2020 Week 8 NFL Picks

New Orleans Saints at Chicago Bears: 2020 Week 8 NFL Pick

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New Orleans Saints (4-2) at Chicago Bears (5-2)

The Bears are 5-2, but they’re about as bad as a 5-2 team can be. While their five wins have remarkably all come by one score or less, including a pair of wins that both required nearly impossible 4th quarter comebacks, the Bears haven’t been competitive in either of their losses. They needed a last second garbage time touchdown to cut their margin of defeat against the Colts from 16 to 8 and they needed a meaningless defensive touchdown late against the Rams to cut their margin of defeat from 21 to 14. Their average lead ranks just 24th in the league and in terms of schedule adjusted first down rate differential, they rank 25th at -1.91%.

As bad as that is, there are reasons to believe it will get worse going forward. For one, the Bears have been reliant on their defense so far, ranking 28th in first down rate over expected and 10th in first down rate allowed over expected, and defensive performance tends to be much more inconsistent on a week-to-week basis than offensive performance. If the Bears’ defense happens to have an off game, the Bears don’t really have much of a shot of beating anyone outside of the worst teams in the league. The Bears are also starting to lose key players to injury, particularly on offense, where they will be without a pair of key offensive linemen in James Daniels and Cody Whitehair. Their defense also has a significant injury concern with edge defender Khalil Mack playing at less than 100% recently.

Making matters even worse for the Bears, they have a tough matchup with the Saints this week and are in a tough spot, on a short week, coming off of an ugly performance. Teams are 39-54 ATS since 2002 after a Monday Night Football loss by 17 or more points and, though the Bears technically lost by 14, it would have been 21 if not for that meaningless defensive touchdown. With little time to adjust from last week’s loss, the Bears could easily be blown out again this week, especially since they won’t have the benefit of any fans in the stadium in Chicago this week.

A lot of attention has been given to the Saints’ absences in the receiving corps without their top-2 wide receivers in Michael Thomas and Emmanuel Sanders, but the Saints haven’t had Thomas healthy and have had to shuffle things in the receiving corps all year and they still rank 7th in first down rate over expected at +2.59%. The Bears are also missing much about as much on offense as the Saints, which is a big problem because they’ve struggled even when relatively healthy, while the Saints’ defense should be better than their 15th ranked schedule adjusted first down rate allowed, now that key players like Marcus Davenport, Janoris Jenkins, and Marshon Lattimore have returned to the lineup. 

Given that the Saints are healthy defensively now, it’s not a stretch to say these two teams are comparable on the defensive side of the ball, with the Saints also having the massive edge on offense. This line is too low at New Orleans -4, as my calculated line is New Orleans -7.5, so the Saints are worth a bet this week. They should win this one with relative ease against a Bears team that is not nearly as good as their record and that is missing key offensive players.

New Orleans Saints 24 Chicago Bears 16

Pick against the spread: New Orleans -4

Confidence: Medium

New England Patriots at Buffalo Bills: 2020 Week 8 NFL Pick

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New England Patriots (2-4) at Buffalo Bills (5-2)

I had a lot of confidence in the Patriots last week. The Patriots started 2-1, easily defeating capable teams in the Raiders and Dolphins and coming up just short on the road in Seattle. Then their COVID outbreak happened, costing them starting quarterback Cam Newton for a game in Kansas City that it looked like the Patriots would have won had Newton been able to play and then the following week costing them significant practice time and several offensive linemen from an already injury plagued group, leading to the Patriots’ upset home loss to the Denver Broncos. 

With a healthy offensive line and a normal week of practice, I expected the Patriots would bounce back to their early season form, but instead they had easily their worst performance of the year, getting blown out at home 33-6 by the 49ers in a game in which the Patriots lost the first down rate battle by 6.58% and really didn’t do anything well on either side of the ball. Making matters even worse, the Patriots have been bit by the injury bug over the past week. The Patriots’ offensive line is much more complete than it’s been for most of the season, but they’ll be without their top-2 wide receivers this week from an already thin group, as well as several other questionable players, most notably top cornerback Stephon Gilmore, who seems unlikely to play after a mid-week injury.

