I always love the start of a new postseason. That doesn’t mean it will always love us. Unfortunately, we stumbled out of the gate. Unlike the teams, themselves, however, we aren’t done yet. We have the opportunity to recover and continue improving on a season that has already been quite good for us.
The irony is that, last week, I wrote about the potentially quality of the games being quite high. They weren’t. Most of the matchups were duds, and even the football fan in me couldn’t enjoy the action. Only one game was settled by fewer than twelve points.
It’s easy to expect that to change both with a new round of matchups and a handful of teams entering play following a victory, but I want to pay special attention to the spreads. Without even looking, we know that the premier battle of the weekend will be between the Buffalo Bills and Baltimore Ravens — considered potential Super Bowl champions — but, outside of that one game, are we expecting another weekend of dominating outcomes?
Let’s dive in and find out.
Below are predictions for each game against the spread. Spreads have been taken from various websites and are subject to change. The spread in parenthesis denotes the selected team. Spread is listed as advertised number and odds at either DraftKings Sportsbook, FanDuel Sportsbook, Caesars Sportsbook, or Fanatics Sportsbook (formerly PointsBet). All efforts were made to provide picks at -110 or better, with some stretching to a -125 if no reasonable advertised spread was found.
*Confidence Picks – 2024 Season: 62-57 (Last Week: 1-0)
(2023 Season: 63-61-4) (2022 Season: 54-54-5) (2021 Season: 55-50) (2020 Season: 53-42-3) (2019 Season: 57-43-3) (2018 Season: 63-48-4) (2017 Season: 53-48-4) (2016 Season: 53-67-3) (2015 Season: 69-45-2) (2014 Season: 61-46-2) (10-Year Total: 581-504-30)
All Picks Against Spread – 2024 Season: 144-133-1 (Last Week: 1-5)
(2023 Season: 142-135-8) (2022 Season: 143-132-9) (2021 Season: 158-126-2) (2020 Season: 132-128-7) (2019 Season: 142-118-7) (2018 Season: 137-118-12) (2017 Season: 137-119-11) (2016 Season: 123-136-8) (2015 Season: 143-117-7) (2014 Season: 149-114-4) (10-Year Total: 1406-1243-75)
Houston Texans at Kansas City Chiefs
How disrespectful. Indeed, it’s become a running joke that teams from Houston get slotted into the afternoon games on Saturdays, but how is it justified that the back-to-back Defending Champions will be playing here?
The obvious answer is that the Houston Texans and Kansas City Chiefs simply don’t form the most exciting combination for the National Football League.
What does that mean for us?
For starters, we are analyzing a game that is probably going to be cast aside as an afterthought. That means we can expect