Welcome to Week 5 of the 2024 Bad Beats roundup, a weekly column where Geoff Ulrich and I dissect the worst betting beats from around the NFL. 

First off, I just want to say: This is a safe space. The Betting Life team loads a ton of bets in our FREE Bet Tracker every week, and trust us, we don’t just do it for show. As much as we espouse the long-term profitability of our FantasyLife+ tools and projections, we, like anyone, also get caught up in the moment when things go against us (this is a fancy way of saying we like to whine like toddlers when we lose… especially on the bets we should have won!).

If you want a more specific breakdown of some of the biggest missed fantasy opportunities, also be sure to read Ian Hartitz’s “Sheesh Report,” a weekly feature of heartbreaking videos and stats, like Terry McLaurin failing to bring down a touchdown:

Ulrich’s Bad Beat No.1: Bengals Make the Blacklist

Before we talk about this game, which the Bengals somehow lost 41-38, here is the final stat line for Joe Burrow. 

  • 30 for 39 (77%), 5 TDs, 1 INT. 10.1 yards per attempt. 137.0 passer rating. 

This is about as perfect a game as you can pitch as a QB and, for history's sake, I can’t imagine the list of QBs who throw for five TDs in a game and still lose is relatively high. Unfortunately for Burrow and my wallet (which had the Bengals +3.0), the Bengals bungled pretty much every important late-down decision in this game and couldn’t make a stop on defense; a fatal combination. 

Cincinnati had the ball on the Ravens' 33-yard line on second and 15, with 3:03 left, and Baltimore down to one timeout. Not running on second down and burning the Ravens' last timeout — before you tried to win the game on third and long — made almost no sense at the time. The move nearly lost the Bengals the game in regulation after Burrow threw a pick into a Ravens secondary that you knew was going to be aggressive in going after the ball. 

Then, when their defense finally stepped up with a turnover in OT, the Bengals decided to get ultra-conservative on offense by running three times from the Ravens' 38 and forcing Evan McPherson to make a 53-yard field goal (shocker, he missed). 

McPherson being one of the most reliable kickers in the NFL, who went 4-of-5 on FGs from 50+ last year at home, is just another layer to this beat. However, I blame the coaches in this one. Better managing the clock and end-game strategy in regulation likely gets them the win, as does taking off your life preserver in the shallow end and throwing it once on your only offensive possession in OT. 

Alas, the Bengals did neither, and my +3.0 Bengals ticket (which looked like a lock 3+ times in this game) fell short and returned nothing this week.

LaMarca’s Bad Beat No. 1: Jaguars Get on the Board… Kinda

The Jaguars entered their Week 5 division showdown vs. the Colts at 0-4 straight up. They did manage to cover in two matchups (depending on what number you got in Week 1), but it had gone about as poorly as possible. Doug Pederson was on the hot seat, Trevor Lawrence was playing the worst football of his career and their once-promising defense had completely evaporated.

That said, the Jaguars managed to right the ship vs. Indianapolis. They put up 497 yards and 37 points, both of which were easily their top marks of the season. Lawrence threw for two scores, while the emerging Tank Bigsby added two more and eclipsed 100 yards for the first time in his career.

Unfortunately, things weren’t quite as smooth for Jaguars’ bettors.

The Jags closed at either -3.5 or -4.0 at most sportsbooks. That shouldn’t have been an issue. After Bigsby poured in his second touchdown, the team took a 14-point lead with just 5:09 to go in the fourth quarter. It should’ve been smooth sailing.

But Joe Flacco had other ideas. It started with a 45-yard bomb to Alec Pierce, which was initially ruled a touchdown and eventually put at the 1-yard line. No matter; Trey Sermon simply finished off the TD on the next play. The drive took all of 42 seconds.

The Jaguars got the ball back and proceeded to go three-and-out. They threw the ball on all three plays, and two of them were incomplete. Not only did they fail to pick up a first down, they didn’t even take any time off the clock.

The Colts got the ball back with ample time, and Flacco wasted little time connecting with Pierce for another deep ball. This time, there was no doubt about him scoring the touchdown:

Overall, the Colts scored 14 points in less than two minutes of game time. All of a sudden, we had a tie ball game.

The Jaguars would go on to win with a last-second field goal, but that was little solace to those who had a -3.5 or -4.0 ticket. It’s just another reminder of why getting the best number in sports betting always matters.

