Playoff Picks, Conference Title Games, 2017

Regardless of whether you think this is the best quartet of quarterbacks to ever reach the final four, you know it's at least pretty close. Three of the teams possess passers with at least one Super Bowl ring, and the other has the likely MVP playing his best football right now. That's exciting! And these games should be too.

Record last week: 3-1
Against the spread: 3-1

Record for the playoffs: 5-3
Against the spread: 4-4

Green Bay Packers at Atlanta Falcons, 3:05 p.m. (Spread: Falcons favored by 5.5) 
When these teams played in the Georgia Dome earlier this year, it was a shootout won by the Falcons, 33-32. A few things have changed since that game, notably the Packers' injury woes have gotten worse and the Falcons have lost their best cornerback. But another thing has changed too, and that is DNA tests have proven conclusively that Aaron Rodgers is not from this planet.

Even with injuries to Davonte Adams and Jordy Nelson sure to limit his top two receivers, Rodgers looks capable of completing passes to YOUR MOM if he needs to right now. Yes, no matter what the Falcons do with their marginally improved defense - and I emphasize marginally - the Packers are going to put up points.

And so are the Falcons. The Packers' defense isn't exactly shutting good offenses down right now, and their secondary is severely hindered by several key injuries. These are two top-five offenses playing against bottom-third defenses in a domed stadium with fast turf, and the scoreboard is going to reflect that.

If I had to pick one defense I trust more, it's Green Bay. The Packers do a few good things well on defense that could matter in a close playoff game, such as holding steady against big running plays.

But you're kidding yourself if you think this game isn't coming down to Aaron Rodgers vs. Matt Ryan, with the score in the high 30s, two minutes left and one of them driving down to bring his team to the Super Bowl. The experts are picking the Falcons more than I expected considering how much the world has fallen in love with the alternative game of "football" Rodgers is playing right now, and going against the experts is good enough for me. Pick: Packers +5.5. Final Score: Packers 36, Falcons 34

Pittsburgh Steelers at New England Patriots, 6:40 p.m. (Spread: Pats favored by 6)
On paper, this game could be very similar to the NFC one. Two great quarterbacks, throwing the ball exquisitely against two defenses that, while they had their moments, faced relatively easy slates of offenses and don't always make stops when they need to.

But I don't think that's what's going to happen. I believe both teams are going to try and control the clock, Pittsburgh with Le'Veon Bell and New England with the short passing and cavalcade of running backs they  use. These are experienced coaches, with playoff backgrounds, and I could see each settling into the mindset that it's going to be 23-20 and there's no alternative.

So who wins? I think this comes down to the one thing that always matters when you're trying to beat the Patriots, and that is "Can the Steelers hit Tom Brady?" The Pats are good at protecting him, and while the Steelers are just outside the top 10 when it comes to hitting the quarterback, they've really upped the amount of blitzes they bring since the teams played earlier this year (I found that stat in this comprehensive Football Outsiders preview of the game.) I don't suggest the Steelers blitz Brady with every defender they have, because you can't beat him that way. He will slay you. BUT Pittsburgh is No. 4 in the league since week 8 in getting pressure on the quarterback bringing just one extra pass rusher, and they're going to have to do that here and it's going to have to work.

I've seen Brady in those situations, and usually you know early on. He can't find his first two receivers, he looks indecisive, he pump fakes a few times in one motion, and then he is hurried into a throw he only sort of wanted.  If this happens a few times on the first few series, we'll know it's up to the Pats to make some adjustments.

But I've seen New England make adjustments. They're like well-coached and stuff. I sense that they will make those fixes and stabilize the game. Throw in that the Pats do all the cool little playoff things that you want to do such as pick up first downs on third-and-short (something the Steelers are bad at stopping), and I'll take my chances with the Pats in a three-point game. The Steelers might cover, but that's not the same as winning in New England with a Super Bowl berth on the line. Pick: Steelers +6. Final Score: Pats 26, Steelers 23

Playoff Picks, Divisional Round, 2016-17

I went against some very strong postseason gambling laws last week and I paid for it. I took a rookie quarterback on the road (making his first career start no less!), went with a Detroit team to cover the spread despite having no confidence they could actually win and acted like an absolute homer for the Giants without factoring in Aaron Rodgers' routine hail mary passes that somehow end up as touchdowns. 

Some other things that I had no control over went against me, too. All four home teams won and covered the spread, which I don't think has happened since gambling became legal. Oh wait, gambling isn't legal.

Hopefully, I'm smarter now. And hopefully, the games are more competitive than they were last week. As always, the spreads are from Sportsbook.ag.

