2005 Arizona Cardinals NFL Handicapping Review

 

By Tom Wilkinson

 

The Arizona Cardinals are justifiably ripped as one of professional sports worst organizations. Entering 2004 the Cardinals were coming off of season records of 5-11 in 2002 and 4-12 in 2003, with 6-10 marks against the sports betting odds in both of those campaigns. Arizona was known not only as a lousy football organization but also for teams that didn’t always come prepared to play or to give the maximum effort. New head coach Dennis Green’s biggest challenge was to at least get a full effort from his charges in 2004. With a solid new coach and bad reputation, the Cardinals offered potentially good sports handicapping value against the sports betting odds as few bettors would want them anywhere near their list of football picks.

In their 2004 opener as 10.5-dogs at St. Louis, a few astute members of the sports handicapping community took a flyer on the Cardinals as the Rams are notoriously erratic and it was figured that Arizona would, if nothing else, play hard. The Rams won the game 17-10 but the Cardinals got the money for sports betting players.

Arizona played hard for Green in the season’s first half and beat the sports betting odds six out of their first nine games. The Cardinals were proving to be one of the better bargains on the sportsbook and online sports betting boards and they began to attract some extra activity from sports betting players. Just as the general sports betting public began to believe in them, you can pretty much guess what happened next; the roof caved in!

With their value as a sports handicapping “sleeper” eroded, if not gone altogether, the Cardinals dropped four straight both straight up and against the sports betting odds. Many online sports betting blogs wrote Arizona off as the “same old Cardinals.” At this point, Arizona was 6-7 against the sports betting odds but in the positive, regained some bargain basement value that they carried in the early part of the season.

Just as the general sports betting public got off the Cardinals, they began to again produce for bargain hunters. Arizona won and covered their final three games against the sports betting odds in 2004, finishing 6-10 straight up and 9-7 against the sports betting odds. Green did a nice job of not allowing his team to quit, and the sharper members of the sports handicapping community were rewarded for including Arizona on their lists of football picks.