Bust out your folding tables and trim up your mustache, because this week we’re picking the Buffalo Bills. The Bills come into this week off a bye and should be getting back a healthy Josh Allen and Devin Singletary to take on the Miami Dolphins on their home field. They are also this week’s biggest odds on favorite at -17.
I would feel even better about this pick if the Fins were still rolling out Josh Rosen, but either way this ferocious Bills D should make that O-line look like swiss cheese. No amount of Fitzmagic can save them.
A close 2nd this week would be to pick the 49ers on the road vs the Washington Redskins favored by 10. I opted to take the Bills though, for the home field advantage, and because San Francisco is a better team overall that I can use later on in the season.
Well, I was really pulling for the Redskins on Thursday night as nearly 2/3rds of the remaining players had selected the Minnesota Vikings. Having used the Vikings week 5 they were not an option for me this week. So I narrowed it down to another two big favorites that I like this week.
First is the Los Angeles Rams against the Cincinnati Bengals. The Bengals look to be the weakest team the Rams will face the rest of the season, so this might be the best game to take the Rams had it not been in London. I have yet to see a team perform well across the pond, I think they legislate we kick more field goals or something when the NFL sends teams over. With the close call this week I am going to save a solid Rams team for another week.
So that led me to the other team that I ultimately picked, the Pittsburgh Steelers going up against the Miami Dolphins at home where they are two-touchdown favorites. Without Ben Roethlisberger this is the only game on the Steelers schedule that I would feel comfortable picking them. Now I wish I was getting Josh Rosen against this Steeler defense but I think they can get a few turnovers from old man Fitzpatrick regardless.
Last week was a good week for the picks. Heading into Monday night, I was a perfect 14/14 relying on the Steelers to win at home vs the winless Dolphins to capture my 14 point pick and survive another week in the big pool. Never in my life had I picked every game correctly in a week and was quite nervous. I even texted friends early in the first quarter when Miami jumped out to an early lead to tell them I was kicking myself for not switching the pick to Miami before kickoff. (Seriously considered it, no way the football gods could let me be perfect.)
Ahh but alas, the Dolphins have no intentions of winning a game and ran a boneheaded defense at the end of the half allowing the Steelers to score a long TD and bring the game to within 4 points. The Dolphins were to never score again and Pitt got the easy victory.
This week’s schedule has been the toughest for me to make a pick. Halfway through the season and I have used up many of the stronger teams with good matchups. That left me with 2 options pick the Packers in Carson,CA against the Chargers or the 49ers in Arizona on Thursday night. I opted to go with the latter.
The 49ers are the biggest favorite of the week and have looked unstoppable on defense. Add to that facing a first time NFL coach and rookie QB, it should be a no brainer. Right? Well anyways Thursday night games always seem to burn me, so I will be watching this one with my fingers crossed and a bottle by my side to ease the nerves.
Twenty teams were eliminated last week, this brings our surviving entrants down to 186 with 8 weeks left to go in the
season. Last week we managed to fade the dreaded Thursday night nightmare on Halloween of all nights,
when the 49ers were able to pull out an unnecessarily close victory against the Cardinals 28-25. The
Cardinals jumped out to an early 7-0 lead and had me doubting game manager Garoppolo's ability to
keep up with the potent Cardinal offense. But then the tables turned and the Niners had the 21-7 lead at half,
wrap it up, easy game right? Wrong the Cards rallied back outscoring the Niners 18-7 in the second half
capped by an 88 yard touchdown from Andy Isabella to bring the game within 3. But alas, the Cards
couldn't get a stop and the Niners held on. Seriously, I would not bet against Kyler Murray if they are down
by a score and have the ball last.
Now, on to this week, where I will again be taking the cowards way out by selecting the largest favorite of
the week in the Saints at -13.5 on the road vs the Atlanta Falcons. The announcement that Matt Ryan
would be returning for this game shockingly did not move the line an inch. Bottom line in this one is the
Falcons can not stop anyone, and this week that anyone is Drew Brees and the best team in the NFC.
Could this be Dan Quinn's final coaching performance? Hopefully the Dolphins can do me a favor and
knock off the next biggest favorite Colts at home, which will surely eliminate a large number of
remaining players.