Argos and Als square off for first in the East
Football Betting Lines
07/28/2010 -
Montreal, QC (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - With their touchdown drought now a memory, the
Montreal Alouettes turn their attention to the Toronto Argonauts as the two
clubs, tied for the lead in the CFL's Eastern Division, tangle at McGill
Stadium on Thursday night.
Even though Montreal finally put the brakes on an unhealthy run of being held
out of the end zone, last week the team leaned heavily on the kicking game in
order to get them over the hump. Damon Duval tied a career-high with seven
field goals as he helped lead the Alouettes to a commanding 37-14 win over the
visiting Hamilton Tiger-Cats last Thursday. Duval finished the night with 22
points as Montreal logged its third straight win after losing the season
opener to Saskatchewan in overtime, 54-51.
Quarterback Anthony Calvillo, who came up lame late in the first half but
returned to action, also had a strong outing as he converted 28-of-38 passes
for 309 yards and a pair of touchdowns, getting his team into the end zone for
the first time in six quarters when he struck in the fourth period.
As for the Argos, they tied their entire win total from a year ago (3-15) when
they slipped by British Columbia on Friday night, 24-20, at home at the Rogers
Centre. After starting slow and amassing just 10 points through the first
three quarters, Toronto got a late boost from quarterback Cleo Lemon and, more
importantly Byron Parker who returned an interception 41 yards for the go-
ahead score with under two-and-a-half minutes remaining in regulation.
For Parker, the pick-six was the seventh of his career, leaving him one shy of
the all-time CFL record.
Lemon, who absorbed a nasty hit from Solomon Elimimian but still managed to
work his way back into the huddle, converted 19-of-28 passes for 222 yards and
a pair of touchdowns. He was however, picked off twice and sacked three times
in the victory. Running back Cory Boyd posted his third straight 100-yard
rushing effort as he gained a game-high 148 yards on 19 carries, his 41-yard
burst in the fourth quarter setting up a clutch TD pass from Lemon to Brandon
Rideau.
Toronto has played far too many tight games in the early going and, after four
weeks of action, are the only team in the league with a winning record that
has allowed more points (108) than it has scored (103), and that certainly has
to be a concern for the coaching staff as they prepare for a Montreal squad
that has finally found an offense after hitting a dry spell.
Boyd has found his way through defenses for the most part, save for the season
opener when he was held in check, but that was a game in which all of the
Toronto offense was handled by Calgary to begin with. Considering this was an
Argos unit that was expected to be the easiest target in the CFL this season,
anything positive that goes on from here out should be considered a huge step
in the right direction. Boyd currently leads the league in yards from
scrimmage with 455 and is first overall in rushing with 431 yards on 66
carries, but he has just a single touchdown to his credit and that's not
enough to keep the pressure off his quarterback.
Lemon is not going to be able to elude defenders much longer if his offensive
line doesn't work harder to keep him upright. Of the quarterbacks who have
started all four games thus far, Lemon is at the bottom of the list with his
59.1 percent accuracy and has one more interception (four) than touchdown
(three). As a team, the Argos have the weakest passing attack in the league,
while Calvillo and Co. again have the top efficiency rating at 101.7 at this
stage.
If Lemon isn't careful this week, he's going to be exposed to a heavy dose of
John Bowman who, after leading the team last season with 12 sacks, the most in
a decade for a single Montreal performer, already has five quarterback
takedowns so far this season. Thanks in part to Bowman, who was named the CFL
Defensive Player of the Week after posting four sacks and two forced fumbles
in the win over Hamilton, Montreal is easily at the top of the turnover list
with a plus 10. No other team in the league has more than a plus-one in
turnovers, with Toronto being one of those squads.
Obviously as he showed last week, Parker has the ability to change the
complexion of a game with one quick burst to the end zone, but the Argos
cannot be waiting on Parker to carry them into the win column yet again,
especially with Calvillo finally getting his confidence and beginning to hit
his marks as everyone expects of the reigning MVP.
In terms of the all-time series between these two clubs, taking into account
regular season matchups dating back to 1946, the Alouettes own a mark of
101-80-3 at this juncture. The teams met three times in 2009 and Montreal
claimed each and every meeting by double figures, the last of which was a
42-17 final on November 7 on the road. The Als have in fact won six straight
encounters, the last victory for the Argos coming by a 16-9 score on October
20, 2007, which also happens to be the last time Toronto enjoyed a win streak
of at least three games as well.
The teams are set to face each other three more times during 2010, with an
August 14 date in Toronto and an October 29 meeting at the Roger Centre as
well, not to mention a November 7 affair back in Montreal to close out the
regular season.
