I’m not a gambler, and so I don’t usually follow the betting lines on NFL games, but I did hear yesterday that the Falcons are favored by 1 point in Saturday night’s match-up.
Well, this much I do know about NFL betting: home field is typically worth 3 points in a betting line. Which is to say that Vegas thinks Green Bay would beat the Falcons on a neutral field.
Think about that for a moment… The Green Bay Packers, who have a third of their starters in IR, are still considered a better team than the #1 seed in the NFC. Remarkable.
No wonder Steve Wyche at NFL.com is not referring to our team as the Packers, but rather as “The Team No One Wants to Face.” And I wonder if that is especially true of the Falcons. After all, when you beat an opponent as narrowly as they beat us a few weeks ago, you usually feel like you’ve escaped, like you’ve dodged a bullet, like “Whew, that was a close one!” Typically, like at the end of Rocky, you don’t want a rematch with that opponent. But now we’re coming to town again, and I’ve got to think that Falcon fans are nervous about it.
Meanwhile, let’s return for a moment to this matter of Green Bay being the de facto favorite on a neutral field against the #1 seed…
I remember hearing a story quite a few years ago -- I think it was during the heyday of Rick Pitino’s Kentucky Wildcats -- that someone asked one of the other SEC basketball coaches, “We all know that Kentucky is the best team in the Conference. But who is the second best team?” And the SEC coach replied, “Kentucky’s bench.”
That’s how dominant, how stacked, how deep that squad was.
Could it be that the Green Bay Packers are similarly deep? If that’s true, I should take back much of what I’ve said (and thought!) about Ted Thompson.
If this injury-plagued Packer team is still considered a better team than the #1 seed, just think how good we’ll be when all are starters are back on the field when the 2011 season opens!
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