Why Are the Giants and Jets Still Considered Underdogs?
Every day I read what the New York Times editors have to say about the Giants-Redskins game. I had to laugh when an April 11 article pointed out that the Giants are really only 1-3 against the spread:
Eighth-year coach Ben McAdoo and the Redskins are the favored team in this matchup because he’s won them all. The Giants are 2-6 against the spread heading into this game, and it’s not even a particularly close game. The Giants have won two of the three games in which they were listed as the favorite and the two games in which they were listed as the home team. The other two games were both close decisions: The Giants were listed as the home team, and both of them were, and the Giants even held a 23-17 lead. In those two close decisions, they did manage to win, but the way in which they won those games really has nothing to do with the spread.
A similar thing happened last season with the Giants up by a point:
Eighth-year coach Ben McAdoo was 0-7 against the spread against the Giants last year, and the Giants are 3-5. But the Giants have won more times than any other team against the spread this season, and it’s a huge difference against a team coming off a win. And there wasn’t a lot of doubt about which team it would be.
You get the point. For the Giants, the NFL regular season is basically a matter of one-game wins. And even when they lose, they’re 3-5 (not 4-5), which I’d view as a good performance because they’re very likely to win the next game.
But for the record, it’s not the Giants they’ll be playing at Washington. Washington is 10-1 against the spread this season, and they have to be considered, at least from Week 13, a legitimate contender for the final home playoff game. Since the Giants are 2-6 on those occasions, that means that the Giants will probably be underdogs in each of their remaining three Sunday games. That should make for some very entertaining football.
And when you consider that the Giants could easily have a game scheduled against a 2