Record last week: 2-2
Against the spread: 1-3

Saturday

Seattle Seahawks at Atlanta Falcons, 4:35 p.m. (Spread: Falcons favored by 5.5)
When these teams played earlier this season, the Seahawks dominated the first half and Atlanta dominated the second half. The Falcons had a great chance to win the game at the end, but Richard Sherman committed a clutch, game-clinching pass interference penalty against Julio Jones that the refs somehow didn't call.

What may have gone overlooked in that game, though, was the Seahawks hit Falcons' quarterback Matt Ryan 13 times. Looking at these teams, in fact, that's something we should expect to continue. Seattle is sixth-best in the league at hitting the quarterback, and Atlanta allows the QB to get hit more than 16% of the time he drops back, which is in the bottom third in the league. While Ryan has said the hits don't bother him, he needs time to do what he does best, which is create explosive pass plays. Atlanta's No. 1 in the league at big pass plays, and Seattle's defense is the ninth worst at defending such plays. If you want a stat that shows how important safety Earl Thomas was to this defense, here it is: The Seahawks were EIGHTH BEST in the league against long pass plays before Thomas's season ended with a broken leg in week 13 and have fallen ALL THE WAY to 24th.

When the Seahawks have the ball, I expect they'll try to do exactly what they did to the Lions last week, which is run the football with Thomas Rawls against a weak run defense. They also should have another week of decent pass protection, because Atlanta's pass rush doesn't have the firepower to exploit Seattle's weak offensive line. Like Detroit, in fact, the Falcons are weak in many defensive categories, including stopping teams on early downs, stopping the run and preventing touchdowns in the red zone. 

So with those things in mind, I see this game going one of two ways: Either the Falcons do a decent job of protecting Ryan and hit for many big plays and the game is a shootout, or Seattle controls the clock and the ball for 35 minutes, punches in a few touchdowns, and the game stays in the low- to mid-20s. I don't believe in the Matt Ryan playoff failure narrative, I just think the Falcons have never surrounded him with the defense or running game to be a Super Bowl team. This year, Atlanta's offense is one of the best in the history of the league but I still think they're a few players short on defense. It will show this week. Atlanta might win this game, but I think those defensive weaknesses will get exploited at some point, and that's why I'm picking against them. Pick: Seahawks +5.5. Final Score: Sea 24, Atl 23

Houston Texans at New England Patriots, 8:15 p.m. (Spread: Pats favored by 16 - SIXTEEN!!!)
Don't overthink it Joe. It's the Patriots and Tom Brady hosting the Texans and Brock Osweiler. It doesn't matter how high the point spread is, you know what you need to do. JOE! Don't look for a stat or storyline that makes you even THINK about picking the Texans. The Texans have the fifth-best pass defense in the league according to Football Outsiders? JOE. It's BROCK OSWEILER AGAINST BELICHICK AND BRADY. Houston's good at red zone defense? Texans' head coach Bill O'Brien is a Belichick disciple and knows all his tricks? The Pats are the second-worst team in football in terms of how frequently they hit the quarterback? JOE. Shut up. Stop looking at the numbers. STOP IT. I'm glad we had this talk. Pick: Pats -16. Final Score: Pats 34, Hou 3

Sunday

Green Bay Packers at Dallas Cowboys, 4:40 p.m.  (Spread: Cowboys favored by 5.5)

Let's get one thing out of the way first. I'm not betting against Aaron Rodgers in this game. Sure, the Packers might lose by seven, but actually putting money on anything more than 3 points the way he's playing right now is too much.

Now that we've got that cleared up, let's try to figure out together who's going to win the game. Dallas's defense has sneakily become somewhat respectable: Middle of the pack against the pass and top 10 against the run, against an average slate of offenses. They don't get beat on big pass plays, for the most part, which is surprising considering they aren't that good at getting hits on the quarterback. That whole not hitting the quarterback thing is a big thing, though. Aaron Rodgers is good as it is at buying more time, so not getting any pressure on him is a pretty risky proposition. Green Bay would be well-advised to use Ty Montgomery and other running backs in the passing game this week, because Dallas is excellent at covering tight ends. I think those outlet receivers could play a major role in the game.

What about Dallas's offense and their adorable rookie tandem of Dak Prescott and Ezekiel Elliott? Well, they've been good at football. And they have a good offensive line, as you may've heard (although they've been uneven at times in pass protection and actually finished SECOND best in the league behind the Titans, according to ProFootballFocus). I think the game's going to have a decent chunk of scoring, but I believe the beginning is going to be crucial. Early rust from Prescott, a remnant of the bye week, could result in an early Packers' lead. I don't really love rookie quarterbacks playing from behind in their first playoff game. Especially when the opponent is possibly the greatest quarterback I've ever seen. I believe Dallas peaked earlier this season and the Packers are peaking right now, and we're going to get the outright upset from Green Bay in this game. But it's going to be a classic! Pick: Packers +5.5. Final Score: GB 28, Dal 24

Pittsburgh Steelers at Kansas City Chiefs, 8:20 p.m. (Spread: Chiefs favored by 1)
The fact that this game's been moved to Sunday night because of weather issues actually favors the Steelers, or so I thought. They're the more explosive offense, so anything that levels the playing field (both literally and athletically) would favor the Chiefs. Or so I thought. These teams are actually very even in terms of both explosive running plays and explosive passing plays. Both are decent at defending the big pass, and not so great at defending the big run.

