Early Week 4 NFL line moves

LAS VEGAS -- For all the NFL's recent off-the-field woes, the on-the-field product once again showed Sunday why pro football is America's favorite sport to watch (and wager on).

There were some blowouts in the early games (Bengals over Titans, Colts over Jaguars, Giants over Texans and, to a lesser extent, Saints over Vikings), but we also had come-from-behind victories by the Cowboys, who were consensus 2-point faves over the Rams and won 34-31, and the Ravens, who were minus-1.5 over the Browns and won 23-21 on a field goal as time expired.

San Diego's 22-10 win at Buffalo was the only outright upset in the early games, but the Eagles and Patriots both had scares in non-covering victories.

The Seahawks squandered a 17-3 lead in the fourth quarter against the Broncos, but they ended up covering as a closing 4.5-point favorite with a touchdown on the opening drive of overtime. The rest of the afternoon and evening games were all outright upsets as the Cardinals topped the 49ers 23-14 as 3-point home 'dogs, the Chiefs routed the Dolphins 34-15 as 5.5-point road 'dogs, and the Steelers beat the Panthers 37-19 as 3-point road 'dogs in the night game.

But the focus of this column is to see how the action affects the lines for the upcoming week's games, so let's take a look at some early opening-line moves for Week 4 and some other gambling takeaways from Week 3 that we can use moving forward.

Off-the-board report

The Westgate Las Vegas SuperBook posts its NFL openers at 4:30 p.m. PT each Sunday. This is the section where we will note which games are off the board due to injuries (note: the SuperBook usually posts the games involving the teams involved in Sunday and Monday night games, while most books hold off on those). Again, this week there are no such games, as the Westgate put up all 16 games. The adjustments appear to have already been made with the teams expected to go with new starting QBs (Tampa Bay, Jacksonville and Minnesota).

Early Week 4 line moves

Here are the openers from the Westgate SuperBook. We'll look at how we got to those numbers, including a look at the advance lines for Week 3 that they put up last Tuesday as well as where the offshore openers might have differed and how they moved in early betting Sunday afternoon. While the biggest part of winning at football is picking winners, it's just as important to be able to read the market and know when to place your wagers to get the best number, so we'll try to point out which numbers are most likely to move during the week.

Thursday: Giants at Redskins (-5): The advance line on this game last Tuesday at the Westgate was Redskins minus-3.5, but they raised it to 5 even though the Giants won and the Redskins lost. It was quickly bet down