Ulrich’s Bad Beat No. 2: Antonio Pierce Hates Your Gardner Minshew Prop

This week wasn’t just painful on ATS bets and sides for me — the pain extended into the prop department as well. If you don’t follow already, every week I post a bunch of Underdog and PrizePicks Pick’em tickets in our Pick’em tracker. It’s been going well (+143u all time), but this week I missed out on another big cash thanks to one man and his apparent quick trigger finger. 

The Raiders/Broncos game was one I targeted extensively this week in props, as Las Vegas’ poor rush defense made this a great spot for some Javonte Williams overs. Javonte was coming off his best rushing game of the year. With Davante Adams out, the Raiders' targets would also be condensed for Jakobi Meyers, whose receiving over I paired with Gardner Minshew’s passing overs in several pick’em tickets. 

Everything was going great. Williams was rushing efficiently (even on a low carry volume) and the Raiders were trailing (great game script for more passing). Minshew/Meyers were about 70% of the way to hitting their overs and cashing this nice five-way ticket for me. 

Then Antonio Pierce decided to go “make a name for himself.” Despite Minshew going 2-2 this year (with a comeback win over one of the best teams in the league in Baltimore) and ranking inside the top 10 in EPA per play for much of the first three weeks, he still got the hook in the second half after throwing (gasp) two INTs. 

Look, Minshew made a couple of mistakes (one of the INTs was terrible), but this pull was a little sudden. The guy also orchestrated a perfect drive to start the game and won a game from behind in Week 2. It’s also not like we’re talking about a world-beater here in backup Aiden O’Connell, who couldn’t beat out Minshew in a QB battle this summer. 

Anyways, as you can see, the move killed my hopes of shipping this play and a few other tickets this weekend. I guess I’ll be more careful with the Raiders QB props (or just play more unders) going forward, because if 2-2 Minshew can get hooked that easy, then I don’t expect the leash on O’Connell will be very long, either. 

LaMarca’s Bad Beat No. 2: What Is You Doin’ Sean McDermott?

I get wanting to be aggressive with Josh Allen at quarterback. He’s one of the best players in football, maybe the best quarterback not named Patrick Mahomes. You don’t want to take the ball out of his hands.

But there’s a time and place for everything. It goes without saying that getting the ball with 32 seconds left, zero timeouts and at your own 3-yard line is not the spot to get aggressive. In a tie game, far more bad than good can come out of it.

Watching it happen in real time was mind-boggling. A shot on first-and-10? That's not what I would’ve done, but defensible. But after a near-pick that was broken up by offensive pass interference, it’s definitely time to play for overtime.

The Bills didn’t stop there. Allen dropped back again on second-and-10 and threw an incompletion. Then he did it again on third-and-10. Overall, the Bills killed just 16 seconds and were forced to punt the ball back to the Texans, who immediately returned the punt to Buffalo’s 46-yard line. One five-yard pass later, and Ka’imi Fairbairn drilled a game-winning 59-yard field goal.

I completely understand if the Bills are still a bit shell-shocked from the game vs. the Chiefs in the 2021 Divisional Round. Mahomes got down the field in less than 30 seconds; why couldn’t the Texans do it?

But the difference is the Chiefs had no choice. They were losing in that game and needed a FG to tie it. The Bills were already tied. They could’ve gone to overtime in a game where they had all the momentum: they had outscored the Texans 17-3 in the second half before Fairbairn’s game-winner. Instead, the Bills suffered their second consecutive loss.

Was this a true bad beat? I’m not sure. Frankly, I was on the Texans, so it worked out quite well for me. But this was one of the most head-scratching coaching decisions in recent memory. The Bills are still in the driver’s seat in the AFC East with the Jets stumbling and the Dolphins missing their starting quarterback, but this feels like an awful missed opportunity overall.

Ulrich’s Bad Beat No. 3 (Special Fantasy Edition): Pat Freiermuth, Not Like This…

I’ll keep this one short and sweet. I am in a Guillotine League (at guillotineleagues.com) with the rest of the fantasy and betting degenerates on Fantasy Life this year. Long story short, I was on the verge of making it through safely into next week (barely) until Pat Freiermuth took the lateral on the last play of the Sunday Night game against Pittsburgh and fumbled the ball back to Dallas. 

That play cost me 2.0 points and knocked me into second-last, where I now have to sit and hope Carson Steele and Travis Kelce don’t combine for more than 5.2 points. 

As far as bad beats go, getting your head chopped off because of a meaningless last-play fumble is about as bad as it gets. I’ll be back next week with more painful stories and hopefully a reattached frontal lobe.