Wednesday, October 6, 2010

The NFL Blog: 2010 Week 5 Betting Lines

Last Week: Vs. Spread (3-11); Straight Up: (6-8)

Season: Vs. Spread (24-37-1); Straight Up: (32-30)

Week 4 Review: Shock and awe.

Week 5 Preview: Zero clue. None at all. Not a single feeling one way or another.

Sunday’s Early Games

Jacksonville (-1) @ Buffalo
Pick: Jags cover
Comment: Well let’s see. What wouldn’t make sense? I guess it would be that the Jaguars come off a win over the Colts by losing to an 0-4 team that has allowed at least 34 points in each of the last 3 weeks. Last season the Jags were 8 point favorites at home and it took a TD pass with 56 seconds left to give Jacksonville an 18-15 win. The Jags are 2-10 in their last 12 road games going back to late in the 2008 season. However, the Bills are 3-12 in their last 15 home games going back to the middle of the 2008 season. Buffalo will also be without Terrence McGee (one of their few good players) for a few more weeks. This is a tough injury for the Bills because going into the season their only strength was their secondary.

Kansas City (+8) @ Indianapolis
Pick: Colts win but Chiefs beat the spread
Comment: The Chiefs are 3-0 and coming off of a bye. They are actually 4-5 in their last 9 road games since the start of last season. Of course in their 1 road game this year they only beat Cleveland by 2 points. The Colts had another surprising road loss last week, but since losing their first 2 games at Lucas Oil Stadium (opened in 2008), the Colts are 16-1 in their last 17 at home. Actually, they are 16-0 in the last 16 home games in which they didn’t quit (only loss was to the Jets in week 16 of last year when they were 14-0). I didn’t think that the Chiefs would make a major leap this season but so far they have proven me wrong. The Colts’ secondary took another hit this week, as Melvin Bullitt joined Bob Sanders on the injured list. The Chiefs have been very stingy against the run this season. Unfortunately, that won’t help them much against the Colts.

Tampa Bay (+6.5) @ Cincinnati
Pick: Bengals win but Bucs beats the spread
Comment: The Bungles choked in Cleveland again last week, despite T.O.’s best game in years. The Bucs are 2-1 and coming off of a bye, but their 2 wins are over Cleveland and Carolina, and they lost their last game by 25 at home. Then again, the Bengals just lost to Cleveland, so the Bucs won’t be scared. One bizarre stat is that the Bucs have now won their last 3 road games. The Bungles are 9-3 in their last 12 home games, but they are still the Bungles. Plus, after last week, if T.O. goes 2 plays without getting the ball thrown to him he will probably scream at Marvin Lewis, put on sunglasses and cry, take 30 pain killers and 15 sleeping pills, and then say it was an accident after firing his publicist.

Green Bay (-2.5) @ Washington
Pick: Packers cover
Comment: How are the Packers this banged up already? In my opinion, Green Bay has been a little disappointing this year, but I have no idea what to expect from the Redskins. Both teams will be without their best running back in this game. I think the Packers have more weapons.

St. Louis (+3) @ Detroit
Pick: Lions win but Rams beat the spread
Comment: It’s fairly obvious that both teams are better. The Rams are 2-2 and their 2 losses were by a combined 6 points. One thing that could be keeping Rams fans from flushing those cyanide pills down the toilet is the fact that the last time the Rams won back to back games they lost their next 17 and 27 of their next 28. I know Lions fans don’t want to hear this (what do you want to hear when your team has only won 3 of their last 44 games?) but Detroit has actually been a very competitive 0-4 team. They should have won at Chicago opening week, they lost by only 3 to the Eagles, and last week they lost by just 2 points at Lambeau Field. Both teams are 3-1 against the spread.

