Packers-Bears Wild Card Odds: Vegas sees the two teams as equals

Sometimes, point spreads don’t always tell the whole story. That is the case with the Green Bay Packers’ upcoming Wild Card playoff game against the Chicago Bears on Saturday night, which will be played at Soldier Field thanks to the Bears winning the NFC North.

Sportsbooks often do things differently from one another, and in Fanduel’s case, they always tend to find a way to put a point spread on every game, and they typically do so with a half-point line to guarantee that there will not be a push. With the playoffs eliminating the possibility of a tie, Fanduel will post their primary point spread as at least 1.5 points, but they do so by adjusting the odds on either side. That means that when two teams are viewed as being extremely close to one another, the team that is displayed as “favored” can swing back and forth with slight movements, and the odds of those lines will change accordingly.

In this case, the line has already switched once since the matchup was confirmed on Sunday night. Immediately after the lines were posted, Fanduel had the Bears as -1.5 point favorites, but as of Monday morning, it is the Packers who are giving 1.5 points as the favorites instead. In both cases, the odds of the favorite covering that spread are even at +100, however, with the Bears currently at -122 to cover as the underdogs.

Notably, FanDuel has alternate spreads available with the odds adjusted to address any potential score line. That’s where it’s clear that the Packers are seen as a favorite by the slimmest of margins. Packers -1.5 gets -102 odds in that category, while Packers +1.5 is -128. The Bears, on the other hand, are even money at +100 to cover as the favorite giving 1.5 points, while they are -122 to cover a +1.5 spread.

Got all that? The Packers have ever so slightly worse payouts for the same point spreads, which is a sign that Fanduel views them as the slimmest of favorites.

However, the moneyline in this came is currently dead even. Both teams are at -108 odds to win the game outright, with the difference between those odds and even money (+100) being the book’s take. That’s really where it becomes clear just how close a matchup the books currently view this game to be.

The total points line sees the books expecting a decent amount of scoring output on Saturday night as well. Currently, Fanduel has the over/under set to 46.5, which is the same number as in the second meeting between these two teams in Week 16. That game stayed under as the Bears won 22-16 in overtime, but the first game hit over that amount, with the Packers winning 28-21 at home.

There’s a good chance that the primary posted point spread continues to bounce back and forth between the two teams as the week goes on. Don’t pay too much attention to that — focus on the moneyline in this one to see where the picks are coming in.