Falcons at Cowboys over 53.5 points (-110)

Week 9 was one of the strangest in league history but two things struck a note of predictability: the Falcons couldn’t hold a lead and the Cowboys couldn’t win a big game.

Atlanta is figuring out their offense without Calvin Ridley, and it involves a heap load of “tight end” Kyle Pitts. (Side note: what makes Pitts a tight end? Because it sure isn’t the position he plays when on a football field.) This season’s offensive revelation has been Cordarrelle Patterson and the Cowboys don’t have an answer for him in the passing game.

Dallas is desperate. And home. These weapons aren’t being held down two weeks in a row. This feels like a game where both teams could get into the thirties.

Titans -2.5 over Saints (-110)

There seems to be a general belief that at some point the Titans have to lose. But Mike Vrabel’s team had the most impressive win of the season Sunday night in Los Angeles; without their best player; on the back of their defense; against perhaps the league’s best team (before Sunday). Tennessee’s schedule down the stretch is a pathway to the number one seed. Sure seems like that is the direction in which they’re headed.

And while Sean Payton is one of the best coaches in the league, he’s now playing with third stringers at QB. (He opened the season with a backup playing the position.) Eventually, that car runs off the road. They lost last week and three of their next four are against the Titans, Bills and Cowboys.

Colts -10 over Jaguars (-115)

Colts point totals since October 3rd: 27, 25, 31, 30, 34, 45.

Average: 32.

Jaguars point totals since October 10th: 19, 23, 7, 9.

Average: 14.5.

Colts 32, Jaguars 15.

This three-game parlay goes off at +581 so $100 bet will win you $681.38.

Went 2-2 ATS last week and would have been 3-1 if I’d remembered never to lay 9 points on an Andy Reid-coached team under any circumstances. Still, 2-2 is a good start. Need a 3-1 week to keep the dream of topping 7-4 alive. I’m confident.

All spreads from BETUS, Thursday evening.

Atlanta at Philadelphia

Saturday – 3:20 pm CT

Pick: Falcons -3

This is the hardest game to analyze on the weekend because it’s impossible to know what to expect from Nick Foles. But if the Falcons defense plays as fast and angry as it did against the Rams, how could anyone expect Foles to get anything done through the air? A few interceptions are likely as the Falcons continue their journey to Super Bowl redemption…maybe. Falcons 20, Eagles 14.

Tennessee at New England

Saturday – 7:15 pm CT

Pick: Patriots -13

This Titans crap has gone on long enough. Patriots 27, Titans 10.

Jacksonville at Pittsburgh

Sunday – 12:05 pm CT

Pick: Steelers -7

Here’s my hot take for the column: the Jaguars defense is overrated. Jimmy G tore them to ribbons on Christmas Eve. Since then they’ve faced the offensive juggernauts of Tennessee and Buffalo and could easily have lost to both. (Tyrod Taylor had plenty of opportunities.)

I can’t imagine a scenario where Ben Roethlisberger repeats his mid-season “maybe I don’t have it anymore” nightmare. I can imagine a scenario where Chad Henne finds his way onto the field to replace Blake Bortles. Steelers 30, Jags 10

New Orleans at Minnesota

Sunday – 3:40 pm CT

Pick: Saints +5

Last week I didn’t trust Goff. This week I don’t trust Keenum. Both had wonderful regular season but the playoffs are an entirely different animal. Every single throw carries the weight of the entire season. Is Keenum ready for that pressure?

New Orleans has the corners to limit what the Vikings receivers can do outside, allowing their front to harass the Minnesota signal caller into mistakes. Then the game falls on the arm of Drew Brees and, well, he’s just fine with that. Saints 20, Vikings 17

There are 11 playoff games. My best record against the spread was 7-4 in 2014. This year I will take that record to the woodshed.

Tennessee at Kansas City

Saturday – 3:20 pm CT 

Pick: Chiefs -9.

For some reason I’ve been watching a bunch of Titans games lately, mostly to look at Mariota, and something is very clear: the Titans are terrible. Kansas City was 6-2 at home this season and are quietly coming into the postseason on a four-game winning streak. (The Matt Nagy bump?) This profiles as the weekend’s only blowout. Lay the points! 37-16 Chiefs.

