Week 6 Sunday Night Football Betting Breakdown. Best Bets for Giants @ Bills
If you’ve been waiting all day for Sunday night, I’m not entirely sure what exactly you’ve been waiting for. Sorry, Carrie Underwood.
For the fourth time in six weeks, the Giants will grace our TVs for a primetime contest. If you can’t tell, I’m using the word “grace” very sarcastically. New York has arguably been the worst team in football this season, currently ranking 31st in yardage differential and ranking dead last in scoring differential.
The Bills are just 3-2, but they are still one of the best teams in the league. Buffalo did have a slip-up last week in London, but they should be ready to reassert their dominance in Week 6.
Let’s dive into all the betting angles for Sunday Night Football.
New York Giants at Buffalo Bills
- Spread: Bills -14.5 (-115; BetMGM)
- Total: 44
- Moneylines: Giants +675 / Bills -1100
In addition to the Giants’ straight-up struggles, they’ve also been a disaster against the spread. New York is now 0-5 ATS on the year, and no NFL team has cost bettors more money than the Giants have thus far in 2023.
Historically, teams that have been this bad ATS tend to become strong targets in the betting market. In fact, teams on an ATS losing streak of five games or more have gone 85-62-4 ATS since 2005. That’s a 57.8% cover rate which has been good for a +11.9% return on investment.
That said, it’s hard to make a buy-low case for the Giants given their current injury situation. The team will be without Andrew Thomas and Saquon Barkley once again on Sunday night, and Daniel Jones will be joining them on the sidelines in Buffalo. This leaves the team without their top three offensive players.
Things only get worse from there. Two additional offensive linemen have been ruled out, another two offensive linemen are questionable, and pass-rusher Azeez Ojulari has been ruled out.
The Bills are significantly healthier, so the only potential snag is that they'll be adjusting to a return from overseas. Teams returning from a game in Europe the prior week without the luxury of a bye week to reacclimate have struggled mightily:
Obviously, if Buffalo follows the same trend this week and doesn’t lead at some point during the fourth quarter, it’s going to be pretty damn tough to cover a spread of more than two TDs.
Sunday Night Football Best Bet: Bills -14.5 (-115, BetMGM)
All that being said, I’m going to keep this one pretty simple. I don’t care if the Bills are returning from London, Australia, or the moon – this game should not be close.
The Giants have been a disaster all season, and this will be easily the worst team that they’ve put on the field. Without their entire starting backfield and potentially five offensive linemen, I’m not sure how this team will manage to move the ball much against a tough (albeit banged-up) Buffalo defense.
New York's offensive line injuries loom particularly large. The Giants’ offensive line ranks dead last in both Pro Football Focus (PFF) pass blocking and run blocking grades, and they could somehow be even worse than they've been so far on Sunday night.
Oct 8, 2023; London United Kingdom, Buffalo Bills quarterback Josh Allen (17) throws the ball against the Jacksonville Jaguars during the first half of an NFL International Series game at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Kirby Lee-USA TODAY Sports
14.5 feels like a lot of points, but this number is as high as 15.5 at some locations. Josh Allen has also historically been a strong investment after a loss, having posted a record of 13-9-2 ATS. That includes a 9-5-2 mark as a favorite, so I’m not overly worried about the points.
The Giants already have four losses by at least 15 points this season, and I expect it to be five by the end of Sunday night.
I'll take the Bills -14.5 in primetime.
You can tail the Bills at BetMGM, where you can get up to $1,500 paid back in bonus bets if your first bet does not win by signing up below!
Sunday Night Football Player Props
One of my favorite tools at Fantasy Life is the Player Prop Tool, which allows you to compare our current projections to the various prop betting lines across the industry.
There are a few wagers that stand out as appealing when using the tool for this matchup.
James Cook Over 1.5 receptions (-172, FanDuel)
- Bet To: Over 1.5 (-200) or Over 2.5 (+110)
- Fantasy Life Projection: 2.9
Don’t be scared of the -172 odds on the over. It’s definitely steeper than we’d ideally like to pay, but it still represents a nice value. -172 translates to an implied probability of 63.24%, but I think that the true odds are closer to 75%.
Cook isn’t a true bell-cow RB for Buffalo, but he’s pretty darn close. That includes healthy utilization in the passing attack. He's seen a 10% target share and has been targeted on 17% of his routes run through the first five weeks. Plus, Cook has logged at least two catches in all but one game this season, and he's caught three passes or more in three games in 2023.
