By Alex Newcomer
Cincinnati Bengals at Buffalo
Bills (+7.5) - Sun, Oct 13, 1:00 PM ET
Buffalo
has a couple things working against them this Sunday. First, they will be handing the keys of the
offense to a fourth year quarterback out of Duke, Thad Lewis, who will be
making his second career start against a Mike Sherman led Bengals eighth ranked
defense that did not allow a touchdown last week against the mighty
Patriots. The Bills were forced to turn
to Lewis after undrafted free agent rookie quarterback Jeff Tuel failed to
complete a pass over 13 yards in relief of E.J. Manuel this past Thursday
against the Browns. Look for C.J. Spiller to finally have a big
day as the first option in the read with Lewis.
Spiller is the much more explosive back compared to Fred Jackson’s
running style and Spiller has finally earned himself a start by busting a forty
yarder to the house last week. Jackson
has held him off thus far, but Spiller’s big play ability will keep him on the
bench for the majority of the game. If
Buffalo can successfully run the read option and Lewis can pull it down for
some crucial yardage, Buffalo has a chance, but if the play fakes don’t work
early it could be a long day against these Bengal linebackers. Utilizing the read option may be the best
option for the personnel of this team as the offensive line has allowed 15 total
sacks, the 7th most sacks allowed in the league and those came with
Manuel at the helm, an above athlete at the worst playing the quarterback
position, suggesting their line is even worse than their stats.
The Bengals come in with the 25th
ranked offense, averaging a mere 18.8 points per game. On the other side of the ball Buffalo has
given up 26 points per game, tenth most in the league. The tight end position for Cincinnati is
going to be crucial with rookie Tyler Eifert and Jermaine Gresham coming in
with the 13th and 15th most receiving yards for tight
ends, but it’s going to be their blocking is going to be the key to opening up
the rushing attack featuring BenJarvus Green-Ellis with rookie second rounder
Giovanni Bernard as the change of pace back.
Buffalo has a strong front seven anchored by rookie linebacker Kiko
Alanso who has been flying around out there, sprung by Mario and Kyle
Williams. If these two highly touted tight
ends are able to block against this front seven, they will open themselves up
later in the game for play action along with their All-Pro receiver A.J. Green
who is due for a breakout performance coming off of a relatively slow start follow
up to last year’s torrid campaign.
Pick:
Cincinnati
Detroit Lions at
Cleveland Browns (+3) - Sun, Oct 13, 1:00 PM ET
Detriot
has been an inconsistent team so far this year, dealing with injuries to Bush
and Johnson. I do not expect them to
find a major challenge with the Browns, but this game will be very close,
especially if Megtron does not play. Weeden’s play off the bench last week was
impressive as he looked more like the guy who was throwing to Justin Blackmon
at Oklahoma State, not the dud who has shown up to don the uniform in
Cleveland. In all fairness, there’s no
way Weeden gets drafted in the first round if he did not play with Blackmon,
especially being over half a decade older than the rest of the prospects at
twenty eight. Even after Weeden came
back from injury he lost his job to Brian Hoyer, who was originally signed into
the league as an undrafted free agent.
Without
Johnson, the Lions will be forced to run the ball a bit more than they would
like with Reggie Bush, who should also be used in a variety of screens. The Browns having just completed a trade to
the Colts for their feature back Trent Richardson, unsurprisingly find
themselves with a lack of depth at the running back position and signed free
agent Willis McGahee to join the underwhelming rotation of Bobby Rainey and Fozzy
Whittaker. With the Lions’ edge on the
ground they will be able to manage the clock to limit possessions and try to capitalize
in the red zone without their number one target. Lions should be able to pull this one out as
it would take a turnover-free inspired performance from Brandon Weeden, who unfortunately
is tough to bet on without Blackmon, no offense to Josh Gordon.
Pick: Detroit
Oakland Raiders (+9.5)
at Kansas City Chiefs - Sun, Oct 13, 1:00 PM ET
The Kansas
City Chiefs begin the season undefeated and have been beating their opponents
by an average of 14 points per game but if you don’t count the blowout wins
against the Giants and Jaguars, they have only been winning by 6 points per
game on average against the likes Eagles, Cowboys and Titans, one potential
playoff team between the three of them.