Why am I so obsessed with explosive plays? Because these teams are so even! The Pittsburgh blowout earlier this year notwithstanding, the Chiefs and the Steelers play big boy football. So what I think separates them will be a few big plays here or there, by Tyreek Hill or Antonio Brown. Just as Atlanta's lack of pass rush will hurt them against Seattle, I think Kansas City's lack of pass rush will hurt them against the Steelers. Unless of course Justin Houston looks healthy, which could make a difference. In general, anything that gives Ben Roethlisberger more time to find a receiver downfield is frightening.

Two other things that might make the difference in this game? Red zone play! Both teams are awesome at stopping red zone touchdowns, but the Chiefs are one of the worst teams in the league at scoring inside the 20.

This one can go either way, but when you have to pick one of them, it's just the smarter thing to do to pick the one with a better history of playoff success and fewer weaknesses. So it's Pittsburgh. Pick: Steelers +1. Final Score: Pit 27, KC 19

Playoff Picks, Wild Card Weekend, 2016-17

As a degenerate gambler, Wild Card weekend is always one of my most exciting weekends of the year. It seems to always start with one or two shaky quarterbacks playing against one another, daring you to bet on or against them. This year is no different. The other three games include at least one Super Bowl winning quarterback, and in two instances, those guys are playing against passers who've never even won a playoff game.

The macro factors surrounding Wild Card weekend are these: 1) At least one road team always wins (last year, all four road teams won). 2) The truly shaky quarterbacks don't even wait until the second quarter to shit the bed (Brian Hoyer last year). 3) Something funky always happens in the Saturday night game (the Bengals/Steelers slugfest last year certainly qualifies).

The last time I posted here, I very accurately predicted what would happen in the Super Bowl, although I sucked against the point spread for the entire playoff season. That's not going to happen again this year.

So here we go. As always, the spreads are from Sportsbook.ag.

Record last year: 8-3
Against the spread: 4-7

Saturday

Oakland Raiders at Houston Texans, 4:35 p.m. (Spread: Texans favored by 4)
Toward the end of the 2016 season, I got even more excited than usual for this weekend as it became clear that I would have the opportunity to bet against either Brock Osweiler or Tom Savage in an actual playoff tackle football game. Then, Raiders left tackle Donald Penn missed his first block of the year, leading to a shattered ankle for Derek Carr, a freefall from the No. 2 seed to the No. 5 seed for Oakland and something called Connor Cook starting today in Houston. I'm a stats guy, but the stats mean very little in this game now that Carr's out. In fact, the one bet I really wanted to make on this game was the over in total punts, but Vegas is smart enough to not even be offering that bet right now because that number CANNOT high enough.

At first, I thought the way to look at this game was to throw out the quarterbacks. We have a known terrible quantity in grossly overpaid turnover machine Brock Osweiler for Houston, and an unknown-but-probably-terrible quantity in the young Mr. Cook for the Raiders. Houston has one of the best pass rushes in the league, and while Oakland's offensive line is great, it's going to be without Penn. That hurts. The only thing worse than a young quarterback making his first pro start OF ANY KIND in the playoffs is a young quarterback making his first pro start OF ANY KIND in the playoffs against a good pass rush. You would think that's too much to overcome, unless Osweiler is completely awful.

That's the thing, though. I DO think Osweiler is going to be awful and that this game is going to feature some laughably inept offense. I wouldn't be surprised if it turns on a defensive touchdown by Houston to salvage the game. All of that said, the four-point spread in favor of Brock Osweiler is too high, even if YOUR MOM is quarterbacking the other team. I'm picking the Raiders to cover, and I'm hearing weird things that the Raiders actually have confidence in Cook so I'll pick them to win, too. It seems like a three-point game either way. Pick: Raiders +4. Final Score: Oak 20, Hou 17

Detroit Lions at Seattle Seahawks, 8:15 p.m. (Spread: Seahawks favored by 9)
Can you forget everything you know about the Pete Carroll Seahawks, please? This isn't the same team that went to the Super Bowl two of the past three seasons. That's not to say they're bad, but they don't have Earl Thomas at safety right now and that's made a very good defense merely good. While we're here, can you also delete the narrative from your head that the Detroit Lions are in a freefall? They've lost three straight games, yes, but against Dallas, the Giants and Green Bay, three of the best teams in the NFL. Detroit, for the most part, is a team that plays close games. The Lions' defense isn't very good, and in fact it's last in the league in two of my favorite categories; 1) early down efficiency (stopping teams from getting 50% of the yardage needed on first down and 60% of what they need on 2nd down) and 2) stopping teams on 3rd-down-and-2 or less. The problem for the Seahawks' offense is, they're not too good in those categories either.

