Canadian Football League Betting

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1. CFL Betting Odds, Canadian Football League Online Lines CANADIAN FOOTBALL - GREY CUP - TO WIN - Jun 11 2020 CFL GREY CUP - TO WIN Wager cut off: 2020 11th June 10:00 AM 10801. HAMILTON TIGER-CATS +340 10802. SASKATCHEWAN ROUGHRIDERS +500 10803. WINNIPEG BLUE BOMBERS +550 10804. CALGARY STAMPEDERS +550.
2. The CFL, which stands for the Canadian Football League, has some major betting potential for American bettors. Once the NFL and NCAAF seasons are done, there’s some what of a football action void left in the summer. If you’re looking for great football betting lines, the CFL offers excellent lines.
3. Canadian Football Betting Football bettors often bemoan the fact they can’t wager on their sport after the Super Bowl. But up in Canada, there are CFL Odds to check out starting each June – a full summer’s worth of football lines to study and exploit. The CFL is a nine-team league with former NCAA stars and some former NFLers.
4. An Over / Under Bet refers to the number of points that are scored in a Canadian Football League game. Bookmakers will set a line, which may start at 20.5 points and the lines continue in an upward direction. The job of the bettor is then to stake Over or Under one of those lines.

CFL Canadian Football League Betting Preview 11/24/19 I’d like to take Hamilton in this spot, but never easy taking an East team against a West team, as the West was 29-13 straight-up and 24-18 ATS.

As the NFL season has now started, most of the focus of the sports betting world is on the 16 games played every Sunday and Monday, but did you know that there has been professional football happening all summer long? No, we aren’t talking about the short-lived AAF, we mean the Canadian Football League! The CFL has been around since 1958 and, while it has seen its fair share of ups and downs, it’s still kicking and providing entertainment to football fans on both sides of the border.

There’s a lot to love about the CFL, especially if you are a gambler. Why don’t we give you a primer on all the reasons you should be placing bets on the CFL.

First off, let’s start with the best online gambling sites for placing your CFL bets. When you’re done reading this page, you will be so pumped up to start wagering on these games that you will want to have your accounts all set up and ready to go. Below is a list of the sites we recommend for CFL betting online (we’ll explain why in more detail further down this page).

7 Reasons You Should Bet on the CFL

Arena Football League

#1: It’s Football!

Let’s start with the most obvious reason: The Canadian Football League is professional football! Yes, there are some nuances that make it a little different than its counterpart in the United States, but the general strategy of the game is the same. If you have some general knowledge of how to make point spread, moneyline, and prop bets, you will be able to pick up betting on the CFL in no time!

#2: Wild Point Spreads

The Canadian Football League offers bettors some pretty wild spreads, and this means more chances for great action! The games are often high scoring (more on that shortly), which means more lines that are larger than those in the NFL. Bettors who like to play parlays and teasers will love the ability to take the teams they want to bet with lots of room to cover those spreads.

#3: Fewer Teams to Follow

Canada has a much smaller population than the US, meaning there are fewer places to accommodate a professional football team. There aren’t as many teams to follow, giving you a chance to learn more about each one in more detail before you bet on the CFL.

There are currently eight teams in the Canadian Football League:

• C. Lions
• Calgary Stampeders
• Edmonton Eskimos
• Saskatchewan Roughriders
• Winnipeg Blue Bombers
• Toronto Argonauts
• Ottawa Redblacks
• Montreal Alouettes

#4: The Schedule

The CFL offers many different betting alternatives to gamblers, but one of the most attractive is the schedule itself. Each team plays 18 games (two more than NFL teams) and the season runs from June to November. This means you can make your CFL bets right through the summer while waiting for the NFL to start in September. Since the season ends in late November, you can also refocus on the NFL just as the playoff push starts.

Another interesting twist on the CFL schedule is that the majority of the games are on Friday and Saturday. The folks running the league realized they simply could not compete with the popularity of the NFL even in the Canadian market, so they shifted their games to other nights of the week to maximize viewership. This is an added bonus for US players to bet on the CFL as well, as the league is covered by American sports networks.

#5: 3 Downs

We mentioned earlier that the CFL has some slight rule differences that make it a different type of football than the NFL. One major rule difference is that there are only three downs for a team to advance 10 yards, versus the four downs that NFL teams have. There is far more passing in the CFL than in the NFL. Also, there are many more changes of possession, meaning more chances for teams to score. Keep this in mind if you plan to bet on the CFL. From a prop betting perspective, this can really change the way a bettor looks at individual performances, and this rule difference is one of the reasons the point spreads and totals can seem far higher than NFL games.

