Week 7 2020 picks
What a Week 6! Even though we collectively crawled over the finish line, it was a satisfying week across the board. At one point during the early games, our picks were perfect, if you can believe that! …Until Baltimore left the backdoor open and Philly scored 14 points in like 7 minutes of garbage time. And then there was the abominations that were the “Battle of the Bays” game (Green Bay-Tampa Bay) and whatever you want to call the matchup between Arizona and Dallas. Still here’s the performance recap from Week 6:
Entry A (Alex): 4-1
Entry B (Sean): 3-2
Entry C (Bryan): 4-1
Entry D (Alex & Erik): 3-2
The top-25-ish players in the contest averaged 3.18 so as a group, the 4 entries gained ground 0.3 points per entry, on average. Legendary Lauren went 3-2 and is now approaching 70% average since her 1-4 Week 1 start. Incredible.
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Few reminders:
We’re still trying to rekindle our appreciation for favorites with value and that will continue this week.
And where a team has lost the previous week and their opponent has won, this game will be “flagged” (⚐).
Lastly, now that we’re deep enough into the season for the Pythagorean W/L differentials to mean something, when there’s a significant difference in the matchup this will be denoted by a ⇧, when the difference is favorable, or a ⇩, when it’s not.
Now for the Week 7 games…
Raw algorithm picks:
LV +3.5 ★★
CAR +7.5 ★★
DAL EV ★
DET +2.5 ★
GB -3.5 ★⇩
Upon studying the public action this week, it seems like many of the lines are appropriately set given the high percentage of games between a 40-60% split. Nonetheless here are the value-taking sides of varying confidence for this week.
Sharp/Contrarian Sides:
NYG (@PHI) - Weak - I’m mixed on this game. Raw algo shows value on PHI by about 1-point but my gut thinks this divisional game will be tight. The line is moved towards NYG which scares me from following the algo here.
HOU (GB) - Weak - A modest 60% of the public tickets are on the Packers here and the line’s moved off the key number of 3 to GB -3.5. Algo thinks this number should be GB -6, but the Pythag differential is signaling there’s value on HOU. Pass for now.
CIN (CLE) - Moderate - The Bengals aren’t a good team but this is a divisional game and the model things the line should be closer to 1.5-2 in favor of the Browns. Getting 3 in the contest is good value. There’s been pretty balanced ticket action with a slight tilt towards the Browns, which is what we’d want to see here as a decent contrarian signal. Bengals +3 the play here.
CAR (@TB) - Moderate - Similar to the game above, the Panthers are getting slightly less than 50% of the public ticket action but is commanding the money by a 2:1 ratio, estimated. This has an interesting Teddy Bridgewater facing his “old” team storyline to it. I actually like Teddy over Brees in this matchup and the algo shows tremendous value on Carolina here.
TEN (PIT) - Strong - The move across 0 isn’t huge but this line’s moved a full 3 points from the opener of TEN +1.5 to now TEN -1.5 amidst only 40% of public tickets suggests strong sharp action here. Since the contest is offering TEN at -1, there’s some value to be found and since the algo shows the Titans at -1.7 I think this is a play. It also turns my gut a little bit, which some say is the sign of a winning pick.
CHI (@LAR) - Strong - Another gut turner here…the Bears are getting decent sharp action as determined by the reverse line move off the key number of 7—now CHI +6 even as the public is on LAR at a 60% clip, which is where the contest is. My raw algo shows CHI only deserving 1.5 so it begs the question, “what am I missing here?” Still, I like them.
Unofficial Plays: