Florida Football: Early betting odds bleak for the Gators

Everyone knows Florida Football has a brutal schedule ahead of the 2024 season. We have spent plenty of literature highlighting the fact that even if Billy Napier and crew make genuine improvements on the field that it still may not show up in the win loss record.

But even when mapping out a best case scenario for the Gators, early odds from DraftKings have zero faith in Florida's ability to win anything more than three or four games.

Florida Football: Bet On It

DraftKings dropped early lines for seven of Florida's games, and not only are the Gators underdogs in all seven games, but they are massive underdogs in multiple games.

In their opener against Miami, Florida is a +2 underdog. Against Texas A&M, +4. It only ballons from there as Florida is +11 against Tennessee, +13.5 against FSU, and +22 against Georgia. The Gators are also +5.5 against LSU and +6.5 against Ole Miss.

It is easy to look at some of these lines in one breath and blow a gasket. Considering the turmoil in Miami right now and the fact the game is at home, it feels preposterous that the Gators are the underdog. Florida beat Texas A&M straight up two years ago, and the Aggies have a new coach. We all remember Florida dog walking Tennessee last year out of The Swamp. And the past two seasons, Florida has had second half leads against FSU and LSU.

Combined with a defense that should be improved and an offense that has the tools to be just good enough, all of these lines feel like taking free money from Vegas.

But...

This is Vegas and there is a reason why Vegas knows best. We all gawked last year when Florida was projected to hit 5.5 wins and we all took the over thinking it was free money.

Oops.

Florida was also 4-8 against the spread last season.

Double oops.

So rather than get all in a huff, these lines should be a continued dose of reality that Florida hasn't earned the respect to be considered a threat until they actually prove they are.