LOUIS Ross (@LouisRoss67) lines up his Week 13 NFL picks for us.
San Francisco 49ers @ Chicago Bears | Sunday 18:00
Something different this week. More games, shorter write ups and more picks.
The dreadful San Francisco 49ers visit the woeful Chicago Bears. A candidate for prime time Sunday Night Football, this is not. John Fox was supposed to come into Chicago and make it all better. After all, even the Cubs just won a championship. Surely it's time for the Bears. Nope.
To be fair to Fox, he has been hampered by injuries and losing Brandon Marshall and Matt Forte in his first two season did not help. Chicago is on its third quarterback of the season and Matt Barkley is his name.
He put a fairly reasonable showing in his first start last Sunday at home to the Titans in a game in which Chicago almost recovered a 20 point deficit.
Barkley does not have a great arm and if the 49ers are to be prevented from walking away with a rare win, it will rely on the ground game and Jordon Howard.
The young man has averaged 103 points yards per game in the last four weeks and is up against the worst rushing defence in the NFL. I will take on Paddy Power and say Howard goes over 88.5 yards on the ground.
Detroit Lions @ New Orleans Saints | Sunday 18:00
This is a classic NFL shootout. Two quarterbacks playing lights out really get now and two defences that cannot stop anything. You can't ever bet against the Saints at home with any confidence nor can you want to bet against Stafford right now.
It seems Detroit comes back to win late in the fourth quarter almost every week recently and all of the Lions games this season have been decided by seven points or less. All this without any kind of running game.
New Orleans are always so strong in the. Superdome and Brees seems superhuman in that environment. The Saints overcame a couple of early Jared Goff TDs last time out to eventually humiliate the Rams.
Whilst the secondary is porous, the front seven improves game to game. This should be exactly the kind of matchup the NFL wants and I can easily see something along the lines of 38-35 to New Orleans. I think the line here is a little low at 52 and we should be able to take advantage.
Buffalo Bills @ Oakland Raiders | Sunday 21:05
A really tricky game this and one I'm generally staying away from. However, I think I have found one valid betting angle. The key here could be the 26th ranked Oakland rushing defence.
The obvious play would be a bet we have taken once or twice already this season. Namely LeSean McCoy. We're going somewhere different though and a favourite bet of mine in recent weeks, quarterback rushing yards.
Tyrod Taylor's recent games have seen him rush for 68-35-48-43-39-35 yards. All against better units against the ground game. The return of Sammy Watkins should prevent Oakland stacking the box and Taylor should be able to exploit the opportunities that will certainly come his way. Over 40.5 yards is something for us to exploit with Bet365.
Tampa Bay Bucaneers @ San Diego Chargers | Sunday 21:25
Another game to look forward to. Week 12 was pretty epic, Week 13 has five or six fairly epic looking games and this is one of them. I think I'm going to back San Diego. I think. The Bucs always fool me. This year's Falcons on my betting accounts. Never seem to get them right.
I did not see Tampa beating either Kansas City or Seattle. They did both fairly convincingly. The power of Mike Evans, improvement of Jameis Winston and return of Doug Martin give them hope on the cross county trip to California.
Philip Rivers is having a very Philip Rivers season. Continued brilliance that will eventually see him end a career as possibly the best quarterback never to play in, let alone win a Super Bowl.
The Chargers have just never had a team good enough. To be fair, this is a very underrated franchise this season. Despite some devastating injuries on both sides of the ball, top defensive rookie Joey Bosa continues his improvement as does the entire defence, not least in (parts of) the secondary.
Melvin Gordon has had a breakout second season in the backfield and is currently on he sixth best running back in the NFL. He faces a rushing defence here that ranks 22nd giving up some 115 yards per game.
Paddy Power have set Gordon's rushing line at just 80.5 some 8 yards lower than their competitors and that is too low to ignore with Gordon having torched the Titans for 196 yards a fortnight ago.
With two powerful offences and two quarterbacks playing such great of football. I also like the points line here. This looks to have way over 48 points in it.
Best Bets
San Francisco 49ers @ Chicago Bears – Jordan Howard Over 88.5 Rushing Yards (5/6 Paddy Power)
Detroit Lions @ New Orleans Saints – Over 52 Points (10/11 Bet365)
Buffalo Bills @ Oakland Raiders – Tyrod Taylor Over 40.5 Rushing Yards (4/5 Bet365)
Tampa Bay Buccaneers @ San Diego Chargers – Melvin Gordon Over 80.5 Rushing Yards (5/6 Paddy Power)
Tampa Bay Buccaneers @ San Diego Chargers – Over 48 Points (10/11 Bet365)
