Two-Thirds of the Public on Seattle. Sportsbooks Want the Patriots.
Three days before Super Bowl LX, the betting public and the sharp money are telling two different stories. Across multiple sportsbooks, roughly 67% of spread bets are landing on the Seattle Seahawks. At DraftKings, that number comes with 74% of the spread dollars. Hard Rock Bet reports 69% of spread bets and 70% of spread money on Seattle. Station Sports sees the same 67% lean toward the Seahawks on tickets.
None of that has moved the line. Seattle opened between -3.5 and -4 depending on the book, briefly touched -5 on January 25, and snapped right back to -4.5. It’s been parked there for over a week despite a steady flood of public Seattle money. That kind of line resistance is worth paying attention to.
Where the Big Money Is Going
The moneyline tells a different story from the spread. At Circa Sports, while 58% of moneyline bets are on the Seahawks, 72% of the moneyline money is on the Patriots. That’s a textbook public-sharp split: lots of small bets on the favorite, fewer but much larger wagers on the underdog.
The seven-figure action reinforces the pattern. Circa took a $1.1 million bet on the Patriots moneyline at +188. Jim “Mattress Mack” McIngvale put $2 million on the AFC at +200 through Caesars before the conference championships. On the other side, Florida attorney Dan Newlin placed $1 million on Seattle’s moneyline at -230 at Hard Rock Bet on Wednesday, with winnings pledged to pediatric cancer research.
BetMGM’s trading strategy manager Halvor Egeland summed up the house position: “Currently, we need the Patriots and the under, but most of the money is still to come.” Station Sports’ Chuck Esposito was even more direct, telling VegasInsider that despite 67% of tickets on Seattle, the book “wants the Pats at the moment.”
A Five-Year Streak and a Stubborn Number
Super Bowl underdogs have covered the spread in five consecutive games. Four of those five won outright. The last favorite to win and cover was Kansas City in Super Bowl LIV back in February 2020, when the Chiefs covered as 1.5-point favorites against San Francisco. If you go back further, underdogs are 17-7 ATS since 2001 and 9-2 ATS when getting three or more points since 2003.
New England fits squarely in that profitable zone at +4.5. The Patriots aren’t some overmatched opponent hoping to keep it close. Both teams finished 14-3. New England’s offense averaged 28.8 points per game during the regular season, second-best in the NFL. Drake Maye led the league in Total QBR at 77.1. The contrarian angle here has teeth because the talent gap between these teams is narrow, even if the public perception gap isn’t.
82% of Experts, 67% of Bettors, One Direction
ESPN polled 57 of its analysts, writers, and commentators. Forty-seven picked Seattle. That’s 82.5% consensus on one side, which is unusual even for a Super Bowl. The public betting numbers mirror that tilt almost exactly.
History has a complicated relationship with this kind of unanimity. When the market and the media converge this heavily on one side, the line should reflect that conviction. Instead, the number has barely budged. Sportsbooks aren’t shading toward Seattle. They’re sitting at -4.5, absorbing the public money, and apparently comfortable with their Patriots exposure.
That’s a signal worth weighing. Books don’t leave money on the table by accident. When they’re comfortable taking public action on one side, it usually means they’ve already balanced their risk with sharper money on the other. The Circa moneyline split — 58% of bets on Seattle, 72% of dollars on New England — shows exactly how that balance works.
What the Line Is Saying
A line that doesn’t move when two-thirds of the action is on one side is speaking clearly. The books have enough Patriots money, from sharp bettors placing larger wagers, to keep the number steady. They don’t need to entice more New England action by dropping the spread.
Does this guarantee anything? Of course not. Seattle’s defense allowed the fewest points in the NFL this season at 17.2 per game. Sam Darnold put together back-to-back 14-win seasons. The Seahawks have real reasons to be favored. But the public betting patterns here match a familiar template: casual money piling onto the favorite, professional money quietly taking the points.
Super Bowl LX kicks off Sunday at 6:30 PM ET from Levi’s Stadium. By then, the real money will have arrived. Whether the line holds at -4.5 through kickoff, or finally breaks toward -5, will tell us a lot about which side absorbed the final wave of action.