Inside the Numbers of Super Bowl Point Spread History

By Todd L. Frank  |   Monday, February 01, 2010  |  Comments( 2 )

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Super Bowl Week is finally upon us. Hopefully we can move past the garbage about Archie Manning, Brett Favre, Tim Tebow and any other quarterbacks who will have no impact on this game. Actually, wait, scratch that. I’m just getting word that ESPN Insider Extraordinaire and General Everywhere Man Adam Schefter is reporting the NFL has just announced that during the 2nd quarter of the Super Bowl, Brett Favre will play Permanent QB for both team while John Madden guests in the booth.

Anyway, back to the actual game. The Super Bowl point spread had opened at around Colts -4 and since moved up to about Colts -5.5 or -6 depending on where/when you look. If people keep betting on the Colts, it could reach 6.5, but I don’t expect it to reach 7. The over/under opened at about 55 and is now around 56.5 or 57. I don’t see that one coming back down, but doubt it would move much higher.

We’ll have our free Super Bowl pick out this Friday, and at some point this week we’ll take a look at some of the intriguing Prop Bets. For now, while we all formulate our picks and best bets for the Super Bowl, I’ve found some more interesting stats and trends to consider.

Something to keep in mind about this stuff: just as with any trends.... at some point they don’t have much bearing on the actual game being played on the field. If the AFC favorites had covered 12 in a row, that really doesn't mean anything if Peyton Manning throws 2 pick-6's and Reggie Bush takes a punt return to the house. Just cuz the under has hit 4 out of the last 5 years, doesn't mean that offenses led by Manning/Brees wont still go back and forth for a 31-27 game that goes over. I think people tend to get lost in trends: "oh, the last 4 times the SB bowl was in Miami with an AFC favorite of under 7 points with a democratic administration in the White House in an even-numbered year, the underdog won outright!!"

Huh?

I understand the idea of knowing your history, but it's also wise to consider the fact this is just that: history. That said, let’s go inside the numbers of Super Bowl point spread history and results:

***The spread has been a factor only 7 times, twice pushing and 5 times the favorite didn’t cover. The other 36 games, whether the underdog or favorite won, the spread did not factor into the game.

***Four out of the last 5 Super Bowls have stayed UNDER the total.

***In their franchise's previous 3 Super Bowls, the Colts are 2-0 when wearing white and 0-1 in the blue jerseys. The team wearing the white jerseys has won the last 5 Superbowls in a row. New Orleans will be wearing white this week, with the Colts choosing their home blues.

***Only 5 underdogs have won the game outright in the last 20 years. But, don’t despair if you’re thinking about betting on the Saints: 3 of the last 6 underdogs that lost the game actually won against the spread and 3 of the last 8 won the game outright. So that means 6 of the last 8 have covered or won outright. Not bad.

***The three times the Colts played a top 10 ranked offense in the regular season (twice against division rival Houston and once against New England, two of which were at home), they surrendered a not horrific but hardly spectacular average of 26 points.

***Under the current NFL Playoff format, there have been 19 previous Super Bowls and the winning team has also covered the point spread in 13 of those wins, with 4 ATS losses and a pair of point spread pushes. Interestingly, three of the four games in which the Super Bowl winner lost to the spread have occurred over just the past six Super Bowls, including last season when Pittsburgh defeated Arizona 27-23 but failed to cover as a 6 ½-point favorite.

***Each of the past five Super Bowls has totaled 50 or fewer points including two games that produced just 31 total points.

***The favored team has won 14 of the last 19 Super Bowls. To be fair, however, only three times has the favored team been less than a six-point choice.

***In each of the past six Super Bowls the team with the better regular season record has failed to cover the spread, with three of those teams losing outright.

***The NFC holds a 22-21 straight up edge over the AFC and if you look at the past dozen Super Bowls, the AFC has gone 8-4 straight up. However, they’ve only posted a 5-5-2 mark against the point spread over that time.

***In the last 11 Super Bowls, the favorite has won the game outright on the field eight times. But, it is interesting to note that those favorites were just 4-3-1 against the point spread in that same time frame.
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