It has been quieter here than I intended the last few weeks thanks to various things at work, and a trip to Stamford Bridge on Sunday to watch the Chelsea women beat Spurs, but games were still picked and I did get to see the Bengals beat the Steelers, which is always a good thing!

However, I do seem to have completely lost the knack of picking games, or at least I haven’t done better than Dan since week five and have sunk below .500. In that time, Dan has kept picking up a point or two and slowly whittled down my lead to two points. I need to turn things around fast, starting with the Thanksgiving games!

Gee:	Week 11:  6 – 8	Overall:  81 – 83
Dan:	Week 11:  7 – 7	Overall:  79 – 85

There are three interesting games on this week, with the lines seemingly bigger than expected. The Lions come into their traditional Thanksgiving game with a three game win streak and face a Bills team that have had enough injuries and problems that whilst I expect the Bills to win, this line is a bit rich for me. The Bills are not suddenly a bad team, but they do look a little fragile and that is a problem when your expectations are Super Bowls.

The Cowboys are coming of a complete domination of the Vikings last week and welcome a Giants team that even after a couple of losses are a lot more competitive than anyone was expecting going into the season. I understand why this line is so high, but it is tricky as the Cowboys are the right side of ten, but I just worry that the Giants are going to make this divisional game more competitive than that. I really don’t like this line but am nervously backing the Giants.

The final game sees the 8-2 Vikings looking to get right after their awful loss to the Cowboys last week. Part of that was the Cowboys ability to take advantage of the loss of left tackle Christian Darrisaw to concussion and whilst the Patriots don’t have a pass rusher like Micah Parsons, they are ranked first in defensive DVOA. The Pats are having an existential crisis at quarterback and so if the Vikings get going its hard to see the Pats keeping up. However, as much as Kirk Cousins seems to have been unlocked with a new head coach and offensive coordinator, this is still prime time against a defensive master and so whilst I’m not sure the Pats will win, this line is the wrong side of three for me to back Cousins in prime time against Bill Belichick.

Bills @ Lions (+9.5)

Gee’s Pick:      Lions
Dan’s Pick:      Bills

Giants @ Cowboys (-9.5)

Gee’s Pick:      Giants
Dan’s Pick:      Giants

Patriots @ Vikings (-3.5)

Gee’s Pick:      Patriots
Dan’s Pick:      Vikings

Survivor Competition

After getting myself level in week eight, Dan and I have either both scored or both struck out, but going into week twelve we only have six points each so hardly a ringing endorsement of our picks.

This week we have both gone for home teams with Dan backing the Seahawks to beat the Raiders, whilst I’m hoping I’m not being a jinx as I back the Dolphins to beat the Texans.

Current Score

Gee: 6
Dan: 6

Week 12 Selection:

Gee:     Texans @ Dolphins
Dan:    Raiders @ Seahawks

DVOA is Football Outsiders statistic for measuring a team’s success on every play versus the league average and you can read more about it and other football topics at https://footballoutsiders.com.