Given the disparity between how the Patriots played early in the season and how they’ve played recently, it’s tough to know what to make of this team, but it seems like the general public is completely ignoring their early season success and just focusing on their recent struggles, leading to them being 4-point underdogs in Buffalo against a Bills team that will have minimal homefield advantage and that was also better early in the season than they’ve been in recent weeks. The Bills started 4-0, with competitive wins over quality teams like the Raiders and Rams, but then they lost back-to-back games by multiple scores against tougher opponents in the Titans and Chiefs and last week they had trouble with a Jets team that had previously lost by at least 9 points to every team they’d faced all season. 

The Bills obviously have a better record than the Patriots, but they’re much closer together than their records suggest in terms of point differential (-4 vs. -28) and first down rate differential (+0.60% vs. +0.51%), even though the Bills have played a below average schedule, while the Patriots have faced one of the toughest schedules in the league. When schedule adjustments are taken into account, the Patriots actually have a significant lead in first down rate differential, ranking 11th at 1.65%, while the Bills rank 23rd at -1.11%. Of course, if the Patriots come out and play like they did last week again, it won’t matter than they’ve been better statistically than the Bills this season, just like it didn’t matter that they had a statistical edge over the 49ers going into last week, but I don’t expect the Patriots to come out flat like that in back-to-back weeks, especially since this is a must win game for the Patriots against a division rival.

In fact, if either of these teams comes out flat again this week like they did last week, it’s likely to be the Bills, as the Bills still were able to pick up the win last week because of their easy competition and would still hold a healthy divisional lead even if they lose this game. This isn’t to say the Bills are going to look past the Patriots, who they’ve been trying to get past for years, but the Bills have another tough game on deck against the Seahawks, while the Patriots get the Jets next, so the Patriots are much more likely to be fully focused than the Bills, especially given the results of last week. 

Underdogs cover at a 62.7% rate before being favorites when their opponents will next be underdogs and all three of those are likely to be the case in this one. On top of that, teams are 115-67 ATS as underdogs since 1989 before being road favorites of 4 or more, which the Patriots will be in New York next week (-7 on the early line). There is too much injury uncertainty for me to lock in a bet on the Patriots now, but if their inactives list is favorable and/or the Bills’ isn’t, the Patriots are worth a bet this week. I will have an update before gametime most likely.

Update: Gilmore is out for the Patriots, but I was expecting that. The bigger news is that their other questionables are playing, most importantly JC Jackson, who will be their new #1 cornerback in Gilmore’s absence, while the Bills will be without safety Micah Hyde. Despite that, this line has dropped to 4.5, likely due to the Gilmore news, so the Patriots are worth a bet this week. The Bills haven’t been much better than the Patriots have been lately and the Patriots played better against tougher competition earlier in the year.

Buffalo Bills 24 New England Patriots 23

Pick against the spread: New England +4.5

Confidence: Medium

Indianapolis Colts at Detroit Lions: 2020 Week 8 NFL Pick

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Indianapolis Colts (4-2) at Detroit Lions (3-3)

This is another game I locked in earlier this week, back when the line was 2.5, and I am glad I did because sharp money has pushed this line up to 3 since and about 1 in 6 games are decided by exactly a field goal. What caused me to lock this game in when I did was seeing linebacker Darius Leonard return to practice in the Colts’ first practice following last week’s bye and, in fact, Leonard is not even listed on the injury report this week, after missing the Colts’ previous two games with injury prior to the Colts’ bye week. 

Despite not having Leonard for the past two games, the Colts still rank 3rd in first down rate allowed, but that’s a testament to how good the Colts’ defense was with Leonard (#1 in first down rate allowed), not a sign that the Colts didn’t miss Leonard, as their first down rate allowed climbed from 28.17% in the 4 games with him to 30.34% in the 2 games without him. The Colts haven’t faced a tough slate of offenses overall and “only” rank 6th in schedule adjusted first down rate allowed, but with Leonard back in the mix, the Colts look like one of the top few defenses in the league, both statistically and in terms of their talent level on paper. 

