What Are the Circa Million Leaders Betting? We Built a Top 25-ish Consensus.
What Are the Circa Million Leaders Betting? We Built a Top 25 (plus ties) Consensus.
The Circa Million consensus is one of the most closely watched indicators of NFL handicapping opinion each week. But what happens when we narrow the field to the contestants who have performed best?
We decided to find out.
Using the standings through Week 8, we identified the 28 entries at the top of the Circa Million leaderboard, then matched each entry with its five Week 9 selections.
That's 140 picks from contestants who have accumulated at least 28.5 points through eight weeks.
We compared their selections with the consensus from the entire field of 5,717 submitted cards.
The results are interesting — especially for Sunday night's Buccaneers–Bears game.
The Leaders Aren't Buying the Bears Hype
Chicago's 34-17 Monday night victory over Seattle certainly got everyone's attention.
Bears–Bucs was the most frequently selected matchup in this week's Circa Million, appearing on 2,430 cards, or 42.5% of the submitted entries.
The full field was nearly evenly divided:
Bears -6: 1,301 selections (53.5%)
Buccaneers +6: 1,129 selections (46.5%)
But the leaders had a very different opinion.
Of the nine Top 28 entries that selected the game, eight picked Tampa Bay +6. Only one backed Chicago -6.
That's an 89% preference for the Buccaneers among the leaders who played the game.
The Top 28 Consensus: Week 9
Here's how the most popular selections among the leaders compare with the entire Circa Million field.
Three Things That Stand Out
1. Minnesota is the leaders' No. 1 selection.
Twelve of the 28 entries selected Vikings +3½ against Buffalo. That's 42.9% of the leaders, compared with 24.9% of the overall field.
But there's a complication: The contest offered Minnesota +3½, while the market subsequently moved to +3. That extra half-point is valuable, especially around a key NFL margin.
2. The Rams and Panthers are tied for second.
Eleven entries selected Rams -4 against Washington, and another 11 took Panthers +2½ against Denver.
The Rams' frozen -4 was also better than the later market price of -4½. That's another reason not to treat every contest selection as an endorsement of the current betting line.
The Panthers' popularity among the leaders is worth noting because they were considerably less popular across the entire field.
3. The overall field's favorite isn't the leaders' favorite.
Saints -3 against Cleveland was the Circa Million's most popular individual selection, appearing on 1,802 cards.
Only nine of the Top 28 entries included New Orleans.
That's not exactly a rejection — 32.1% of the leaders selected the Saints, almost identical to the overall field's 31.5%. But the leaders showed substantially greater interest in Minnesota, Los Angeles and Carolina.
What Should Bettors Take Away?
A few important qualifications.
First, contest picks aren't necessarily betting picks. Contestants are selecting from fixed point spreads, some of which are no longer available at sportsbooks.
Second, these are the 28 leading entries, not necessarily 28 independent handicappers. Some contestants have multiple entries among the leaders, which can make certain opinions appear more frequently.
Third, eight weeks of success doesn't prove that a contestant has a sustainable handicapping advantage. We're looking at a relatively small sample, not declaring anyone a professional bettor.
And finally, a consensus is not a betting system. Popular selections can lose, regardless of who's making them.
Still, the comparison provides another way to examine the weekly contest selections.
Instead of simply asking which teams are most popular, we can ask whether the contestants currently performing best are seeing the board differently.
This week, the answer is yes — particularly on Tampa Bay, Minnesota, Los Angeles and Carolina.
We'll track how the Top 28 consensus performs against the spread and compare it with the overall Circa Million consensus as the season progresses.
