NFL Wild Card Weekend Odds
After a wild finish to the NFL season, the playoff matchups are set in both the NFC and the AFC. Oddsmakers put in long hours Sunday night, crunching the numbers for this weekend’s lines.
In the NFC, the defending Super Bowl champion New Orleans Saints must head west to face the Seattle Seahawks, who are coming off an emotional win over the St. Louis Rams to win the NFC West crown.
Books, including Bodog, have the Seahawks set as big 10.5-point home underdogs versus a Saints squad looking to rebound from a disappointing loss to Tampa Bay in their season finale. New Orleans already has one win over Seattle, thumping the Seahawks 34-19 as 11-point chalk back in Week 7.
The Green Bay Packers are another team that needed a win in Week 17 to punch their postseason ticket. The Packers knocked off the Bears on Sunday and now visit the Philadelphia Eagles, who will be well rested after sitting their starters against the Cowboys this weekend.
Oddsmakers at Bodog have this spread just under a field goal at 2.5 in favor of the Eagles. This is a rematch of Week 1’s meeting between these teams. Green Bay took a 27-20 win then as 3-point favorites in Philadelphia.
The AFC Wild Card Weekend schedule features the Baltimore Ravens making the trip to Arrowhead Stadium to take on the Kansas City Chiefs. Oddsmakers seem to be all over the board with this line, setting Kansas City anywhere from +1 to +3.
This is unknown territory for most of the Chiefs, who are up against a veteran-savvy Ravens side that is 5-3 SU and 5-2-1 ATS on the road this year. Baltimore won the last two meetings with Kansas City in 2006 and 2009, covering the spread both times.
The final matchup in the AFC is a rematch of last year’s conference championship game between the Indianapolis Colts and the New York Jets. The Colts managed to win that contest 30-17 as 8-point favorites. This year, books have Indianapolis as a 2.5-point favorite at home Saturday.
The Colts have won four straight games heading into the playoffs, coming back to capture the AFC South title for the ninth straight year. The Jets, however, stumble into the playoffs with just two wins in their last five games, going 2-3 ATS in that span.