The Colts’ offense isn’t quite as good, but they still rank 5th in the NFL overall in schedule adjusted first down rate differential at -2.34%, despite being without one of the top defensive players in the league over the past two games. The Lions, meanwhile, rank 30th in schedule adjusted first down rate differential at -5.22%, despite a decent 3-3 record. The Lions beat the Cardinals week 3, but needed to win the turnover battle by 3 in that game to win by just three points and lost the first down rate battle by 8.96%. The following week, the Lions only lost by 6 to the Saints, but needed 3 fourth down conversions just to make it that close and lost the first down rate battle by 9.89%. 

In their last two games, the Lions have beaten the Jaguars and Falcons and won the first down rate battle in both of those games, but those are their only two first down rate battle victories of the season and they came against the teams ranked 31st and 29th respectively in schedule adjusted first down rate differential. It helps that offensive stats are more consistent and predictable than defensive stats because the Colts’ edge over the Lions in offensive statistics isn’t nearly as big as their edge in defensive statistics, but the Lions are still unlikely to be competitive in the first down rate battle and will need to rely on more unpredictable things like turnover margins and 4th down performance to have a chance to win this game. It’s possible they could do that, but this line is too low at 2.5. My calculated line favors the Colts by 5.5, with the Lions having in fans in attendance at home, so we’re getting great line value with the visitors.

The Colts have a tough game on deck after this one, as they host the Ravens next week, a game that may seem like a distraction for this Colts team, especially since road favorites cover at a 38.6% rate before being home underdogs (the Colts are +4 on the early line). However, that should be minimized by the Colts coming off of a bye, as road favorites tend to do well after a bye, covering at a 60.9% rate over the past 30 seasons, including a 65.9% rate as road favorites of 3.5 or more. The line isn’t that high, but it arguably should be, so the logic holds that the Colts should be focused and fresh this week and we’re getting good line value to boot. 

I’m leaving this as a medium confidence pick for now because of some injury question marks, including the possible absence of Lions’ left tackle Taylor Decker, the possible absence of Lions’ center Ryan Kelly, and the possible season debut of Colts’ defensive end Kemoko Turay, who has begun the season on the PUP list, but I like the Colts for a bet regardless and if the injury news is good, I’ll boost this to a high confidence pick.

Indianapolis Colts 26 Detroit Lions 20

Pick against the spread: Indianapolis -2.5

Confidence: Medium

Minnesota Vikings at Green Bay Packers: 2020 Week 8 NFL Pick

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Minnesota Vikings (1-5) at Green Bay Packers (5-1)

The Vikings have just one win, but there is reason to believe they’ll be a lot better than that going forward, coming out of last week’s bye. In many ways, they remind me of last year’s Atlanta Falcons, who started 1-7, but won 6 of their final 8 after their bye week. The Falcons had a first down rate differential of +1.33% in their first 8 games, but had a turnover margin of -11 that was the 2nd worst in the league at the time, which made winning any games very difficult. 

Fortunately for those Falcons (and these Vikings), per play success stats like first down rate tend to be much more consistent and predictive in the long run than stats like turnover margin that only tell what happened on a small percentage of a team’s snaps. The Falcons weren’t drastically better in first down rate differential over their 6-2 stretch at +2.02%, but their turnover margin improved to +6, making it much easier for the Falcons to win games. 

If anything, the Vikings have been better this season than the Falcons were last year during their 1-7 stretch, as the Vikings rank 4th in the NFL this season with a +2.73% first down rate differential, adjusted for schedule. The Vikings haven’t been killed by the turnover margin quite as much as last year’s Falcons, but they still rank 3rd worst in the league at -7, as they’ve recovered just 35.71% of fumbles, while quarterback Kirk Cousins has thrown interceptions at a rate 2.5 times higher than his career average and over 3 times higher than his previous 3 seasons. Both of those things are unlikely to continue. Also unlikely to continue is the Vikings allowing 19 of 19 field goals against and their -31.8% 4th down conversion rate disparity. 

