Only one team in football has a record better than the Tampa Bay Buccaneers five wins this season. That would be the Indianapolis Colts, who are 6-1 on the year.
The Buccaneers are atop the NFC South Division standings one game over the Carolina Panthers, one-and one half game ahead of the Atlanta Falcons, and four games up on the last place New Orleans Saints.
Before the season began, the opening line on this game projected that the Buccaneers would be a 6½ point road favorite this Sunday. Then, after seven weeks of regular season play in which Tampa Bay has surged to the top of their division standings and the Saints have won only one game in seven decisions, the line on this game opened this week with the Buccaneers favored by only 5½ points.
How can that be right?
Point spreads are not designed to be right, they are orchestrated by the books to get the public to wager on the losing side. The opening number of this game indicated that the books reaction to the Buccaneers success and the Saints struggles led to New Orleans being the percentage side of this wagering proposition.
Want to know what happened then?