Monday Night Football

The spotlight NFL Week 11 Picks Against The Spread- Monday Night Football

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Believe it or not, week 11 in the 2015 NFL season comes to a close tonight as the 9-0 New England Patriots play host to the 5-4 Buffalo Bills.  We are fresh off of another 5-2 week and now have our overally record up to 59-24 on the season.  The major headline for the Patriots is going to see how they adjust to the loss of wide receiver Julian Edleman.  Whereas the headline for the Buffalo Bills is going to be can they open up a bit of distance for themselves in the wildcard race that has 1 game separating 7 teams currently.  Of course this is also Rex Ryan’s return to Foxboro as the coach of the Buffalo Bills which adds a little extra pizzazz to the matchup for sure.

Yes Rex Ryan has won in Foxboro before, and has even done so in the postseason, but that was a long time ago.   Rex Ryan actually doesn’t have a particularly good record against the Patriots (4-10) despite his insistance that he isn’t there to kiss Bill Belichick’s rings.  Ryan has also long 8 of the last 9 matchups against the Patriots including an 8 point loss to the Pats earlier this season in Buffalo.  The Bills are coming off a big win last week against the Jets but, like I said in my preview for that game, it was Rex Ryan’s Superbowl.  Also, let’s be honest, the Bills won that game moreso due to the Jets’ ineptitude on the offensive side of the ball which included costly turnovers. The Bills offense looked better by finally getting Shady McCo involved in the offense but I’m still generally unimpressed with Tyrod Taylor who threw for only 158 yards last week and who, despite an 11-4 TD-INT ratio is ranked 31st in passing yards amongst qualifying quarterbacks.

Flipping the dime on the Patriots side of things, I’m not going to say that the loss of Julian Edleman is going to be easy but, let’s face it, one of the best things the Patriots do is adjust.  I mean let’s not forget that Bill Belichick once won 11 games with Matt Cassell and we saw how good hes been ever since.  The story before the season was how the Pats would adjust with losing Darrell Revis and they may go 16-0!  They’re all about the next man up and I can see Danny Amedola playing a larger role in the offense for the Pats, sliding into the role once occupied by Edleman.

A rare night as a Jets fan when I’ll actually be rooting hard for the evil empire and sporting some blue.  At the end of the day if you ask me to choose, I’d go Brady over Taylor, Belichick over Ryan and the New England Patriots over the Buffalo Bills any day of the week.

The Pick: Patriots (-7) 

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The Spotlight On Monday Night Football With Pick Against The Spread 

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Week Number 9 in the 2015 NFL season will conclude a little bit later on this evening when the 2-5 Chicago Bears head to San Diego to take on the 2-6 San Diego Chargers. 

I’ll tell ya this is a bit of a disappoint to see where both of these teams stand right now in their respective divisions (3rd & 4th respectively). On paper this game should be a lot more of an intriguing matchup with pro bowl caliber players everywhere from Phillip Rivers to Jay Cutler to Melvin Gordon and back to Alshon Jeffery. Instead, what we have two teams fighting to save their season and remain relevant at least for one more week. 

Logic would say that the Chargers should take this game tonight running away hosting a team with a subpar record in their building but that’s not the way I’m going tonight. While the injuries to both Eddie Royal & Matt Forte won’t help the Bears, the Chargers have far more injuries including 7 injuries alone just last week. Their O Line is banged up, their secondary is depleted & Phillip Rivers will be without his favorite target Keenan Allen. 

I’m as a big a fan of Phillip Rivers as any but 4 1/2 points are too many to back the Chargers against anyone this season. The Bears have had two weeks to prepare for this game and I expect them to keep it close, if they don’t win the game outright. 

Chicago Bears +4.5 is your pick for Monday Night Football tonight. 

The Spotlight NFL Picks Against The Spread- Monday Night Football- Jets At Colts

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Hello everyone,  first off I just wanted to apologize for being off the grid these past few days.  It was actually my three year anniversary with my girlfriend and so I was away for the weekend.  We did a variety of different activities from checking out a lobster bake at Penthouse 808 in Long Island City to boat riding at Central Park to checking out Matilda on Broadway.  They were all a lot of fun and you can expect reviews of each one of those in the coming weeks.  Due to this,  I was unable to give you guys the usual Picks entry you’ve come to expect but will return with that this Friday.  However, what I was able to do was post some of my picks over on twitter (@TommyOnTheSpot) throughout the week.  I hate missing more than one but I missed two this week, including our lock of the week- the Detroit Lions who got manhandled by the Minnesota Vikings.  It looked like Adrian Peterson was able to knock off some of that rust from week 1 and Matt Stafford just doesn’t look like himself.  I also missed badly on the Titans (-1) over the Browns.  This was a game that I wouldn’t have touched had Josh McCown been starting for the Browns but I got suckered in when I heard Manziel was starting.  While I’m not a believer in Johnny Football,  I should have realized a rookie quarterback on the road in Cleveland so early in the season wasn’t going to be able to do much.  Like I said in my preseason predictions, there will be growing pains with Marcus Mariota.

The good new is that I absolutely cleaned up with the rest of my 1pm picks yesterday connecting on the Patriots (-1), the Cardinals (-2), the Steelers (6), the Falcons (+2) and the Bengals (-3).  I then ended then night out strong by picking the Packers (-3.5).  This brings our total over here this season up to 11-3 with our NFL Picks Against The Spread and we’ll attempt to keep the hot hand going with Monday Night Football tonight.  Remember with the Sunday night, Monday night and Thursday night games, I’m going to give you guys a prediction because they are the primetime games but I’m not including them in my picks of the week.  That said,  I do think the primetime games are a little bit easier to pick sometimes due to the fact that they allow you to focus in on one key game.  With that said,  let’s get into today’s game.

In the interest of full disclosure,  I’m a big fan of the New York Jets, I like them more than any team in any sport and have rooted for them my entire life.  You will very rarely see me pick against them as one of the picks I choose to place action on but since they’re playing on Monday Night, I’ll will remain as impartial as I can be when I pick the Jets (+7) tonight.  I’m not saying the 1-0 Jets are going to beat the 0-1 Colts in Indy but I expect them to keep it close.  The number one thing I look at here is the injuries that the Colts have. It remains unclear if Robert Mathis will make his season debut and also remains unclear if TY Hilton is going to play.  If Hilton is out this means that Andrew Luck is left with unproven Donte Moncreif and Andre Johnson, who he really didn’t seem to click with during Week 1.  Furthermore, I’m already pretty unimpressed with the Colts on the defensive side of the ball and now Cornerbacks, Greg Toler and Darius Butler have both been ruled out as well.  I’d look for Eric Decker to have a big game tonight and for Ryan Fitzpatrick to exploit the weaknesses that Indy has at the cornerback position tonight.

Thus, my pick is The New York Jets (+7),  I expect a close game and don’t be shocked to see the Jets win the game outright.  Until next time who were some of your winners and losers from last night?