Not to worry, I spent the entire Seahawks-Cardinals game doing one-thumb push-ups every time Carson Palmer threw an interception or Russell Wilson fumbled the football inside the ten yard line. By the end of the third quarter I was ready to write. Unfortunately, the great/god-awful thing about gambling is it keeps you interested in a game until way past its due date. If that game had been milk, I would have thrown it out ten minutes after halftime, but with a potential cover and four team teaser going on, I watched until the bitter end. As much as there is no crying in baseball, there is no garbage time in gambling.
There is, however, garbage time in baseball and crying in gambling. Lots and lots of it this year. As I mentioned yesterday, there isn't a whole of good advice to be gleaned on the Internet when it comes to handicapping football. Whether you submit your picks on Monday or wait until late Friday morning, the best you'll find is an author who had a great week bringing his total five games within .500 or someone who nailed their top three confidence picks but went 5-10 ATS overall. The worst you'll get, however, is right here at The Spread Zone.
Let's not be bashful about it anymore - we just plain stink. Although Psychic Granny C is basking in the glow of 45-44-3 ATS, Marco and I are bringing up the rear of our Expert Team at a statistically impossible 29-61-3 ATS. The only good news is our Over/Under picks are carrying us at 52-40 ATS. Unfortunately, the ones we recommend to our TSZ Insiders never seem to do that well.
So, this week Marco and I decided to shake things up a little by taking the picks (almost) completely out of our cursed hands with what we pseudo-experts/hobby bloggers in the capping world call retrospective ATS performance analysis - also known as "desperation" or "finding something this season that has worked better than we have." As I've mentioned three times now, there are no humans out there that fit this description, so we turned to the computer-generated, fact-based rankings compiled by Andy Iskoe at vegasinsider.com and tried to find something that allowed us to prove - through the powers known as 20-20 hindsight - that there is a way to break .500 besides copying your mother-in-laws picks.
And, you'll be happy to find out that we did. By carefully scrutinizing Iskoe's Power Rankings we found that when you take a visiting team's average result on the road versus the host's average result at home, it will give you an indication of who will win/cover the game. For example, looking at the Philadelphia Eagles @ Tampa Bay Buccaneers game, the Eagles' had a 97.10 away score while the Bucs had a 95.17 score at home for a difference of 1.93 in favor of Philadelphia which exceeded the -1 the Eagles were favored by. Therefore, the Eagles should have won and covered the game. And, as the space time continuum would have it - they did.
I kept on going down the schedule, comparing numbers and seeing which team should have won and/or covered. At the end of fifteen games, there were only 6 teams - Chicago, Oakland, Cleveland, Arizona, New Orleans, and the New York Jets that should have covered and didn't. Now to some of you 9-6 sounds paltry, but to us it sounds like numeric gold. So, this week we're going with the numbers and - of course - allowing ourselves a couple of audibles according to three very simple rules:
Rule #1: We are allowed to call audibles in games which feature teams who met in the Super Bowls XLII and XLVI. You'll figure it out.
Rule #2: We are allowed to call audibles when a team ranks way, way higher than the other team in the Average Line Played Against Rankings and Linear Regression Power Rankings, because this influences the results of the other ranking system.
Rule #3: We were allowed to call audibles in games involving NFC East teams with discriminatory mascots, which then just became NFC East teams because of all the letters to the editors we received from disgruntled Cowboys and Eagles for leaving them out of our rules.
So, without further adieu - here are our almost completely objective NFL Week 7 Picks ATS:
1. ARIZONA CARDINALS (+6.5) over Seattle Seahawks: Believe it or not, the stats support this pick - until of course you look at the Linear Regression Power Rankings (LRPR from here on out), but we didn't have that Rule until late last night. Stupid hindsight.
2. New England Patriots (-4) over NEW YORK JETS: I know, I know - the Jets barely lost in Foxborough, are undervalued because of their game last week, and the Pats are super banged-up on defense. I just can't bet against New England on a line this low, even though the number system supports it. We are evoking Audible Rules #1 and #2.
