Here’s the picks:

This week, there’s one good bet: Tampa will cover the spread. I know, I bet on Tampa before… but at least it probably won’t snow in Tampa.

Speaking of snow, cold weather, and rain (For you idiots who built domed stadiums, this is how God intended football to be played…) if your team comes from some place like Texas or Florida, or worse, some place indoors and you know you’re going on the road to some place like, say, Green Bay or Foxboro, here’s a tip on practice:

Find your nearest local meat packing plant. Make a deal with the owner to borrow their blast freezer for 3 hours a day. Put your whole team in there for the workout, and I mean everybody, put the fricken water boy in there. After a week of that, your team will be so glad to get into the nice warm snowy rain, playing football will be a breeze.

For extra points, set your kicker’s practice rig right in front of the freezer duct, if he can kick against that 50 MPH, -80° F wind, nothing Mother Nature does to him will bother him. “OH MY GOD! HE JUST GOT HIT BY LIGHTNING!… AND THE KICK IS GOOD!”

Here’s my take on the upcoming playoffs:

Somehow I expect Minnesota to do better than predicted, geriatric Favre is doing a good job of whooping up on those snot nosed kids on the other team. And he still sleeps good on the sidelines, just wake him up and tell him who won when it’s time to go to the lockers. Someone should send him a purple snuggie, for those sideline naps.

Today the kid wanted to make his picks, here they are:

E.W.

Six-year-old wisdom:

Queen: Ok, dinner’s ready, turn off the TV and come on.

Prince: Mom! It’s TV dinners, you’re supposed to have the TV on!

It’s getting a little harder to pick now. At least for me. Eventually one of the 4 undefeated teams is going to loose. But which one and which game?

This week I want to pick my Skins to win over the Eagles, but I don’t think that’s going to happen. I think the Eagles are embarrassed by the loss in Oakland that they’re going to feel as if they have something to prove. Sorry Coach Zorn, this isn’t the week you’re going to turn things around.

I’m taking all the undefeated teams this week, though I think Minnesota has there work cut out for them. My upset pick is Tampa Bay over New England. I have no idea why; just a gut feeling. Another one of those is Carolina, I have no idea why I think they’ll win this week except they’re playing at home and have a little confidence from last week.

So we’ll see. Here’s the Week 7 picks.

Well it was an interesting weekend. Watching football in the snow is always fun, but not when the home team is totally killing the visitor. Sunday’s New England v Tennessee game was just painful to watch. Thank the football Gods CBS decided to change the coverage to a better game. What a total embarrassment for my Titans. Evidently they need to practice a lot more, and add some snow in the mix for good measure too.

Carolina was a surprise. Who knew they’d take Tampa Bay on the road. Wow. Maybe they realized they weren’t dreaming and the NFL season really had started. Nice they showed up to play. But how in the world did Oakland beat Philadelphia? Holy guacamole. I also lost the pick on the Jets and Buffalo. I knew that one was going to be tough to pick, oh well. I’m not the only one who picked the Jets to win; so did a few of the guys on Fox.

My favorite game of the weekend was Minnesota v Baltimore. I was disappointed that the Viking defense didn’t step up to the plate and match the great performance of Farve and the offense. They allowed the Ravens to come back in the second half and turn a solid win into a hair raising potential loss in the last 2 seconds. That last field goal attempt by Baltimore had me on the edge of my seat, but it cracked me up to see that Brett didn’t even watch it. He had to get off the bench and ask a fellow player if they lost or not. His expression and excitement at hearing the Vikings won was beyond wonderful! What a great game.

And what about Denver. I was worried about them in the first half, but they played up to their potential in the 2nd half just bombarding the Chargers front line. That leaves 4 teams undefeated so far, Denver, Minnisota, New Orleans and Indianapolis.

So here’s the results for Week 6.

Here’s the picks:

Once again, there are no good bets.

I forgot last week to put my Superbowl picks, this week it got interesting, New England is no longer the king of the hill, they’ve been replaced by Pittsburgh. Also, Brett Favre has knocked Green Bay out of the playoffs almost entirely. Think they miss him?

E.W.

The Great Depression of the 21st Century is very depressing.

 Ok Week 6 Picks

I have no rhyme or reason for some of these. I wanted to pick my Titans over NE, but I’m going against my gut feeling for common sense. I do think Jacksonville will pull out the win at home. And Baltimore v Minnesota might be a tight game, but I think the run will continue for the Vikings.

So here are the picks for Week 6
Update: Sun. Oct. 18.2009 – 12:30pm:
Ok this might be a bad idea, but I’m making a last minute change and going with NO Saints over the NY Giants. I think home field will make the difference today and this will be a big defensive game. NO’s has a better defense and I think they’ll shut down the Giants today.

