As we prepare for week 6 of the 2017 NFL season, Packernet has decided to put our predictive powers to the test. Each week we will give you our picks and see how we stack up.
*Special guest predictions by Tecmo Bowl, courtesy of Sgt. Nathaniel Buschmann, currently serving in Iraq*
Cleveland Browns (0-5) at Houston Texans (2-3)
Line: Texans by 10. Total: 47.
Ryan’s Pick: Browns
I’ll be honest, I’m allowing my desire to pick a long shot to dictate what should otherwise be an easy Texans pick. But let me explain why it makes sense. First, the Browns are a team that is actually quite good against the run allowing just 2.9 yards per carry. They have the number 1 ranked corner in the NFL according to PFF, Jason McCourty who can match up with DeAndre Hopkins. I’m not sure I would say advantage Browns here, but they match up enough to at least slow them down, especially with new pass rush phenom Myles Garrett playing great ball.
On the other side of the ball they have one of the better offensive lines and serviceable backs but have decided to throw the ball nearly every down (likely because they are down early). Kizer, the Browns biggest ailment up to this point, held the ball longer than any QB and took a ton of sacks due to his inability to make decisions, and when he did throw, he gave up 11 picks, most in the NFL.
Kizer is now benched and Hogan’s PFF grade is average, which in my mind is perfect. If they can slow the Texans and lean on their run game, using Hogan as a game manager, they should be able to take advantage of a team who’s hopes of sniffing the playoffs just went on IR.
Jon’s Pick: Browns
This game has all the makings of a trap game. It has a rookie quarterback putting up stats like he’s been in the NFL for nearly a decade and has two rings under his belt. It has a talented wideout who is finally able to prove he’s one of the league’s best now that he has a QB who can get the ball to him early and often. It has the hapless Browns who can’t beat anyone but themselves, who have no business winning a game this year. The Browns, who just benched their rookie quarterback for some nobody. This is how the NFL works. There’s no logical reason that anyone would be able to find—except that Houston’s two best pass rushers just went to IR, but that shouldn’t matter against the Browns—but the Browns will win the game anyway. For once, I’m going to be on the winning side of a trap game.
Tecmo Sim: Texans 31 Browns 7
The Texans are hot and cold. The Browns are always cold. It would seem the Browns caught the Texans on the wrong day.
New England Patriots (3-2) at New York Jets (3-2)
Line: Patriots by 9.5. Total: 47.5.
Ryan’s Pick: Patriots
I’m sure if I wanted to I could find an argument for the Jets but there’s just no way. Tom Brady and Billy B. will not lose to the Jets.
For me this isn’t about who wins. It’s a gauge to see how bad the Patriots are. If the Jets are even close to winning the game when this is said and done, the Patriots have some soul searching to do.
Jon’s Pick: Patriots
The Patriots will continue struggling to beat teams with high octane offenses. The good news for New England is that the Jets aren’t one of those offenses. Better still, the Jets defense isn’t anything to write home about. At the end of the day, this is a case of a fading (one hopes) dynasty against kind of a bum team. My money is on the team that has known how to win for almost twenty years, not the team that looked like they might not win a game after two weeks.
Tecmo Sim: Patriots 42 Jets 31
For just a moment it felt as though time stopped when it dawned on me how realistic this outcome might just be. The Patriots refusal to lose, their familiarization and traditional domination of the Jets, coupled with the Patriots horrific defense… I mean it’s possible.
Miami Dolphins (2-2) at Atlanta Falcons (3-1)
Line: Falcons by 12.5. Total: 46.
Ryan’s Pick: Falcons
Another game I really don’t feel the need to research, the Falcons are possibly the best team in the NFC and arguably the NFL. How in the entire world is there any way the Dolphins win this game? In Atlanta? No, not going to happen.
Jon’s Pick: Falcons
I’ll take a mostly healthy Atlanta that had an entire week to stew over their loss against the Bills. The Dolphins don’t look like they even want to play football this year. That’s a real shame. I liked what Adam Gase did in Denver and Chicago, and was hoping he’d have success in Miami.
Tecmo Sim: Dolphins 21 Falcons 27
The Dolphins find a surprising amount of success against the Falcons and almost pull off an upset. Despite an impressive showing from Ajayi, the Falcons were not to be denied.
Detroit Lions (3-2) at New Orleans Saints (2-2)
Line: Saints by 4.5. Total: 50.
Ryan’s Pick: Saints
The Saints are a team coming off a bye having won their last 2 games in a combined score of 54 to 13. Their offense is clicking, they’re relatively healthy (despite their 12 players on IR), and they cut Adrian Peterson which, although seemly is a bad thing, should give the Saints more clarity at running back and less division in the locker room.
