Gambler's Guide to the 2015 Eagles Season: Part 1

Photo Credit: Bill Streicher-USA TODAY Sports

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Marc Lawrence’s Playbook 2015 Football Preview Guide is here, available online and at Barnes and Noble.

Some Philadelphia sports fans might recognize Marc as the soft-spoken football handicapping tout on WIP’s Howard Eskin Show each weekend during football season. Granted not the most accurate football prognosticator on the planet (who is?), Marc has been more wrong than right.

For ten bucks I’m not aware of any other widely available publication that offers more football betting trends. Many football experts and gamblers scoff at trends, but in my experience they offer a very valuable guide. I’m no gridiron Nostradamus, but I won over $1200 in 2012 in an online college football handicapping contest (first place) and even managed to win an extra C note in the Mock Hilton NFL contest (fifth) in part by using Lawrence’s trends.

Digging into this year’s Philadelphia Eagles section, there are some gems that offer some insight into how the season might go. Before the tour, some nomenclature and acronyms: ATS= “Against the Spread” indicating the teams W-L record versus the Vegas line. While not a predictor of wins and loses, certainly an ATS analysis can offer some insights into whether or not a team will be in a favorable or unfavorable situation to win or lose the game ”Straight Up” or “Outright” (to quote Mike Missanelli, who threw me under the bus on the air blaming me for his predicting Frenso State to cover v USC in Game 1 of the 2014 season).

In Part One of Three we will sort through the good news according to Playbook. In Part 2, the Bad News trends. And then we will conclude in Part 3 with an exhaustive week-by-week analysis of these trends, as well as my opinions to see how the Eagles might fare this season.

Is there a Super Bowl in our immediate future? Or will the denizens of Philadelphia march down Broad Street with pitchforks demanding Chip Kelly be run back into the NCAA?

Perhaps the answer might be somewhere in between. Lets take a look right now at the things we as Eagles fans can look forward to according to The Playbook:

Chip Kelly has a Straight Up 23-2 Record Away vs. NFC East and Conference Opponents in his Career

5-1 of that is against the NFC East; based on this, its safe to surmise the Eagles will win at Washington, Dallas and in an eerie repeat of last season (more on THAT in Parts 2 and 3) the Giants at the second straight Meadowlands season finale.

This trend should not be a shocker. Chip Kelly is so anal he makes his players wear sleep monitors. We can only assume he micromanages every detail of his teams road travels, and makes every use of every frame of footage of a team he plays twice a year (or in college every year).

Eagles are 6-1 Against the Spread on Monday Night Road Games

Conclusion: Opening night win at Atlanta as the Eagles are 9-4-1 ATS v the Falcons. I don’t think predicting an opening night win here is a stretch. Chip can claim 3-0 of this trend, and again it appears he MIGHT be a good road coach (only 9-7 ATS NFL) and takes advantage of that extra day of preparation offered by Monday night games.

Eagles are 7-1 Against the Spread in November

Buddy Ryan once said that in order to get in the playoffs, you have to win games in November. God I hope so because you wont like what I predict the Eagles do in December in Part 2 and 3.

Things look to break Philadelphia’s way that month as they play one of those three Monday Night road games in Dallas, which is off of a bye, and the Eagles are indeed 21-6 straight up off a week of rest, making this Dallas game seem like a lock (to be fair we can thank Andy Reid for a lot of that bye trend but it’s still hard to ignore).

I don’t have 2013 stats, but Chip’s Eagles went 4-1 ATS last November. Seems as if it’s a good month for Chip Kelly. After Dallas the rest of November actually looks good for the Birds and we will go over that good news in Part 3 (yes, after the Bad News in Part 2)

NEXT: Feeling good about the Eagles chances in 2015? You might not want to read Part 2 of this Gamblers Guide to the 2015 Eagles Season without downing a stiff drink.

What do you think of betting trends in sports? What method do you use to beat the Bookie? Is there a trend you know that Marc does not? We’d love to hear from you in the Comments section below or @danmoreland

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