Some of the most popular NFL futures that avid football bettors love to wager on involve betting odds for individual player achievements for the upcoming regular season. The incredible growth and popularity of fantasy football over the past few years has actually fueled an increased demand for NFL futures bets of this nature and the sportsbooks have responded with a number of different ways to bet on individual players over the course of year.
One of the most popular player futures to bet on is for NFL Most Valuable Player in the regular season. This list is usually weighted heavily towards the top quarterbacks in the NFL given that a player at this position has been named league MVP in 12 of the last 15 seasons. The only other position to claim an MVP award since 1987 has been a running back so a good way to narrow down the list is to focus on your top one or two picks at quarterback and possibly one top running back.
You can also find NFL futures odds for offensive and defensive rookie of the year. Betting these futures can be tricky given just how hard it is to predict how any player will make the transition from the college ranks to the pros. One betting strategy to help narrow down the list is to find a rookie quarterback that has already been penciled-in as a starter. Since 2004, a quarterback has won this award 50 percent of the time. Running backs have also had good success winning this futures bet with four awards in that same time span. A wide receiver has accounted for the other two offensive ROY trophies. Picking a defensive ROY can be hard as well, but with the exception of Marcus Peters last year at cornerback, a linebacker or defensive lineman has won this award every year since 1999 with the LB position holding an 11-5 edge.
A really popular group of player futures post betting odds for which quarterback will throw for the most yards, which running back with rush for the most yards and which receiver will post the most yards in the regular season catching the ball. Some sportsbooks break things down even further with futures odds for most touchdown throws, rushing touchdowns and touchdown catches. The closer you get to the start of a new regular NFL season, the more player futures tend to be released. Historical data can be a good starting point when it comes to handicapping these types of bets, but in the end you will basically be making an educated guess when it comes to actually picking a winner.
It can be real easy to get carried away betting individual player futures, especially if you do consider yourself a fantasy football junkie. If you look hard enough, you can probably find a few books that set player futures based on their performance in the upcoming fantasy football season. The best course of action when it comes to these types of bets is to allocate a small portion of your NFL betting bankroll and spread-out any bets over the course of four or five categories as opposed to one or two bigger plays. Win or lose, nothing will be decided until the end of the regular season, so you want to make sure that you still have plenty of money on hand to bet each week’s actual NFL games.
