The Circa Million and Westgate SuperContest are examples of NFL Pick ’Em contests.
Most will have five picks per week over the 18 weeks of the NFL season. The lines come out at a designated time and do not move, so every contestant has the same set of point spreads available to them.
That is a very important point because it can dictate your strategy from the start or as the season goes along.
Keep that in mind as you read along. There are only 90 points possible in a traditional contest — one point for a win, a half-point for a push, and zero points for a loss. That means that the margin for error is very thin in the quest to cash.
Here are some potential strategies applicable to most NFL pick ‘em contests:
Play the ‘stale’ lines
This is a really popular contest strategy. The NFL betting market is the most efficient one there is, so line moves should be taken seriously. If a contest line is -2½ and the betting market line is -3½, that creates a really good opportunity to take a favorable position in a contest setting because 3 is such an important number. The same is true of a number like 7, if a line is +7½ in a contest and moves to +7 or +6½.
Sometimes you’ll get an even more obvious example like when a quarterback gets hurt on Friday or is ruled out. For example, if Patrick Mahomes were to be ruled out in Week 1, the Broncos would flip to a favorite. If that announcement came down Friday, it would be really hard not to take Denver with that much line value. Those opportunities will come up throughout the season for sure.
Fade the consensus
A lot of people believe that the public is largely flipping coins when it comes to betting. They’re going to win 50 percent of the time. If you can isolate the sides that will be the most popular from a groupthink standpoint in a contest, it could be good to go against those teams.
It can create a two-point swing in a contest where there are a finite number of picks and a set number of chances to earn points. In something like the Circa Million, the maximum number of picks is 90, so these potential two-point swings can be extremely valuable.
In larger contest pools like that one, this could be a more useful strategy because there is more incentive in being creative and different because you can’t just follow the masses and win all the same games they do and lose all the same games they do.
Play half-point lines
There is a lot of game theory that goes into contest participation. One element of that mindset is to only play games where a push is not possible. A push isn’t a loss, but it isn’t a win either. In most cases, a push is worth a half of a point. There is often more equity in taking the chance at full points, which can be guaranteed by playing games that have a half-point line and cannot tie.
The reason for this is what I mentioned above. In larger pools with a lot of entrants, a half-point isn’t going to get you very far because others are also getting a half-point for being on the other side. Also, you’ll get jumped by people who are getting full points. Sure, you’ll move ahead of people who got zero points on games, but the juice isn’t always worth the squeeze.
It is also important to point out that the time of year matters with these contests. If you need to jump over a lot of people later in the year, taking more chances is essential. That might mean picking some bad teams or playing only half-point lines in the spirit of game theory.
Be mindful of quarter prizes
One of the best characteristics of the Vegas football contests is that you have a chance to make money in smaller segments of the contest, even if your season-long record is not very good. The season is broken into four quarters (Weeks 1-4, 5-9, 10-13, 14-18), and the prizes for cashing in a quarter are very lucrative.
Stay locked in, even if the season isn’t going the way that you want it. You might still be able to salvage something by getting hot for four or five weeks across 20 or 25 picks.
Whether you are participating in one of the main Vegas contests or a different pick ’em contest, consider these strategies when making your picks.
