How often favorites really win in pick'em pools: 2026 data

Every pick'em strategy guide says "just take the favorites." We wanted to know how good that advice actually is, so we looked at the first six weeks of the 2026 season: every NFL and college football game with an opening point spread, and every pick made in the pools run on Pick'em Builder.

The short version: favorites win often enough that the crowd is right about two times in three, but much less often than most people think in close games, and almost never by enough to cover the spread.

What we looked at

• •79 NFL games with an opening line (Weeks 1–5) and 753 college football games with a line (FBS and FCS, through Week 7).
• •Lines are the opening point spread, the same number against-the-spread pools on our site grade against.
• •6,330 picks made by players in pick'em pools on Pick'em Builder this season, counted only in aggregate. No pool or player is identified.
• •Six weeks is a small sample for the NFL, so treat the NFL numbers as a snapshot, not a law. The college numbers rest on far more games.

Finding 1: NFL games with a line of 3 points or less are coin flips

In the NFL, a favorite of 1 to 3 points won only 47% of the time this season, slightly worse than a coin flip, across 43 games. Favorites of 3.5 to 7 points won 76% of the time, and favorites of 7.5 to 14 points won 73%.

That matters because more than half of NFL games (43 of 79) had a line of 3 or less. In a straight-up pool, those games are where the week is won or lost, and the favorite is not the safe pick it looks like.

College football is far more lopsided. Overall, college favorites won 78% of the time, and favorites of more than 14 points won 94%. But the close college games were coin flips too: 1-to-3-point favorites won 60%, and 3.5-to-7-point favorites won only 59%.

• •NFL, 1–3 point favorites: won 47% (43 games)
• •NFL, 3.5–7 point favorites: won 76% (21 games)
• •NFL, 7.5–14 point favorites: won 73% (15 games)
• •College, 1–3: won 60% (114) · 3.5–7: 59% (128) · 7.5–14: 77% (183) · 14.5+: 94% (328)

Finding 2: favorites rarely cover

Against the spread, favorites covered only 46% of the time in the NFL and 47% in college football. In college, the 3.5-to-7-point range was the worst for favorites: they covered just 39% of the time.

If you play in an against-the-spread pool, this is the useful part. Taking every favorite is a losing strategy against the opening line. The line is set so each side is close to a coin flip, and this season the underdog side of that coin has come up a little more often.

Finding 3: the crowd is right about two times in three

In games where at least five players in a pool picked, the side most players took won 63% of NFL games and 69% of college games. Players took the favorite with 63% of NFL picks and 72% of college picks.

Home teams won 53% of decided NFL games and 68% of college games. College home-field advantage is strong because so many early-season games are mismatches played at the bigger school.

So the crowd is a decent guide, but it's not close to perfect. Over a 14-game NFL week, following the majority gets you about 9 right. Winning a pool usually takes 10 or more, which means picking a few well-chosen upsets.

The upsets almost nobody called

These were the upsets (the opening-line underdog won) that the fewest players in our pools saw coming:

• •Cal Poly at Idaho State (Oct. 10): Cal Poly was a 14.5-point underdog and won 25–24. Only 4% of 69 players picked Cal Poly.
• •Portland State at Weber State (Sept. 27): Portland State, a 6.5-point underdog, won 44–41. 5% of 22 players picked them.
• •Northern Arizona at Idaho State (Oct. 4): Northern Arizona, a 6.5-point underdog, won 38–31. 9% of 78 players picked them.
• •Arizona at the Chargers (Sept. 13): Arizona, an 11.5-point underdog, won 26–14. 20% of 40 players picked Arizona.
• •Seattle at Washington (Sept. 27): Washington, a 3.5-point underdog at home, won 33–31. 21% of 33 players picked Washington.

And the upsets the crowd did see

Not every upset is a surprise. In some games the betting line favored one team but most of our players picked the other, and they were right:

• •Philadelphia at Jacksonville (Oct. 11): Jacksonville, a 2.5-point home underdog, won 19–17. 76% of 21 players picked the Jaguars.
• •Indianapolis at Washington (Oct. 4): Indianapolis, a 1.5-point underdog, won 30–13. 67% of 24 players picked the Colts.
• •Carolina at Atlanta (Sept. 20): Carolina, a 1.5-point underdog, won 34–3. 58% of 31 players picked the Panthers.

What this means for your picks

• •Straight-up pools: lock in the big favorites (7+ points), and spend your thinking on the games with lines of 3 or less. That's where the week is decided.
• •Confidence pools: put your top numbers on the biggest favorites and your lowest numbers on the close games. A 1-to-3-point NFL favorite deserves a low number even when you like them.
• •Against-the-spread pools: don't default to favorites. They covered less than half the time, especially in the 3.5-to-7-point range in college.
• •Every pool: to win, you need a few contrarian picks. Following the crowd gets you to the middle of the standings.

How we'll keep this updated

We'll refresh these numbers as the season goes on, including bowl season and the playoffs. Want to see how your own group stacks up? Every pool on Pick'em Builder shows each game's pick split once picks lock, so you can see exactly where your group went with the crowd and where it went against it.