#6: The Rouge

Another difference in the rules in the CFL that can impact gamblers is something called the “rouge.” In the CFL, the end zone is 30 yards long as opposed to the 10 yards in the NFL. When a kicker attempts a field goal, if it is missed, a defensive player has the opportunity to run the ball out of the endzone. While this is a rare occurrence, it does produce some very exciting plays!

The more likely scenario on missed field goal attempts is that the ball is kicked all the way out of the endzone, despite the kick being missed. If that occurs, the kicking team is awarded one point called a “rouge.” Now, this can work as both a benefit and detriment for gamblers, so be wary of who is kicking for the teams you are betting on. And pay attention to the weather conditions, as these extra points could mean the difference between winning and losing your bet on the CFL.

#7: Names You Know and Names You Should Know

The CFL has always had a connection to the NFL. While the league isn’t exactly a farm system, we have seen many examples of players who either weren’t drafted or couldn’t make the NFL come up to Canada and make a splash before returning down south. Some of the more notable names that fall into this category are Warren Moon, Doug Flutie, and Jeff Garcia.

Going the other direction, there have been many NFL players who were either looking for a fresh start or decided that the CFL was a better place to ply their trade. Players like Rocket Ismail, Michael Sam, and Johnny Manziel have donned CFL jerseys over the years. This gives the CFL a higher profile and gives you something to watch as you try to determine which players could be headed for NFL squads the next season.

How to Bet on the CFL

Now that you know what sites we think are the best CFL betting sites, and you understand more clearly why it’s fun to watch and bet on the CFL, the logical step is to get down to wagering! Here are a few tips for you.

First, you should find a site that offers you the best deposit bonuses and promotions for CFL betting online. There are many sites that actually have CFL-specific offers, although you may have to dig deeper to find them. Our sportsbook review pages try to capture all the relevant offers for Canadian football bettors.

Second, you want to find sites that offer the most pre-game betting options. Most sites will offer pre-game spreads, moneylines, and totals, but the best CFL betting sites offer markets on all the main prop bets you would expect to see for an NFL game.

Finally, look for sites that offer in-play betting on CFL games. As we mentioned, there are wild swings in most games, which offer great opportunities for gamblers to take advantage of updated live lines.

So, there you have it, all the reasons you should take notice of the Canadian Football League and bet on the CFL online! The Grey Cup (the CFL Super Bowl) happens in late November, so there’s lots of time to familiarize yourself with teams and players. Start making some money betting on the football league of the Great White North!

Differences between CFL and NFL

The Canadian Football League is seen as the exciting appetiser for the forthcoming NFL season and while sharing many common elements, the two sports also have distinct differences.

The Canadian version is twelve a side, with the extra player utilised in the back field on offense and is played on a wider and longer pitch with deeper end zones. Scoring also allows for single points via unreturned punts to the end zone and missed field goals.

Most significantly, back field motion prior to the snap is universal and receivers are able to stretch the field by timing their sprint downfield so that they cross the line of scrimmage as the ball is snapped.

Defensive coverage is therefore more difficult compared to the NFL, so to partly redress the balance between offense and the defense, the quarterback has one fewer down per series. The CFL is three, rather than four down football, although the aim remains to advance the ball by at least 10 yards to gain a fresh set of downs.

The regular season is 18 games long and is played across two divisions. Since 2005 each division comprised of four sides in each. However, the addition of Ottawa in 2014 has expanded the competition to nine sides and the season’s length to 20 weeks to accommodate bye weeks.

Sides qualify for post season football through their regular season records, with the best being rewarded with byes and home field advantage, until two teams ultimately contest the championship game for the Grey Cup. Unlike the NFL, a team can crossover between divisions and gain a playoff place if their record is superior to a potential playoff side from the other division.

Betting OVER/UNDER on the CFL

Betting revolves around markets familiar to the higher profile NFL. Handicap lines give a start to the perceived weaker team in the match up, either measured in full or half points and total match point markets exist for those whom wish to bet on a low or high scoring contest.

Canadian Football League Teams

Average scoring is elevated compared to the NFL, but not excessively so. The average total regular season points since 2008 is 52 per game, with home field advantage currently worth a shade over three points.

So, for example, 40.2% of regular season games played since 2008 contained, in total, 48 points or fewer and 62.8% had 48 points or more.

