Carolina Panthers vs. Denver Broncos Betting Odds - Free Pick Against the Betting Line

<p> This 50th Super Bowl on paper looks like a good one, with the No. 1 seeds from both conferences taking to the field at Levi's Stadium this Sunday at 6:30 PM ET. It only took minutes for many of the sportsbooks to put up a line on Super Bowl 50, it opened with Carolina as a small 3-point favorite. The money flooded in on the NFC champs over the next few hours driving line up to 4.5 by night's end and by mid-week the point spread on the game hit -6. The total line hasn't had much of a ride opening at most shops in the 45 to 45.5 range and has since fallen to 44 or 44.5 depending on the bookmaker.
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<p>The Panthers come into this game off of 49-15 beat down of the Cardinals in the NFC title game for their 17th win of the season to go with just one defeat by NFC South foe the Atlanta Falcons. The public loves this NFC Champion with them not only racking up the "W's", but also tallying 13 spread covers in their 18 games this season. Carolina hasn't just squeaked out the wins; the margin of victory has been by 7 points or greater in 66% of their matches this season. So their ability to extend margins isn't in question, but the strength of their schedule does.
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<p>Carolina's regular season opponents finished with a combined win/loss record of 107-149 in the regular season which translates to a 41.79%-win percentage. If we back out the games against the Panthers, the number improves to 106-134, but still a subpar 44.15%. Carolina played just four regular season games against teams with a winning record and those teams certainly weren't elite, playing the 10-6 Seahawks, 9-7 Texans and the 9-7 Redskins.
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<p>The Broncos were in control for most of the AFC Championship game against the Patriots and in the end they hung on to clinch a 20-18 victory which was decided by a missed two-point conversion. The defense pounded the Pats QB Tom Brady with knockdowns on a high number of his drop backs. Denver QB Peyton Manning saw his numbers regress from his previous game against the Steelers, but he looked more comfortable as his offensive line plus the play calling did a bang up job limiting the pressure. Keep in mind that both his playoff starts were against two of the top three sack units in the league with only Denver itself having more.
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<p>The Broncos went 11-5 on the season, but they didn't impress against the spread with a juice losing 7-7-2 regular season versus the posted line. While they did have fewer victories than Carolina, they faced a vastly superior group of opponents in comparison. Denver's competitors totaled a combined 150-106 for a strong 58.59% W/L percentage and with the exclusion of games against the Broncos they would have a 146-94 W/L record good for an impressive 60.83 winning percentage.
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<div class="heading">Run Defense</div>
<p>Both of these clubs rank in the top 4 for rushing yards allowed per game with Denver allowing just 83.6 while Carolina allows 88.4 RYPG. The Broncos 3.3 yards leads the league in fewest yards per carry and the Panthers are also solid in this category with 3.9 YPC.
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<p>Carolina had half time leads of 14 points or more in six of their last nine regular season games which had their opponents getting away from the running attack which would skewed the numbers. On the season the Panthers opponents matched or exceeded 25 rushing attempts on six occasions eclipsing the 100-yard mark in five of those games. The Broncos said at the beginning of the season that the running game was going to be a key component of their offense and they accomplished that in the last nine games handing the ball off 25 or more times in seven of the games and falling one yard short of hitting the century mark (99 yards vs. NE) in eight of the nine contests.
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<p>I see Carolina getting their yardage in the run game as well. Denver's YPC is outstanding, but they did allow seven teams to run for 100 yards although only Kansas City in the first match (144 yards on 5.0 YPC) and Minnesota (113 yards on 5.4 YPC) to run for over yards and surpass 4.0 YPC. Carolina is a step below those two clubs managing just 4.3 YPC versus the Chiefs and Vikings 4.7. They did however grind out 2282 rushing yards to finish second in the league in that category.
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<div class="heading">Pass Defense</div>
<p>The Broncos lead the league in fewest passing yards allowed per game at just 200, while the Panthers were a more than respectable 11th allowing 235 yards through the air which was just 10 yards fewer than the 4th ranked team. What I believe is a better indication of a quality pass defense is the yards per attempt statistic and they both excelled in that category allowing a league best 6.2 yards per with only decimal points separating the two squads.
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<p>Over the regular season both teams faced their share of top flight pass offenses, but the Broncos did a superior job against teams in that category. The Steelers lit them up for 354 passing yards back in Week 15, but Denver was playing without both starting safeties and arguably their top back up in that contest. Every other opponent on the regular season schedule was held to 262 yards or fewer.
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<p>Carolina allowed only three teams to surpass 300 yards passing in the regular season but what is concerning is that only Arizona with Carson Palmer and his injured finger were the only team that didn't pass for at least 296 yards in their last four (including playoffs) games. The good thing for the Panthers is that Manning's arm strength isn't the same as it used to be which lowers the probability of getting lit up by the deep ball.
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<div class="heading">Summary</div>
<p>I was very tempted to take the underdog Broncos here, but I believe there is more value in the total. Carolina loves to run the ball leading the league in attempts per game with a fraction under 33 and I don't expect them to have a high percentage of passing plays. Only the Steelers and the Patriots late in the AFC title game had any kind of success against the Broncos pass defense and the Panthers certainly don't have the talent at the receiver position to compare to those clubs. Unlike Arizona, Denver doesn't need to dial up blitz packages to get pressure on the QB something that Newton has been killing this season.
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<p>The Broncos as mentioned have been giving their running backs a lot of action over their last nine games averaging 29.88 carries per match and will need to stay with it to slow down their opponent's pass rush. Manning has been very careful with the ball, throwing a lot of high percentage short passes and there is no reason to think that he'll continue that in this game.
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