Bengals vs Bills: Odds, expert picks, analysis, predictions for NFL Week 5

The Cincinnati Bengals and Buffalo Bills are set to play on Sunday, and it may be one of the weirdest match ups this weekend. Mostly because I don’t think anyone had the Bills being 3-1 at this point in the season. The Bengals and Bills have also played each other pretty frequently through recent seasons.

The experts and oddsmakers aren’t sure of what to make of this game either. Are the Bills actually good? Or are they just a team who got lucky against some good teams? Will the Bengals be able to turn it around after their 0-3 start? Or are they going to struggle all the way till the end? This game will go a long way for either team.

Odds

Odds makers see this as a close game that favors the Bengals. As of Friday morning, the Bengals are three-point favorites over the Bills, according to OddsShark.

The Bills have won three of the last four against the Bengals. They also come into the game having defeated the Broncos and Falcons in the past two weeks. It is fairly surprising the Bengals are favored given the performance of these two teams so far this season.

Here are some trends for both teams:

• Cincinnati is 4-2 against the spread in its last six games.
• Cincinnati is 2-5 straight up in its last seven games
• the total has gone under in seven of Cincinnati’s last eight games
• Cincinnati is 2-5 against the spread in its last seven games at home
• Cincinnati is 2-4-1 straight up in its last seven games at home
• The total has gone under in five of Cincinnati’s last six games at home
• Cincinnati is 3-11 against the spread in its last 14 games when playing Buffalo
• Cincinnati is 3-11 straight up in its last 14 games when playing Buffalo
• The total has gone over in seven of Cincinnati’s last eight games when playing Buffalo
• Cincinnati is 1-5 against the spread in its last six games when playing at home against Buffalo
• Cincinnati is 1-5 straight up in its last six games when playing at home against Buffalo
• The totals has gone over in five of Cincinnati’s last six games when playing at home against Buffalo
• The total has gone over in 11 of Buffalo’s last 16 games
• The total has gone under in four of Buffalo’s last five games
• Buffalo is 2-3-2 against the spread in their last seven games on the road
• Buffalo is 2-5 straight up in its last seven games on the road

Picks

• CBS Sports has four of their eight experts picking the Bengals
• Fox Sports projects the Bills to win 24.0-18.1
• Only two of ESPN’s 10 experts picked the Bengals
• SB Nation has one of their eight experts picking the Bengals
• NFL Pick Watch, which takes into account picks from experts all around the internet, has 60 percent of the picks going towards the Bills.

I guess this is the game many people will use to see if the Bills are for real or not. Usually, when a 3-1 team takes on a 1-3 team, they are favored. The experts are still picking mostly in favor of the Bills though, which makes sense. The Bills have beaten some impressive opponents. The Bengals struggled through most of the season so far.

This is a game for both of these teams to prove whether or not they are for real this season.