Sports Betting: Three best bets for the AFC in the 2022 NFL season

Any avid sports bettor is always looking for the opportunity to take advantage of Vegas lines, and there is no better chance to do that than with future bets. Before Vegas has data to precisely calibrate their lines, they are ultimately just as in the dark as the bettor. As a rule of thumb, you want to be careful with your bet size on future bets, as this money will be locked up until early January.

In this article, I will highlight three of my favorite bets that you can make on teams in the AFC Conference, with two being win totals and one being a player prop. However, I will also mention any additional bets I made on those teams along with their respective unit size.

In 2021, Garner Hasler and the Bookie Busters Podcast profited over 50 units in the NFL and over 145 units across all sports. While this article highlights his favorite bets of the week, his full card can be found on all major podcast platforms. 

Sports Betting 2022: Three AFC bets to take to the bank this NFL season

• Lamar is a superstar
• Team back to full health 
• Relatively easy strength of schedule

The Baltimore Ravens are coming off of a relatively disappointing season, as they completely missed out on the playoffs after possessing the one seed in the AFC heading into December before losing six games in a row. However, the story of their season was one full of injuries on both sides of the ball. They lost both of their starting running backs before Week 1 kicked off, were pulling players from the practice squad to play in the secondary, and were without Lamar Jackson for five games.

Now we see their 2022 win total set to a modest 9.5 wins, although it is heavily juiced to the over. With the team almost back to full health, it should be relatively easy for the Ravens to surpass this number. First and foremost, this team was 8-3 last year under Lamar Jackson with no run game and no secondary. This 8-3 record came after Jackson was forced to adapt to a major offensive overhaul due to running back injuries. In 2020 the Ravens ran at a 55.04% rate, the highest in the league by a large margin.

In 2021 the Ravens ran at a 43.63% rate, eleventh in the league and a drastic drop from their 2020 numbers. The narrative of Lamar Jackson being a “running back” or poor passer can both be disproven from these numbers, but people do forget how good he has been in his short NFL career. Jackson is 37-12 in his career and will easily take the Ravens well past this win total.

Additional Bets:

Ravens to make Playoffs -150 (0.75u to win 0.5u)

Lamar MVP 20/1 (0.3u)

Rashod Bateman o825.5 rec yards -110 (1.1u to win 1u)