Opening Night: Why The Smart Money's on the Giants

Thanks to the President, the Giants will open the season a day early

In the first Wednesday night game in the NFL in 64 years (thank you, President Obama and the DNC), the Cowboys and the defending champion Giants open the season tomorrow.  The NFL first started having its most recent champion play a home game in primetime to start the season in 2004.  And since then, the defending champs have been overwhelmingly successful.  Details after the jump:

Results of the 8 opening night games since 2004 – both outright and against the spread – are below:

Year	Previous Year’s Champ	Opp-onent	Spread	Score	Champion Wins Game?	Champion Covers Spread?
2004	Patriots	Colts	Patriots by 3	Patriots 27, Colts 24	Yes	Push
2005	Patriots	Raiders	Patriots by 7.5	Patriots 30, Raiders 20	Yes	Yes
2006	Steelers	Dolphins	Steelers by 1.5	Steelers 28, Dolphins 17	Yes	Yes
2007	Colts	Saints	Colts by 5.5	Colts 41, Saints 10	Yes	Yes
2008	Giants	Redskins	Giants by 4.5	Giants 16, Redskins 7	Yes	Yes
2009	Steelers	Titans	Steelers by 6.5	Steelers 13, Titans 10	Yes	No
2010	Saints	Vikings	Saints by 5	Saints 14, Vikings 9	Yes	Push
2011	Packers	Saints	Packers by 5	Packers 42, Saints 34	Yes	Yes
	Total Record				8-0	4-1-2

The previous year’s champion hasn’t lost yet in these opening night games, and has failed to cover the spread only once (Pittsburgh in ’09 opening against the Titans – a game that saw Kerry Collins prominently involved at quarterback!).

Kerry Collins led the Titans to a cover (not a win) in the '09 opener,
the only time the defending champ hasn't at least tied the spread on opening night

The success of previous years’ champions probably shouldn’t be surprising.  They are, after all, the defending champs, typically with strong rosters (even in the free agency era).  Throw in home crowds extra fired up to celebrate the previous season’s championship, and the visiting team is walking into a buzzsaw.

Even though our view is that the Cowboys had a slightly better offseason than the Giants, and even though the Cowboys were a better team last year by Pythagorean expectation, we see no reason for them to buck the trend tomorrow night.  The smart money is on the Giants to cover the 3.5 point spread.  The smartest money might be on the Giants money line (-190, meaning they have to win the game 65.5% of the time to make the bet profitable).  And for those of you in suicide / knockout pools -- especially the handful of you who got knocked out early last year when you took the Browns at home against a Bengals team starting a rookie QB in his first professional start -- you might need to look no further than the Giants for your pick this week.

Think we're crazy?  Think we're brilliant?  Tell us in the comments!

Like us on Facebook at facebook.com/backupquarterbackblog
Follow us on Twitter at twitter.com/TheBackupQB

Idea for a post?  Email backupquarterback@gmail.com