It’s not hard to see how that has led to the Vikings losing otherwise winnable games, as they were a failed 4th down conversation away from clinching the game in Seattle and lost by 1 to the Titans in a game in which the Titans made 6 of 6 field goals, including a trio from 50+ and a 55-yard game winner. The Vikings could easily be 3-3 right now, despite a relatively tough schedule, and that doesn’t even take into account that the Vikings fared much better on a per play basis than the final score suggests in losses in Green Bay and Atlanta, or that the Vikings were missing top offensive player Dalvin Cook before the bye in that Atlanta loss and have been without guard Pat Elflein since week 1. Both players are expected to return this week.

The Vikings’ defense is a real concern, especially with defensive end Yannick Ngakoue being traded and several injuries to their cornerback depth, and I definitely don’t think they’re as good as their raw first down rate stats would suggest, but even with their defensive problems, I still have them as a middle of the pack team in my roster rankings and defense tends to be much more inconsistent on a week-to-week basis than offense. Like last year’s Atlanta Falcons, the Vikings are an offensive led team, which makes their chances of improving significantly going forward much better than if they were a defensive led team. 

The Falcons made a statement right away out of their bye last season, winning convincingly by score of 26-9 as 13.5-point underdogs in New Orleans in one of the biggest upsets of the season. The Vikings have a chance to do something similar this week in Green Bay (though it wouldn’t be quite as big of an upset) and even if they don’t I like their chances of keeping this one close. The Vikings lost by 9 to the Packers in Minnesota back in week 1, but that was a weird game where the Packers out snapped the Vikings 76-49 because they won the turnover battle by 1, they converted a 4th down, they forced a safety immediately after their failed 4th down conversion, and they stopped the Vikings on a 4th down try of their own. 

On a per snap basis, the Vikings won the first down rate battle by 10.23% and the yards per play battle by 0.9, which tends to be much more predictive than things like turnovers and 4th down performance. On the season, in addition to their edge in schedule adjusted first down rate differential (+2.73% vs. -0.05%), the Vikings also are just behind the Packers in net yards per play (0.3 vs. 0.2) and DVOA (10th vs. 18th). This game is in Lambeau, but with no fans in attendance, that doesn’t make much of a difference, so my calculated line is just Green Bay -4 and that’s before taking into account any situational factors.

Not only are these two teams closer than their records would suggest, but the Packers are also in a tough spot, having to turn around and play again in 4 days in San Francisco against a 49ers team that beat them twice easily last year and ended their season in the NFC Championship game. Favorites cover at just a 44.0% rate all-time before a Thursday night game and for the Packers the look ahead effect could be even greater, given that they’ve already beaten the Vikings once this year and have likely been looking forward to their nationally televised revenge game with the 49ers since the schedule came out. 

The Vikings, meanwhile, should be totally focused, coming out of a bye, with a much easier game against the Lions on deck. Underdogs cover at a 62.7% rate before being favorites when their opponents will next be underdogs and even that doesn’t hold true in this matchup, the logic still stands that the Vikings will be much more focused for this game than their opponents. On top of that, divisional home favorites of 3.5+ are 36-48 ATS over the past 30 seasons against a team they’ve already beaten and, for what it’s worth, underdogs are 9-5 ATS over the past 30 years off of a bye when their opponents will next play on a short week, although that’s obviously a small sample size. 

The Packers have a lot of injury uncertainty, with key players like left tackle David Bakhiari, safety Darnell Savage, and wide receiver Allen Lazard being legitimately questionable for this matchup, but even if they all play, I like the Vikings enough to make this my Pick of the Week and if all three of those players don’t play, there’s a good chance the Vikings could pull the straight up upset. I am glad I was able to lock this in at 7 earlier in the week because sharp action has pushed this line down to 6. I would still like the Vikings at 6, but not as much and at that number, the injury inactives will be more important.

