“Edge of Fury” US Theatrical Poster

UK label Signal One Entertainment is preparing a Blu-ray (Region B) for Edge of Fury, a 1978 martial arts film directed by Lee Tso Nam (Fist of Fury Part II) that stars Bruce Li (Bruce and the Iron Finger), Dana Tsen (Image of Bruce Lee), Tommy Lee (The Hot, the Cool and the Vicious) and Yasuaki Kurata (Manhunt).

A wealthy business man is arrested and sentenced to death for drug smuggling, and it’s up to his trustworthy chauffer, Fang Pao (Bruce Li), to unravel the mystery behind his boss’s downfall. Was he really smuggling drugs? Was he set up? Does his boss’s sleazy girlfriend (Dana Tsen) have something to do with it? The closer Fang Pao gets to the facts, the more dangerous his life becomes.

This title will soon be available at The Goodie Emporium, a U.S.-based online store that currently Continue reading →

As sports betting becomes legal in more parts of the United States, it is skyrocketing in popularity. In fact, 20% of American adults will place a bet on NFL football this year.

To be clear, that’s not the number of adults that will place a bet on just any sport this year—that is only the amount that will bet on NFL games. The opportunities to put a little skin in the game are steadily increasing with expanding legality and methods by which you can bet on NFL games and players.

From fantasy football to daily fantasy sports to just straight-up betting, this blog has got you covered.

If you’re ready to get your feet wet when it comes to betting on football games or if you’ve already begun to bet on football and are looking for betting advice or tips, read on.

How to Bet on NFL Games

First and foremost, it is critical that you check your local gambling laws and excise tax codes before placing any kind of bet on any sport—whether it be online or in person. Sports gambling laws vary widely from state to state, and violating those laws can come with hefty penalties.

So, one more time – check your state’s sports gambling laws before placing a bet or wager. Instead, you might have to (gasp) enjoy watching your favorite team play without gambling.

Sometimes catching your favorite teams or players can be a bit complicated since the end of net neutrality and the advent of streaming subscription services, but knowing how to watch your players play is almost mandatory.

Now, with that out of the way, let’s take a deep dive into everything there is to know about today’s odds and betting on the NFL.

Different Ways to Bet on the NFL 

As mentioned above, there are several different ways to bet on NFL games and even individual players. The oldest and most popular method is traditional fantasy football.

Traditional Fantasy Football

Ah, old-school fantasy football—the original underground way to bet on football. Traditionally, fantasy football is conducted between a group of friends that comprise a “league.” However, the advent of modern technology has helped give rise to this “sport” that was previously reserved for stats nerds.

In “traditional” fantasy football, each “team owner” drafts a team of various players from throughout the league based on their statistics and regardless of which real-life team for which they may play. League fees are collected by the “commissioner” of the league (where legal), and payouts come at the end of the season, depending on where each respective team finishes in the standings.

The rules, draft rules, and scoring are very dynamic because of the customizable nature of the game. It comes down to the personal preference of each league, their commissioner, and ultimately the “team owners” therein.

Leagues may also play for bragging rights, a trophy, or to avoid some kind of creative punishment at the end of the season. The only limits are your imagination (and obviously the law in your state).

Traditional fantasy sports will also introduce you to the colloquial term “handcuff,” which refers to your star player’s backup player. Consider them an insurance policy should something unfortunate happen to your big stud ballplayer.

Daily Fantasy Sports

Similar to traditional fantasy football but confined to the microcosm of one specific day’s slate of games, daily fantasy sports leagues allow players to bet a  customizable amount of money toward any number of public “pools” before drafting players for their team on that day alone—usually for an arbitrary “salary cap” amount. While payouts are much smaller and harder to hit big with, the quick turnover is attractive to some bettors.

Another favorable side of daily fantasy sports in the eyes of bettors is that it is set up in a much more traditional, almost “day-trader” type format. This allows people that may not be huge fans of watching football games to place more of a situational-based bet on NFL games and players.

When it comes to daily fantasy sports (a.k.a. DFS), the higher the wager, the higher the payout. While this is a basic tenet of gambling, you should remember that if you’ve got the dough to be a high roller, you’re also pricing out some of the riff-raff and decreasing the chance of someone getting lucky at random.

