Free Betting Tips – Bears Try To Hold Off Eagles For Second Seed In NFC Playoffs

The Chicago Bears currently hold the second spot in the NFC’s betting playoff pecking order, but they’re not favored to hold onto that position.

The New York Jets await this Sunday. Here’s a preview with some free betting tips.

Free Betting Tips: New York Jets @ Chicago Bears

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Sunday, December 26th –1:00 PM ET

Soldier Field, Chicago

Broadcast: CBS

Odds:

The Chicago Bears don’t have Michael Vick or DeSean Jackson. They don’t have offensive playmakers or eye-popping talent. They have a very solid and rugged defense, but they got crushed at home by the New England Patriots a few weeks ago and did not look like a Super Bowl contender. Yet, amazingly, this team is still sitting in second place in the NFC’s playoff picture. If Chicago can somehow win its last two games, it will gain a first-round bye and fend off the Philadelphia Eagles in the race for a very precious prize. However, in order to run the table and earn that wild-card bye, Chicago will have to take down two formidable foes. Green Bay lingers on Jan. 2, but first, the Bears must beat another upper-tier team from the AFC betting East.

Chicago couldn’t figure out New England, but now the New York Jets come to Soldier Field, intent on gaining the fifth seed in the AFC postseason. The Jets are coming off a very encouraging performance in a 22-17 win at Pittsburgh. Yes, the win came against a Steeler team that sorely missed all-world strong safety Troy Polamalu, but the Jets – having just endured a brutal 10-6 loss on home turf against a mediocre Miami club – needed the bounce-back win for their confidence as much as anything else. Coach Rex Ryan’s boys will be very confident when they take the field in Chicago.

Free Betting Tips: What The Jets Have To Do To Win

In disposing of Pittsburgh, the big key for New York was that Mark Sanchez – in a repeat of his two playoff wins last season – looked like a capable and worthy field general. The Jets’ defense understandably gets the lion’s share of publicity in the Big Apple, but New York’s playoff and Super Bowl hopes rest on the ability of its offense to score an appreciable amount of points while also controlling the ball. This game against Chicago is no different. New York has to post at least 20 points, shorten the game, and thereby place a lot of pressure on the Bears whenever they get the ball. The Jets will win games if they keep their defense fresh and limit their opponent’s amount of first-rate opportunities. Sanchez and the offense have been impotent for much of the season, and when they haven’t been impotent, they’ve been mistake-prone. The negative double-whammy has allowed opponents to beat the Jets without playing particularly well on the offensive side of the ball. New York can still contend for a championship, but the Jets need to make good opponents beat them with excellence; if the Jets avoid mistakes and force opponents to play well, they have a very good shot to do so against any team other than New England.

Free Betting Tips: What The Bears Have To Do To Win

Ironically, the Bears face the same challenges the Jets do, only to a slightly lesser extent. Chicago quarterback Jay Cutler has begun to play well, and his major-league arm –much better than Sanchez –means that he can take at least a few risks. Cutler must still make sound decisions, but he’s being asked to make a few more plays than Sanchez, a classic “game manager.”Nevertheless, the same basic template exists for Cutler: Don’t make mistakes and trust your defense to win games.

The other thing Chicago has is Devin Hester. The superstar kick returner is an incredibly potent weapon. Naturally, if the Jets are dumb enough to kick to him, Hester needs to take advantage and set up the Bears with a short field.

NFL Handicapping: Outlook & Free Betting Tips

The Jets won’t kick to Devin Hester, and they have the defense that can put the clamps on Jay Cutler. Moreover, New York’s offense is now playing with more confidence, and as long as the Jets don’t commit turnovers, they can probably win a hard-nosed 17-13 kind of slugfest in the Windy City. Take the Jets.

Free Betting Tips: Jets