This column -- a collaboration with NFL officiating guru Joe Gibbs -- is 53-44-2 (plus 4.61 units) since its debut last season

Gibbs (not the Hall of Fame coach, the NFL referee expert who tweets @NFLrefstats1) teams with SportsLine to deliver three weekly bets. Gibbs dives into the NFL referee assignments the moment they are released each week, unearthing the most relevant betting angles.

Before you make any Week 17 NFL picks or NFL parlays, you need to see what Gibbs and SportsLine senior analyst Larry Hartstein have to say about the officiating crews' tendencies.

A former lead writer for Covers and The Linemakers, Hartstein combines a vast network of Vegas sources with an analytical approach he honed working for Pro Football Focus. Hartstein tied for 52nd place (out of 1,598 entries) in the 2022 Westgate Las Vegas SuperContest, going 53-34-3 ATS. His weekly Vegas contest selections form the basis of his NFL best bets column, which is 97-77-3 (plus 11.28 units) since its inception in 2022.

We can tell you Hartstein and Gibbs are betting Carolina +8.5 (-120, FanDuel), in part because Clay Martin will officiate. Divisional home teams are 16-22 SU and 12-26 ATS in Martin's career, including 3-7 SU and ATS this season.

Martin's crew assesses 48.2% of its penalties in two categories: false starts and offensive holding. The Panthers rank 14th for offensive holding, "but a significant portion occurred earlier in the season," Gibbs said. "That has been an area of improvement the past five weeks." Tampa Bay ranks 19th in offensive holding. Strangely, about 80% of the Panthers' false start penalties have occurred at home.

Hartstein and Gibbs also are sharing key officiating angles in Cowboys-Eagles and Dolphins-Browns. You need to see this key referee data before locking in your picks!

So what's the play for Cowboys-Eagles? And what other officiating edges can be found on the Week 16 slate? ... Join SportsLine right now to see Larry Hartstein's Week 17 NFL officiating trends, all from the column that went 37-23 last season!