NFL OPENING WEEK PICKS
Before embarking on a journey of great consequence (as we are about to do today), it is wise to steel your conviction with some inspirational words. Sadly, Tim's capacity for providing said inspiration is low, so we'll do the smarter move and borrow someone else's words of wisdom:
INVICTUS
William Ernest Henley (1849-1903)
| OUT of the night that covers me, | |
| Black as the Pit from pole to pole, | |
| I thank whatever gods may be | |
| For my unconquerable soul. | |
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| In the fell clutch of circumstance | 5 |
| I have not winced nor cried aloud. | |
| Under the bludgeonings of chance | |
| My head is bloody, but unbowed. | |
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| Beyond this place of wrath and tears | |
| Looms but the Horror of the shade, | 10 |
| And yet the menace of the years | |
| Finds, and shall find, me unafraid. | |
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| It matters not how strait the gate, | |
| How charged with punishments the scroll, | |
| I am the master of my fate: | 15 |
| I am the captain of my soul. | |
Mighty words, mighty words indeed.
The story of Henley's life is quite compelling:
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"William was afflicted with tuberculosis of the bone, a condition that caused him to have his left leg amputated at the knee when he was 19 years old. Five years later, he was told that the surgery had been unnecessary!
But William Henley was not a whiner. During his years as an invalid in the dungeon-like infirmary of 1870's Edinburgh, he wrote a number of marginal poems and met his future wife, Anna.
By the age of 31, William had become a highly regarded critic and launched the careers of Rudyard Kipling (Jungle Book), J.M. Barrie (Peter Pan), George Bernard Shaw (Pygmalion), Thomas Hardy (Far From the Madding Cowd), H.G. Wells (The Time Machine), William Butler Yeats, and the artist Rodin (The Thinker).
But the honor that was to immortalize William Henley forever was bestowed upon him by his old hospital companion, Robert, who saw something "boisterous and piratic" in Henley and shaped it into Long John Silver, the one-legged sea cook of Treasure Island..."
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That's just the summary and it's well worth reading the whole article by Roy Williams over at
the Wizard Academy.
Let us be encouraged then and take our first steps of this NFL wagering season.
Tim's WIN-O-RAMA picks
I like to break out my plays by category based on my reasoning behind them. This week I am providing four fabulous 'Rama picks for your perusal.
Turnover play of the week:
Curiously the 'turnover difference' methodology of NFL handicapping has been very successful not just in the middle of the season, but also for week one. The opening games are strange for may reasons, but one aspect that is notable is the strength of home underdogs and away favorites. As it happens there are may of those this week, with seven of sixteen games seeing the away team giving the points. Not to shock you or anything, but my turnover play is a home dog...
The visual image that comes to mind for me when I think back to the Buffalo Bills' horrible 3-13 season a year ago, is of Rob Johnson holding the ball for an interminable amount of time in the pocket, only to be sacked and fumble the ball away. Well, the Bills were one of the worst turnover teams in the league with a -14 net in 2001, whereas their foe this week the New York Jets were the best in the whole flippin' NFL with a +18 stat. Give credit to Herman Edwards for getting his troops on the right side of the turnover scoreboard in his first season as coach, but this year it will all be different! Bledsoe at the QB spot gives the Bills a much better chance on offense of at least getting to punt, and with Moulds and Price at the wideouts this could be a pretty potent scoring team. Turnovers tell us take Buffalo +3.
Contrarian Bridgejumping play of the week:
Another fabulous anti-conventional thinking method for beating up on NFL bookies is to look at how teams have done against the spread set on their games. The Vikings were absolutely dismal in 2001, but maybe we can give them a little slack since they had to go through seeing their teammate Korey Stringer felled by overexuberant practicing in extremely difficult conditions. They wound up losing to the line on their games by over five points. On the flip side the Chicago Bears were the NFC's cinderalla story and bested the line on their games by over eight points. That my friends is a thirteen point hole you can drive a truck through. So here it is a year later and the Vikings are big dogs against the Bears who are not exactly even the home team since Soldier Field is being reworked and this takes place somewhere in the boonies far from Chicago. Culpepper is back (only the #1 fantasy QB by some measures) with Moss apparently fired up (only the #1 threat in football at the receiver spot) and I LOVE the pickup of Biekert off the waiver wire just days ago. You may say I'm being sentimental given the Vikes were my preseason game of the century and won for me, but let me give it to you straight dem Vikings could be good at looting and plundering once again this season. Take Minnesota +4.5.
Angle play of the week:
So the TwoMinuteWarning.com research moles have this angle that has been rather good over the past few years in week one games. It's a ridiculously complicated formula that involves calculating a team's net points in the previous season, finding the loser on that score, then 'making a line' using the prior year stats which must then show the opposite team (the 'winner' of the net points comparison) to be the presumable 'value' against the spread, which if it then all falls within certain parameters gives you a play. Well, I'm not going to work through the details on this, just let me give you the news: it's had a winning record for seven straight years in week one games.
The TMW guys have done all the math for me and there are six games that qualify so with the ingenius Tim skill at picking the best bet out of a hat, I'll take Cincinnati -2. Now this wager deserves a disclaimer -- while I professed undying loyalty to the new upstart Houston Texans back in preseason, I just can't bring myself to love a team with such bad uniforms, and so I will have to revert to my beloved Bengals ("Icky Woods forever!") as the team worthy, yea worthy of my essential support. Besides which, you've got to love a team where the #3 QB one week will probably be starting the next...some teams get into these petty Quarterback controversies (eg the Bengalis opponent this week, San Diego) but in Cincy we don't settle for just the dynamic duo going at it, no! We bring in every QB we can find and let 'em scrum it up every single week. Who will be starting in week two? Akili? Gus? Jon? A waiver wire steal? Ken Anderson? Go BENGALS!
Overlay pick of the week:
Normally the Tim's prognosticating predictions would revolve around the stats, particularly the arcane data that the TMW guys crank out. With week one of course that's just not possible, and in fact according to the TMW brain-trust, going against the week one overlays (which use the prior year stats) has been a profitable venture. Don't argue the logic with me buster! Dem's da results. So while the '2001 drive chart stats predict a 27-20 Jacksonville win, I'm a telling a-you, take Indianapolis -3.5. Can that really be right? The Colts are truly three and a half point road favorites?? (gulp) I imagine the installation of Dungy as coach is making people think they are the turnaround team du jour, and with Edge back that should be a plus...yet on the other side there is that guy Fred Taylor, only my freakin' Fantasy sleeper pick of the year! Ah well, again, don't overanalyze there will be time for Monday Morning Quarterbacking after the games are played.
One last point, the neon green sidebar was nixed since some people said they couldn't read stuff on that page, and other people were complaining they were twitching uncontrollably...back to the gray then.
tim@twominutewarning.com
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