NFL Week 6 teasers: Beware the obvious

Two more seconds. It didn't even have to happen one play later. Just two more seconds.

Geno Smith's interception would have been fine if Nick Scott's momentum hadn't taken him directly out of bounds. Had Scott wandered around for two seconds, the clock would have struck 2:00, and the Rams would have taken knees and secured a 6-point win, comfortably inside the SEA +8.5 teaser leg. The Bills and Ravens eventually covered their teaser legs, but our prime-time three-team tease fell by the wayside, two seconds short of victory.

Each teaser leg has a price of -270 - the cost of teasing a 6-point favorite down to PK. Let's use this week's Thursday night tilt between the Buccaneers and Eagles as an example.

You're able to bring the Bucs down to -1 via a teaser, which is a bit of value on the alternative spread of -1. While that's a small advantage, it allows you to take another game and manipulate that spread in your favor.

Not all teaser legs are created equal. The biggest mistake novice bettors make is teasing through zero - you're wasting valuable price points on a number the game probably won't land on. So how can we maximize the six-point move? How can we get what we're paying for at -270 per leg?

Plenty of my favorite teaser options - that is, options to tease a one- or two-point underdog up over a touchdown - were available in Week 5. With so few upsets in general, we saw touchdown favorites cover their teaser legs, too. However, such choices this week seem to be few and far between.

Half the games are lined between -3 and -4.5, which doesn't lend itself to profitable teasing. A few sides provide the opportunity to tease a point spread that captures the key numbers of three, six, and seven. Remember, these are not recommendations; this is more about the selection of teams you could tease from a mathematically correct standpoint in the "teaser basket."

Teaser basket

The first two options here require an upper-echelon team to beat an NFC East team on the road. As a result, a Bucs/Chiefs tease will be incredibly popular, but we should be wary of something that seems too obvious. My favorite leg of the four is taking the Vikings up to +7.5 in Carolina, as the Panthers aren't likely to pull away from Minnesota, whereas the Browns might be set up to roll against the Cardinals.

Fundamentally, take as many legs from the basket as you want that align with your handicap of the game. Which ones do you like?

Matt Russell is a betting writer for theScore. If there's a bad beat to be had, Matt will find it. Find him on Twitter @mrussauthentic.