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| Friday, November 13, 2020 |
| I'm not sure if you guys have looked at a calendar yet today, but it's Friday the 13th, and let me just say that the last thing 2020 needs is a Friday the 13th. I'm not leaving my house today. |
| I mean it's definitely not a coincidence that an alligator the size of a dinosaur showed up in Florida this week. It's clearly here to eat us all (Click here to see the alligator). This is actually the second Friday the 13th we've had in 2020 and I'm hoping this one goes slightly better than the other one, because the other one came on March 13 and that was the day the coronavirus was declared a national emergency. |
| Speaking of national emergencies, the Titans might want to declare their special teams one or at least a federal disaster area after the performance the unit pulled off on Thursday night. The Titans got smoked 34-17 by the Colts and a big reason for that was because their special teams absolutely fell apart. |
| That will be one of the many things we talk about in today's newsletter, so let's get this thing started. As always, if you want to share this newsletter with everyone you know, I will not be offended. Just click here to grab the link and then send that link to everyone on your email list. |
| 1. Today's Show: Colts manhandle Titans in blowout win |
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| It's not often that the podcast ends with the three of us in a good mood, but that's exactly what happened after we recapped the Colts' 34-17 win over the Titans. Will Brinson was happy because the North Carolina State homer got to see a bunch of N.C. State alums perform well on Thursday. I was happy because special teams were a major storyline in the game and Ryan Wilson was happy because we kept this episode under 30 minutes. We never go under 30 minutes. |
| If you missed the game, here are three reasons why the Packers won. |
| Philip Rivers was unstoppable. Rivers must have been drinking from the fountain of youth over the past four days, because he looked much better in Week 10 than he did in Week 9. With the Titans getting no pass rush on him, Rivers was able to dice up their defense to the tune of 308 yards and one touchdown. Nyheim Hines might be the Colts' best running back. The Colts currently have a running back rotation, but maybe that rotation should only consist of Hines, especially after what he did to the Titans. Not only did he have a big game on the ground (12 carries, 70 yards, 1 TD), but he also put up some impressive numbers through the air with five catches for 45 yards and a touchdown. The Titans special teams weren't so special. The Titans special teams were the opposite of special in this game. During a seven-minute span in the second half, the Titans shanked a 17-yard punt (that led to a Colts touchdown), had a punt blocked and returned for a touchdown, and as if that wasn't bad enough, Stephen Gostkowski missed a 44-yard field goal that would have cut Indy's lead to 27-20 in the fourth quarter. After the miss, the Colts immediately drove down the field and iced the game with another touchdown. Yikes. |
| Since the game was such a blowout, we spent a lot of time talking about whether Ryan Tannehill is a top-10 quarterback right now after struggling for much of the past four weeks. We also spent some time talking about who we think will eventually win the AFC South and somehow, one of us is still convinced it's going to be the Titans, despite their ugly loss Thursday. |
| To listen to today's episode -- and subscribe to the podcast -- be sure to click here. |
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| 2. Today's show Part II: Picking Week 10 games |
| The best part about Friday -- besides the fact that it's Friday -- is that you get two episodes of the podcast in your feed. After the recap of the Thursday game, Brinson muted my microphone and told Wilson to go take a nap so that he could bring in Pete Prisco, R.J. White and Kenny White for a discussion about their best bets and picks for Week 10. |
| I still don't know how Brinson has the power to mute my microphone, but I'm going to figure that out someday. Anyway, the guys spent nearly 60 minutes going over the best bets for every single game being played in Week 10 and we're going to cover three from each guy below. |
Will Brinson
Browns (-3) to cover against the Texans
Eagles (-3) to cover against the Giants
Ravens (-7) to cover against the Patriots |
Pete Prisco
Packers (-13.5) to cover against the Panthers