The Chiefs also did not have a clean win against the Titans last week,
who were without their starter Jake Locker, needing special teams help to edge
the Titans despite Ryan Fitzpatrick’s best effort to hand them the game with a two
turnover performance.
The
Oakland Raiders on the other hand, come in red hot off their rivalry win against
the San Diego Chargers this past late Sunday night on the only remaining
baseball converted football field, utilizing a few home field tricks including
field goals of forty seven and fifty yards from the infield dirt by drunken
boxer turned kicker Sebastian Janikowski.
Pryor looks a man possessed by someone who can actually play quarterback
and he does have speedy receivers on the outside to make use of, as long as he
keeps his eyes downfield and continues to learn that the most valuable
scrambling always takes place behind the line of scrimmage, the Raiders will
keep this one within ten.
Pick: Oakland
Carolina Panthers (+3)
at Minnesota Vikings - Sun, Oct 13, 1:00 PM ET
If the Carolina
Panthers have been anything this season, it has been consistent unreliability, no
matter which side of the ball. Cam
Newton continues to puzzle everyone with his peaks and valleys from week to
week, since they all know the Panthers can only go as far as Newton will take
them. Either way this game is not about
Carolina. This one takes the form of a
game that is for Adrian Peterson’s son as he is going to just run all over the field
and take out all of his emotions against the Panther defense. Matt Cassel will get his second start of the
season for the Vikings, last time hooking up with Greg Jennings for a couple touchdowns,
including a seventy yarder. Carolina may
have no choice but to pack the box with eight defenders, and play action could
inflict large chunks of yardage over the middle. Vikings win easy, the spread is only as close
as it is since everyone knows Newton could just decide to go off, and if he
went all out, no defense in the league could stop him.
Pick: Minnesota
Pittsburgh Steelers (+3)
at New York Jets - Sun, Oct 13, 1:00
PM ET
The strength
of this New York Jets team is their defensive line, while the glaring weakness
for this Steelers weakness is their offensive line play, highlighted by the
loss of All-Pro center Maurkice Pouncey.
New York has improved the normal backbone of any Rex Ryan team, the
defensive line, where rookie Sheldon Richardson from Missouri is playing Pro-Bowl
caliber ball at the defense end position opposite third year player Muhammed
Wilkerson out of Temple. This game will
not be a blowout by any means, and the Steelers could potentially win if the
line is able to give ben enough time to find solid wide outs Antonio Brown and
Emmanuel Sanders, not to mention Ben’s old favorite target Heath Miller at
tight end. Geno Smith continues to
progress at a rapid pace from game to game and even if he regresses a little
bit this week, they should still haven enough to get the victory provided they
take care of the football.
Pick: New York Jets
Philadelphia Eagles at
Tampa Bay Buccaneers (+2) - Sun, Oct 13, 1:00 PM ET
It doesn’t
matter who is starting for Philly, either QB is deadly in that system throwing
to Jackson, in the same backfield as McCoy, although it looks like Nick Foles
is going to start. Tampa Bay’s defense
has been touted this year, but they are going to have to be on the field for an
awful lot of the game with the Eagles defense stacking the box and daring Mike
Glennon to try and burn them over the top.
Giving up just two point, this Eagles team is my lock of the week right
here, no further explanation needed.
Pick: Philadelphia
Green Bay Packers at
Baltimore Ravens (+3) - Sun, Oct 13, 1:00 PM ET
I bet this one will be closer than
expected, but have to go with Green Bay due to the fact that even if Baltimore’s
defense doesn’t make any mistakes, their offense (a la Joe Flacco) will and
turn the ball over at a costly time. As
long as Green Bay continues to execute above the league average in the red zone
(coming into the game tied for 13th) they should be able to put this
one out of reach of the Raven’s feeble offense and cover those three points on
the road. Rodgers continues to spread the
ball out week to week, and will find resistance in this talented Ravens
secondary, but he has enough weapons now to strictly exploit mismatches, so wherever
the linebackers may be covering the tights ends or running backs, look for
Rodgers to go there early and often, and not miss.
