Denver Broncos (9-5) at Los Angeles Chargers (8-6)

The Broncos got off to a slow start this season, losing their first two games of the season, games in which they lost the first down rate battle by a combined 6.98% and the yards per play battle by a combined 0.50. However, since then, they have won 9 of 12 games, while going 10-2 ATS. This is nothing new for Sean Payton coached teams, as Payton is 146-104-5 ATS in week 3 or later in his career, as opposed to 11-22-1 in weeks 1 and 2. That’s mostly from his time in New Orleans, but, in addition to this season, a similar thing happened last season in Payton’s first season in Denver, although it took a little bit longer, as they started 1-5 (0-5-1 ATS), before going 7-4 (6-5 ATS) the rest of the way.

With the Broncos’ improvement since early in the season, they have moved up to -0.02% in first down rate differential and +0.24 in yards per play differential on the season, despite how terribly they played in the first two weeks of the season. That’s actually slightly above their opponents this week, the Los Angeles Chargers, who are at a -0.28% first down rate differential and a -0.12 yards per play differential. When you add in that the Chargers lack a significant homefield advantage in Los Angeles, where they frequently play in front of crowds that favor the road team, (26-34-3 ATS at home in Los Angeles since their first season in 2017), we get a little bit of line value with the Broncos at +2.5 when you look at it purely from a statistical standpoint.

However, my roster rankings have the Chargers with a 5-point edge, almost exclusively due to the Chargers massive advantage at the quarterback position with Justin Herbert (4th among quarterbacks on PFF) over Broncos’ quarterback Bo Nix (24th among quarterbacks on PFF). Aside from the quarterback position, these two teams are pretty even, but the Chargers’ advantage at the game’s most important position can’t be ignored. The Chargers actually are one of the two teams to cover against the Broncos since week 2, doing so in a 7-point victory as 3-point favorites in week 6, in large part to Herbert (75.8 QBR) significantly outplaying Nix (53.4 QBR).

My calculated line when we look at roster rankings gives the Chargers a bigger advantage than my calculated line when we look at it from a statistical standpoint and my overall calculated line when taking everything into account is Chargers -3, so I am taking the Chargers for pick ‘em purposes, but there is too much conflicting analysis for me to confidently bet the Chargers, especially at home against a coach in Sean Payton who covers at a high rate outside of the first two weeks of the season.

Los Angeles Chargers 20 Denver Broncos 17

Pick against the spread: LA Chargers -2.5

Confidence: Low