I expect this line to be extremely temporary, but the Patriots opened up as 4-point favorites, per OddsShark.com. The line has already crept up to the Patriots being 4.5-point favorites, which implies the Patriots are 1.5-point favorite on a neutral field.
The spread should grow over the course of the week if there is good news about QB Jimmy Garoppolo’s availability and how TE Rob Gronkowski and LB Dont’a Hightower look in practice. The spread could move in the other direction with positive news about Bills WR Sammy Watkins and CB Ronald Darby.
The Patriots are 3-0 against the spread this year, while the Bills are 1-2.
Under head coach Bill Belichick, the Patriots are 28-4 against the Bills. The last three times the Bills beat the Patriots (2003, 2011, 2014), the Patriots went on to the Super Bowl.
Other than week 17 of the 2014 season when the Patriots rested their starters, the Patriots have managed to win every home game against the Bills since 2001 by 5 or more points, except for two cases: week 1 in 2006 and week 1 in 2009, when the Patriots won by 2 and by 1, respectively.
The line will be something fun to monitor over the next week and hopefully the Patriots can move to 4-0 against the spread.