My season-to-date mark is rather good at 59-32-1 (65%), but the bottom line wasn’t helped by an 8-6 tally last week. Week 7 will be better!
NOTE: All games will be played on Sunday afternoon unless otherwise noted.
Kansas City 26, Denver 23 (Thursday night): The Broncos have flashed a stingy defense lately, winning two straight as a result. Yes, the Chiefs are a bit depleted, but they can still put up points. (What an understatement!) This game should be a fun one to watch!
Jacksonville 23, Cincinnati 10: The game, which will be being played at Paul Brown Stadium, would have the eponymous innovator rolling over in his grave. That’s because his Bengals are a sorry lot. And if an equally sorry team, like Arizona, can come to the Ohio Valley and win, then what’s a better team like Jacksonville going to do? (Hint: win)
San Francisco 30, Washington 6: Forget about Paul Brown for a moment. Let’s switch attention to George Allen. If Brown’s rolling in his grave, then Allen would be getting out of his. That’s just how bad DC is these days. Washington would need to bring back the Hogs, Joe Theismann, Dexter Manley, and many more from eras-gone-by to handle these 49ers.
Buffalo 37, Miami 15: The bottom-feeding Dolphins haven’t played well at home, so what are they supposed to do in Western New York against one of the league’s best defenses? It’s a shame to see a good division rivalry go to pot, but the Bills will gladly take an easy win. They are in wild-card contention, after all.
Los Angeles Rams 31, Atlanta 26: The Rams and Falcons have both made recent Super Bowl appearances, but now these teams are slumping badly. The Rams’ defense is better, so we’ll go with them.
Minnesota 24, Detroit 13: The Vikings could use a satisfying home win over Philadelphia as a springboard. Will they? This year Ford Field has been a surprisingly tough place to play.
Green Bay 33, Oakland 24: Hail, NFL history! These two franchises played each other in Super Bowl II, which was Vince Lombardi’s last game as the Packers’ head coach. Even though the Raiders have shown signs of life lately, including a good win over Chicago in London, it’s asking too much for them to win at Lambeau
Houston 38, Indianapolis 20: The Texans are fresh from a come-from-behind road win at Kansas City, which is supremely difficult to do. Jacoby Brissett has played well for the Colts, ‘but’ is the operative word here. Even with a home game, the horseshoe helmets will start regressing to the mean at some point. And it might start this week.
New York Giants 23, Arizona 16: Arizona traveled to the Eastern time zone and won at Cincinnati. This time, the Cardinals are traveling farther and playing a better team. The Giants are coming off a mini-bye (a longer week to prepare) after a gallant Thursday-night effort in New England. In a battle of good, young quarterbacks, I’ll take the better team–NYG.
Seattle 27, Baltimore 16: Baltimore has never won in Seattle. It’s 0-2 at noisy CenturyLink Field. But, of course, the Ravens aren’t alone. Things have to go perfectly for a visitor to win in Seattle, and the Ravens–while not lacking for effort–aren’t a perfect team. Baltimore will enter its bye week at 4-3.
New Orleans 20, Chicago 16: This is a really good matchup!. Chicago will be home as it comes off its bye. New Orleans’s D got it a win at Jacksonville. I don’t think many points will be scored in this one, but the Saints are my NFC pick to go to the Super Bowl. So I’m going with NO in a critical game for both squads.
Los Angeles Chargers 23, Tennessee 17: This game doesn’t deserve the late-afternoon spotlight. It should have been moved back to the 1 p.m. window. The reason is obvious. These slumping teams have lost their way, and I’m not sure the Titans ever had one. Marcus Mariota was benched last week, Philip Rivers wasn’t, and that’s enough for me to take the Chargers.
Dallas 27, Philadelphia 26 (Sunday night): The banged-up Cowboys are heading for their bye–and not a moment too soon. We’ve seen what can happen when their starting tackles are out: they can’t move the ball, even with Ezekiel Elliott. With Amari Cooper banged up, tool, this game could bring Dallas a fourth straight loss. Ouch! The good news for the ‘Boys is that the Eagles have issues–plus they’ll be on the road this week. I’ll go with Dallas in this one.
New England 38, New York Jets 20 (Monday night): Thanks to last week’s Thursday-night game, the unbeaten Patriots had a mini-bye (extra days off) and now take a short road trip to play a bad team. It’s the best of all worlds for New England! This year, though, there’s no Mark Sanchez with his “butt fumble” for the Patriots to face, and Sam Darnold is healthy and making the Jets look better. That means this one could be better (and closer) than some people think.
