Whether or not you believe that the San Francisco 49ers traded up to the third overall pick for Alabama quarterback Mac Jones, the betting market is convinced that’s the case.
BetMGM offers odds on many draft props, and one of them is which player will go with the third overall pick. Jones, the Alabama quarterback who finished third in the Heisman Trophy voting, has taken over as the favorite to go No. 3 and it’s not close.
Jones is -200 to go third overall, meaning a bettor would need to wager $200 to win $100. Ohio State quarterback Justin Fields is next at +260. That’s a huge gap. If you’re still not convinced Jones is going No. 3 overall, maybe you should be.
Mac Jones is favored to go to 49ers
There has been a lot of skepticism over Jones going at No. 3, because it goes against just about everything we’ve heard in the offseason about the order of the quarterbacks.
Trevor Lawrence is going first overall. He is -10000 at BetMGM to go first. That’s as much of a lock as there is. Kyle Wilson going second to the New York Jets has become the big favorite. Those odds are -1100. For most of the offseason the conventional wisdom was that either Wilson or Fields would be the second quarterback off the board, and the other would go third. Maybe Trey Lance would be the surprise in the top three quarterbacks, but it wasn’t going to be Jones.
It only takes one team to fall in love with a player, and it certainly seems that’s what happened with the 49ers and Jones. San Francisco gave up a ton in a trade to move up to No. 3. The trade alone wasn’t a huge shock, because the team clearly is ready to move on from Jimmy Garoppolo soon.
The surprise was that the big move up was for Jones, who nobody had mocked in the top five before the trade.
49ers don’t have a reason to lie about third pick
If you don’t believe the reports that the 49ers have zeroed in on Jones with the third pick, you can make some money betting Fields, Lance or someone else.
The team has not said who it will be drafting, though it has acknowledged it will be a quarterback. There have been more than a few reports that it would be a surprise if Jones isn’t the pick. There’s no reason for the 49ers to put out false information. They’re not trying to entice a trade; the 49ers already traded a lot to move up and aren’t flipping the pick. Whichever quarterback they prefer won’t change the Jacksonville Jaguars’ pick of Lawrence or the Jets picking Wilson. Simply put, there’s no reason for the 49ers to lie, other than messing with everyone for the fun of it. That’s unlikely. We’re so used to misinformation before the draft, but there’s no reason to believe this is a smokescreen.
The odds have moved significantly this week as more reports come in. If Jones isn’t the third pick it will be a shock, not to just the reporters passing along that information, but to bettors as well.
More from Yahoo Sports:
Source link
