NFL Picks

Hope you capitalized off of the SUNDAY SPECIAL TEASER: Chargers -6.5, Vikings -3.5. That was my biggest and only play of the day.  Although we had an 11-0 streak going into Saturday, we gave some of that back with 2 bad beats on Saturday, but we were able to make up for that with the teaser today.

I’m still thinking about what to do tonight.  The spread moved from Ravens -9 to Ravens -7.5, so a bunch of people are siding with the Steelers and the points.  First the injuries, Roethlisberger is out, Polamalu is out, and Suggs is out.  Rookie Dennis Dixon gets the start tonight.  This is his first start of the season and his only action was 2 preseason games where he wasn’t very impressive.  He was a dynamic playmaker in college for Oregon last year and was also a Heisman hopeful. He brings an elusive running game, but I am not expecting much from the kid in his first start against the Ravens.

The over under is set extremely low at 35.5.  All signs point to this game and the under, but with Polamalu and Suggs out, that may open up some scoring opportunities.  Dixon is also capable of breaking open a run as well.  You can also expect the Steelers to call run after run and kill that clock.

I want to do a teaser here.  I don’t think you take the Steelers at +14.5 due to the rookie factor against a very good defense on the road.  I like the Ravens at -0.5, so you’re going to have to debate whether to tease the over/under to over 28.5 or under 42.5.

This could easily be a 16-13 game or this could be a …

Back-to-back-to-back-to-back SUNDAY & MONDAY NIGHT winners. Yes I will boast about a 4-0 record in the past 2 weeks in the prime-time games. Even after bad starts and let’s be honest here, 5-8 in the last two week for the top picks is not what I’m shooting for, but we kept you in the game and hopefully made up some ground with our prime-time picks.

All it would have taken is 2 games to go our way to post a winning record and I will throw out 2 injuries to “justify” or “excuse” my poor record: QB Kyle Orton’s injury last week, which cost us the game against the Redskins and QB Kurt Warner’s injury when the Cardinals were beating the Rams 21-3, but then failed to cover by a mere point when Leinart scored 0 2nd-half points.  I will also consider the Steelers loss complete BS due to “luck.”

However, all was not melancholy in the end! We picked the Eagles and Titans and got two big wins after a less than ideal start to our Sunday.  We did it the previous week with the Patriots/Ravens double-whammy and we did it again this week.

We’ve battled back and made up a ton of ground going into Week 12.

Why do the statistical analysis when a kickoff return, a turnover, or even a crucial penalty call will determine the outcomes of at least 67% of these games against the spread. Let’s just roll with it from the gut.  So now I give you a more condensed version of our weekly picks without all the garbage and some “fearless” predictions.  I also throw out about a half-dozen teasers that I like more than the actual spreads.

IT’S TEASER WEEKEND!

GREEN BAY …

I’ll try to be direct here. It was another bad week. Our top 5 picks went 2-3 and the 3 other plays in the “picks to consider” category went 1-2. Before people decide to start sending hateful comments on how we “suck”, I just wanted to make a few points. Sometimes the NFL gets downright silly and simply unpredictable.

First point: I was 1 point away from having a winning record for the top 5 picks. The Cardinals were up 21-3 at the half. Now if you took the first-half line, you were in great shape. I do not know how they managed to put up 0 points in the 2nd half, but they did, and they won the game 21-13. With the spread set at -9, they didn’t cover by a single point. Now if I would have came out last week and said take the Rams +9, I would have been called a fool.

Second point: I was 1/2 of a point away from having a winning record for the picks in the “spreads to consider” category. The Packers had a 23-3 lead as well, but let the 49ers get a few scores and won by the score of 30-24. With the spread at 6.5, they lost by a half point. Now if I said take the 49ers +6.5 after the they scored 10 points after producing 5 turnovers from the week before, I would have been called a fool and would be laughed at.

