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We had another profitable week last week, going 4-2 on our Sunday Best Bets. Let's keep it rolling this week with some more spread and total picks from our team of experts.
Below you'll find our picks for the best bets to make on Sunday of Week 8 of the NFL season. Remember, you can always compare NFL lines and odds by sportsbooks here.
Sunday Best Bets Season Record: 39-23-1 (+17.55 units)
Best Sunday Bets – NFL Week 8 Picks
- Denver Broncos vs Jacksonville Jaguars UNDER 40.5
- New Orleans Saints vs Las Vegas Raiders OVER 49.5 Points (Competing Picks)
- New Orleans Saints vs Las Vegas Raiders UNDER 49.5 (Competing picks)
- Detroit Lions vs Miami Dolphins OVER 51.5
- Jacksonville Jaguars –2.5 vs Denver Broncos
- New York Giants +3 @ Seattle Seahawks
Denver Broncos vs Jacksonville Jaguars UNDER 40.5 – 9:30 am
Rob O’Connor is a veteran sports handicapper. He broke into the industry in 2002 and has continued to provide high quality sports handicapping advice ever since.
The Denver Broncos travel across the pond to London to take on the Jacksonville Jaguars in Week 8.
The Broncos are worst in the league in scoring, averaging only 14.3 points per game. The Jaguars are a middle-of-the-pack offensive team averaging just over 22 points per game.
Now they run into the 3rd best scoring defense in the league in the Denver Broncos who allow only 16.4 points game. The Broncos are also 2nd best in yards allowed giving up only 286 yards per game, so the Jaguars will not find points easy to come by Sunday.
The least effective area of the Broncos defense is the run defense where they do allow opponents 112.9 yards per game. So look for the Jaguars 9th ranked rushing offense to try and exploit that on Sunday.
On the other side, the Broncos offense has been absolutely abysmal so far this season. They will get Russell Wilson back at QB but he has not been the QB the Broncos were expecting to get. He is only completing 58.6% of his passes and has been sacked 20 times so far on the season.
The Jacksonville defense is allowing only 19.6 points per game.
With the travel involved for this game, two strong defenses should have the advantage over suspect offensive play, take the UNDER.
New Orleans Saints vs Las Vegas Raiders OVER 49.5 (Competing Picks) – 1 pm
Ernie Horn is a veteran newspaper writer with 25 years of experience. As a bettor, Ernie has exceeded 60% of his predictions over the past three years.
When the Las Vegas Raiders square off against the New Orleans Saints Sunday in the Caesars Superdome, both fan bases will be staring at two squads in similar situations.
Both teams are led by a new head coach and have dealt with a slew of injuries that have derailed their early-season progress.
The Raiders head east this week in search of their first road victory of the season. Las Vegas has won two of their past three games after starting the season 0-3. All four of the Raiders losses have been by a combined 14 points.
The Saints received an extra two days off as the team returned home in search of its third win.
QB Jameis Winston is healthy now after missing nearly a month as he’s dealt with back and foot injuries, but Andy Dalton is expected to get the start. He’ll be joined by Alvin Kamara, the do-it-all running back that had over 100 total yards last week in a loss to the Cardinals.
Both the Saints and the Raiders have gone over in four of their last five games, and the final point total in those 10 games has exceeded 50 points all but twice.
Expect a final score in the upper 50s for this matchup.
New Orleans Saints vs Las Vegas Raiders UNDER 49.5 (Competing Picks) – 1 pm
Kyler Wolff is a sports writer with a passion for football & statistical analysis. He uses his knowledge of the game and ability to break down stats to make the best picks.
This is a very interesting game. Both teams have really struggled this year, which is why their combined record is 4-9, (Raiders 2-4, Saints 2-5) but both teams have the talent to turn it around this season and are going into this game hoping that this week will be the one that it all finally clicks.
You best believe that these two teams are going to play with the highest intensity possible like it’s a playoff game, and they are going to try and play to their strengths, which is high-octane, fast-paced offenses. They both rank in the top 10 in points per game (Raiders are third with 27.2 ppg and the Saints are seventh with 25 pp), and they both have playmakers all over the field on that side of the ball.
On the defensive side, both teams are again, eerily similar, with weak defenses that are both at the top of the list of teams that give up the most points. The Saints are the second-worst defense, giving up 28.6 ppg, and the Raiders are seventh worst with 25 ppg.