Pick: Green Bay
St. Louis Rams (+9) at Houston Texans - Sun, Oct 13,
1:00 PM ET
Have to take St. Louis here, with
this amount of points and going up against the lowly Texans with Matt Schaub
hoping woefully not to continue his NFL record 4 game pick-six consecutive game
streak. I do expect the Texans to be
able to win this game, but this one is going to be played out between the ears
of Schaub long before this one gets started.
If he blows it this week and throws another pick six, he is out now, and
might never be able to start in the NFL ever again. This has to be weighing deeply on Schaub, who
has always been doubted and now with his confidence waning, he likely has begun
to question himself. Last week with the
Texans only able to must three points on offense, look for them to go to Foster
to try and take some of the game off the shoulders of Schaub. The Texans will win, but not by double
digits.
Pick: St. Louis
Jacksonville Jaguars (+27) at Denver Broncos - Sun, Oct 13,
4:05 PM ET
Can’t give Denver 27 points, no
matter how tempting due to how poorly their defense played last week. Jacksonville actually put some points up
against St. Louis, and now that Henne’s the full time quarterback, he and
Blackmon should hook up for at least one long score, if the Jaguars aren’t
going to throw the long ball they might as well just go home. I heard on ESPN that this is the NFL record
for the most points in a spread, and even though that’s for a good reason,
Gabbert will not be starting and the Broncos will let in at least a couple of
touchdowns, and don’t cover.
Pick: Jacksonville
Tennessee Titans (+14)
at Seattle Seahawks - Sun, Oct 13,
4:05 PM ET
This is a lot of points for the
Titans to receive, but they are coming in starting Ryan Fitzpatrick, who is
known for turning the ball over consistently throughout his time starting in
the league. The Seahawks will enjoy
advantages on the special teams and their strong secondary, who is without a
strong number one receiver, and most of Seattle’s defensive backs already hold
the size advantage with their matchups. Fitzpatrick’s
gunslinger like mentality that has kept him in the league thus far is not a
good match with this Seattle defense, and it would not surprise me to see him
put up at least three picks, with one taken back to the house to help cover
that spread.
Pick: Seattle
New Orleans Saints (+1) at New England Patriots - Sun, Oct 13, 4:25
PM ET
New
Orleans is ecstatic to have head coach Sean Payton back and he is not letting
them down with all kinds of schemes that are keeping defenses on their toes,
and off of star quarterback Drew Brees.
With the Patriots coming off a woeful performance against the Bengals, I
can’t see them matching up with the Saints in a shootout. In what was supposed to be the battle of the
top two tight ends in the game with the return of Gronkowski, it will just be
Graham going up and down the field at a record breaking pace this Sunday.
Pick: New Orleans
Arizona Cardinals (+11.5)
at San Francisco 49ers - Sun, Oct 13, 4:25 PM ET
Arizona
had a good victory against the Panthers last week, and the 49ers defense has
finally come around, getting an early pick six in their route of the
Texans. I think the 9ers will take this
one down, but not by double digits against a potent Arizona offense that can
punch in some garbage time touchdowns with some big plays. San Fran still does not like having the game
in the hands of Kapernick, so get ready for a heavy dosage of Frank Gore and
clock management in a relatively low scoring game.
Pick: Arizona
Washington (+6.5) at Dallas Cowboys - Sun, Oct 13, 8:30 PM
ET
Dallas almost had a victory against
the best team in the game last week, and don’t look for them to slow things
down against their heated division rival from Washington. RG3 has not lived up to the hype to say the
least and I don’t trust this guy to throw a lot of touchdowns that aren’t
against prevent defenses in garbage time.
Dallas is not going to be denied back to back weeks, and they should be
able to cover up for one or two Romo mistakes as Griffin seems poised to make a
couple of his own.
Pick: Dallas
Indianapolis Colts at San Diego Chargers (+1.5) - Mon, Oct 14, 8:30
PM ET
Last
week’s victory by Luck and the Colts over the Seahawks showed me something and
it also got Luck back on track throwing touchdowns. San Diego can put up some points, but this
team makes way too many mistakes to be considered a playoff contender, or a
contender in this game for that matter.
Let’s go with the Colts on the road as I know Luck likes to play in
California.
Pick: Indianapolis
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