Third point: The Steelers pick didn’t work out because of bullshit. They gave up a kickoff return for a TD on the first play of the game, which basically makes the spread Steelers -17 from the get go. Roethlisberger then throws an interception …

We are back with our NFL Week 11 Picks Against the Spread.  Last week was rough.  The underdogs finally had their day.  Our top 8 picks went 3-5 and the games that I personally played went 3-3.  I was able to get back in the game with back-to-back winners in the Sunday Night and Monday Night games, which were both listed in my top 8 picks.  I apologize for the poor start, but we came back with the solid finish to the week.  We’ve had a tremendous amount of success in the NFL this season.  In the past three weeks, our top picks have a 14-4 (77.77%) record.  That amount of success is unprecedented, so get off my case about 1 bad week.  This week I seek to prove all the haters wrong.  I’m sticking to my guns and will continue to bet against teams like the Rams, Browns, Raiders, Bucs, and Chiefs, who are facing solid teams with the exception of the Lions (Cardinals, Lions, Bengals, Saints, and Steelers respectively).  Top spreads ranked by strength are listed at the bottom.  As you can tell, I did more due diligence on each game.  I packed in a ton of analysis into each game and kept my eye on the injury reports.

MIAMI DOLPHINS @ CAROLINA PANTHERS -3

Most people see this matchup and want to jump on the Dolphins +3.  First lesson in sports betting, well maybe not the first, but one of the top 5: always check the injury reports!  Ronnie Brown is out in this game.  I provide links to resources for you to use that I use before picking my games.  Look at the NFL Information section and click the NFL Injury Report link or visit …

We may have been down, but we certainly are not out!  Back-to-back Sunday and Monday night winners baby!!!!  THE PASS RUSH conducted a little damage control.  I have to admit that we, along with most people placing wagers this Sunday, got a little banged up on Sunday (during the day at least), but if you kept the faith, and hung in there with us, you hopefully recouped your losses and then some.

Week In Review: Our top pick of the Saints -13.5 over the Rams didn’t work out due to the defense surrendering 23 points to a team that typically scores 6 points, as well as 2 INTs from Drew Brees.  We had some saving grace with the Titans as our 2nd strongest pick of the week to help even things out, but the Dallas over Green Bay pick failed to pan out as well.  The Broncos -3.5 over the Redskins was another play that I was pretty high on, and it was looking money after the 1st quarter when the Broncos had a 14-7 lead.  Unfortunatey, Kyle Orton was injured in the 2nd quarter and had to leave the game.   With Denver’s backup taking snaps, it was all downhill after that point, and a 3/13, 13 yards, 0 TDs, and 1 INT stat line are all you need to know about Chris Simms’ performance.

However, after a rough day, we got you back in the game if you boldly followed us into the Sunday and Monday night games. DOUBLE STAMP! THE PASS RUSH took down back-to-back night games to recoup all losses.  We got the cover with the Patriots +3 and it was all the sweeter that they lost due to my hatred for the Patriots.  We also got …

The books were due for a comeback. They’ve been dominated by THE PASS RUSH for three straight weeks and today was their day. It seemed as if every underdog was able to cover. So far this week, 9 out of 13 underdogs covered.

The way the spreads looked, I don’t think I would have played it any different. I loved the Saints pick and did not see the Rams as a potential threat to score 23 points when they average 6.3 PPG. The Broncos should have defeated the Redskins.  They had a 14-7 lead thanks to 2 deep TD passes from Kyle Orton, but Kyle Orton was injured in the 2nd quarter, had to leave the game, and the Broncos backup QB was completely worthless. The Packers lose to the Bucs last week and dominate the Cowboys this week? What is going on in the NFL?

In our pick ’em league, 19/20 people picked the Saints -13.5 over the Rams, so don’t point the finger, we were all fooled. 20/20 picked Denver -3.5 over the Redskins, but the Orton injury cost us that one.

In THE PASS RUSH pick ’em league, only 2 out of 20 teams finished above .500, so that tells you just what kind of week it truly was.

At least the Titans and Patriots prevented what would have could have been a painful week.   Another crazy week in the NFL. Every week can’t be easy.…

I should have done this way earlier, but it hasn’t come to my mind until now.  There’s still 8 more weeks in the season, so this can still be fun.  I created  Pick ‘Em against the spread league on Yahoo!  Now our members can create a team and enter their picks to see how they fair against me and our other readers.  There’s a link on the right to access the league, which is located above the beer mug.  Cheers!

Feel free to join the league.  Here is the information:

League Homepage: http://football.fantasysports.yahoo.com/pickem/75814

Register Here: http://football.fantasysports.yahoo.com/pickem/register/joingroup

League ID: 75814

League Password: thepassrush

Thanks to our readers who already signed up already.  Don’t forget to enter your picks before the games start.…