Alternative Picks: Week 12, 2020

Andy lost big in week 10, but rebounded in week 11 to start rebuilding his lost lead.

It was tighter – neither picker was particularly accurate. But Andy narrowly won the week.

Anyone else disappointed with the Thanksgiving slate of games? Detroit, Houston, Dallas, Washington? Yay, I can fall asleep watching half the NFC East suck Thursday afternoon.

Here are the picks.

1) Tony: Packers over Bears – If I’m going to lose this thing spectacularly, I might as well start picking teams I’d rather see lose, so I win either way.
2) Andy: Seahawks over Eagles – A good team from a legit division is better than an also-ran from the worst division in football.
3) Andy: Chiefs over Buccaneers – There might be some games that appear to be more straightforward, but I’m ready to call it for Kansas City being the best team in the league again.
4) Tony: Bills over Chargers – The Chargers finally got their third win of the season, but they almost let the lowly Jets back into the game. They won’t have a chance to let the Bills back in it.
5) Andy: Saints over Broncos – There are about three games I’m debating between right now. While I think eventually it’ll be shown that Taysom Hill is NOT a quality NFL starting QB, I don’t think New Orleans will need top-notch signal calling to defeat Denver in its current state.
6) Tony: Browns over Jaguars – The Browns are a better team with Chubb & Hunt in the backfield, and OBJ no where near the field.
7) Andy: Rams over 49ers – I like Cleveland and I think they are better, in large part because I think Kevin Stefanski is a capable, competent coach. That said, the Browns just still strike me as a team that could implode at any time. You might be able to say the same about Los Angeles. The Rams don’t seem dominant right now, but they do seem a bit methodical. The defense is really good and the offense just kind of keeps doing enough to get the job done. That should continue here.
8) Tony: Dolphins over Jets – How badly did the Dolphins screw up their QB situation? Bad enough to drop this game from a top three lock to #8. How bad are the Jets? Bad enough that a team that just royally screwed up their QB situation is still picked 8th overall to beat them.
9) Andy: Raiders over Falcons – Atlanta has mostly been better since the coaching change, but last week against the Saints was ugly. Meanwhile, the Raiders really impressed me in defeat. They answered every punch Kansas City threw and didn’t look the least bit overmatched. Derek Carr is playing at a new level for him.
10) Tony: Giants over Bengals – Unfortunately for the Bengals, their best bet at winning any more games this year got carted off the field with a nasty looking knee injury, which was caused by his own offensive line — which was the big fear for Burrow heading into the season.
11) Andy: Cardinals over Patriots – Carson Palmer was interviewed about Burrow this morning and he called the injury a blessing in disguise because of how beat up he was getting every week. Cincy probably loses out and, my guess, ends up at No. 2. There will be a huge temptation to trade that pick for a ransom so someone else can draft a QB. If I’m the Bengals, I’m keeping the pick and drafting Penei Sewell, who, even if he underachieves, would be the best lineman that team has had possibly since Anthony Munoz. Oh, wait, I’m picking Arizona to beat New England.
12) Tony: Colts over Titans – I’ve been calling the Colts frauds for weeks, and thinking the Titans had something special for weeks…but the Colts pulled off a surprising comeback against the Packers, while the Titans lost a key cog to their defense in his own gruesome injury in Jayon Brown. The Titans could still pull this off, but I’ll take this over the rest of the slate.
13) Andy: Cowboys over Football Team – The NFC East is historically putrid and it’s a disgrace a team from this division will get to take up a playoff spot, but Dallas is, most likely, the best of the worst. They’ll take another step toward the postseason on Thanksgiving.
14) Tony: Steelers over Ravens – Even though the Steelers aren’t dominating teams the way a 10-0 team normally would, it’s hard to pick against them the way Lamar Jackson has regressed this year.
15) Andy: Texans over Lions – I’m not sure Bill O’Brien was a good coach, but he definitely wasn’t helped out much by Bill O’Brien, general manager. Houston is a really bad team right now. But at least the Texans are trying. I don’t care that Deandre Swift was out. Detroit has no business getting shut out by Carolina. There is some bad football on this Thanksgiving, sad because it would be nice to have a couple decent games to watch as a diversion. This ain’t it. The Lions will maintain their recent years tradition of getting beat on Turkey Day.
16) Tony: Panthers over Vikings – Start by picking the Packers, end by picking against the Vikings. The Panthers haven’t been great, but at the end of the day, I don’t think the Vikings have an answer for CMC (if he plays) or DJ Moore/Curtis Samuel/Robby Anderson.  They might stop 1-2 of them, but not all of them, even if Teddy Bridgewater doesn’t get to play against his old team.

Well … the straight up picks were ugly. I mean potentially uglier than watching these clowns try to bet on football. These guys picked games so badly in week 11… yeah, I don’t have a punchline. But they’re a pretty good punchline on their own.

Here are the picks for week 12