Chicago (-1.5) @ Carolina
Pick: Bears cover
Comment: I knew the Bears weren’t any good. The Panthers came into this season 16-4 in their last 20 home games, but they’ve already lost twice at home this season. Last week Carolina nearly beat the Saints in New Orleans, losing by just 2 while holding the Saints to 16 points. Jay Cutler sustained a concussion last Sunday night (how’d that happen?) and it isn’t hard to imagine him getting rattled and suffering a meltdown again this weekend. However, the Panthers will be without their best weapon, as Steve Smith is unlikely to play due to an ankle injury.

New York Giants (+3) @ Houston
Pick: Texans cover
Comment: This is an interesting game in my opinion. I pronounced the G-Men dead last week and then they almost killed Jay Cutler. The Texans used to be very tough to beat at home, going 14-4 at home from late in the 2006 season through the 2008 season, but they are just 5-5 at home since the start of last year. We all remember the road warrior Giants who went 10-1 on the road to win it all in 2007, but they have lost 5 of their last 6 away from home. The Texans won without Andre Johnson last week and he is expected to play this week. Houston also gets Brian Cushing back from suspension on Sunday. I’ll be interested to see if the Giants can put anywhere near as much pressure on Matt Schaub as they did on Cutler.

Denver (+7) @ Baltimore
Pick: Ravens cover
Comment: I think (hope) the Broncos are in for a bruiser this week. When a team needs to learn to keep its mouth shut, there is no better way for them to learn their lesson than to go play the Ravens in Baltimore.

Atlanta (-3) @ Cleveland
Pick: Falcons cover
Comment: There’s plenty of reason for Falcons fans like me to be worried about this game. For one thing, the Browns haven’t been pushovers this season. They just beat the Bengals; they lost by 7 at Baltimore the week before last; and their first 2 losses were by a combined 5 points. They haven’t allowed more than 24 points in any game this season. The Browns have won 5 of their last 6 at home. Also, one of my worst memories of the Vick/Mora era was a loss at home to the 2-6 Browns in 2006. I was at the Dome for that game and I left the stadium craving a fight. It has to be admitted that the Falcons should have lost at home to a winless 49ers team last week. In fact, while the Falcons could easily be 4-0, they really ought to be 1-3.

Sunday’s Late Games

New Orleans (-6.5) @ Arizona
Pick: Saints cover
Comment: The Saints have yet to score more than 25 points this season, after starting off last season by scoring more than 25 points in 12 of their first 13 games. They’ve already been held under 17 points twice this season which is really something, as they came into the season having scored at least 17 points in 27 of their last 28 games, with the only game of less than 17 points being last year’s regular season finale when they didn’t try. While the Saints should probably be 4-0, they definitely could be 0-4. But the Cardinals suck. They’re only passing for 150 yards a game, and this week they are going with Max Hall at QB.

Tennessee (+6.5) @ Dallas
Pick: Cowboys cover
Comment: This was a hard game for me to pick. I still don’t know what to think of the Titans. The Cowboys are only 1-2. Dallas is coming off of a bye and they’ve won 5 in a row following their bye week. The Cowboys have already lost once at home this season and they haven’t lost more than 2 at home since 2006. The Titans should be in a foul mood going into this game but it seems like a tough matchup for them. Chris Johnson has averaged just 3.2 yards per carry over the past 3 games, and the Cowboys are a tough team to run against. In fact, the Cowboys hadn’t allowed a 100-yard rusher in 22 games before Arian Foster went for 106 against them in their last game.

San Diego (-6) @ Oakland
Pick: Chargers win but Raiders beat the spread
Comment: One of the remarkable things about Oakland’s fall from consistent greatness to perennial laughing stock has been the fact that the Raiders have had absolutely no home field advantage in recent years. The Black Hole was once a very unfriendly place for visitors. Now it’s a joke. For people in the Bay Area who don’t go to the stadium, the game has often fallen into a black hole in recent years, as they have frequently failed to sell enough tickets to have the game broadcast locally.

