NFL picks
OK, we have a pretty full mailbag – but if you want to offer one, feel free, the more the merrier – so let’s break these NFL conference championship games down and offer some picks.
Deal? Deal.
New England minus-8.5 over Jacksonville over 46. Know this: In the last 15 AFC title games the favorite is 10-5 against the spread and the winning team in those games covered the spread. One point for the Pats. We like to grade the two most important match-ups of head coach and quarterback of each two. Two more points for the Pats. (At least.) Home-field matters. Point for the Pats. Considering and comparing each teams weaker side of the ball? Point for the Pats, who after a disastrous start with a new secondary that allowed more than 30 points per game through the first month, have allowed less than 16 per game in the 13 games since. Experience matters, and the young Jags were unfazed by going to Pittsburgh. But how they handle the stage of being a step away from the Super Bowl against an organization that has made been to this stage the last seven straight years will be telling. Point for the Pats.
We will ride with the Pats, but believe there are two ways for the Jags to not only cover the number but go there and win and both of them fall on their defense.
From the great Bill Barnwell, the analytical NFL writer for ESPN.com: When Tom Brady is sacked 0-1 times, he’s 75-13 (winning percentage of 85.2). When Brady is sacked 2-3 times, he’s 52-17 (75.4). When he is sacked 4-or-times, he’s 13-8 (61.9). Now recall the most memorable Patriots setbacks in the playoffs. There was the Super Bowl against the Giants sacked Brady five times top topple the previously unbeaten Patriots. In 2015 in the AFC title game, the Broncos knocked Brady down 17 times. The Giants’ strength in both Super Bowl wins was their front four. Terrell Suggs’ strip-sack allowed the Ravens to grab a two-touchdown lead in 2009 and the Jets sacked Brady five times in 2010. Heck in the Pats’ last two Super Bowl wins, the offense only got going when a) Seattle pass-rusher Cliff Avril was injured and b) when the Falcons’ pass-rush as a whole got gassed for being on the field so long.