We had our first losing weekend last week, going 2-3. Overall for the season we are 17-12-1 (58.6%).
In the Wall Street Journal we actually went 3-1, pushing our yearly record to 7-4 (63.6%). As detailed in a blog entry last week, we’re tracking those picks separately since they are based on late-week lines. For example, last week the WSJ published us on Saturday, so used Friday afternoon lines. This cost us a couple of picks, since we only include those with edges above ~2 points. The line moved toward us enough to take away the edge on the Ari & Jax picks. But it also moved enough away from us on the SF pick that we gained that one. Then we got lucky and missed Ari & Jax while hitting SF. Will try to remember that next time we’re wingeing about line moves. Main point: We’re tracking WSJ picks separately.
We’re back with a pretty long slate this week. We’ll need to be more conservative with our thresholds as we get deeper into the season, but for now we are staying aggressive. “Big Plays” are games with more than 3.7-point edges, while “Other Plays” are picks with edges of 1.8-3.7 points.
As usual, these are directly from our power rankings – we don’t consider injuries, weather, matchups, etc. Lines are from Bookmaker via SBRodds.com as of an hour ago.
Big Plays (8-5 YTD)
SF (-4.5) vs NYG [MP= -11.1]
NYJ (-3) vs Ind [MP= -7.5]
Mia (-3) vs STL [MP= -6.8]
Other Plays (9-7-1 YTD)
Atl (-8.5) vs Oak [MP= -11.1]
Det (+5) at Phi [MP= +2.5]
Hou (-3) vs GB [MP= -4.9]
Cin (-1) at Cle [MP= -2.9]
A few notes…
We’ve included the Texans game despite the Cushing injury. Our only potential adjustment for injuries is to scratch games, but we’ve only ever done that for QBs, and then only early after the injury. But a word of caution on that Texans pick.
Speaking of injured QBs, as of this writing the Minny-Redskins game is off the board, presumably due to uncertainty over RGIII. We have the Vikings by 1 there, assuming RGIII plays. We’d scratch the game if he doesn’t.
Finally: We hit our below-threshold pick again last week – SF made it easy. But there’s nothing here this week, it’s a long drop from the 1.87s we already pulled into “Other Plays” to the next pick on the list.