Damien Harris Over 17.5 Rushing Yards (-114, FanDuel)
- Bet To: Over 18.5 (-120)
- Fantasy Life Projection: 17.1
Our projection team isn’t nearly as bullish on this prop, but I’m fine with flying solo on this one. Harris has been a larger part of the team’s rushing attack over the past two weeks, garnering 22% and 27% of the carries. Given the game script, there should be plenty of work to go around against the Giants in the second half.
The Bills blew out three straight teams from Weeks 2 through 4, and Buffalo had a dropback rate of 54% or less in each of those contests. If the Bills can establish a big lead against the Giants, Harris should be looking at somewhere between five and seven carries. He averaged six carries in the team’s three previous blowouts and gained an average of 25.7 rushing yards per game in those games.
You can tail the Cook and Harris props on FanDuel Sportsbook, where you can get $200 in bonus bets when you sign up and place your first bet of $5 or more!
Tyrod Taylor Over 175.5 Passing Yards (-115, BetMGM)
- Bet To: Over 175.5 (-125)
- Fantasy Life Projection: 189.1
Taylor's current projection provides a solid edge over the betting line, but I think that he has a wide range of outcomes. It’s important to remember that mean projections are different than medians, and there are going to be plenty of outings where Taylor is held below this figure.
Still, even a backup QB should be able to get to 200 passing yards more often than not, especially since we've seen Taylor play competently in the past.
Taylor is going to have to overcome plenty of adversity behind a shaky offensive line and with an uninspiring group of pass-catchers. However, the game script should play in his favor. The Giants will likely be forced into a situation where they have to throw the ball a lot in the second half, and the Bills could play softer coverage if this game is a blowout as projected.
Oct 8, 2023; Miami Gardens, Florida, USA; New York Giants quarterback Tyrod Taylor (2) runs with the football against the Miami Dolphins during the fourth quarter at Hard Rock Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Sam Navarro-USA TODAY Sports
I wouldn’t go crazy with this number, but there’s definitely some value in taking the over on this.
James Cook Anytime Touchdown (+105; DraftKings)
TD props are a slightly divisive prop betting option. Some bettors swear by them while others hate them. Personally, I tend to fall into the latter category. I just don’t think that the odds of TD props are tempting enough to justify a ton of effort.
Fortunately, Geoff Ulrich doesn’t mind diving into some touchdown props, and he’s highlighted Cook for Sunday Night Football:
"I’m honestly a little surprised that we can still get Cook as an anytime TD scorer at better than even money. The Giants are terrible tacklers, a fact that has been reflected in the seven rushing TDs that they've now ceded to opposing RBs this season.
Cook may be in a “red-zone timeshare” with Latavius Murray and Damien Harris, but he's still seen eight red-zone touches on the season and should be in a spot to bounce back quickly after he was limited to just five rush attempts and three catches in Week 5."
For more analysis, make sure to check out Geoff’s complete breakdown of Week 6 TD scorer props.
You can tail the Cook anytime TD on DraftKings, where you can sign up to get $200 in bonus bets by placing an initial bet of $5 or more. Click below to get started!
Same-Game Parlay
Same-game parlays (SGPs) are about telling a story. Will the Bills cruise to an easy victory, or will the Giants keep this game competitive? There are ways to tell yourself a story to correlate your SGP and profit.
As usual, we’ll be attempting to build a correlated SGP for Sunday Night Football. The Broncos let us down on Thursday, failing to cover by the hook, but the thesis behind our play was still sound.
If you’re doing SGPs correctly, you want to construct them so that if one leg hits, the other legs are likely to hit as well.
I clearly like Buffalo in this matchup, so I’m starting my SGP with the spread. A massive spread is actually pretty convenient for SGPs since the Bills are going to have to dominate in order to cover. That makes it easier to know what the rest of our card should look like.
I’m going to focus the rest of my SGP on the Bills’ ground attack. I’ll piggyback off Geoff's bet and take Cook for an anytime TD, and I’ll also add at least 75 combined rushing and receiving yards. This also pairs well with the Taylor passing over we discussed above.
And finally, let’s add a leg on at least 25 rushing yards for Allen. We have him projected for more than 30 rushing yards in this matchup, so there’s a decent bit of cushion.
Add it all up, and it looks something like this:
Good luck in Week 6! You can tail the SGP on BetMGM, where you can also get up to $1,500 paid back in bonus bets if your first bet does not win! Simply sign up below to start betting TODAY!
