Time to check in on a couple teams going in surprising…and opposite directions. The boys of Bet the EDGE dove into one team from the NFC and one from the AFC. Each has seen their respective season take a turn.
Stock Up! Green Bay Packers
Seems like all of a sudden, the Packers are playing pretty good football. How did that happen? Matt LaFleur (+2000 Coach of the Year) was overrated, and Jordan Love (+20000 MVP) was on his way out of the league according to many of the so-called experts.
Drew Dinsick (@whale_capper) believes the coach was always good. The renaissance has everything to do with their quarterback, Jordan Love.
“He looks very, very much in control of what he is being asked to do and what the situation calls for at a given time in the game. He’s improved his ability to perform in the first half substantially from what we saw in the beginning of the year, which was in a large way leading to the Packers being at huge deficits and having to fight for their lives in these games. Now they’re playing from ahead all of a sudden. It’s a totally different story.”
Bet the Edge is your source for the day in sports betting. Get all of Jay Croucher and Drew Dinsick’s insight weekdays at 6AM ET right here or wherever you get your podcasts.
Jay Croucher (@croucherJD) concurs.
“I make the Packers (-230 to make the playoffs) right now a 69% chance to make the playoffs so they should be in. I think it’s impressive as well they’re doing this without Jaire Alexander who hasn’t played in a month. It just feels like every week he’s coming back, and he just never comes back…He’s arguably the most important player on their defense…Aaron Jones, who’s been their most reliable skill player for a couple of years now…he’s been out too.”
Stock Down! Kansas City Chiefs
Frankly, as much as we are all expecting KC to turn things around, it is becoming more and more likely they simply are not good enough this season.
Jay Croucher summed it up earlier today.
“I think the answer for why it’s worse is just everyone has gotten a little bit worse. Kelce is not the same guy as he was last year MVS has gotten worse. They got a lot out of Jerick McKinnon in the second half of last year and he’s just been a nonfactor this season…it’s just very uninspiring. Mahomes (+850 MVP) hasn’t completed a 40-yard pass in six weeks. That is completely insane.”
Dinsick also finds fault in the defense of late.
“That unit has problems. I know that I was very laudatory of the kind of backyard difficult to defend nature of the Packers’ offense but there were some very clear opportunities for the Chiefs’ defense to get off the field...get the ball back to Mahomes and they could not do it. I am nervous about that. There is a very decent chance you’ve seen the best of the Chiefs’ defense, and it was earlier this season and that this is a little bit of a regression coming down the homestretch as they have been asked to do quite a lot of football. And oh, by the way, this Chiefs’ defense is going to be continually at a rest disadvantage the rest of the season.”
No doubt Kansas City will qualify for the postseason, but their path looks like it will include road playoff games which is foreign territory for Mahomes.
Enjoy the games and enjoy the sweat.
*odds courtesy of DraftKings
