Wildcard Weekend 2-1

Reg Season ATS 60-42

I found this a tough weekend to handicap, Divisional weekend is my favorite football weekend of the year but this years games have such interesting matchups that for the most part I felt the lines were pretty good and whenever I lfelt I had a good read on one side, I would see something to make me like the other. Overall I do like 3 plays as of now including 2 totals.

Game 1 Bal @ NE Under 48

Bet % Over 63% Under 37%

Most of the week I liked Bal +7 but as the week went on and I read more and more people picking Bal as the team most likely to pull the upset I began wondering if maybe everyone, including me,was putting too much stock on the previous playoff games between the two teams. I also wondered that since it had been about 3 weeks since NE played a game they had to show up for maybe we were forgetting just how good they have been the 2nd half of the season.

In the end what I trust most about Baltimore is their defense, if they win this game it wil be because their pass rush will overwhelm the Patriots, similar to what we saw KC do on that MNF game. Ravens are the #6 DVOA defense overall, they are dominant vs the run giving up just 3.6 yards/rush 3rd best and should be able to make NE a one dimensional offense in this game. Where Baltimore has struggled is defending the deep passing game but NE doesn’t really have the type of speed to get behind them so I don’t see that being a major issue here.

On the flip side NE brings the 11th best DVOA defense to face the Ravens 9th ranked offense, they are 9th in opp passer rating and at home should be able to cause problems for Flacco. There are a couple of numbers I really like when betting unders, the first is yards per point against and here we have the 4th and 5th best teams by that metric, Bal gives up a point for every 18.1 yards while NE gives up a point for every 17.6. It should be mentioned that by that NE is #1 in yards per point on offense at 12.5 yards/pt which is one of the reasons I didn’t like Bal +7. The Other number I like is TD% against in the Redzone and both tehse teams hold offenses under 50%, Bal holds teams to TD’s 42% and NE does it 47.8%.

If Bal wins I thin their defense dominates the game and the offense does just enough and it comes under the total but I also think this is a game the defense could play well and still lost by double digits 24-13 or something. What I don;t see is both these offenses getting off and playing in the high 20’s.

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Wildcard Weekend 2-1

Reg Season ATS: 60-42

2014- 2015 Overall 62-43

Nice start to the playoffs, both wins were really strong through the game, the loss on Dallas never really had a chance but overall I felt good about my breakdowns of the wildcard week.

Game 1: Ari @ Car -5.5

Bet% Ari 55% Car 45%

Score Ari 16 Car 27

Result: Win

This was kind of  a strange game as I’m sure Cardinals backers would say if anyone but Lindley was starting they could have won this game as a couple of big mistakes late by him ended up killing any chance of the comeback ot to mention just his general ineptness. That being said as a Panther backer I would say that had it not been for a couple of big mistakes after Car took a 10-0 lead, the muffed punt and Int return which set up 2 first half TDs this game would have been over early.

Overall this was  ugly game was dominated by the Panthers, they outgained Arizona 386 to 78,hel the Cards to 1.7 yards/play. The game was full of mistakes which game both teams an opportunity to lose it at different points, 3 turnovers each and the Panthers also had twice the penalty yards the Cards did.

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Week 17- 2-3

Season ATS: 60-42

The regular season ended with a losing week of 2-3, it was a tough week in that both the wins were no doubters an in all of the losses we either had a couple of key plays or D/ST TDs go the wrong way. Adding to the frustration of the week, there were 4 other games I liked this week when deciding the card, 3 of which I had the right side. None the less, even though we had a rough December and finished with a losing week, we end the season just a fraction under 60% which is a pretty great year, so it’s a little like making the playoffs even though you lost your final game.

Game 1: Phi at NYG -1

Bet% Phi 41% NYG59

Score: Phi 34-NYG 26

Result: Loss

I thought going in the that motivation for this game was very different for these 2 teams, the Eagles missed out on the playoffs last week and were on a 3 game losing streak, I didn’t think there was much reason for them to be up for the game. As for the Giants they were closing out the season on a high note playing their best football of the season. I was wrong on the Eagles as they came out and played a really competitive game.

This was a really even game, both teams ran around the same amount of plays Phi-72 NYG-78, the Giants outgained the Eagles 6.5 yards per play to 5.9 overall and 8.1 yards per att to 6.6 in the pass game. Eagles outgained the Giants on the ground 5.1/rush to 3.0.

The difference in this game came down to the redzone, where the Eagles were 2-4 to the Giants 1–3 and the big punt and return TD by the Eagles in the 3rd Q when the score was 17-16 Eagles. The Giants never led again after that play.

 

Game 2 NYJ +7 @ Mia

Bet% NYJ 43% Mia 57%

Score: NYJ 37 Mia 24

Result: Win

I liked the Jets for 2 reasons in this game, the largest being this was going to be Rex Ryan’s last game and the very popular coach would have his players give a great performance in hopes of sending him off with a win. I also thought they would be able to have success in the run game.

The run game for the Jets was only so so. NYJ only averaged 3.1 yards per rush but kept with it rushing 34 times, it was actually the Miami run game that dominated averaging 8.9 yards per rush (179 on 20 carries) but it should be noted Lamar Miller had 97 of those yards on 1 carry.

While it wasn’t in the run game, the Jets did play their best offensive game of the year, they had almost 500 yards of offense, Geno Smith had a perfect passer rating of 158.3, the Jets had 5 plays of 20 yards or more including a 74 yard TD pass to Decker which led to an amazing 13.9 yards per pass attempt.

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