can get the measurements just right. It’s all about hitting him early and often and making him uncomfortable in the pocket with just a four-man rush. In his last 10 career losses, opponents averaged 2.6 sacks and 7.6 hits on Brady.

Football Outsiders had Atlanta’s defensive line ranked 24th in the league during the regular season, with an adjusted sack rate of just 5.4-percent. While the Falcons have managed to rack up five sacks this postseason, most of that pressure came off blitzes. Consistently rushing five or more against Brady is a quick way to get burned: he’ll just hit the unstoppable Julian Edelman, who is averaging eight catches and 95.8 yards over his last nine playoff games.

Another worrisome sign for the Falcons is their run defense. While it looked much sharper in the playoffs, they allow over 20 yards more per game (115.9) when playing away from the Georgia Dome. If they aren’t able to slow down LeGarrette Blount and the Pats run game, New England will be able to control the clock.

Finally, for the superstitious, the Falcons have literally chosen to don a red flag, as they’ll be wearing their home jerseys in the Super Bowl. The team wearing colors has lost 11 of the last 12 games.

The Play

OVER (59)

Sure it’s a bit of a cop out, but at this point in the week, both teams are such attractive plays. I, like many bettors, am waiting to see if the line will move one way or the other. Until then, the game total is where I’ll be looking. It’s the highest in Super Bowl history, and usually this game is anything but a shootout. Of the nine previous Super Bowls with a total of over 50, just three cleared the over.

But this year is different. It has the most offensive firepower in a game since Joe Montana’s 49ers met Dan Marino’s Dolphins in Super Bowl XIX (one of the few +50 totals that hit the OVER). The Falcons have gone UNDER in just two of 18 games this season. The Patriots haven’t had nearly as many OVERs down the stretch, but that’s because, as mentioned earlier, they were playing bottom-third offenses that couldn’t keep pace. We’ve gotten some shootouts in recent years, too, as three of the last four Super Bowls went OVER.

We already saw the Falcons clear the highest game total in playoff history in the NFC title game, and now with the Patriots help, they should be able to clear the highest mark in Super Bowl history. No matter who wins this game, the game total will be alive late in this one.

Photo Credit: Texas.713 (Flickr)[https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/2.0/]