NFL Preseason Picks & Odds: Seahawks vs. Chargers

Written by Charles Martese
Thursday, 11 August 2011 16:30

It’s time to handicap the odds and make NFL betting picks in the game between the Seahawks and the Chargers.

The ESPN-televised game between the San Diego Chargers (0-0) and the Seattle Seahawks (0-0) has an 8:00 PM ET start time, and this California clash is the best NFL preseason matchup of the day to bet on.  NFL betting odds show the home-team Chargers are 3-point favorites on the point spread, while the total sits at over or under 35.

Betting on the NFL preseason is a bit tricky and you really have to rethink the methods and statistics that you’d otherwise embrace when handicapping the regular season schedule.  Instead of team strengths and veteran experience, you have to look at positional battles, motivation to win, and depth across the roster.  With that in mind, let’s take a look at the teams and figure out how the Seahawks vs. Chargers game will play out.

The first thing that comes to mind here is that the Chargers are a veteran team and really don’t have a ton of positional battles on the offensive side of things.  We know San Diego can put up big points and I don’t expect to see much of the starters on either side of the ball.  Experienced veteran Billy Volek should provide some quality leadership in this one, while game manager Scott Tolzien seems like a good bet to run a vanilla offense in the later stages.  Head Coach Norv Turner used to be a good NFL preseason bet to win but he’s called off the dogs quite a bit over the last two seasons (3-5 record).

The Seahawks only went 1-3 under Coach Pete Carroll in the preseason last year but they won their first game and were very competitive in 2 others.  Tavaris Jackson is new to the team but he knows the offense after playing under the offensive coordinator for years before they both made the jump to Seattle.  After Jackson we have Charlie Whitehurst and Josh Portis, and both are youngsters with a lot to prove.  I expect Seattle to be a bit more aggressive on offense and Portis should put up some 3rd and 4th quarter points.  Carroll has been talking up his 3rd stringer in the preseason and I get the impression that he wants to let Portis take some shots.

Seattle appears to have more motivation to get their offense going with the new signees trying to get on the same page.  San Diego does have some things to work on defensively and I expect the Chargers to get out to an early lead.  When the 2nd and 3rd stringers come in, however, I expect Seattle to dominate and win this game outright.  San Diego will likely run a vanilla offense in the 2nd half while the Seahawks attempt to run a normal offense to get everyone acclimated.

Seahawks 23

Chargers 17