Another NFL season is here, and wow does time fly. Looking to cash in on some big opportunities in the preseason market. It is pretty well known that betting preseason football is quite a bit different than during regular season football due to coaching changes, preseason goals, shorter pre-season, quarterback changes, new coordinators, rule changes, and maybe the most important factors in motivation. Coaching philosophy is the single most important factor when handicapping pre-season football and it is imperative that we know what some of these coaches did in the past to try and accurately predict the future. Some coaches are very motivated to win preseason games, or at least certain ones, and some coaches do not care to win these games at all.
Since last NFL football season, there have been seven head coaching changes, and one rule change that could effect the way that these games are being played out. That rule change is a modification to the kickoff return. Touchbacks will now be moved to the 35 yard line instead of the 30. When the touchback is moved to the 35-yard line in 2025, it’s expected to encourage teams to kick the ball into the landing zone, therefore forcing a return, rather than simply gift their opponent an additional 5 yards.
As far as the coaching changes are concerned, we do have data on two of the coaches in Pete Carroll and Mike Vrable to make educated preseason motivational decisions. We hope to use this data and information to capitalize on a successful preseason from a sports betting perspective. It is also important to understand that we need a good sample size to start making determinations on what these coaches are more prone to do. I personally have to have at least eight games played, or three seasons of pre-season football to make a determination. As said earlier, some coaches are very bullish on winning games that have zero significance to what their record will be at the end of the season, and some coaches do not care whatsoever and will instead be a lot looser with their play calling, and very liberal on which athletes that they will put into play the game. Coaches that want to win in the preseason will play a lot of their good 1st, 2nd and 3rd string players and determine if their lower tier players will make the team during training camp and OTAs. They also like to stick to their main playbook without fear of showing their hand in the preseason. Other coaches that do not care much at all about winning will tend to play their worst players to determine if they will make the team during the preseason games rather than in practice or OTAs. These “bearish” coaches will also try out a lot of new plays during the games that were created in the offseason, or plays that were never a factor in their playbook in the previous years.
Unfortunately, coaches come and go and every year we seem to lose at least one money maker. After last season we had to say goodbye to coach Dennis Allen who was 8-13 at 31%. This guy was so bad that he may actually had been trying to win. On the other side of things, we had to say goodbye to Matt Eberflus from the Bears who was 8-2 or 80% preseason win rate. The only games that he could win were in the preseason. Lastly, we way goodbye to Robert Saleh who was an amazing 10-2 in the preseason. An 83% win rate was nice, but there is much less than an 83% chance that he will be back at coaching anytime soon. Rough hits to the pocket book if you ask me.
For 2025, some of the most winning coaches who will be paying our bills will be:
- Mike Tomlin at 41-23 at 64% – Although he somehow went 0-3 last season. Small sample size.
- Pete Carroll at 28-21 at 57% – Pistol Pete is back and stronger than ever. Now in Vegas, he can make his fans and bettors happy.
- John Harbaugh at 45-16 at 74% – Not a great last two years, but hey, his backup quarterbacks pretty much sucked.
Some of the most losing coaches who could also help pay some bills are:
- Dan Quinn at 7-17 at 29% – Losing in the preseason means winning in life.
- Nick Siriani at 3-7 at 30% – Super bowl preseason hangover is coming.
- Zac Taylor at 3-12 at 20% – Let’s just piss off the rest of the team.
There also is a lot of up and comers with coaches like Demeco Ryans at 5-2 at 71% as well as Brian Callahan at 3-0 at 100%, and Nick Siriani at 3-7 at 30%.
When looking at coaching records, it is also very important to look at how they approach the preseason. We must be cognizant enough to know what these coaches do in the beginning, the middle and at the end. Looking in the past for many of these coaches, they use to have four preseason games rather than three. I basically had to combine weeks two and three for the NFL Preseason before 2021. Some of the significant data that we found show that Jon Harbaugh is 15-2 in game one but only 9-8 at the final week. Maybe be a little more careful with that. Another look is Dan Quinn who is 1-10 in the middle weeks or what is now looked at as week 2, yet 4-2 in the final week. Another coach to look at Sean Payton who is 19-11 in the middle weeks yet 5-11 in the final. If you want an extra edge in your handicapping, looking at these week to week records could certainly help.
I know what you are thinking. Why are you giving me coaching records per game rather than straight ATS? Well, the reason for this is that preseason spreads are usually very small due to the fact that the best teams are not always trying to win and the worst teams might have some more skin in the game when it comes to QB competition. The winning team usually covers, so motivation can be read more easily just based on the coaching records.
A few things to keep in mind for 2025. The preseason schedule remains only three games. Even though this change is still at it’s youth, I do not think that it factors in much to what these coaches do with respect to their history in the in the first game, the middle game, and in their last game.
In summary, it can certainly be profitable to bet preseason football if you understand how some of these coaches approach their season juxtaposed with what some of these other teams want to accomplish. If you have any questions about this, feel free to tweet me @OBKiev or @TheOddsBreakers.
