Week 6: More from the Girl

I am not going to look back and judge my rookie performance. Onward and upward! Home teams in bold: I will take a look back this week. How did I do? See below in bold:

Cincinnati (-5.5) Tampa Bay
Cincinnati is rested, and the Bucs still blow despite putting on a better show than I had anticipated in New Orleans. Bengals by a touchdown. Ouch. That wasn't a fluke in New Orleans.

Washington (-10) Tennessee
I do not trust this line. I think it should be a prerequisite that in order to be favored by ten points, you need to have scored at least ten points in your previous game. I am right about a two things here. First, Washington sucks. Second, if you're the favorite, the spread cannot be larger than the number of points you managed to put on the board the previous week. I guess it was also weird that Tennessee won, but I'm taking credit for this despite never having actually said that.

Dallas (-13) Houston
Did anybody watch that new show “Friday Night Lights?” In the first episode the back-up QB gets called in after the starter gets hurt. He gets sacked on his first play and bounces a pass off the helmet of one of his lineman on his second. Time Out. Coach (the delectable Kyle Chandler) calls this poor QB over and asks if he remembers how to read coverage. The scared young man shakes his head No. At which point Coach offers the following piece of wisdom, “Look down the field. Look where their guys are and look where our guys are. Then you throw the ball to our guys.”

Somebody put that on a t-shirt for Drew Bledsoe.

Dallas better win this game by a pretty goddamn significant number of points, or I will impotently shake my fist at the TV and come back for more next week. Hooray, we beat a shitty team. Let's see how we do next week against actual competition.

Buffalo (-1) Detroit
Detroit will take this one. They blew it last week, but they’re home now so they can lick their wounds against Buffalo. One more for me.

Seattle (-3) St Louis
This is my upset pick. The Rams should have had a better game than they did in Green Bay, but I’m beginning to think I underestimate them. I also don’t think Seattle is nearly as dangerous on the road as they are at home. I should have had this one. Credit to Seattle though. They pulled out a tough road win.

Atlanta (-3) Giants
I like the Giants here. And that’s really all I have to say about this one. Score one for intuition.

Philadelphia (-3) New Orleans
I’m picking New Orleans until they lose. I also believe that the Eagles think that they’re better than they actually are after last week—like they actually won the game rather than having Dallas throw it away. Fuck the Eagles. Go Saints! I love Drew Brees. I wish he were the Drew playing for my team.

Baltimore (-3) Carolina
Panthers because they’re clicking now. Plus, my wallet was stolen in Baltimore, and I think they need to pay just a little bit more for that. Baltimore continues to pay! Huzzah!

NY Jets (-2) Miami
There’s a rule for games like this. When two crappy teams play each other, don’t bet on the game. Jets should take it, which means they won’t because I never know what they’re going to do from week to week. For example, last week I expected them to score points. No credit at all for this. I need to learn to focus on an actual prediction rather than an off-topic tangent.

San Diego (-10.5) San Francisco
I’m rarely comfortable with double-digit spreads. Last weekend’s Indy game is a perfect example of why they’re to be avoided. The 49ers blow, but come on. Take San Francisco to cover this. Bit down hard on this one, didn't I? 49ers really are this bad. Huh.

Pittsburgh (-6.5) Kansas City
This should have been Ben Roethlisberger’s first game back after his various surgeries, injuries, etc. Still, despite coming back too soon, I don’t anticipate Pittsburgh losing four in a row. How right was I about this? Completely and totally. Go me!

Denver (-15) Oakland
Another huge spread, but at least the favorite is at home. Oakland doesn’t look like they could take my high school football team (Go Red Raiders!), so Denver should be the safe pick. And here my orignal theory about huge spreads is vindicated. Why do I ignore my instinct?

Chicago (-10.5) Arizona
There’s nothing bad to say about Chicago right now. The same can’t be said about Arizona, but things appear to be looking up for them. Not wild about that line, but the Bears should be able to take this one pretty handily. Okay, I was completely wrong about this pick, but I was right in life. I have friends who can attest to the fact that during the draft I said Dallas should have traded up for Leinart. They didn't, and now he's stuck in Arizona. That's not really fair to us or him.

7 out of 13 for me. Staying ever so slightly above .500. I'll give myself a barely passing grade this week.

And last but not least, I would be remiss if I didn’t extend my sympathies to all the Yankees fans out there. You’ve had a tough week.