There is still trepidation on some fronts because of early snafus with ineligible gamblers and creative cheaters gaming the daily fantasy sports world. Still, it appears that since the industry has grown out of its infancy, those fears and instances have decreased considerably.

Daily fantasy sports is now a profitable, viable, legitimate way for fans to bet on NFL players and games.

Betting the Spread

Now we’re getting into the territory of old-school gambling. “Betting the spread” is a term that those unfamiliar with sports gambling have probably heard, even if they have no idea what it means.

Each game has a set “spread” determined by sports experts and “bookkeepers” that have sources inside the game. The “spread” is the amount set for one team to defeat another points-wise. This is not in relation to fantasy football but rather actual, real-life football games.

If you’re still not picking up what I’m putting down, think of it like this: Team A is favored to win by 6.5pts (a.k.a. +6.5) over Team B. Since there are no available ways for football teams to score half points, you are betting about whether one of the two teams is going to score 6 or 7 more points than the other team.

If the underdog team (in this situation, “Team B” wins by any point margin and you bet on them to win, you’re going to profit. However, this bet comes with a significantly higher risk, hence the more straightforward win.

If “Team A” in this situation wins by seven or more points and you bet on them to do so, you stand to profit from the bet, albeit at a lower profit margin than taking the underdog.

Betting the Over/Under

Another common stat that targets folks who bet on NFL games or players is the “over/under.” This term refers to the total amount of points that will be scored in a game by both teams combined. For example, if you bet the “under” on a game with an over/under of 37.5 points, you are betting that both teams in a given game will score 37 or fewer total points.

Many sports enthusiasts will tell you that “life is too short to bet the under,” but it is often a worthwhile wager. The key to the new generation of betting tips is to sniff out irregularities in the market and mitigate risk. In the end, placing a bet on NFL games or players isn’t much different than buying or selling stocks.

Betting the Money Line

Betting the money line is when a bettor bets for a team to win, regardless of the spread. Betting on the favored team will pay much less if they win, but it will still pay.

Money line bets are typically best suited for gamblers who have some feeling or information that lead them to believe that the underdog might win. Die-hard fans of a team that may come out as underdogs when betting opens are the most likely to bet against the money line.

How to Bet Smart on Football Games

Now that you’ve gotten a rudimentary rundown of the most common ways to bet on NFL games and players, let’s dive into some fundamental strategies that might help you make money off the hobby.

For now, let’s focus on the straight-up money line, over/under, and spread betting, and save the fantasy football advice for later.

Money Line Bets

The simplest to bet and the riskiest to research, money line bets can make or break you on game day. A great example was the Colts/Jaguars tilt in Week 2 of the 2022-2023 season. The Colts opened as 11.5-point favorites because they are easily the better team talent-wise.

Many bettors were caught off guard by the 24-0 drubbing that the Jags laid on the Colts, who were suffering from a glut of injuries on both sides of the ball. What many bettors also likely ignored was the fact that Jacksonville has spanked the Colts mightily over the last 2-3 seasons, roster rotations be damned.

Over/Under Bets Will Catch You Sleeping

Sure, life’s too short to bet the under. Who wants to watch a boring, low-scoring game? Smart bettors, that’s who. Too many folks bet optimistically, hoping for a raucous good time as they watch two teams duke it out on their way to a big fat payday for the bettor.

Bookies see you, folks. There’s an easy uptick on over/under bets for this reason alone.

In the end, over/under bets are typically the most successful if you can keep emotion and fandom out of the equation.

Betting the Spread Pays Fools Well

Look, betting for your team to win by (x) number of points is one of the purest ways to put some skin in the game, regardless of the sport. It’s also the quickest way to lose money when you bet on NFL games.

When you bet on football games, basketball games, or any kind of competition in general, a particular illusion of knowledge floods bettors’ minds. Sure, you might be the most prominent New York Jets fan since Joe Namath made The Guarantee, but if you keep betting on the Jets to win and cover, you’re also going to be a very poor gambling Jets fan.

Parlays Are Doom

A “parlay” is when you make multiple bets on many different games or aspects of a game. While parlays pay huge dollars, they are notoriously difficult to hit correctly. Parlays will lose your money for you in a hurry unless you know what you’re doing. Newbies, beware.

Professionals Shop Around for the Right Money Line

It may seem like nitpicking, but the truly great bettors will shop around for a half point or o through each available sportsbook. It is shocking how accurate bookkeepers can be about predicting scores, so a half point here or there can be the difference between losing big and pumping money into your vacation fund.

Common Sites to Bet on Football

Whether you are looking for a betting website or app on your mobile device or PC/Mac, there are a few very prominent betting services to partner with if you want to bet on NFL games or players. Let’s take a quick look at these common and popular services.

• DraftKings
• FanDuel
• BetMGM
• Barstool
• PointsBet
• BetRivers

All of the above sportsbooks are legitimate and legal betting services (again, we can’t stress it enough…only in states where sports gambling is legal)

While the basic setup remains the same from site to site, you’ll notice that the interface and bonuses will vary. Promotions also run the gamut from “free money” to loss refunds for new bettors again, depending on the service and site themselves.

One More Warning

Remember to ensure that you comply with local and state laws before attempting to place a real money bet or wager on any type of sports outcome. This site nor the author should be held liable for any misinterpretation of this fact.

If you learned something from this blog or if you’re looking for more information about sports that bucks the mainstream on how to bet on the NFL, check out our other content for news on entertainment, sports, technology, and pop culture.

It is no secret that as Quentin Tarantino was growing up, he earned money to fund his writing by working in a video store. In doing this he was surrounded by movies all day every day collecting encyclopedic knowledge from a massive array of different genres. Tarantino often refers to this as his free education and makes reference to the number of different movies he watched growing up throughout all of his own films. 

Asian Cinemas Influence on the West 

Before discussing how Tarantino took influence from Asian cinema when he wrote Kill Bill, it is first worth discussing how Asian cinema influenced the west in general as these influences would trickle down onto Tarantino’s screen in the movies he would watch. A lot of western filmmakers were famous for reusing plots that were originally from Asian films. This article by BFI.org on Asian Cinema and its influences show just how much of a massive part of western cinema owes to its Asian counterpart. 

The likes of George Lucas, Sergio Leone, and Martin Scorsese all owe some of the success of their classic movies to Asian cinema as plot points and characters were inspired by films such as Yojimbo, The Hidden Fortress, and Battle Royale. That being said, rather than merely repurposing plots from Japanese and Chinese movies and then relaying over a different template, with Kill Bill, Tarantino did something different. 

Asian Cinemas Influence on Tarantino 

As you can see by this post by Screenrant.com that talks about Kill Bill and why it is so good, there are a number of reasons to like the film. That being said, Tarantino’s originality in how he wears his inspirations on his sleeve is up there with one of the most prevalent reasons. He doesn’t imitate his influences, instead, he pinpoints them and continues storylines within his own film. 

For instance, the Deadly Viper Assassination Squad that the Bride hunts down throughout the film is clearly taken from the Five Deadly Venoms, which is a kung-fu classic by the Shaw Brothers. Not to mention, Hattori Hanzo reprised a role that he originally played in an old Japanese TV series called the Shadow Warriors back in the 80s. 

The Continued Influence of Kill Bill 

It’s clear that Tarantino’s Kill Bill is a movie that continues to give and is respected by film buffs around the world thanks to the continued influence its plot and characters continue to have on popular culture. An example of this comes in the form of the slot game Crazy 88, which has a name and a theme taken from the famous gang portrayed in Kill Bill. The game even utilizes the music that is played during the outrageous fight scene within the movie, as well. This post by Bonus.ca on new casinos outlines some of the new online gambling sites that are available and a lot of these are likely going to continue to have games inspired by Tarantino’s films, given he is such a cultural icon. As such, it is well worth having a look at the likes of King Billy, Jackpot Paradise, and Hell Spin to see if you catch any movie references. 

Tarantino and Asian Cinema 

Thanks to his time working at a video store, Tarantino does not hide the fact that he lets influences creep into his movies. The influence of Asian cinema can clearly be seen throughout Kill Bill except Tarantino separates himself from other western directors as instead of simply reimagining classic characters, he reprised originals and continued storylines. The effectiveness of how well this resonates with audiences is clear on the continued influence that Tarantino films have in pop culture in the likes of online casinos.