Seattle had a pretty good season on defense playing one of the easier slates of offenses, and on offense, they've had such a problem protecting Russell Wilson that he's been banged up all year and hasn't been able to run as much. They haven't been able to run the ball in a conventional way, either, but that's sort of okay considering Detroit can't stop the run. I think Seattle's going to come in with a game plan of really wanting to run Thomas Rawls a lot, and pop a few big plays in the passing game once Detroit commits more resources to stopping the run. However, I also think Detroit will make plays in the game, and stay within one or two scores. Count on both teams having trouble in the red zone, making for a bit of a lower scoring game than the 44.5 over/under total suggests. However, covering the point spread is one thing. Do you want to put money on Matthew Stafford and the Lions winning outright against Russell Wilson and Seattle at CenturyLink Field? Yeah, me either. Pick: Lions +9. Final Score: Sea 23, Det 16

Miami Dolphins at Pittsburgh Steelers, 1:05 p.m. (Spread: Steelers favored by 10.5)
One of Miami's big problems on offense is not succeeding on early downs, meaning third downs are a lot longer than they should be. One of Pittsburgh's best characteristics on defense is that IT DOES succeed on those early downs. That might sound like a small thing, but when your quarterback is Matt Moore (or even Ryan Tannehill, who's not that much better than Moore), and you're playing in Pittsburgh, third down and long is not a recipe for success. It's a recipe for screaming fans, false start penalties and turnovers.

The Dolphins beat the Steelers earlier this year, and they beat them pretty convincingly. And there is a recipe for Miami to win this game. It's for Jay Ajayi to bust out a few long runs en route to a 150+ yard day, and that's entirely possible. Miami was 6th best in the league at busting long runs, and Pittsburgh was 21st best at stopping them. You saw that first hand in the earlier matchup between the teams. Miami's also very good at covering No. 1 and No. 2 wideouts, meaning Ben Roethlisberger might need to find targets not named Antonio Brown every now and then.

But this is the first time Roethlisberger, Brown and Le'Veon Bell will ever play a playoff game together. I wouldn't be able to go to sleep at night knowing I bet against that. Pick: Steelers -10.5. Final Score: Pit 34, Mia 21

New York Giants at Green Bay Packers, 4:40 p.m. (Spread: Packers favored by 5)
Here we go again. It's hard for me to be unbiased about the Giants, but I'll try. Their defense is among the best in the league according to the advanced metrics, and it passes the eye test too. The G-Men are fourth against the pass, third against the run, No. 2 on keeping teams off schedule on first- and second- down, No. 3 at stopping explosive runs, No. 1 at defending the red zone, and sixth-best in the league at getting pressure on the quarterback (that last stat is according to Sports Info Solutions). All of that while playing the fifth-toughest set of offenses in the league. Even the first time the Giants played in Green Bay this year, they picked off Aaron Rodgers twice and held him to barely above 50% in completion percentage in a seven-point loss.

But it's Aaron Rodgers. A red-hot Aaron Rodgers. An Aaron Rodgers who said his 4-6 team could run the table and then promptly willed them into doing it, all while throwing 17 touchdowns and zero interceptions. The Giants might frustrate Rodgers, but he's going to make some plays, probably using his tight ends more than usual against a Giants' defense that is great against all types of receivers except tight ends. Plus, the Giants give up some big pass plays. Rodgers probably won't get much help from the running game, as the Giants have been great against the run and Green Bay's Eddie Lacy - who ran reasonably well in the first game - is out.

So this game comes down to the Giants' offense, most notably the struggling Eli Manning. He's been a bit off all year, both by the numbers and the eye test. Part of it is he doesn't seem to have as much time to hold the ball. This has happened before, and Eli's turned it on in January and February, but he's 36 now. Maybe he can't. The thing about this game is, he only sort of has to. He doesn't have to put the Giants on his back, he just needs to play better than he has in the last six weeks. The Green Bay defense doesn't hit the quarterback a lot, isn't great against the pass and has a lot of injuries in its secondary. If Eli can make a few plays and limit his turnovers to one, the game is going to be a toss-up. And you know what happens when Giants' playoff games in Green Bay are toss-ups. Pick: Giants +5. Final Score: NYG 19, GB 17