Here are my Week 6 picks. I picked 11 of 13 games correctly in Week 5, so I’ve got that going for me.
Raiders @ Falcons: Falcons. Atlanta’s defense is allowing 5.4 yards per rush. You’d expect Darren McFadden to kill them, but he’s having a bad season (3.5 yards per carry). The Falcons will get an early lead, force the Raiders to pass and Carson Palmer will throw a few interceptions.
Bengals @ Browns: Bengals. This game will be closer than you think. The Browns’ offense is improving – it scored 27 points last Sunday – and the Bengals’ defense gives up an average of 25.8 points per game. The Bengals offense will score 30 points and win a high-scoring game.
Rams @ Dolphins: This will be a close low-scoring game. I’m picking the home team. The Rams offense isn’t good enough to beat the Dolphins in Miami. St. Louis can’t run the ball, they can’t protect Sam Bradford and their No.1 receiver, Danny Amendola, is out.
Colts @ Jets: Colts. Antonio Cromartie will shut down Reggie Wayne and force Andrew Luck to throw to other receivers, and he will, and the Colts will win.
Lions @ Eagles: Eagles. The Lions have lost their last three games and they’re going to lose their next three as well. They play the Bears in Chicago next Monday night and the Seahawks and home the Sunday after.
Chiefs @ Buccaneers: Tampa Bay’s defense allows just 73.8 rushing yards a game. They should be able to slow down the Chief’s No.2 rated rushing attack.
Cowboys @ Ravens: Ravens. Joe Flacco is 3-0 at home this season, 30-5 at home in his career.
Bills @ Cardinals: The Cardinals defense allows a skimpy 3.6 yards per carry. They will shut down C.J. Spiller and Fred Jackson, and then the Bills will quit.
Patriots @ Seahawks: Patriots. New England has one of the best run defense’s in the league, allowing an average of 3.4 yards per carry. They’ll force rookie QB Russell Wilson to beat them, and he won’t. The Patriots will keep him in the pocket, knock down his passes and sack him.
Vikings @ Redskins: Vikings. Minnesota is one of the best teams in the NFC and they’re getting better. Washington’s 2-3 and their quarterback, Robert Griffin III, got knocked out of last week’s game with a concussion. I’m picking the team with the healthy QB.
Packers @ Texans: Texans. With Cedric Benson injured, the Packers will use four and five-wide receiver formations, but the Texans specialize in six-DB dime defense. They’re ready for the Packers’ passing attack. Up front, the Packers’ offensive line cannot block J.J. Watt. On the other side of the ball, the Packers will not be able to stop top running back Arian Foster.
Broncos @ Chargers: Broncos. Denver is 2-3, a game behind San Diego in the AFC West. The Broncos are the better team. They’re too good to fall to 2-4.
Stay tuned for my 49ers-Giants prediction, which I’ll post later this afternoon.
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Grant
Why do you think the Broncos are better? At this point PM hasn’t led them over a team Tebow failed to beat. Tebow beat the Raiders in Oakland and the Steelers in Denver. No upgrade in the W-L column.
Both Tebow and PM lost to the Pats (who are something like 9-4 against PM). Should the 2 meet up again, PM hasn’t shown to be better.
I still think Denver wins the division. But SD right now isn’t worse than Denver. If SD has a better D than the Pats, PM’s bad play shows up and Denver loses.
Isn’t denver’s schedule significantly harder this year because they made the playoffs last year? I haven’t done the research, nor will I becuase i don’t care that much about the broncos, but I would consider strength of schedule in addition to w-l record when assessing how good a team is.
and as for the chargers… isn’t norv turner still their head coach? nuff said
Schedule difficulty is one of the most over rated stats\info used out there, if not the most over rated.
There are only 2 games decided by the previous years standings and there’s no guarantee that those teams will be as good as the year before [Saints]. 6 division games, 4 against NFC North, 4 AFC east, 2 first place games Saints and Giants.
Dangle
They play in the weakest division. I mean the Raiders should only count as 1/2 a win, and they get them twice. KC’s HC is doing his best to impersonate Nolan.
Ever since the NFL switched the schedule system, the divisional teams more or less plays the same non-division opponent. We played Buffalo who was a nobody last year, and we were in the title game. Now AZ plays Buffalo, and they didn’t do anything last year. So where is the harder schedule?
“The Lions have lost their last three games and they’re going to lose their next three as well. ” Music to my ears Grant! I h@te the lions and their doofbag coach, and their skeezy QB, and their criminal psychopath NSuh. The only good thing about that team is megatron.
I might be willing to bet on the redskins over the vikings if they got a couple points. Or maybe I’m just feeling crazy. Idk what the spread is.
I also think its interesting to see the matchups of teams that we recently destroyed. Ex; the texans playing the jets and not dominating them in the same fashion, and this week the Bills @ Cardinals. These are potential and actual future matchups for the niners and its an interesting to use them as measuring sticks. I would love to see the bills wreck the cardinals, on many levels, but i dont’ see it happening. Should be a closer game with the cardinals coming out on top.
I’m interested in that game too. I don’t think the Bills are as bad as they’ve looked the last 6 quarters (or should I say the last 13 years…), and I don’t know what to think of ‘Zona. They’ve beaten 4 relatively good teams, but I’m still not buying in for some reason. Buffalo needs to pull it out, or at least be competitive. If they get killed for the 3rd game in a row, and any confidence the players had in themselves and the coaching staff will be gone.
Grant, why don’t you just pick games against the spread? I think it would make for a more interesting and enjoyable read than one simply picking the winners.
Respectfully disagree. If you want gambling and other non-football related discussion, there are other, better sites for that than this.
49ers win,Raiders lose,and Mark Davis salivates at the new L.A. Coloseum..who want any team but one that already failed in the southland and were gangster icons.
ARE gangster icons.
@ Coffee
Re: our exchange yesterday: Ted Brusci picked the Bowns on this one. If it does become a shootout, then maybe the rookie presses and makes more mistakes than the redhead. I’m going with the Browns though on a hunch (but then I had the Steelers, so…….)
Patriots @ Seahawks: Patriots. New England has one of the best run defense’s in the league.
Why do you think that is Grant?
There are 3 types of lies: lies, damned lies and statistics. Point being is A- they haven’t played anybody that can run the ball and B- mostly they’ve had such a lead that the opponent abandoned the run.
That won’t happen in Seattle. As much as I hope the sea chickens lose, I see them pulling out a tight one.
The only team they played that could run was the Ravens and Rice got 5 yds a carry for 101!
Every year some hot-shot east coast team gets it into their heads that playing Seattle in Seattle is no different from playing the Jets in NY. And then they come home saying that Seattle got lucky.
Yeah. Right.
11 of 13? Very impressive Grant.
I’m going with the Rams over the Dolphins, the Seahawks over the Pats, with the Packers a tossup vs the Texans simply because I think the NFC is the better conference.
Th Giants are a good measuring stick game for the 49ers, and the Packers will be a good measuring stick game for the Texans. If the Pack even hangs in their vs the Texans, it bodes well for the 49ers.
Grant,
I picked the Rams over the Dolpins, Chargers over the Broncos and Redskins over the Vikings..