Bengals Backers Should Take Advantage Of Line Against Broncos

The Cincinnati Bengals have dropped two straight games, and now may meet their playoff demise with a third loss in a row to the Denver Broncos this Sunday, but are oddsmakers losing faith in Cincy too quickly?

WynnBET Sportsbook has the Bengals as 1.5-point underdogs against the Denver Broncos, which may be an overreaction to recent results.

Overreaction in Betting Market

The Bengals lost to two likely playoff teams in the Chargers and 49ers in recent weeks while the Broncos have split their last two, a 22-9 loss to the Chiefs and a win over the depleted Lions.

Last week in the lookahead market the Bengals were around a 3-point road favorite, but now they are catching points? Did something drastically change on Sunday to change the sentiment by more than four points?

The Bengals closed as two-point home underdogs on Sunday, took the Niners to overtime and came up short. Joe Burrow's finger didn't appear to be an issue after tossing for 348 yards and a pair of touchdowns.

I'm going to fade recency bias and stick with what the market believed before Sunday's tilt, the Bengals are the far superior team.

Bengals' Path to Success

Burrow is of course the catalyst to what the Bengals want to do on offense, but I Cincy will have an edge on the ground.

Denver is 28th in defensive rush success rate, per SharpFootballStats, and the Bengals will be able to stay ahead of schedule with Joe Mixon on the ground to set up Burrow and the host of Cincy pass catchers.

Further, I see Cincinnati as a prime regression to the mean candidate on third down. The team is 22nd in EPA/Play on 3rd down, meaning they are falling well short of expectation on key plays. However, I'm going to side with Burrow making the key plays against Denver's defense that may be getting too much credit in the market over Bridgewater and the middling Broncos offense.

This is an overreaction to recent results and people should be rushing to be backing the Bengals on Sunday.