Atlanta at Los Angeles

Saturday – 7:15 pm CT

Pick: Atlanta +6.5.

I don’t know why I think this but I think there’s a big effort somewhere in this Falcons team. I’m not sure they can win this game on the road because they don’t have a consistent bone in their collective bodies but I still need Jared Goff to win a playoff game before I can get fully on the Ramwagon. 27-21 Rams.

Buffalo at Jacksonville

Sunday – 12:05 pm CT

Pick: Bills +9.

I’m just banking on this game being unwatchably low-scoring. 16-9 Jags.

Carolina at New Orleans

Sunday – 3:40 pm CT

Pick: Saints -7.

These teams played twice this season. Saints won both. Total score: 65-34. If this game were in Carolina I think a Panthers upset would be in-play but I’m having a hard time seeing it in the dome. I’ll be rooting for Chico and the boys but that egg they laid in Week 17 against the Falcons is tough to shake from my mind. 30-17 Saints.

Special thanks to Data for his post-game report yesterday. We’ll be trying to provide post-game content throughout the season.

• Mike Glennon did everything Mike Glennon can do yesterday. And the Bears had a chance to win. Remind you of anything? It’s exactly what we were saying every week during Hoyer/Barkley last season. But when your passer is this limited, the rest of the team needs to be absolutely perfect. And the Bears are not good enough to be that.
• If this is all the Bears are going to ask Glennon to do, not playing Trubisky makes even less sense. Trubisky can do everything Glennon did yesterday. Hell, Chad Hutchinson can do everything Glennon did yesterday. But Trubisky can extend plays with his elusiveness and extend drives with his legs. The Bears shouldn’t be playing Trubisky to develop their future. They should be playing him because he’d help them win now.
• Didn’t foresee the Bears having no answer for Austin Hooper.
• Not surprised at all by Tarik Cohen. The Human Joystick has been turning heads since he showed up for his first Bears practice and I’d imagine he’ll be lighting up fantasy waiver wires today. (I haven’t played fantasy football in 17 years but I suggested Cohen to a DFS player who won five grand yesterday.) Cohen is the Bears best offensive weapon.
• Akiem Hicks is their best defensive weapon. Maybe giving guys millions of dollars the day before the opener should become a trend. That was a dominant performance.

Read More …

• Yea Chicago’s defense had a solid day overall. They held a team that averaged 34 points per game last year to only 23, and kept them in check for most o the game.
• That’s going to be their recipe for success this year, and it’s the reason they were in this game.
• With that said, the defense still showed issues on 3rd down. It was especially bad in one 4th quarter sequence, when 3 straight 3rd downs ended with an 88 yard TD, a 40 yard completion, and a penalty for a 1st down. Good defenses have to be able to get off the field on 3rd down. To their credit, they did have a few big 3rd down plays earlier in the game, including a run stuff on 3rd and 1 to hold Atlanta to a field goal and a batted pass on 3rd and medium to force a punt.
• That 88 yard touchdown on 3rd down was particularly brutal. It looked like Matt Ryan was about to be sacked, then he had somebody uncovered down the field. The defense looked confused pre-snap, and somebody should have called a time out.
• Quintin Demps missed a tackle on that 88 yard touchdown, and also missed a tackle for loss on 3rd down in the first half that would have forced a punt and instead turned into a 1st down conversion. He also may have blown the coverage on the long touchdown. To put it mildly, it was not a good debut for the veteran free agent who was supposed to stabilize the back of the defense.
  Another area where the defense needs to improve is forcing turnovers. They came close on a few passes today, but weren’t able to finish the play. Forcing turnovers is the difference between a good defense and a great one.
• One area where the Bears’ defense excelled was in run defense. Atlanta ran it 22 times for 65 yards, only 3.0 yards per carry. That would have been the worst mark in the NFL last year, when the Falcons averaged 4.6 yards per carry, good for 5th in the NFL.