Those familiar with NFL handicap betting will be aware that because of the scoring regime in the NFL, certain margins of victory or defeat are more likely to occur than others. Teams more often win by three points (the value of a field goal), seven (the value of a touchdown) and multiples of these two common numbers.

This effect is somewhat diluted in the CFL, partly through a wider diversity of scoring options. However, as the plot from the 2008-13 regular seasons below demonstrates, there is still a bias towards matches being settled by three points.

As well as sharing some common ground with the NFL, the scoring patterns are also partly comparable and so bettors may use similar techniques to estimate how successful sides may be in the 2014 season.

Using Pythagorean to predict the Grey Cup winner

Pythagorean estimates are well established in many American sports. Introduced to baseball by Bill James, this approach uses points scored and conceded as a more reliable indicator of a side’s true ability.

Therefore, it is more likely to project future wins and losses than a team’s recent actual win loss record, which may be influenced by luck, either good or bad. A team’s talent may determine their ability to score or concede points, but they may not be able to greatly influence how this scoring is distributed within individual matches.

To take an example from soccer in the Premier League, Newcastle’s goal difference of +5 in 2011/12 would rarely be good enough to gain 65 points and 5^th spot, but a fortuitous split of many narrow wins and fewer large defeats ensured that is what happened.

However, the good fortune that was present in 2011/12 did not persist and Newcastle’s raw points differential gave a better indication of their subsequent performance than their actual win/draw/ loss record.

Where p is the Pythagorean constant, initially set at 2 by James, in deference to Pythagoras, but it is subject to change for different sports, various run or points scoring environments and different eras.

Past performance is a major influence for future performance, but ideally bettors would wish to allow for excessively lucky or unlucky outcomes and a Pythagorean approach appears to achieve this. Using a Pythagorean constant of 2.6 and comparing actual win/tie records for the CFL teams in year N to their performance in year N+1 since 2006 alongside Pythagorean wins from the previous year, James’ insight overall has the better predictive record.

Of the 56 individual team seasons since the start of the 2007 regular season, Pythagorean wins from the previous campaign predicted win records in the next season more accurately for 31 team seasons, ten were tied and on only 15 times did the previous season’s win/loss record prove to be a better predictor.

The return of Ottawa as an expansion team for the first time since 2005 may complicate the dynamics of the 2014 season, but Calgary and Hamilton appeared to be fortunate to post the wins they did in 2013 and Edmonton and Winnipeg may well be better than they appeared.

If luck plays a role over an 18 game season, it is even more of an influence over a single match. However, the granular nature of gridiron, where each down presents a discrete data point makes the sport data rich and allows bettors to identify consistent pointers to a successful final score line.

Highly efficient NFL sides in terms of yards per passing or running play appears to go hand in hand with success. Also previous levels of efficiency usually indicate similar levels of such play in the future.

Logistic regression can be used to determine actions that correlate to discrete outcomes, such as winning or losing a gridiron game and using play by play data from the 2011 Canadian season it is possible to highlight the importance of an efficient passing game to success in the CFL.

In the NFL passing ability is more important to success than rushing talent and the current CFL appears to heighten this divide.

In the CFL punting may become an enforced option after just two downs. So the much larger playing area, an extra eligible receiver and the larger average gains made through the air compared to on the ground, dictates that passing ability is a valuable asset and this is reflected in the win loss records of the sides.

There is a strong, significant relationship between passing efficiently, denying your opponent the same luxury and winning a single game.

In 2013, Calgary excelled in both, Winnipeg in neither, with BC, Saskatchewan, Hamilton, Toronto, Montreal, and Edmonton filling the gap in between in that order. A statistic that was largely consistent with the ranking of both the Pythagorean and actual wins for all eight sides.

Canadian Football League Scores

To illustrate the potency of passing efficiency in the CFL, if two statistically average passing sides met, the home team’s chances of winning the game would increase from around 58% to over 62% if they could improve their passing efficiency by 5%. A fall of 5% would see their win probability fall to 54%.

Canadian Football League Expansion News

A similar relationship isn’t seen, either in terms of size or significance on a game by game basis, between match outcome and a side’s rushing efficiency for the CFL, at least in 2011.

History Of The Canadian Football League

Therefore, likely passing efficiency, as measured by the historical yards per passing attempt records for each side, from an offensive and defensive viewpoint, is an excellent starting point to predict probabilities and ultimately points spreads for individual games in the CFL when the regular season opens on June 26^th.