High totals go under

Published for pro football by Paul & Weinbach in 2002 and long dead there — our NFL test finds nothing. It is alive in college: 57% over 2018-25, above the vig in all eight seasons, and biggest in games with no ranked team in them, which is what a thin market looks like.

Credit. The rule was published for pro football by Rodney J. Paul and Andrew P. Weinbach. The idea is theirs; the college test and the live ledger are ours. Original paper.

This is a statement about the market, not a forecast of the game, and it is graded on its own ledger — it never enters the model’s record. The two can disagree, and when they do the trend has the better history on these games.

The 46% line. A trend like this one can stop working — the same rule was profitable in pro football until about 2009 and has been dead there since — so the condition for dropping it is set in advance rather than argued about later. If it is really still winning at its long-run rate, a season lands under 50% about one year in ten, but under 46% only about one year in sixty. So a season in the low fifties is ordinary variance and settles nothing, while a season below 46% is real evidence the market has moved and this page stops publishing it.