The Chargers were 7-1 on the road last season but they’ve started this year 0-2. You’ve got to be confident if you’re a Chargers fan, however, as San Diego has beaten the Raiders 13 times in a row, including winning their last 6 in Oakland. However, the last 2 trips to Oakland haven’t been easy wins. In 2008 the Raiders looked to have the game won, leading 15-0 at the half and 15-3 going to the 4th quarter. But the Chargers outscored Oakland 25-3 in the 4th quarter and ended up covering. Last year’s game was the 2nd half of a Monday night double header to close out week 1 and it was a thriller. The Raiders took the lead on 4 separate occasions and gave the lead up each time, with the Chargers scoring the winning TD with 18 seconds left. Oakland lost 24-20 but did manage to beat the spread.

Sunday Night’s Game

Philadelphia (+3.5) @ San Francisco
Pick: Niners win but Eagles beat the spread
Comment: Philly’s offense is banged up going into this game. Pro Bowl fullback Leonard Weaver is on injured reserve, and LeSean McCoy and Michael Vick are both out with rib injuries. Kevin Kolb was supposed to be the guy at QB but he has looked lost so far this season. To be fair, Kolb hasn’t had that many opportunities to prove himself. He’ll get the chance to create a QB controversy this weekend. The Niners have alternated hideous performances with good performances, but the end result has been the same each time, thus they are 0-4. They’re too good of a team to stay winless much longer. This will actually be the 5th meeting between these two teams in the last 6 years. The Eagles have won each of the previous 4 games by at least 14 points. They won at San Fran in 2006 and 2008, winning by 14 points in each game. However, the Niners were 9-2 in their last 11 home games coming into this season, and in their only home game so far this year they nearly knocked off the Saints.

Monday Night’s Game

Minnesota (+4) @ New York Jets
Pick: Vikings pull off the upset
Comment: The NFL is ridiculous. We’ve got the two most talked about teams during the offseason playing each other at the new stadium in New York (okay fine, New Jersey, but just for the sake of this paragraph let’s pretend it’s in New York City). It’s Brett Favre’s team vs. Rex Ryan’s team on Monday Night Football. It’s LaDainian Tomlinson vs. Adrian Peterson. It’s a huge game for both teams. The Jets have won 3 straight since getting off to a bad start with a 10-9 loss in week 1. The Vikings nearly went to the Super Bowl last season but they are just 1-2 this season. However, they got their first win in their last game and they are now coming off of a bye. Of course Favre left the Jets after one disappointing season--in which they lost 4 of their last 5 games to miss the playoffs--claiming again that he was retiring, only to reappear a few months later and lead the Vikings to the NFC Championship Game.

Oh, and just to make things interesting, on Wednesday morning we’ll have one of the most controversial players in the sport and one of the greatest receivers of all time—who was on Monday Night Football last week and didn’t catch a pass during his team’s blowout win—get traded from one of the most polarizing teams in the country back to his original team which he left on bad terms a few years ago. By the way, one of the reasons that led to Favre’s eventual split from the team he played on for 16 years was management’s unwillingness to trade for this receiver when he was available. Also, the best cover cornerback in the NFL—who like Favre missed all of training camp and threatened not to play this season—will be coming back from a hamstring injury—which he suffered while trying to cover the afore mentioned receiver--just in time to again try and cover this receiver who he once called a “slouch.”

I do have one personal note to add. A few weeks ago when people first started talking about Darelle Revis having once called Randy Moss a slouch, I chuckled to myself, because I thought it was another case of verbal confusion by an athlete. I was only familiar with the verb “slouch;” as in: “Stand up straight. Don’t slouch! If you do you will be shot!” But when I looked it up in the dictionary, to my surprise, there it was, listed as the primary form:

Slouch noun 1: a lazy or incompetent person.

So, I was wrong. I’m humbled and embarrassed by my smugness and ignorance. I think it’s safe to say that Revis was correct, both in word usage and in judgment. However, I don’t expect Moss to be “actin’ a slouch” on Monday night.

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