Christmas winning, analyzing our NFL Week 16 picks

With the season of giving upon us, our picks from last week were winners with a 2-1 Week 16 taking us to 30-28-3 on the season. Our picks were highlighted by three games that our YPP metric favored by 5 points or more – our preferred threshold to bet on.

YPP went 2-2 with differentials over 5 points on the week with the one game we stayed away from turning out to be a flop – more on that later. Overall YPP went 7-6 with differentials over 1 point.

Our other metric EW had been so close to the Vegas spread the previous two weeks but with a bit more separation in Week 16 those suggested spreads cleaned house. EW went 2-and-0 with differentials over 3 points – our preferred differential for that metric – while in differentials over 1 point EW was 9-4 overall, for a very successful outing.

Below as always is our breakdown of all that happened plus an early preview of Week 17 with the last suggested spreads of the regular season.

Jacksonville pulls through

Injuries did affect this game as the Tennessee Titans quarterback Marcus Mariota exited this game at the end of the third quarter after having taken several hits throughout the game. But the Titans were already down 25-10 at that point with the Jacksonville Jaguars looking as good as they have all year.

The Jags found some good play from Blake Bortles who’s finally utilizing his talented receivers more finding Marqise Lee and Allen Robinson for some big gains on the outside. While the run game also was able to contribute in minor ways through Chris Ivory who also had an impact in the short receiving game.

More impressive was Jacksonville’s defense which was able to create some consistent pressure on Mariota and substitute Matt Cassell. Furthermore, the Jags were great against the Titans running game holding them to a season-low total of 58 yards on 2.9 yards per carry, something other top defensive units like the Denver Broncos, Kansas City Chiefs, and Minnesota Vikings were unable to do.

Top Jaguars draft pick Jalen Ramsey had a standout performance capped off by a pick-six score to officially put them over the top 38-17.

After having been wrong the last time these two teams faced one another this time the numbers regressed back to the mean with the Jaguars showing nicely with a different head coach.

Chicago falls flat with too many picks

We were on a nice little run betting on the Chicago Bears who’d kept their last five close to within 6 points of their opponents. Chicago had also been playing some solid defense and with Matt Barkley at the helm as the new starting quarterback were managing to play reliable if unspectacular football. Better known as John Fox ball.

That was not the case this Saturday as Barkley looked like the third stringer that he is by the second half. The Bears signal-caller had five interceptions by the end of the day in a disastrous outing. With all those turnovers Chicago’s defense that benefited so much from sound play from Barkley completely unraveled.

In our defense, we really liked the matchup of the Bears pass defense against the powerful Washington Redskins aerial attack and it’s not like Kirk Cousins did anything otherworldly, though he was relentlessly efficient. The real issue was the Washington running game wich had been dormant for a while but came to life using three different runners plus Cousins to the tune of 208 yards on the ground for four touchdowns on 5.9 yards per carry. Not good.

The Bears managed 6.8 YPP on the day but allowed 7.5, add a five-to-nothing turnover margin and that spells disaster. Barkley had managed to limit his interceptions as of late aside from a bad third quarter against the Green Bay Packers but he now has 12 in five full starts which is problematic.

As the Skins broke away this was a lost cause, just not our day with all those turnovers.

The Saints attack comes alive 

This was another game that came back to reflect the numerical projections. After a disappointing low scoring affair a couple weeks ago against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, losing 16-11, the New Orleans Saints needed to figure things out this week.

The Saints did exactly that with Drew Brees and his young developing targets in fine form. After an impressive defensive stretch in which Tampa held opponents under 20 points in three of four games, the defense has been tested by two great offensive units in New Orleans and the Dallas Cowboys showing they might not be the 86′ Bears just yet.

This was also a case of the Saints and Brees getting back to what they do. The Bucs secondary put up a nice test but the quarterback was tossing dimes to all parts of the field, while his playmakers to the outside, Brandin Cooks, and Micheal Thomas, came through for him.

Much like the Titans vs. Jags contest YPP went 2-and-0 this week after having been wrong when these two divisional rivals squared off the first time in 2016. Credit to us for staying strong in our belief and all of you who bet and believed the numbers would come around for us. Regression to the mean is real.

Other picks that led to EW’s great week

This week, as mentioned above, we had four games that YPP favored over our preferred 5 point differential from the actual spread. The one game that we didn’t pick of the four was the New England Patriots vs. the New York Jets. In unprecedented fashion, EW had the Pats above the 16.5 point line with a suggested spread of 18.5. With that type of divergence between the two metrics we stayed away and for good reason considering the Jets were starting Bryce Petty with a limited sample size to go off of. EW won out the debate in big fashion as this game was a pure blowout with Petty’s game ending early as he exited in the first quarter. The temptation to make this an EW pick of the week was there, but considering all the wacky factors and already big actual spread there was no point.

Another game that both our metrics liked was the Cleveland Browns who were 6 point underdogs at home to the San Diego Chargers. The Browns finally came through with their first win of the year and the 4 point differential from both metrics was proved correctly. Again this pick was hard to pull the trigger on with Robert Griffin III’s return to the field that much like Petty’s didn’t last for long.

Those are the two biggest standouts of the week when we look at a big winning week from our EW metrics which also included the Arizona Cardinals over the Seattle Seahawks and the Philadelphia Eagles outright upset of the New York Giants.

As always below you’ll find a preview of the Week 17 suggested spreads for our original EW numbers.