Rams (-1.5) to cover against the Seahawks
Bears (+2.5) to cover against the Vikings |
Kenny White
Cardinals (-2) to cover against the Bills
Rams (-1.5) to cover against the Seahawks
Texans at Browns UNDER 49 |
R.J. White
Browns (-3) to cover against the Texans
Eagles (-3) to cover against the Giants
Cardinals (-2) to cover against the Bills |
| The group also has a three-team parlay that involves betting the OVER (51) in the Broncos-Raiders game combined with the Eagles (-3) and Browns (-3) to both cover. The parlay has hit in four out of nine weeks so far, which is actually a pretty crazy hit rate for a three-team parlay. This parlay has odds of +595, which means you'd win $595 on a $100 bet. To hear what the rest of the best bets are for Week 10 -- and there are quite a few -- be sure to click here so you can listen to the entire episode of the podcast. |
| 3. Midseason predictions from our CBS network team |
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| Last week, we gave you some midseason predictions from our team here at CBSSports.com and since everyone loved them so much, you're getting a bonus this week: More midseason predictions! However, the twist here is that those predictions will be coming from the TV side, a.k.a. these are the analysts you see covering the NFL on both CBS and CBS Sports Network. |
| Basically, we sent out a midseason predictions ballot to more than a dozen of our CBS NFL stalwarts -- people like Bill Cowher, Boomer Esiason, Phil Simms, Nate Burleson, Trent Green, Rich Gannon, James Lofton, Jay Feely, Kyle Long, Adam Archuleta, Charles Davis and Amy Trask -- and we asked them to give us their predictions for two of the biggest awards along with their Super Bowl champion. |
| With that in mind, let's get to their predictions. (A total of 23 people turned in a ballot and and the top vote-getter for each award is listed below. And yes, I conducted multiple recounts before I was satisfied that the voting wasn't rigged in Kansas City's favor, because that's definitely what it looks like.) |
| Super Bowl champion: Chiefs (13 votes) 2020 NFL MVP: Patrick Mahomes (16 votes) Coach of the Year: Mike Tomlin (18 votes) |
| There were actually five coaches who got at least one vote for coach of the year and four teams that got at least one vote to be Super Bowl champion and if you want to see who else got a vote, be sure to click here. |
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| 4. NFL Week 10 picks |
| This is the final newsletter of the week, which means I feel morally obligated to cram as many picks as possible into this space. I once crammed 19 pancakes into my stomach at an all-you-can-eat buffet, so I know I'm good at cramming. |
| With that in mind, we've got three more Week 9 picks coming your way and those will be coming from Will Brinson, Jonathan Jones and CBS Sports NFL Insider Jason La Canfora. Here's how things are going to work: I'm going to give you one pick from each guy and then direct you to the rest of their picks. That way, if you like their pick, you'll be able to read the rest of them, but if they pick against your favorite team, you can ignore the rest of their picks and move on. |
| Will Brinson: Buccaneers (-5.5) at Panthers. Although the Buccaneers got their clocks cleaned in Week 9, Brinson doesn't see that happening again this week. As a matter of fact, he actually sees Tampa covering the spread easily in this game, which he is expecting to be a blowout. PICK: Buccaneers 35-21 over Panthers. For the rest of Brinson's Week 10 picks, be sure to click here. Jonathan Jones: Chargers at Dolphins (-1). It's the No. 5 overall pick in the NFL draft (Tua Tagovailoa) going up against the No. 6 overall pick in the NFL Draft (Justin Herbert) and Jones likes the guy who was picked first out of those two to come out on top. PICK: Dolphins win (Money line: -125). For the rest of Jones' Week 10 picks, be sure to click here. |
| Jason La Canfora: Steelers (-7.5) at Bengals. La Canfora must have gotten the memo that I will be sending a Christmas card to anyone who picks the Bengals to cover this week because he's picking the Bengals to cover this week. PICK: Bengals cover. For the rest of La Canfora's Week 10 best bets, be sure to click here. |
5. NFL has unusual Sunday afternoon schedule for Week 10
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| The NFL schedule is going to have a slightly different look this week and that's because the league has decided to change things up in order to accommodate the Masters, which was postponed from April to this weekend due to the pandemic. |
