NFL Week 7 Predictions, Rankings, and Tips: The Weekly Rundown
October 15, 2014 - by Tom Federico
Here’s a rapid-fire list of weekly highlights from the vast array of NFL content we publish on TeamRankings. We’ll also share some predictions and picks for Week 7 and beyond.
Just announced: Our NFL Week 7 contest is open! Total prize pool $2,249. Claim your spot now.
Is Dallas for real? (Take 2). The Dallas upset of Seattle presents an interesting quandary for quantitative ratings systems. On the one hand, obviously the result matters. Our Predictive ratings expected Dallas to lose by 11 points based on Sunday morning values, and the Cowboys exceeded that expectation by 18 points. (Vegas spreads liked Dallas a bit more, but still implied a loss by 8 or 9.) At the same time, Dallas has only one win so far against a team ranked better than #14 in our Predictive rankings, so you also have to consider the bigger picture. Plenty of random and semi-random events (i.e. luck) can influence one game.
Option A: The Cowboys are good, but not great. That leads to two very different potential assessments of the Cowboys right now from our ratings system. In our Predictive ratings, which are influenced by our preseason ratings of teams, Dallas’s rating gained a full point, which is a solid move. (We’ve done a lot of historical testing, and factoring in a preseason rating improved prediction accuracy even in the later weeks of a season, although the impact of the preseason rating decays as a season goes on.) Still, that one-point rating gain was only enough to raise Dallas’s ranking from #14 to #13 — actually, the Cowboys are now in a cluster of four teams (Detroit, Arizona, Dallas, New Orleans) in a near-tie for the #11 rank in our Predictive ratings. So by this lens, the Cowboys look like a good, but definitely not elite team (yet).
Option B: The Cowboys are great. However, if you look at our Last 10 Ratings, which greatly discount the influence of preseason ratings in favor of evaluating a team’s last 10 game results (or six results, at this point in the season), Dallas ranks much higher at #5. That’s even ahead of Seattle, who plummeted five spots in the Last 10 rankings to #7 this week. So is Dallas a great team? If you think six games is enough to prove it, then yes, they look like it now after last week’s result. But our Predictive ratings don’t completely trust a six game sample, and again, factoring in preseason ratings — which are currently holding Dallas back — improved the future accuracy of the system.
Biggest moves up. Other top gainers in the Predictive ratings this week included Philadelphia (up 5 spots in the rankings to #10), Baltimore (up 4 spots to #5), Cleveland (up 3 spots to #21), and Chicago (up 4 spots to #19). Both the Eagles and the Ravens increased their respective ratings by 1.5 points after blowout wins of different flavors. Philly played a decent team (the New York Giants) at home, while Baltimore played a bad team (Tampa Bay) on the road.
Biggest moves down. The biggest Predictive ratings reductions were inflicted upon Tampa Bay (only down 1 spot in the rankings to #30, though, since there isn’t much farther to fall), the New York Giants (down 5 spots to #15), Atlanta (down one spot to #20), Seattle (holding steady at #2, however, thanks to being so far ahead of the #3 and #4 teams last week), and Pittsburgh (down 2 spots to #22). As it turns out, the Giants were in a high leverage situation last week, with eight other teams rated within about 1.5 points of them. So the shellacking in Philly really punished the Giants’ ranking, as five similarly rated teams ended up winning and leapfrogging New York.
Four teams now at the top. Overall, last week’s action leaves us with an updated foursome of top teams in the Predictive ratings. Denver now ranks as the (relatively) clear #1 team in the NFL, with a rating over a point higher than #2 Seattle. #3 San Francisco has pulled much closer to the Seahawks (SF is 1.6 points worse than Seattle now, compared to over 3 points worse last week), and #4 New England is only a half point back of the 49ers after thrashing Buffalo on the road.
Then a cluster of very good teams. Another small step down finds still-contenders #5 Baltimore and #6 Green Bay in a virtual dead heat, followed by #7 San Diego (whose rating was hurt by underperforming expectations at Oakland), #8 Indianapolis, and #9 Cincinnati. Indy outperformed ratings-based expectations by beating Houston on the road, while the Bengals saw their rating slip for a second straight week after only managing to tie Carolina at home.
Then some plain old good ones. After #9 Cincinnati, it’s another decent drop off in rating value to another cluster of teams ranked #10 through #14 (Philadelphia, Detroit, Arizona, Dallas, New Orleans). Our system currently considers these teams good, but definitely not elite.
