Bills vs. Chargers Odds, Trends: How Do Road East Coast Teams On Short Rest Fare?

Bills vs. Chargers Odds

Road teams from the east coast tend to do poorly on short rest in games in the Pacific Time Zone.

That's according to data from Action Labs, which has accumulated reams of against the spread and moneyline data on specific metrics dating back to 2003.

Road teams from the Eastern Standard Time are 7-18 ATS (28%) in games on short rest against west coast teams. A $100 per game bettor would have lost $1,162 over that timeframe.

The Bills last played on late Sunday afternoon and will come into Saturday night with just five days off. The Chargers have a market-best price of +12 (-110) at PointsBet, which is now owned by Fanatics.

Couple this with trends for teams that just fired their coach — and teams that are coming off of a massive blowout — and you'll see why all the sharps are on the Chargers to cover tonight, despite their lack of offensive production. While this is a Bills team that has seemed to have figured it out with their explosive offense, it's still a squad that's rife with inconsistency — and due for some turnover regression.

First, the bit about the interim coach. Since 2003, teams have gone 21-16 (57%) ATS in games after they fire their head coach. For reference, a mark of about 53% is required to be profitable in the long run against the spread. For reference, too, these teams had won just 37% of the time ATS prior to the coaching change. Teams should average somewhere around 49% ATS, on average.

And as for the blowout trend: teams that just lost by 20 or more points and are facing a team that didn't are 91-64-1 ATS (59%) since 2020. Also, teams that allowed 40 or more points in their previous game are 22-13-2 ATS (63%) the last two seasons.

Teams that gave up 50 or more points the previous week? They're 6-0-1 ATS the last three seasons.

It stands to reason that the public is too low on these types of teams, giving astute bettors the opportunity to capitalize on a team that isn't as bad as market-advertised.

For this week, it's the lowly Chargers, which rank dead last in the NFL at expected points added per play (EPA/play) on offense since Justin Herbert got injured. This is also a team that has ranked just No. 29 on defense over that same timeframe, according to EPA/play. Perhaps it's the perfect time to ride a bad team.