The Lions, on the other hand, have 13 players on IR, including newly added Heloti Ngata, and have a bunch of other banged up players including, Lang, Quin, Ansah, and Stafford.
Although I actually think the Lions are the better team and should win this game, I’m taking a healthy refreshed Saints team at home over the banged up Lions team a week before their bye.
I mean seriously, how productive are you at work on the Friday before your week long vacation?
Jon’s Pick: Lions
This is a huge toss up for me. I want to side with New Orleans because they’re still living on the reputation of being dominant at home, but that’s just not the case over the last few years. The Saints are 23-17 over the last five seasons (23-18 including this season); thirteen of their 17 home losses came in the last three years. The voodoo spells sustained them at home for all those years have clearly worn off. This is the fourth straight season the two teams play each other. Detroit all three games that were played over the last three seasons; they smashed the Saints in the last two, both of which were in New Orleans.
New Orleans is coming off a bye week, and they’re typically pretty good after a bye. To make things better, they’ve tasted victory in two consecutive games, blowing out both opponents. But one of those games was a divisional match, and the other was against the Dolphins in London. I’m not sure that I trust those types of wins when evaluating a team’s stock. The Saints have had trouble scoring more than 20 points, surpassing the mark only once. On the other hand, Detroit has scored more than 20 in all but one game. I think it’s likely that both teams play to their averages this week, and Detroit comes away with a win.
Tecmo Sim: Lions 24 Saints 31
High scoring shouldn’t surprise anyone but the Lions ineptitude on defense might.
Green Bay Packers (4-1) at Minnesota Vikings (3-2)
Line: Packers by 3. Total: 46.5.
Ryan’s Pick: Packers
The Vikings at home are tough, especially their defense, but I just don’t think the Vikings offense will be able to do enough to win the game. Although the Packers offense might struggle, the Vikings offensive line can’t run block at all and with Latavius Murray playing terrible football, the Vikings will be forced to lean on their passing attack to beat the struggling Packers secondary. A strategy that wouldn’t be horrible if not for the fact that both Bradford and Diggs are out.
It will likely be a low scoring affair but I like Rodgers ability to scrape together enough to win the game. The one thing to keep an eye on is special team. If points are a premium, field goals and extra points need to be made.
Jon’s Pick: Packers
Minnesota’s defense is pretty good, but I don’t think it’s good enough to shut down the Packers offense. They’re better against the run than the pass, too, and Green Bay couldn’t care less about running. With Diggs sidelined this week, I don’t think Minnesota has the offensive firepower to keep pace with the Packers. Stranger things have happened, but I expect Green Bay to extend their lead in the division on Sunday.
Tecmo Sim: Packers 28 Vikings 9
To be fair, I did put in Aaron Jones this week but he was promptly injured and replaced by Ty Montgomery. Montgomery helped not at all. Still, despite his lack of help, the Packers absolutely trounce the inept Vikings.
Chicago Bears (1-4) at Baltimore Ravens (3-2)
Line: Ravens by 6.5. Total: 39.5.
Ryan’s Pick: Ravens
Looking at the PFF matchup, the Bears should win this game. The Ravens have absolutely nothing to work with. Everyone is hurt and the remaining players are simply not good. Despite that, the Ravens just annihilated the Raiders, 30 to 17.
The Bears on the other hand have a surprisingly good defense, at least in terms of the talent they have on the field, they have a new quarterback that seems to have the team fired up, and last week they played a rival at home who’s quarterback was benched due to terrible play, and still they lost.
Bottom line, the Ravens find a way to win and the Bears find a way to lose.
Jon’s Pick: Ravens
I can’t find anything to suggest that Chicago can win this game. Trubisky looked okay against Minnesota in his first NFL game. That’s nice to see if you’re a Bears fan, but he can’t throw and catch the ball down the field. The Bears just don’t have the offensive talent needed to beat the Ravens: I don’t think Peyton Manning could have made these receivers look good. The Ravens aren’t particularly scary on offense, but they’re good enough to put a couple TDs on the board, and the Bears are struggling to score double digits this season.
Tecmo Sim: Ravens 28 Bears 13
The new Bears quarterback might excite people but carrying the team to victory the way top end quarterbacks do doesn’t seem to be Trubiski’s thing.
San Francisco 49ers (0-5) at Washington Redskins (2-2)
Line: Redskins by 11. Total: 46.5.