As you can tell by the numbers, these two teams are as closely matched up as you can get, in terms of offensive and defensive production and conventional wisdom would suggest that this will be a high-scoring affair—perhaps a good ol’ fashioned shootout—but sometimes the numbers don’t tell the whole story.
Injuries threaten to derail what should have been a fun offensive showcase. Both sides have key offensive players hurt including Josh Jacobs, Davante Adams, Michael Thomas, and both Saints’ top tight ends.
With this being such an important game for both teams, they are both likely trying to gameplan and strategize around their loss of talent.
This typically takes the form of small ball, winning the field possession battle, and focusing on putting up just enough points, not necessarily running up the score.
Detroit Lions vs Miami Dolphins OVER 51.5 – 1 pm
Rob O’Connor is a veteran sports handicapper. He broke into the industry in 2002 and has continued to provide high quality sports handicapping advice ever since.
The Lions may be 1-5 on the season, but they have been extremely competitive at home, beating the Commanders and losing to the Eagles and Seahawks by a field goal in each game.
The Lions offense has been one of the best in the league this year, putting up 395.2 yards per game, good for 4th in the league.
The three Lions home games have been averaging over 76 points per game on the season.
The Lions defense is worst in the league in both yards and points allowed.
The Dolphins should have no trouble scoring enough points to keep with the Lions offense. While the Dolphins are only averaging 21 points per game, they are 10th in total yards with 367.2 yards per game.
The Dolphins are 2-1 to the over on the road this year and the Lions are 3-0 to the over at home on the season.
The Lions like to throw the ball 56.4% of the time and the Dolphins even with all the QB injuries they have dealt with this year are throwing the ball 62.5% of the time.
The Dolphins have Tua Tagovailoa healthy at QB which will help their 3rd ranked passing offense.
Lots of passing usually leads to lots of points and it shouldn’t be any different on Sunday.
Take the over in this one.
Jacksonville Jaguars –2.5 vs Denver Broncos – 9:30 am
Kyler Wolff is a sports writer with a passion for football & statistical analysis. He uses his knowledge of the game and ability to break down stats to make the best picks.
The Jaguars are once again hosting a game in England—their home away from home—and potentially…future home? Probably not, but that’s not the bet I want to talk about. The bet I want to talk about is this spread on this one.
The Jaguars are the favorites in this matchup, but not really because they are so good. It’s more so because the Broncos have been so bad. With or without Russell Wilson, the Broncos are still underdogs in this one at +2.5.
Following a heartbreaking loss after falling one yard short of a game winning touchdown last week against the 6-1 Giants, the Jaguars have a much easier opponent this week, one that has shared the same fate as them over the last month. Both the Jaguars and the Broncos are on four-game losing streaks.
Even though both teams are equally struggling, I’d much rather be the Jaguars than the Broncos. The Broncos offense has been lethargic and at times appearing completely broken. Their defense is demoralized and uninspired, and the big man on campus, Russel Wilson, the guy that they leveraged their future on, is having the worst season of his career. To make matters worse, he’s also hurt. The Jaguars, on the other hand, are young, hungry, and energized.
The best stat that illustrates this gap in motivation and momentum is the point differential. Take a peek at these numbers: Jaguars score 2.5 more points per game than they give up, and the Broncos give up 2.1 points per game more than they score. That’s a 4.6-point differential that illustrates that even though both teams are struggling in the standings, the Jaguars have been the far superior team, they should be able to cover that spread easily.
New York Giants +3 @ Seattle Seahawks – 4:25 pm
Ernie Horn is a veteran newspaper writer with 25 years of experience. As a bettor, Ernie has exceeded 60% of his predictions over the past three years.
In a surprise matchup of division leaders, the New York Giants fly across the country in search of their seventh win of the season against the Seattle Seahawks.
The history between these two teams is surprising. New York last made the trip across the country in 2020, securing a 17-12 win in early December. Prior to that, longtime Seattle coach Pete Carroll had won four straight games against the Giants, winning by an average of 18 points in those four contests.
History is not on the Seahawks side this time. Seattle has yielded the second-most rushing yards in the NFL this season, giving up nearly 150 yards each game.
New York’s strength is its running game. The Giants are averaging over 170 rush yards through seven games, the second-most in the NFL this season. New York RB Saquon Barkley is second in the league with 726 yards on a league-best 143 attempts.
Expect New York to control this game from the start. When the Seahawks last faced a mobile QB—Arizona’s Kyler Murray—Seattle had no answer for them as Murray ran for 100 yards in a 19-9 win. While Giants QB Daniel Jones is no Murray, New York does have a mobile runner behind center.
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