Will late sharp action affect Wild Card lines?

The lines for the four NFL Wild Card games were released not long after the matchups were determined, and there wasn’t much movement in Las Vegas for three of those games all week.

The Ravens-Steelers matchup opened at Pittsburgh -3 and stayed there (because it’s Ravens-Steelers, the easiest line to set in all of sports); the Colts were initially 4-point favorites over the Bengals, but it moved only a half-point to -3.5; finally, Detroit vs. Dallas (-7) saw the favorite lose a half-point and land on a key number.

The Cardinals-Panthers game, featuring two teams heading in opposite directions, made up for the relative lack of movement in the other three. Bettors hammered Carolina, moving them from 4.5-point favorites to -7 to (currently) -6.5.

Now that the first day of Wild Card weekend is finally here, the current lines aren’t expected to move much (if at all), according to one prominent Las Vegas bookmaker.

“I know the Cowboys and the Colts are going to be the two public plays this weekend,” said Jay Kornegay, VP of the Westgate Las Vegas SuperBook. “But even though the public is going to be all over those teams, I don’t think the sharps are going to let those numbers run too much.”

Kornegay said the SuperBook took sharp action on Cincinnati when they first opened as 4-point underdogs, and even with Bengals receiver A.J. Green listed as doubtful, he doesn’t see much buyback coming.

“I’m really surprised [the line] hasn’t gone back up to four, but I don’t think the sharps have a lot of confidence in a one-dimensional Colts team,” he said. “Getting +3.5 or +4 in a close game is really appealing to a lot of sharps out there.”

The Detroit-Dallas game is the polar opposite—there are no injury concerns affecting the line and the score isn’t projected to be close. Dallas is a fringe Super Bowl contender, and Detroit’s biggest weapon (Calvin Johnson) hasn’t been healthy all season, which explains why the Cowboys are 7-point home favorites and likely to remain so.

The Baltimore-Pittsburgh line will likely only see a change to the vig, not the number. The juice at the Mirage has bounced between -110 and -120, and Station Casinos are currently showing Pittsburgh -3, -120. Like we said earlier: It’s the Ravens and the Steelers, which by law means the home team must be favored by three.

SUPER BOWL FUTURES

Kornegay said the SuperBook isn’t sweating any long shot futures bets this year. But even if he and his staff were exposed to a 50-to-1 underdog (for example), it wouldn’t be keeping him up at night.

The New England Patriots and the Seattle Seahawks are heavy favorites to meet in Super Bowl XLIX. They’re both listed between 11-to-5 and 5-to-2 to lift the Lombardi Trophy, depending on where you look, and those odds could probably stand to be a little shorter. The Green Bay Packers (11-to-2) and the Denver Broncos (6-to-1) are next in line on the futures board, but the chances of those teams going on the road and upsetting Seattle and New England are remote, in Kornegay’s opinion.

“The NFL has always recently produced a hot team that has made some noise in the playoffs,” he said. “But I think there’s a pretty big gap between the Patriots at home and the rest of the AFC, and between the Seahawks at home and the rest of the NFC.”

Relative long shots like Dallas or Pittsburgh have tough roads ahead of them if they are to claim the NFL’s annual mantle of “Hot Playoff Team.” The Cowboys’ road to the Super Bowl would likely go through Green Bay and Seattle, while the Steelers—who may be without star running back Le’Veon Bell for an extended period of time—have to win a tough game with division-rival Baltimore before going on the road to Denver and then potentially New England.