Ryan’s Pick: Redskins
The 49ers have been in disaster mode for some time now and so far in 2017 they haven’t found a way to win a game losing their last two in overtime. They lost them to terrible teams by the way.
The Redskins aren’t great but they are solid in terms of being a steady well rounded team. They are healthy, move the ball well, have a decent defense, and are coming off a bye. The 49ers are a good first team to play after a bye.
Jon’s Pick: Redskins
We talked about this game on the fantasy podcast a bit. You should listen to that if you haven’t already because I give a lot of really good advice, but I digress. I usually like to take the team that’s come close to winning the last couple of weeks but hasn’t quite gotten there. Usually, those losses come from the minor, correctable mental mistakes that are a part of all young team’s growing pains. But the Niners aren’t losing because of small things. They’re losing because they’re showing 2/7 when the chips are on the table. They’re losing because they’re bad, because they don’t have enough talent to pull out tough wins. This isn’t something that can be corrected in a week. Washington beat the brakes off the Raiders, and they should have won against the Chiefs before their bye week. I expect the Redskins to easily dispatch the inferior 49ers this week.
Tecmo Sim: Redskins 35 49ers 17
Tecmo is in some kind of a mood today. What ever happened to 14-21? Perhaps the all mighty Tecmo has read into the Navorro Bowman situation with great displeasure.
Los Angeles Rams (3-2) at Jacksonville Jaguars (3-2)
Line: Jaguars by 2.5. Total: 43.5.
Ryan’s Pick: Rams
The Rams lose 1 game and suddenly, according to everyone, the freak Gurley and his young stud QB are garbage and the Rams are once again an 8-8 team. Likewise, the Jags win a game against the Steelers getting 5 picks after the Steelers stupidly decide to throw the ball every down against the best corners in the NFL, while keeping Bell on the shelf, and the Jaguars are Super Bowl bound.
All that to say both games are outliers. The Rams were putting up 30 on people every week. A 10 point performance against a divisional opponent is exactly an outlier. The Jags likewise just lost to the Jets the week prior.
So now that we are all caught up and all the crazy thoughts are out the window, we are left with 2 very similar teams. Both run the ball well and are terrible at stopping the run. Both have quarterbacks that serve a purpose but you certainly don’t want the game in their hands. Both teams are 3-2 with neither really beating any super impressive opponents, except maybe 1 (Jags beat the Steelers, Rams beat the Cowboys).
With that, I’m extremely torn but I like the Rams ability to put up a ton of points in games. The Jaguars don’t really have the same ability. If the Rams are able to get back to form, I don’t think the Jaguars and Blake Bortles can keep up.
Jon’s Pick: Rams
I’m taking the Rams to bounce back after last week’s tough loss. I’m a little bit nervous about this pick because Jacksonville’s secondary can cover the Rams WRs in man all day and stack the box against Gurley, which I’m assuming is exactly what happened last week. But the Jags are so inconsistent that it’s hard to take them seriously. They’ve actually rotated wins and losses, and they’re falling on a loss this week. It feels like each game is statistically independent of another, so trends shouldn’t matter in the NFL, but they’re not independent, so trends matter. Look for trends to continue this week: Gurley will have a good game, and Jacksonville will lose because they won last week.
Tecmo Sim: Rams 42 Jaguars 14
It seems unlikely but the Rams have an incredible back and the Jaguars can’t stop the run. Maybe it’ll just be like Madden where there is that 1 play the other guy (usually me) can’t stop.
Tampa Bay Buccaneers (2-2) at Arizona Cardinals (2-3)
Line: Buccaneers by 1.5. Total: 44.5
Ryan’s Pick: Buccaneers
I’ll be honest, I didn’t do a ton of work on this because it feels entirely too obvious and that makes me nervous, but I like nothing about the Cardinals. Perhaps Peterson helps the team a little but not this quickly, and probably not at all considering how poor the line is playing.
The Buccs are hot and cold but even on a bad day I think the Buccs win this game.
Jon’s Pick: Buccaneers
What can I say about Arizona that hasn’t already been said about Afghanistan? They look bombed out and depleted. Tampa should win this pretty easily. Arizona is bad all around this season. I mean, their defense is still good in the sense that it has a lot of talent, but they’re giving up a lot of points. And their offense can’t go score for score the way they could in the past three years. As long as Winston doesn’t test Patrick Peterson, the Bucs should walk out of the desert with another W notched into their belt.
Tecmo Sim: Buccaneers 42 Cardinals 24
The Cardinals, like quite a few other teams actually, are in full scale collapse mode. Honestly, the biggest surprise to me in this game is the Cardinals being able to score 24 points.