The Argos have been getting by with smoke and mirrors the last few weeks and
at some point an opponent is going to make them pay. Expect Montreal and
Calvillo to call in that debt and take advantage of a weak Toronto offense on
the way to taking the top spot in the division.
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Who Makes the Sportsbook Betting Lines?
Las Vegas Sports Consultants (LVSC) is the world’s premier oddsmaking company and the most respected authority on making the lines. Mike Seba is a Senior Oddsmaker at LVSC and has been making lines for the last six years. In our extended interview, Seba explained that there are 4-5 oddsmakers assigned to make lines for each of the major sports (pro & college football and basketball; MLB, NHL, boxing, golf). Each of these oddsmakers bring unique opinions, strengths and weaknesses to the process. Oddsmakers at LVSC are professional sports junkies who love what they do and would probably do it for nothing if you asked them, but they do get paid for it. By necessity their approach is very research-oriented and concise, since with millions of dollars at risk there is little margin for error.
“You either have a passion for it or you don’t,” Seba said.
“The #1 thing for us is to make a line for each game that creates good two-way action. We do this by drawing from past experiences and applying them to current situations. People think it’s much more complicated, but it’s not. “
What are the Football Betting Lines Trying to Accomplish?
There is a common misconception that point spreads represent the oddsmakers’ prediction of how many points the favorite will win by. That is not the case at all – their intent is NOT to evenly split the ATS result between the teams; rather, their goal is to attract equal betting action on both sides. Stated another way, they want to create a line that half the people find appealing to bet one way while the other half find it appealing to bet the other way (known as ‘dividing the action’).
Divided action means the sportsbook is guaranteed a profit on the game because of the fee charged to the bettor (called juice or vig – typically $11 bet to win $10).
How the Opening Line Is Made
The opening line is the first line created by the oddsmakers, which is then sent out to sportsbooks. Of course there is an entire method to the madness on how the opening line is created. Seba explained that it all starts with each oddsmaker creating a line on each game based upon their own personal approach. This usually includes having up-to-date power ratings on each team.
Power ratings are the oddsmaker’s value of each team and are used as a guide to calculate a "preliminary" pointspread on an upcoming game. The power ratings are adjusted after each game a team plays. Examples of non-game factors that would require an adjustment to a team's power rating are key player injuries and player trades.
Once a game’s power rating based pointspread is determined, the oddsmaker will make adjustments to that line after considering each team's most recent games played and previous games played against that opponent. Also, adjustments are made after reading each team’s local newspapers to get a sense of what the coaches & players are thinking going into the game.
Since the oddsmaker’s ultimate goal is equally dividing the sports betting action, public perception and sportsbook betting patterns must be taken into account. For example, the public might have heavy betting interest week after week on a popular college football betting team such as USC. If an oddsmaker comes up with a preliminary line of USC -7, then an adjustment up to -7.5 or -8 would be made in response to the public’s expected USC bias.
The last step in the line-making process for each oddsmaker is taking one final look to determine whether or not the line "feels right." This is where common sense and past experience with how games are bet enters into the picture.
A round-table discussion among the 4-5 oddsmakers involved in making the line for each sport is then conducted and a consensus line is decided upon by the Odds Director before it is released to the sportsbooks. Of the 4-5 oddsmakers, generally the 2 most respected opinions are weighed more heavily by the Odds Director before he decides on the final line.
Once the opening line is released by LVSC, the individual sportsbooks decide if they want to make any adjustments before offering it to the public. Reasons for such adjustments include:
Experts working for the individual books having a strong opinion on the game
Individual books having players who consistently bet with certain tendencies (such as an extreme bias toward favorites or toward a certain popular team like USC)
The purpose of these adjustments, like all line adjustments, is to more equally divide the betting action.
Once betting begins, sportsbooks can adjust the line at any time. In doing so they attempt to make more attractive the team that is getting less action. By moving the line, sportsbooks can influence how the public bets on a particular game.
For example, if the pointspread on a game is 7 and most of the money is coming in on the underdog (taking the +7), sportsbooks will then move the number down to 6 ½ to try and attract money on the favorite.
Moving the line is the oddsmaker's effort to balance betting action, and often times such moves can have a major impact on a bettor’s decision. Oddsmakers can also change the line depending on various event-related factors such as player injuries or weather. Obviously, if the line comes out a week ahead of the event (which is the case in football), there is much that could happen during the week leading up to the event that could affect the line. Oddsmakers have to determine if any changes are necessary and send out an "adjusted line."
“The main objective is that our clients get equal action on both sides,” Seba said. “We’re not trying to pick the team that covers the spread, we’re trying to make it a coin flip, a tough decision (for the bettor). If we’ve done that, we’ve done our job.”
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