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The Cincinnati Bengals are soaring up oddsboards, regularly attracting half-a-million-dollar bets in Las Vegas and causing oddsmakers to hang point spreads that haven’t been seen since the early 1980s.
The Bengals kicked off the season at the bottom of the odds to win the Super Bowl, as long as 200-1. Only the Houston Texans had worse odds than the Bengals at most books. At some sportsbooks, the Texans attracted more Super Bowl bets than the Bengals in the preseason.
Two months later, Cincinnati is off to a 5-2 start, sits in first place in the AFC North and has climbed to the top half of the Super Bowl odds. The Bengals were 35-1 to win the Super Bowl this week at Caesars Sportsbook. At DraftKings, 1% of the money wagered on its Super Bowl odds is on Cincinnati.
“They were not popular at all,” Craig Mucklow, vice president of trading for Caesars Sportsbook, said of the betting interest on the Bengals. “They’ve completely gone under the radar.”
One big bettor in Nevada, however, has had his eyes on the Bengals since the opening game. According to Mucklow, a high-level bettor has backed Cincinnati with seven big bets this season, ranging from a $200,000 bet on the Bengals +3.5 against the Minnesota Vikings in Week 1 to a $520,000 bet placed this week on the Bengals -9.5 on road against the New York Jets. The bettor is up $795,000 on his Bengals bets with Caesars.
“We pay attention when he bets,” Muckow said of the unidentified customer. “I really respect him when he comes in on the Bengals. He obviously knows that team really well. Interestingly, he actually backed the Ravens last week against the Bengals. Thankfully, he was wrong for once. But he’s on the Bengals again this week.”
In the preseason, when sportsbooks posted early lines, the Bengals were listed as 1-point favorites over the Jets. Last week, the line was sitting at Cincinnati -3.5, but after the Bengals’ impressive win over the Baltimore Ravens and Jets’ rookie quarterback Zach Wilson being lost…
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Source : espn