Fewer curious cases now. Comparing teams’ win-loss records and Predictive ratings, there are fewer anomalies now. New Orleans still sticks out as a team that the system isn’t ready to give up on yet, having a #14 Predictive ranking despite being an unconvincing 2-3. Cleveland (#21 despite a 3-2 record) is another minor curiosity. The Browns did improve their below-average rating by over a point by beating Pittsburgh handily, but that was a smaller move than some people might expect, since our ratings have been relatively pessimistic on Pittsburgh all season.
Who’s got the hardest schedule left? We also took a look at our Future Strength Of Schedule ratings to get a sense of how the remaining games of the season stack up for current top teams. San Diego currently rates as having #1 hardest schedule left, with games against Denver (x2), Miami (away), Baltimore (away), New England (home), San Francisco (away), and Kansas City (away) all still to come. Several other current top teams rank as having tough remaining schedules, with San Francisco and Philadelphia being the worst off after San Diego.
Who’s got the easiest schedule left? On the flip side, out of all the currently good teams, Dallas has the easiest relative schedule strength for the remainder of the season. The Cowboys still have to play Arizona and Indianapolis, but get both of them at home. They play Philadelphia twice, but the Eagles are a team that our ratings think is worse than its current win-loss record implies. After that, Dallas plays no other teams currently ranked higher than #15 in our Predictive ratings. Green Bay, Indianapolis, and Baltimore also face easier than average future schedules.
Seattle opens the door for Denver, and others. We made an “if Seattle stumbles” hypothetical comment last week, and well…the Seahawks just stumbled. That means Denver now reigns supreme as the most likely 2015 Super Bowl champion, and it levels the playing field significantly for the top challengers, especially since Seattle plays in the very tough NFC West.
Teams with the highest NFL champion odds. The five most likely teams to win it all are currently Denver (21%, up from 19% last week), Seattle (11%, down from 20% last week after the home loss to Dallas), San Francisco (8%, up from 5% last week thanks to an improved rating and Seattle’s loss), New England (8%, up from 6% last week after beating up Buffalo on the road), and Green Bay (7%). In addition, seven other teams (Baltimore, Cincinnati, Indianapolis, San Diego, Dallas, Philadelphia, and Arizona) now all have 4-6% odds to be NFL champions. A lot of teams have a reasonable shot.
Seattle’s loss is whose gain? It’s interesting to evaluate the impact of Seattle’s loss on other teams’ Super Bowl champion odds. The main beneficiary was division rival San Francisco, since a lower rating for Seattle plus making up a game in the standings this week means better odds for the 49ers to win the NFC West and secure a home playoff game (even though Seattle is still currently the favorite to win the division). And since we rate the 49ers as a better team than Arizona right now, San Fran benefits more from Seattle’s stumbles than Arizona does. There was also a broad effect across the NFC, whereby several non-NFC West teams increased their Super Bowl odds. After all, if Seattle is a worse team than previously thought, then facing the Seahawks in the playoffs also won’t be as big an obstacle.
AFC division winner projections. There was significant movement this week in AFC division win odds. Our current projected division winners are New England (78% AFC East, vs. 57% last week, a big gain after a road win over division rival Buffalo and a Miami loss), new favorite Baltimore (48% AFC North after a blowout road win and a Cincinnati tie), Indianapolis (76% AFC South, up from 55% last week, a major surge after a key road win over Houston, the top division threat), and Denver (66% AFC West, vs. 63% last week, thanks in part to a worse than expected result from San Diego). So we’ve now got multiple teams emerging as strong favorites to win divisions.
Other AFC division winner threats. Cincinnati (37% to win the AFC North over Baltimore) is now the biggest division winner challenger, with San Diego (30% to win the AFC West) still a strong threat to Denver, and Houston (21% to win the AFC South) down but not out. However, it’s pretty remarkable how fast the division winner fortunes of other teams in the AFC have fallen. Our simulations currently don’t give any other team in the conference more than about a 1-in-10 chance to win its division. A comeback certainly isn’t out of the question for teams like Miami, Buffalo, Cleveland, Pittsburgh, and Kansas City, but they are on the ropes right now.
NFC division winner projections. There was lots of movement in the NFC too. Our current projected division winners are Dallas (49% NFC East, up from 37% last week, after a statement win over Seattle plus a Giants loss), Green Bay (55% NFC North, down from 58% after a very close win plus solid victories by Detroit and Chicago), Carolina (53% NFC South, up from 42% last week, thanks to a bad Atlanta loss and a better than expected result vs. Cincinnati), and Seattle (40% NFC West, dropping from 63% last week, thanks to a bad loss plus San Francisco and Arizona wins). So the NFC divisions are more up for grabs than the AFC divisions at this point.