3. San Diego Chargers (-7.5) over JACKSONVILLE JAGUARS: Anyone looking at our spread sheet last night while I was making this pick, probably thought they were epileptic with the flashing JAC's and SD's going in and out of this column. San Diego has a slight edge in the numbers and a big edge in the LRPR, so we're calling the audible this time and hoping Philip Rivers doesn't choke on the road.
4. KANSAS CITY CHIEFS (-6.5) over Houston Texans: This one isn't even close. The line could be 16.5 and the numbers would support it.
5. DETROIT LIONS (-2.5) over Cincinnati: This one comes down to Detroit being very good at home and the Bengals being unproven on the road. The numbers support it big time, and the Lions outrank the Bengals in all three columns.
6. Buffalo Bills (+8.5) over MIAMI DOLPHINS: Although the Dolphins outrank the Bills in columns 1 & 2, the Bills are right there when it comes to playing ATS this year. The lines too high to take a still unpredictable Miami team coming out of a bye. Did I mention how fat my thumbs are?
7. CHICAGO BEARS (+1) over Washington Redskins: Even now, I kept starting this sentence with Washington Redskins trying my best resist Audible Rule #3. I can't do it. The ATS rankings support the Redskins pick, but unfortunately the Redskins just don't.
8. DALLAS COWBOYS (+3) over Philadelphia Eagles: The numbers say Cowboys, but Nick Foles starting on both of my fantasy teams says...probably Cowboys. I would ignore this pick if I were you. I'm taking the Cowboys because as the underdogs they have two chances to win.
9. CAROLINA PANTHERS (-6) over St. Louis Rams: The prisoners of the moment are all jumping on the Rams bandwagon this week, but they are not giving this Carolina defense enough credit. Even though the Rams smoked the Texans last week, their offensive woes continued. The rankings support the Panthers across the board here.
10. Tampa Bay Buccaneers (+7) over ATLANTA FALCONS: Check recent history and you'll see that the Bucs play the Falcons close in this heated division rivalry. And by heated, I mean tepid this year. Yes, a must win by the Falcons, but have you ever heard of the power of a Must Cover? Check the numbers, the Falcons kind of blow.
11. San Francisco Forty Niners (-4) over TENNESSEE TITANS: Audible Rule #2 evoked. The Titans have performed better against the spread this year, but they've also had much smaller spreads to deal with and haven't been blown out in Seattle. I think this number is a little skewed and the Niners are rolling.
12. Cleveland Browns (+10) over Green Bay Packers: I can't do it. Not at home. Not with a chip on their shoulder after losing players to injury and escaping from Baltimore with a win. Home field at Lambeau is worth at least 5 points and playing against Brandon Weedon is worth 15. Okay, I can do it - the numbers support it and I have no NFC North audible rule.
13. Baltimore Ravens (+1) over PITTSBURGH STEELERS: Iskoe supports this, the Ravens 15-9 ATS record after a SU loss supports this, and the Pittsburgh Steelers offense supports this.
14. Indianapolis Colts (+6.5) over DENVER BRONCOS: This was a hard one to take with my dad chirping in my ear with a little song he made up called, "You're a sucker to take the underdogs." That's when it's really nice to have the rankings where although the Colts are much lower than the Broncos in their average line played against, they are just a few notches down in the overall Power Rankings.
15. NEW YORK GIANTS (-3) over Minnesota Vikings: These teams are awful. The Vikings outrank the Giants in all three columns. This is way more a play against the Vikings than a play for the Giants. We are evoking Audible Rule #1 here. Check out these fun facts about the Minnesota Vikings in prime time games that I found on a Vikings fan blog. Talk about faith.
- The Vikings are 1-11 in their last 12 prime time games.
- The Vikings have been outscored 358-182 in their last 12 prime time games.
- The only Vikings victory in their last 12 prime time games came on a Tuesday night due to inclement weather in Philadelphia in 2011. In other words, their only win in their last 12 prime time games shouldn't have been a prime time game in the first place.
- The next two Vikings games are in prime time.
Good luck this week, everyone. Remember, you can see all of our Expert Picks and OVER/UNDERS at The Spread Zone.
Vinny and Marco
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