| So what will be different? Let's take a quick look. |
| Tony Romo and Jim Nantz won't be at an NFL game this week. Nantz will be in Augusta as the lead CBS announcer at the Masters and since he can't be two places at once, he'll be spending his NFL Sunday calling the final round of the Masters on CBS. As for Romo, although he'll have the week off from football, you can almost guarantee that the avid golfer will have CBS on the entire weekend so he can watch both golf and football. No early NFL games on CBS. With the Masters airing on CBS until 3 p.m. ET on Sunday, that means there won't be any 1 p.m. NFL games on our network. All five games in the early afternoon window will be aired on Fox. More 4 p.m. games than 1 p.m. games. Besides Week 17, the NFL almost never has more 4 p.m. games on a Sunday than 1 p.m. games, but that will be happening this week. All three of the CBS games will kick off at 4:05 p.m. ET while the three late games on Fox will kick off at 4:25 p.m. ET. That means there will be six games in the 4 p.m. window compared to just five in the 1 p.m window. |
| What all this means is that you're definitely going to want to keep your television tuned to CBS this weekend. Not only do we have the Masters on Friday, Saturday and Sunday, but we also have a strong NFL slate on Sunday afternoon that includes the 7-2 Bills playing against the 5-3 Cardinals. If you want to watch some golf this weekend, you can click here to check out the TV schedule for the Masters. |
| 6. Gambler drops crazy sum on Packers to beat Jaguars |
| I'm pretty confident the Packers are going to beat the Jaguars on Sunday, but I'm not sure if I'm $99,000 confident, which is what one gambler has bet on the game. At some point this week, a bettor walked into a William Hill sports book in Nevada and dropped $99,000 on the Packers money line of -1000. |
| If the Packers beat the Jaguars, that means our bettor will walk away with a nice profit of $9,000. On the other hand, if the Jaguars somehow pull off the upset, our bettor will be out $99,000. This bet might seem crazy, but I actually like it and if I had $99,000 and knew that my wife wouldn't divorce me for betting it all on a football game, I'd probably do the same thing. It seems like an easy way to make a quick 9.1% profit on your money. |
| As I mentioned Tuesday, Packers (-13.5) over Jaguars is my lock of the week and a lot of that has to do with the fact that the Jaguars are 0-10 straight-up and 0-9-1 against the spread in their past 10 games where the kickoff temperature was 55 degrees or below, and it's going to be waaay below that on Sunday. The current forecast at Lambeau Field is calling for 38 degrees and rain when the game kicks off. |
| I'm not dropping $99,000 on Green Bay, but I am going to make the Packers a part of my own personal best bet for the week. As I noted Tuesday, my betting plan for Week 10 is to parlay the Ravens (-7) point spread (-110) with the Packers money line (-1000) which will give me odds of +110 (Bet $100 to win $110). The good news for me is that if the Jaguars somehow manage to win, at least I'll go down knowing that I didn't lose $99,000. |
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| 7. The Kicker! |
| I'm not saying the Titans had the most disastrous special teams performance of all-time on Thursday, but the Titans might have had the most disastrous special teams performance of all-time on Thursday, which I predicted might happen in Thursday's newsletter. |
| The weirdest part about the entire thing is the guy who punted for the Titans in Week 9 (Ryan Allen) somehow got benched for Thursday's game even though he was the best punter in the NFL last week. With Allen inactive for the Colts game, the Titans decided to roll with a punter (Trevor Daniel) who hadn't played in a single game all year, and I'm guessing you already know how that went: His 2020 debut was a total disaster. |
| If you want to see his shanked 17-yard punt, which was the shortest punt in the NFL this year, please click here. If you want to see the Colts block one of his punts and return it for a touchdown, please click here. |
| On a happier note, Colts kicker Rodrigo Blankenship came through with more than 6.5 points in the game, just like I promised he would to hit his prop. Based on what I wrote Thursday, I think this means I have to spend my winnings from that prop on rec specs. I guess this means I know what I'll be doing with my weekend. See you guys Monday and remember to not leave your house today! |
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