Other NFC division winner threats. Philadelphia benefitted greatly from its 27-0 blanking of its NFC East rival, the New York Giants, and now has 41% odds to slip by Dallas and win the NFC East. Coupled with the big win by Dallas, New York’s loss inflicted a crushing blow on its division win odds, which are now down to only 10% from over 30% last week. In the North, South, and West, Detroit, New Orleans, and San Francisco each have a roughly 1 in 3 chance to win their respective divisions, and Arizona (28% to win the NFC West) is still a top contender as well. Minnesota, however, has faded out of the picture in the NFC North over the past few weeks, and Atlanta’s chances to win the NFC South have taken a big hit (now only 12%).
You can probably count these teams out of the playoffs. Our season simulations currently give eight teams less than a 10% chance of making the playoffs, up from seven last week. Five teams (Jacksonville, Oakland, Washington, Tampa Bay, and St. Louis) have now been pretty much eliminated from playoff contention; none of them has better than a 1-in-100 chance to make the postseason. Tennessee (4% to make the playoffs) and the New York Jets (1%) are both on life support. And finally, ladies and gentlemen, please welcome the newest addition to this dubious club: the Minnesota Vikings, whose back-to-back division losses to Green Bay and Detroit have plunged their playoff odds down to just 3% and change.
Tied again. Both our game winner picks and those of the public (i.e. the ESPN user consensus picks) went 11-3-1 last week. We had Cleveland over Pittsburgh, which the public got wrong. But the public also picked underdog Detroit against Minnesota, while we went with loser Minnesota. (The closing Vegas line on Sunday favored Minnesota by 1, after significant line movement toward Minnesota during the week.)
Favorites run riot. The most underrated game winner picks of last week — defined as teams with the biggest differences between win odds and public picking percentage, as posted in our Week 6 Pick’em Data Grid — ended up doing terribly, although there was one near-win. Miami was the #1 underrated pick of Week 6, with 48% win odds yet only 9% picked by the public, and nearly upset the Packers. The other top five underrated teams (Minnesota, St. Louis, Houston, Buffalo) all lost fairly convincingly, though.
Last week’s advice. Our pick’em advice last week was to pick Cleveland over Pittsburgh, which was a nice winner from a value perspective. Our value upset pick for weekly prize pools, the Vikings over the Lions, ended up being a dud. As mentioned above, betting line movement during the week was strongly pro-Minnesota, and the Vikings actually closed as the favorite in that game. So it looked like a fantastic pick on Sunday morning. Too bad Minnesota stank up the joint come game time.
Strategy for season prize pools. For Week 7, your best strategy in NFL pick’em pools that only have season prizes is to remain conservative and not go too crazy picking upsets. Right now a solid value play is to pick Pittsburgh (the Vegas favorite) over Houston, especially to fade the public’s overreaction to the Steelers’ blowout loss at Cleveland last week.
Strategy for weekly prize pools. Pools that only offer weekly prizes call for a different strategy, one that needs to give much more weight to how your opponents are likely to pick this week. After the Steelers, though, this week it’s slim pickings for low-to-moderate risk upset picks. High risk/high reward upset picks abound, but most of them are best suited only for larger pools. So we’re not going to make any official recommendations, but if you want to make an upset gamble, Cincinnati over Indianapolis looks like your best bet for pick’em pools. The Bengals have roughly 40% win odds according to Vegas, but are only being picked by 14% of pick’em players, most likely on account of irrational recency bias — Indianapolis has won four straight while Cincy hasn’t won either of their last two games.
Strategy for YOUR pool. Just remember, the optimal strategy for your specific pool, including how many favorites vs. upsets you should pick this week, depends on a lot of factors: the number of entries in your pool, the rules, the scoring system, the payout structure. That’s why we developed our Football Pick’em Pools product to apply our analytics to your specific pool.
Seattle and Cincinnati eliminate 34%. Assuming your Survivor pool treats ties as losses (which seems to be the most common rule), Dallas’s upset of Seattle knocked out 20% of still-alive Survivor players this past week, while the Bengals’ tie knocked out another 14%. The most popular pick of the week, Denver (picked by 29%), survived, but that was a steep price to pay for the players who used the Broncos, currently the NFL’s #1 team.
We avoided Denver and survived (with some luck). The best pick for maximizing your odds to win a Survivor pool (assuming you only had one entry) ended up being Arizona last week, thanks to decent win odds, relatively low popularity, and relatively low future value. Earlier in the week, before Carson Palmer was announced as starting QB for the Cardinals, we recommended San Diego as the top survivor pick of the week. Both recommended teams won, although San Diego needed to mount a fourth quarter comeback. So our top picks now march on to Week 7 with Denver still in the quiver.
