Seattle Seahawks and the Philadelphia Eagles clash on Monday night was modest and rather tasteless.
Leading wire-to-wire, the Seahawks were clearly the better team, but Seattle wasn’t carefully leading on the attacking side of the ball. Headlined by Carson Wentz, the Eagles struggled mightily, continuing his prolonged slump, and with the Seahawks leading 23-9 late in the fourth quarter, the win-loss result was all but academic. However, the point spread was still in uncertainty, at least to some degree, and mischiefs took place in the final seconds.
Even while acknowledging that the Seahawks were -5.5 or -6 earlier in the week, seattle closed as a consensus 6.5-point favorite on this nigh,. Still, with a 14-point lead, things looked safe… until they weren’t. Wentz connected on a 33-yard Hail Mary pass, with a crazy one-handed catch by Richard Rodgers to bring the Eagles within eight points.
Under “normal” circumstances, the team trailing by eight points might simply kick the extra point to climb within seven. With that said, the Eagles have been at the forefront of the analytical movement to go for two when trailing by 14 and, in predictable fashion, they did so here, with Miles Sanders scampering into the end zone without much resistance from Seattle.
When Sanders crossed the goal line, people without vested interests in the point spread may have simply shrugged, but many took great notice. None more so than a well-publicized bettor that placed a half-million dollars on the Seahawks… at -6.5.
ESPN’s Scott Van Pelt led his postgame coverage with a wink and a nod toward what transpired and, without any doubt, this was a sickening backdoor from a team that didn’t deserve to cover. Everyone that dabbles in the handicapping space has a story (or two) about a bad beat like this, but the Eagles pulled off a miracle that swung quite a bit of money in the desert on Monday night.
The Seahawks beat the Eagles 23-17, with Philadelphia getting a Hail Mary TD in the final seconds.
Seattle was favored by 6.5 points.
