Week 9 Newsletter and Picks

The Orb is officially ‘on fire’ according to the old beer-pong rule from back in the day as our models just hit their third +unit week in a row. Week 8 went fairly chalk as 12/16 favorites won outright and went 8-6-2 against the spread with the Jets-Giants and Eagles-Commanders games pushing. I want to quickly take the time to acknowledge and give a shout-out to the oddsmakers in Vegas. These lines that they come up with are getting so sharp. Each week it feels like they are more and more accurate. I would love to see their modeling someday, it’s really impressive stuff. With that being said, we have our own data to focus on for now. The Orb picked some truly spooky teams to cover this Halloween and ended up with a 4-1-1 record against the spread. For the first time, it picked only underdogs to cover in the Sunday slate followed by a double winner for our paid subscribers on Monday Night as the models took the Lions to cover 7 against the Raiders. We also had our first push of the season on an Orb pick. For anyone not familiar, a push is when the game ends exactly at the line that Vegas set. This page is not gambling advice, but if you did bet on a game that pushed you would simply get your money back with no win or loss, as if the pick never happened. The Giants had the ball up late in what was looking like a winning pick, but through a crazy sequence of a missed short field goal and Zach Wilson coming up clutch, the Jets ended up winning in overtime by a field goal. On the flip side, we got very lucky with the Cardinals covering as they needed their own improbable series of events to finish within the 9.5 points against the Ravens. Beyond the data and modeling, there is clearly some luck involved in this game of picking spreads and we think it just about evened out for us this weekend. I did some research on how to calculate a record that involves a push and it sounds like the generally accepted method is to count it as half a win and half a loss. For our purposes, this would mean the Orb had 4.5 wins and 1.5 losses this week. If anyone knows of a better or more accurate way to handle this please let us know in the comments. But if I don’t hear otherwise please know that is how our performance calculations will be done. Here is the full breakdown of the Orb’s picks from week 8:

Spreads:

• Panthers +3.5 ✅

• Giants +3 🟨

• Patriots +9.5 ❌

• Titans +2.5 ✅

• Cardinals +9.5 ✅

• Lions -7 (MFN - Premium) ✅

All spread picks: 4-1-1, 75%, +2.636 units

Moneyline:

• Bills (TNF - Premium) ✅

• Eagles ✅

• Jaguars ✅

• Cowboys ✅

• Giants ❌

• Dolphins ✅

• Titans ✅

• Vikings ✅

• Seahawks ✅

• 49ers ❌

• Chiefs ❌

• Chargers ✅

• Lions (MFN - Premium) ✅

All moneyline picks: 10-3, 76.9%, +1.849 units

Overall a +4.485 unit performance in week 8. This marks our longest +unit run of the season at 3 weeks and leaves us with 5 +unit weeks to our 2 -unit ones so far this season. Here is how this week’s performance impacts our season totals:

Season-to-date results:

• Season spread picks: 32-16-1, 66.3%, +13.088 units

• Season moneyline picks: 52-23, 69.3%, +4.654 units

For anyone new to our newsletter, our main goal for the Orb project is to pick (as high as possible) above the 52.4% profit line against spreads. We still have more than half of the regular season to go and we will of course run into more -unit weeks, but we do like to take the time to reflect on and be happy with our results so far.

I personally hated the picks the Orb made last week. They were so ugly and scary that they had no choice but to hit at a 75% rate. We have the opposite of that with our week 9 picks as I actually really like pretty much all of them. This can’t be a good omen as I am such a bad gambler that I needed to write an algorithm just to help me out. Here is what the Orb predicts will happen in week 9 as we look to extend our record to a 4th consecutive winning week:

Spreads:

• Chiefs -1.5

• Buccaneers +3

• Ravens -5.5

• Panthers +2.5

• Eagles -3

• Bengals -1.5

Moneyline:

• Steelers (TNF Premium) ✅

• Chiefs

• Texans

• Saints

• Ravens

• Panthers

• Eagles

• Bengals

After a week of riding the underdogs to cover, our models are leaning on more favorites this week. We have some really fun matchups on Sunday starting with the game in Germany as the Chiefs look to bounce back against the Dolphins and the #1 offense in football. Do you think our models can go 4 in a row? Or are we in for a third losing week on the season?

- Team Orb Analytics

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The picks and predictions provided on this website are based on our own research and analysis and are intended to be used for entertainment and informational purposes only. We do not guarantee the accuracy or completeness of the information provided, and we are not responsible for any losses or damages incurred as a result of using this information for gambling or other purposes.

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