Don’t pick these teams in Week 7! For the third week in a row, public picks are very spread out across many teams. That impacts optimal survivor pick strategy, and places more value on picking a less risky team. There are a few teams this week that look like solid choices given that context, but two currently popular picks — Cleveland and Arizona — definitely don’t qualify. Stay away from those two teams if your goal is to maximize your odds to win your survivor pool.
NFL Week 7 Betting Picks & Game Predictions Update
Better week for playable betting picks. Coming off a few down weeks, our playable spread and over/under picks improved last week. Playable spread picks went 4-3, with a win on our sole 3-star pick, Jacksonville +4.5, to go along with Carolina +7, Baltimore -3.5, and Oakland +7.5. We lost Minnesota -2.5, Houston +2.5, and took a frustrating bad beat on the Jets +10; Aqib Talib returned an interception for a 22-yard touchdown with 15 seconds left, blowing the cover, instead of just taking a knee and sealing the victory. Playable over-under picks went 3-2, including a win on our sole 3-star pick, New York Giants/Philadelphia Under 49.5.
Low confidence spread picks still underperforming. On the downside, our low confidence (1-star rated) spread picks continued their poor performance so far this year, going 1-7 against Sunday lines. These are “lay off” games from a betting standpoint, but they still impact our users in spread-based pick’em pools. In addition, our money line value picks had their worst week of the season so far, losing 5.5 units based on flat-betting each starred pick. That’s not totally surprising, though, given that favorites romped last week, and we typically find more money line value on underdogs.
Season performance update. That performance means our playable rated NFL spread picks against Sunday lines are now a profitable 27-22 for the year, while playable over/under picks are an unprofitable 18-20. 2-star money line picks are down -0.6 units for the season based on a flat-betting strategy, while all starred money line picks are currently -3.9 units.
Game winner picks behind the public. As mentioned in the pick’em section above, both our models and the public picked the same number of game winners correctly this week. We’ve had some pretty bad luck so far this season picking close games against the public consensus, but that’s going to happen sometimes. As of now we’re 57-33-1 picking game winners, which lags the ESPN user consensus by four wins. Our picks are currently 6-5-2 against the ESPN human experts; we typically beat all but one or two of them every year, so the stage is set for a showdown over the next 10 weeks.
Fewer upsets than expected, for the fourth week in a row. After upset city the first two weeks of this season, it’s been favorite city for the last four weeks. In Week 6, out of the 11 games listed on our Most Likely Upsets page, we expected right around four upsets to happen based on our win odds. How many happened? Zilch. Overall, it was just a bad week for our models here, as they did not think that Dallas, Chicago, and Detroit were among the more likely underdogs to win in their respective point spread ranges. Our most likely upset in games with a spread of more than three points (Jacksonville over Tennessee) did come pretty close, though.
Week 7 playable NFL betting picks. As of posting time, we had 9 playable spread picks, 5 playable over/under picks, and 4 two-star money line value picks for NFL Week 7, a higher number of playable picks than last week.
Don’t call them the Week 7 locks of the week. The top confidence game winner picks from our models are currently New England at home over the New York Jets (80%), Seattle on the road over St. Louis (75%), and Baltimore at home over Atlanta (74%).
Most likely Week 7 upsets. The most likely upset of the week according to our models is currently Cincinnati over Indianapolis, with a 45% chance of happening. Those are lower win odds than our typical most likely upset, so take note; right now there aren’t any upset picks from our models that have a 50/50 chance or better to win this week. The most likely upset of a Vegas favorite of more than three points is currently Oakland over Arizona, with a 40% chance of happening.
ssvols takes the gold in Week 6. User ssvols dominated the 176-entry field in our Week 6 NFL contest on FanDuel, besting second place finisher pzappa by more than 12 points with this lineup. That’s good for a free Football Season Pass to TeamRankings ($249) in addition to a 100% profit on the contest entry fee. Fine work, ssvols!
And 57% of entrants won cash. Thanks to our guaranteed prize pool, a full 100 of the 176 entrants in this past week’s contest doubled their entry fee. Plus, we have some new users in position to win our end of season prizes now, which include a total of $400 worth of Amazon gift cards, plus lots more free TeamRankings premium subscriptions.
Sadly, we were not among them. This is sort of embarrassing to admit, but we kind of forgot to enter our lineup this past week. More specifically, we took about 47 seconds to enter a placeholder lineup early in the week based on gut instinct, and then completely forgot to update it on Sunday morning like we usually do. And surprise surprise…we got smoked, finishing in 133rd place. That’s not going to happen again, but kudos to everyone who kicked our butt. We now return to hiding our heads in shame.
Come play with us! We want you to get in on all the Week 7 action with us. Another 100 entries will win cash this week, and this is your chance to beat the TR Nerds. Claim your spot now in our weekly tournament.
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