Illustration by ESPNBen SolakSep 8, 2026, 06:47 AM ETCloseBen Solak joined ESPN in 2024 as a national NFL analyst. He previously covered the NFL at The Ringer, Bleeding Green Nation and The Draft Network.Multiple AuthorsOpen Extended ReactionsThe start of the NFL season is closing in fast, which means casual and sharp sports bettors alike are gearing up to bet on the league.You will not reliably beat sportsbooks by betting on your favorite teams and players sight unseen. Sportsbooks have tons of data scientists and institutional knowledge working around the clock to set the best possible lines. It’s very difficult to beat them on your own.So, consume content.
Tail professional bettors who you are confident know their stuff and have a proven track record of profitably betting. Listen to NFL podcasts, watch NFL shows and make informed decisions.Betting should be fun, and that will only happen if two things are true: (1) you are betting with safe amounts of money and not chasing losses, and (2) you are enjoying the sweat and winning often enough that the hobby remains exciting. Studying well helps both.If you’re looking for the basics of betting, this is a good place to start. If you’re ready to talk strategy, here are some tips to help you on your way.Consider taking spreads and totals early in the week, before they moveIf you like getting your spread bets in mere minutes before kickoff, that’s fine — and it can be a rush, too.
But it’s not optimal. Look-ahead lines for NFL spreads and totals are often posted one week in advance — i.e., there are Week 6 lines available before Week 5 even kicks off — but taking these can be very risky, as injuries can dramatically affect lines. Those lookahead lines are taken down during the particular week’s action and then are reposted Sunday evening in anticipation of the following week.At the moment, you can get some good prices. Totals can move three points — sometimes more! — over the course of the week, and critically, they can roll right through key numbers.
Spreads can move much the same. If you were betting right after the Miami Dolphins’ 70-point bonanza against the Denver Broncos in Week 3 of the 2023 season, it may have been wise to grab the Dolphins against the spread, or the full game total, when the Week 4 line dropped on Monday. You’re anticipating a move in the market and trying to secure “closing line value” (CLV), a mathematical edge in which the ticket you’re holding has better odds than what are available right before kickoff.Betting early in the week comes with risks. Nagging injuries and subsequent availability won’t be made clear until Wednesday or even later, so betting early can get you burned.
But it’s generally a good practice, especially for those paying close attention to the league.Know your key numbersIn the NFL, unlike in basketball and in baseball, total scores and point margins are fairly discrete. Because points are largely scored in increments of seven (touchdowns) and three (field goals), certain point totals appear more than others, and certain winning margins are more common than others.Spreads are more significant than point totals here. There is a much bigger difference between a -6.5 favorite and a -7.5 favorite than there is between a -4.5 favorite and -5.5 favorite. By crossing the -7 line, the sportsbook is now suggesting the favorite will win by more than a touchdown — a much bigger deal than crossing the -5 line, which is a fairly meaningless margin of victory.
According to Covers.com, roughly 15% of games end with a three-point margin of victory and 9% finish with a seven-point margin of victory. When books post lines at -3.5 and -7.5, remember that multi-score victories are less frequent in the NFL than you might remember.Key numbers are far more esoteric, but still significant, when it comes to totals. Again, because an NFL total score is most often formed by some combination of sevens and threes, certain totals show up more than others. One of the most common NFL totals (five touchdowns, three field goals) is 44.
So are 51 (six touchdowns, three field goals) and 41 (five touchdowns, two field goals). As more teams attempt 2-point conversions in late-game situations, these totals diminish in significance slightly — but not enough to fall out of relevance.When considering taking a total, especially early in the week, look at how it has moved relative to key numbers. If a 50.5 total is taking money to the over, know that getting in before it moves to 51.5 is significantly more meaningful than getting 51.5 before it moves to 52.5. If a line has moved from 44.5 to 43.5, know that far more money to the under has adjusted that line than another game in which the total moved from 39.5 to 38.5.Strive to take unders on player propsTaking overs exclusively is swimming upstream.
There’s only one way to get to an over — playing and producing — but there are so many ways to get to an under. An in-game injury is the most obvious one, but other little edges also can make an impact. Amon-Ra St. Brown’s receiving over looks great against a pass defense until Jameson Williams takes the first play for a 70-yard touchdown; now the Lions have a lead and are less likely to pass.
Similarly, Jared Goff’s passing over looked great, but because the opposing offense never scored any points, the Lions didn’t need to throw in the second half.The betting advice that is most difficult to stomach is often the most shrewd. Here’s the tough reality: It’s hard to only take overs and succeed in your player prop betting, no matter how much more fun it is to root for an over than an under. Try to find reasons to bet an under, not excuses to bet an over.I’m not telling you never to take an over. But if your card only shows overs, you’re already at a mathematical disadvantage before a single kickoff.Stop betting parlaysBetting parlays: a great way to get a viral screenshot on social media and an even greater way to lose money.
With every leg you add to your parlay, you’re paying the sportsbook a greater and greater tax for placing the bet. You’re making your bankroll less powerful. Stop it.Of course, sportsbooks want you to build parlays, so they incentivize it with profit boost tokens and parlay forgiveness. Same-game parlays are even worse mathematical edges than traditional parlays, and, accordingly, those get double the incentives.
It can be easier to bet same-game parlays, and I certainly do, as those parlays tell a correlated story that regular parlays do not. But don’t overestimate your cleverness relative to the book’s. There are no deals in sports betting — the discount the sportsbook is offering you still gives the house the edge, and in the extremely few cases where that isn’t true, it’s a loss leader to get you hooked on betting parlays and chasing big wins.If you must bet parlays — which, again, you do not have to do, although I acknowledge they are very fun and I certainly bet them myself — only do so with the profit boosts and no-sweat tokens that at least make the house’s edge a little less sharp.Early bets to considerI gave out three seasonlong player props in this column last year, and each one hit. (I also gave out one ill-gotten long shot bet on the Tennessee Titans to make the playoffs, but let’s not dwell on that. This year, I have three more seasonlong player props that I still like at the current number, with my reasoning below.Jameson Williams receiving yards OVER 924.5 (-110)I cautioned you against taking too many overs above, and seasonlong overs are doubly dangerous.
But I like this Williams line quite a bit. Williams is a back-to-back 1,000-yard receiver playing for a Lions team that figures to run the ball a little less (given the departure of David Montgomery) and throw the ball a little more. Williams also vanished under offensive coordinator John Morton last season (14.5% target per route run, 1.43 yards per route run) and re-emerged when Dan Campbell took over