Read More …

I couldn’t believe what I was watching. The morning after, I still can’t believe it. Eight thoughts…

• The better team won this game. A lot was made of the adjustments made by the Patriots coaching staff as this game progressed but the truth is the Patriots were simply playing an awful game for the better part of three quarters. Brady missed wide open receivers. Edelman had a drop that was an easy 30-35 yard gain. Josh McDaniels couldn’t get a handle on things. When those mistakes stopped, the Pats scored at will.
• After the brilliant Julio Jones catch, the Falcons are three kneel downs away from taking an 11-point, two possession lead and essentially ending the game. But what did Kyle Shanahan do? He went pass heavy. He went pass heavy!?!?!! Sack. Hold. For the second consecutive Patriots Super Bowl, their opponent lost their mind when the moment got too big.
• The difference between 4-3 in the Super Bowl and 5-2 is night and day. The Patriots were staring down the barrel of being remembered as a slightly above mediocre Super Bowl team, with many pointing to luck (Pete Carroll) as the only reason they weren’t 3-4 in the Fantastic Football Foray. Instead, the coach and quarterback have five championships and lay claim to the label of the greatest ever.
• Julian Edelman’s catch (pictured above) was poetic justice. For Tyree. For Manningham down the sideline. For the Welker drop in the open field. No, it didn’t happen against the Giants but there were few eyes not thinking of Big Blue when Edelman scooped the ball off the field of a Falcons defensive back. When that catch happened I thought, “this game is over”.
• This was not the greatest Super Bowl of all-time. This was the greatest Super Bowl comeback of all-time. It’s hard to call a game great when one team completely folds. The Falcons didn’t sleep last night. They won’t sleep tonight. They won’t sleep tomorrow night. This is the kind of loss franchises have a hard time getting over and Atlanta immediately becomes the most fascinating team in the NFL in 2017. History and the odds will tell you this group will more than likely be sitting home next January.
• How is James White not the MVP? His versatility and production were the number one key to the Patriots comeback. It’s always somebody you don’t expect with the Pats. This year it was White.
• Shea McClellin, Super Bowl Champion.
• The word I’d use for the game: surreal. I was texting with four different people over the course of the game. Here is a text from each one of them:
  • “Wow. This is just…wow.”
  • “I can’t believe this is happening.”
  • “Are the Falcons serious?”
  • “I can’t watch this.” (Jets fan)

One of the most memorable Super Bowls in history. And now the offseason begins.

Honestly, I haven’t spent much time thinking about this Super Bowl. The NFL starts to drift from my mind moments after the conference championship games are concluded. (At this point, golf begins to take the leaves the lounge and comes into the showroom.) But having seen a boatload of both teams over the course of the season, here are five thoughts:

• I don’t think the Falcons have enough in their secondary to handle the Patriots spread game. But Dan Quinn’s defense will need to do two things to keep Brady & Co. from piling up the points: (1) avoid the deep hit and (2) tighten up against the run inside the red zone.
• Brady has lost two Super Bowls and both of them were not solely because of Eli Manning’s heroics. He lost those games because both of those Giants teams got after Brady with their defensive lines. Both of those Giants teams did not require blitzing Brady – which is schematic suicide – to pressure him into quick throws. While Vic Beasley led the league in sacks, the next guy on the Falcons had 4.5. They’ll need more than Beasley.
• Is it safe to assume the Patriots will take Julio Jones out of this game when the entirety of the football universe believes the Patriots will take Julio Jones out of this game? If we all assume that, doesn’t Kyle Shanahan also assume that? And wouldn’t that mean there’s probably a healthy helping of Sanu and Gabriel and the two backs coming? I think Atlanta is going to have an easy time moving the ball.
• This has nothing to do with Sunday’s game but I wonder where the Bears would be today if Phil Emery had listened to me and brought in Kyle Shanahan five years ago. I believed then, as I believe now, that Shanahan is going to be an excellent head coach in the league.
• This game comes down to one player: Matt Ryan. He’s got a checkered playoff past but he has an opportunity to cement his legacy in the league Sunday and don’t think that hasn’t weighed on him the last two weeks. A Super Bowl title gives a quarterback a blank check for the rest of his career. Joe Flacco could write an essay for the Baltimore Sun denouncing the use of Old Bay seasoning and he’s still not going to be replaced as the Ravens signal caller.

The “expert” analysis seems to be moving towards Atlanta every day. I’m not going there.

New England Patriots 34, Atlanta Falcons 31