Pittsburgh Steelers (3-2) at Kansas City Chiefs (5-0)
Line: Chiefs by 5. Total: 46.
Ryan’s Pick: Chiefs
The Steelers have the ability to win this game but I’m not liking the Steelers much after the beating they took last week. Although I put a lot of the blame on play calling, elite level corners, and garbage time picks, Ben Roethlisburger walked away from that game saying he doesn’t have it anymore and should maybe consider retiring. It’s hard to imagine going from that extreme to beating the only 5-0 team in the NFL.
Jon’s Pick: Steelers
If you want to know why I think the Chiefs will win, you should listen to the fantasy football podcast. I explained it there.
Tecmo Sim: Steelers 27 Chiefs 14
Hunt and Bell both go for over 100 yards but the overall offensive assault of the Steelers was too much for the Chiefs.
Los Angeles Chargers (1-4) at Oakland Raiders (2-3)
Ryan’s Pick: Chargers
The Raiders have been playing some pretty bad ball even when Carr was the quarterback. Their defense is maybe the worst in the NFL and last week they got blown out by the Ravens, a team that has no business blowing anyone out.
The Chargers aren’t a good team right now but they are coming off their first win and have a chance to capitalize on another struggling team to make it 2 in a row.
Jon’s Pick: Chargers
Carr is returning to action after breaking his back against Denver. He wasn’t having a great game against Denver, and he looked terrible against Redskins the week prior. San Diego is better than their record suggests. They have a good offense and a talented defense. And to make things worse for the Raiders, the Chargers figured out what everyone else on the planet already knew: giving the ball to Melvin Gordon a bunch of times significantly increases their win probability. Oakland’s defense fooled everyone for two weeks, but they’re showing their true colors now, and boy are they ugly. I think San Diego will win two games in a row for the first time since week 7 of last season.
Tecmo Sim: Chargers 20 Raiders 24
As battered and bruised as they are, even a hapless Raiders team can’t find a way to lose to the Chargers.
New York Giants (0-5) at Denver Broncos (3-1)
Line: Broncos by 11. Total: 40.
Ryan’s Pick: Broncos
I’m not sure if there is a game I could be more confident in. On the Broncos worst day, I have no idea how they lose this game. The Giants have fallen to 0-5. Can you imagine what it’s like in their locker room(<– Explicit language)? Even when healthy they are filled with dysfunction and chaos. Coming into this game they are down all 3 wide receivers and just suspended their cornerback Dominique Rodgers-Cromartie for fighting with the coach.
McAdoo has completely lost the team and will be lucky to have a job after this week. Usually sentences like that aren’t followed up with, “and then they win the game.”
Jon’s Pick: Broncos
Does this need an explanation? New York’s whole offense is on IR, just about. Their number one WR will be Roger Lewis this week. I honestly don’t know who he is. On defense, DRC was put on timeout for his bad attitude, and both Vernon Olivier and Romeo Okwara will be out. There’s not one threat on this team this week. Barring the possibility of Denver’s starters dropping dead in the middle of the game, I don’t know how they could possibly lose this one.
Tecmo Sim: Giants 24 Broncos 21
This is the upset of all upsets. None more be said. If this is in anyway true, I will concede greatness and the all-powerful Tecmo will reign supreme.
Indianapolis Colts (2-3) at Tennessee Titans (2-3)
Ryan’s Pick: Titans
Remember how everyone was so excited about the NFL ratings after the last two Monday night football games? You know, the games that were actually somewhat interesting to watch? Ya, you can kiss that goodbye. Nobody, and I mean nobody, is going to stay up to watch this garbage. An unemployed kid down 10 points with Titans defense on his $500 buy-in fantasy football league isn’t going to watch this game. This is the worst.
As far as the game, the Titans are two different teams. There’s the team with Mariota and the team without him. The team with him went 2-1, passed for nearly 250 yards per game, and ran for over 150 yards per game. Without him, they went 0-2, passed for 114 yards, and ran for 77 yards.
Mariota is supposed to be back. That’s good enough for me.
Jon’s Pick: Titans
I hate this game, and I probably won’t watch it. I’m irritated just thinking about it. I wish Luck was playing. I wish the Titans weren’t a franchise. I wish Mularkey would get fired, at least. What a stupid name. Is anyone actually a Titans fan? I’ve never met one. Whatever. If Mariota plays, the Titans should win this one because they usually score a lot of points with him in the game. It shouldn’t be too hard to score on Indy, their defense is atrocious. This game makes me want to vomit. What an awful way to end a week of football.
Tecmo Sim: Colts 21 Titans 20
Who cares