Green Bay Packers 30 Minnesota Vikings 28

Pick against the spread: Minnesota +7

Confidence: Pick of the Week

Atlanta Falcons at Carolina Panthers: 2020 Week 8 NFL Pick

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Atlanta Falcons (1-6) at Carolina Panthers (3-4)

Coming into the season, I had the Falcons as the better of these two teams and on paper they have more talent, but the Panthers have actually outplayed them by a pretty significant amount. The Panthers have faced a tough schedule overall and have been competitive in every game, with their only loss by more than one score coming against a dominant Buccaneers team in a game in which the Buccaneers won the yards per play battle, only narrow lost the first down rate battle (+1.28%), and had the game within one score late in the 4th quarter before a meaningless touchdown, despite losing the turnover battle by 2. The Falcons, who the Panthers already defeated in Atlanta back in week 5, have been the easiest opponent on the Panthers’ schedule thus far and the Panthers won the first down battle by 4.76% in that 7-point win.

The Panthers have especially outplayed the Falcons on offense, even though that should be a strength for the Falcons. On the season, the Panthers rank 8th in the NFL in first down rate and that’s even more impressive when you consider they’ve faced the 5th toughest schedule of defenses, including a trio of top defenses in the Buccaneers, Chargers, and Bears. Including schedule adjustments, the Panthers rank 2nd in the league in first down rate over expected at +3.14%. By comparison, the Falcons rank 24th in first down rate over expected. 

The Panthers haven’t fared as well on defense, where they rank 26th in first down rate allowed over expected at -1.56%, but offensive stats tend to be much more consistent and predictable week-to-week and the Falcons have just a narrow edge over the Panthers on defense, ranking 24th in first down rate allowed over expected at -1.43%, as they haven’t been particularly good on either side of the ball. It’s true the Falcons are three improbable blown lead away from being 4-3, but they needed to win the turnover battle against the Cowboys by 3 to gain their big lead in a game in which they lost the first down rate battle by 10.19% and they also lost the first down rate battle to the Lions and in their one win, against the the Vikings. 

Their only first down rate battle win came against the Bears, despite not having a particularly tough schedule, and, on the season, they rank 29th in first down rate differential over expected at -2.70%, significantly behind the 14th ranked Panthers (+1.58%). The Panthers also have the edge in yards per play differential (+0.5 vs -1.0), point differential (-6 vs. -23), and DVOA (+0.6% vs. -13.8%), although when Football Outsiders’ pre-season projections are factored in, the Falcons have the narrow edge in DVOA (-4.9% vs. -6.3%). That last part and the Falcons’ higher level of talent on paper concern me about betting on the Panthers, because by all indications, the Falcons should be better than them, but that hasn’t been the case thus far this season. 

The Falcons have had injury problems this season and have gotten healthier in recent weeks, even since their week 5 matchup with the Panthers, as they’ll have Julio Jones in the lineup this time around, while the Panthers may be going the other way, without left tackle Russell Okung and a few lesser players on the defensive side of the ball. However, it’s also a possibility the Panthers get feature back Christian McCaffrey back from injury this week, which would obviously be a big boost. 

For now, I’m leaving this as a low confidence pick and this line may change from Carolina -2.5 if McCaffrey is active, but even if it does I may consider betting the Panthers, as long as the line doesn’t exceed 3. Favorites typically are at a big advantage on Thursdays and there’s a good argument to be made for the Panthers being significantly better than the Falcons if McCaffrey can go. I will have an update if needed. I am also locking in the below picks for this week before the lines move. I will have full write ups for those picks with the others as usual this weekend.

MIN +7 @ GB

IND -2.5 @ DET

Update: McCaffrey is out, but I wasn’t really expecting him to play this week and the spread has dropped to 1 as a result. I am comfortable with the Panthers at that number as they have significantly outplayed the Falcons this season, particularly on the more predictable side of the ball.

Carolina Panthers 31 Atlanta Falcons 27

Pick against the spread: Carolina -1

Confidence: Medium