Our Action Network Luck Rankings are out for NFL Week 5, and based on this week's slate, there are two games where luck is a significant factor.
As a quick recap, the unlucky team from the Action Network Luck Rankings is 103-58-6 (63.5%) against the closing spread (ATS) since the start of 2018 if the unlucky team in a matchup meets at least one of the following two criteria:
- At least 24 places lower than their opponent in the Luck Rankings
- Has a luck percentage at least 50% worse than their opponent
Unlucky teams in Luck Matchups are 7-4-2 ATS on the year.
Luck Totals, on the other hand, have started the year 0-2 — including on Thursday Night Football this week — to drop to 27-14 overall since 2018 (65.8%). Games show significant value on the over or under if they meet one of the following criteria after Week 3:
- Luck Total above 10 (over)
- Luck Total below -10 (under)
NFL Luck Rankings Games for Week 5
With a Luck Difference of 24, this is the only matchup of the week where luck impacts a side.
The luck total of 42.9% also nearly meets the 50% threshold. Carolina is the unlucky team here, ranking 29th in our Luck Rankings compared to fifth for Detroit.
As the road team, the Panthers benefit from an even better trend, where unlucky road teams meeting at least one of the criteria are 54-21-3 (71.2%) ATS.
Unlucky teams meeting just the Luck Difference criteria are 32-21-3 (59.8%) ATS, but 15-5-1 (73.8%) on the road.
Interestingly enough, the only other Week 5 luck-based matchup since 2018 was last year, when the Raiders were 7.5-point road underdogs to the Chiefs. The luck difference in that game was 24 and the luck total was 43.2% — nearly identical to this game. The Raiders lost 30-29 and covered the spread.
This game doesn't feature a side, but rather a total with the Luck Total for this game sitting at -16.6, favoring the under.
Luck Unders with a Luck Total of -10 or below after Week 3 are 14-9, but 0-2 so far in 2023. That includes two Luck Totals below -20, the only two such occurrences since 2018. The next-smallest Luck Total in that time frame was a -15.5 that did go under.
If we look at Week 5 and beyond and lower the threshold to -9 since we have another week of data, Luck Totals are 30-19-1 (61%) including Luck Unders sitting at 17-10-1 (62.5%).
It's possible if the Luck Total is extremely low, like the two games have been so far this year, it may mean these teams are actually inclined to score more than our Expected Scores predict, which puts this -16.6 value in a precarious position. However, we'd need to build up the sample size to be sure.