Week 5 played out just about like my picks predicted. I’m amazed. The death of Coach Zimmerman’s wife on Thursday gave Cincinnati a greater reason and heart to win their game with Baltimore. Our deepest sympathies to the Zimmerman family and the Bengals for the loss of Mrs. Zimmerman. And kudo’s to the team for their caring support of their coach and giving him a win on weekend he really needed it.

Now some one explain how Buffalo could lose to Cleveland “IN” Buffalo? I just don’t get that one at all. Seahawks and Jacksonville was a surprise to me. Perhaps this is an indication that the Seahawks have stepped it up a notch. At least at home.

My poor Redskins are just in a down spiral. Too much money has been spent on players who demanded big bucks; but who aren’t playing to the status they demanded. Where’s the talent in the younger players? I think blaming everything on Coach Zorn is ridiculous. He can only do so much with Daniel Snyder’s interference. I hate that. Owners pay the bills and gloat about owning a team, but they don’t make player decisions, or interfere with the coaches they’ve paid to manage the team. They shut up, sit down and allow the professionals they hired to do their job!  And if they don’t think they should do that, then I’ll point them to the amazingly great success of Tony Stewart Nascar Driver/Owner who’s number one rule seems to be – delegation and let his staff do their job. Hasn’t the NFL learned how disruptive and destructive owners like Jerry Jones and Daniel Snyder can be to a team. Someone smack these guys for me…please!

Ok so this is how the week played out. 11 wins, 3 losses in the 14 games played.

Here’s the picks:

There are two good bets this week (according to the computer…): Tampa will cover the spread, I buy that one, and Oakland won’t get shut completely out, not sure I buy that one. But just like on Wall Street, I’m gonna trust the machine.

E.W.

I miss the good ole days when the spreads moved some during the week, so I didn’t have only Oakland to bet on…

Here we go for Week 5:

Rumor has it that McNab will be back starting for Philadelphia. I’m sure the Eagles can take Tampa Bay with Vick playing; not so sure if it’s McNab. But I’m going with the Eagles anyway. Washington v Carolina is the next tough pick for me. I hate picking against my Skins, but I just don’t think they have the heart to take the Panthers IN Charlotte. Not to mention SirEvil was born and raised in Charlotte and the Panthers are his team. So even if they beat the Skins, we have a win in the family. Can’t beat that.

I think the high Minnesota is feeling off their win over the Packers will carry them through Sunday and a win over St. Louis. New England and Denver is the next hard pick for me. I think this one might be close, but the Broncos are playing at home and I think that gives them the edge. Same thing for the Jets and Dolphins. After watching Miami’s opener at home, I think they have some good skills this year and I don’t think NY can take them at home.

So here’s my Week 5 Picks. 

It was an exceptional almost perfect week. I didn’t expect NE to pull it out over Baltimore. I thought the Ravens were better than that. So that was my only losing bet this week. I’m honestly amazed at how good of a week it was. 13 games picked correctly out of 14 played. Wow, even if I do say so myself.

Speaking of Wow; Monday night’s game was amazing as well. I’m SO glad Bret and the Vikings pulled it out over Green Bay. It was indeed a hard hitting, hard fought game. I can understand making quarterback choices as part of the business of football. But after 16 years of loyalty; where was the loyalty to Bret when the time came? Where was Green Bay when Bret was facing one of the hardest decisions of his life? They were no where to be seen. Monday night’s game showed that lack of loyalty by Green Bay (to one of the leagues greatest players ever)  was an example of karma in action. Way to go Bret and the Vikings! I also think it was apropos that Aaron Rodgers threw his first NFL interceptions in the Monday night game. Not to mention the fumble. Again, karma in action.  

But the week goes on, which brings me to a Happy 40th Bret – life gets better from here. It did for me.

So here are the results from my Week 4 Picks:

Here’s the picks:

Again there aren’t any good bets this week.  Last week I got 9 games, but did better than break even on bad bets.  Here are the bets (all bad…) this week:

Mostly underdogs here cause it looks like Vegas is expecting some serious ass whoopin’s this week.
E.W.

I think I’ve accidentally found a good indicator of the economy.  Good bets depend on idiots, with too much money and too much time, running down to Vegas and betting on Detroit (or maybe Washington…) to win by 10.  Last year I think there were 3 weeks that didn’t have any good bets, the 5 or 6 years before that probably had only one week.  This year, so far, there are no good bets at all. No one is coming to Vegas and moving the spreads.