NFL Picks, Week 13: I Am The Champion, My Friends

Well, Tools, it's finally happened -- my picks have BROKEN THE .500 BARRIER. That may not sound impressive to you, but it's a better record than the World Wide Lemur's Leading Masstermind. And just like it says on Frank Sinatra's grave, the best is yet to come!

This week's picks, of course, have to come early, thanks to the NFL's need to put the week's most-anticipated game on a cable channel that no one gets. What a PR disaster. Oh, wait, I forgot -- the NFL has no PR disasters. Players are killed, teams run up scores, half of the teams have quarterbacks that you should not watch without getting community service credit... but the league has never been better! Quick, let's complain about MLB salary inequity and the fact that NBA players have lots of kids out of wedlock!

Anyway... no time to be bitter. Or to think. Don't you just love football on every day of the week? YOU WILL!

On to the picks!

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Green Bay as a 7-point dog in DALLAS. The Cowboys blow people out, but with both teams having QBs that turn the ball over, I think the Pack covers the spread. They've also had a crazy amount of good luck this year, so it's hard to see that going away in a hurry. Finally, though the Pack don't run the ball well, the Cowboys also don't cover that great... so it's all coming down as too close for the spread. Tough call, though.

MIAMI covering as a 1-point favorite against the New York Jets. By the numbers (points for, points against), the Dolphins might actually be a better team than the Jets, and their defense has looked like an NFL team the last few weeks. John Beck has to look better at home against a bad team, as opposed to being in Pittsburgh and Philadelphia, and the Dolphins special teams have also shown a pulse recently. Add it up, and I think the Dolphins cheat history and finally get a win.

MINNESOTA covering 3.5 against Detroit. The Thanksgiving game against the Packers may have been the levy break for these Lions, who will have another week where they get absolutely nothing on the ground and have QB John Kitna get smacked around because of it. Meanwhile, the Vikes have had flashes of competence at WR, which should continue against a bad Lions secondary, and the Vikings should really be able to run the ball here, too. Neither of these teams should go to the playoffs, and neither will.

PHILADELPHIA covering 3 against Seattle. The Sehawks were down early and often last week in St. Louis and Gus Frerotte -- yes, Gus Frerotte -- before they picked it up enough to get the win. Things will go worse for them against a suddenly frisky Eagles team that is coming off their best loss ever against the Patriots. There is also this: some of the worst losses in the Reid Era have been to the Seahawks. One suspects that this won't be forgotten about, and when it comes down to it, the Eagles simply need and want this one more than the Seahawks, who could probably win the NFC West with an 8-8 record.

TENNESSEE covering 4 against Houston. I finally saw some Houston football last weekend, and Owen Daniels has some potential -- I see him being another Todd Heap. Unfortunately, that's the 2007 Todd Heap, the face of my first fantasy team ever to miss the playoffs -- so he gets open, but drops the ball and/or fumbles it. This whole game will come down to whether or not Albert Haynesworth can make the start for the Titans; if he can, the Texans won't run the ball well enough to have a diversified offense, and the Titans can go back to being a good defensive team when that happens. If he's out, flush.

INDIANAPOLIS covering 6.5 against Jacksonville. The Jags are my hate team; I just don't think that they are that good, mostly because they play such a boring, low margin kind of style. On the fast track in Indy, against a Colts team that's starting to get healthy again and is better than they've shown recently, I think they get exposed a bit, and we can all stop talking about how David Garrard hasn't thrown a pick.

WASHINGTON covering 5.5 against Buffalo. This kind of emotion is hard to predict, but against a Bills team that stopped trying once the Patriots showed up, I can't see how the skidding 'Skins don't come out like gangbusters and lead by three emotional touchdowns at the break. Reality and loss will hit next week, when they get Chicago at home on a short week in a de facto elimination game, but this week will be all about honoring the memory of Sean Taylor with a win. Marshawn Lynch missing the game is also a big help.

San Diego covering 5.5 in KANSAS CITY. What to do with this Charger team? They remind me of the Seahawks, in that they are gutless frontrunners that should be better than they are, and would probably benefit greatly from a coach change. This week, they are in Kansas City against a Chiefs team that gave up the first road division win for the Raiders since the 1970s (OK, not really, but close). After the Broncos punted the win against the Bears away to Devin Hester last week, the Chargers have to put together a little run to convince people to bet them in the playoffs, right? The False Confidence Norv Drive Starts Now!

San Francisco as a 3-point dog in CAROLINA. What loathsome household task would you rather perform than watch this game? I'd go with cleaning the gutters, or maybe painting the drywall; you'd have more thrills. The Niners come off a Houdini win in Arizona, while the Panthers come off their latest stink bomb against the Saints. If David Carr is involved, you have to go the other way. If Trent Dilfer is involved, you have to... give the ball to the suddenly on the radar Frank Gore, and hope that the Niners pass rush makes a few plays. Or go work on putting plastic on your old windows for the winter.

ST. LOUIS (pick 'em) against Atlanta. Is anyone going to this game? Is anyone, other than the degenerate gambler and desperate fantasy player, in any way interested? Both teams have quit, both teams have coaches that need to be euthanized rather than fired, and both teams are probably better than their rec... no, actually, they are just that bad. I, um, like the Cardinals if Marc Bulger can play, just so that he can rack up big after-the-fact numbers for my DOA fantasy team. As for the Falcons, anyone that can write more than 100 words about them at this point in the season may be related to one of the players.

Cleveland in a pick'em against ARIZONA. This might actually be the most fun game to watch in the NFL this week, just because neither team can stop the pass, both teams are prone to wild plays, and the WRs are just off the hook. I think we're going to see 900 yards of offense and 70 points in this game with 10 sacks and 5 turnovers, and as Cleveland is destiny's darling and the Cardinals are the Cardinals... the Browns pull off the win in the last minute. Good times.

Denver covering 3.5 points in OAKLAND. For two straight years while living in the Bay Area, I received free Raiders tickets. Both years, it was the Broncos. Both years, the road team handed the ball to their RB (Portis one year, Reuben Droughns the next) until he got to 200 yards. Both years, a cold drizzle turned into a cold rain, with the field deteriorating, the crowd starting ugly and getting uglier, and me leaving in the third quarter. This year? More of the same, though maybe with a little more from Jay Cutler and a little less from the RBs.

Tampa Bay aas a 3-point dog in NEW ORLEANS. This is the Bucs' chance to seize this bad division by the throat, and maybe even dream of a top 2 seed in the event of a collapse from the Cowboys-Packers loser. I'd like their chances more if Jeff Garcia was completely healthy, but I think he'll be good enough by Sunday to take advantge of a Saints team that can't avoid turnovers or stop Graham and Galloway. And as improbable as that Tampa #2 seed sounds, remember, it's just the Eagles being able to catch a punt in Week 1 from being a heck of a lot closer to reality...

CHICAGO as a 1.5 point underdog to the New York Giants. That Giants' second-half collapse really crept up on me this year, I have to admit, but now that it's here, at what point does Tom Coughlin through Eli Manning under the bus? From watching last week's freakout against the Vikings, you can say this for definite and forever for Fredo Manning; if he starts the game badly, there's no coming back from it. The Giants would have been better off telling the world he got hurt in the second quarter, putting in Hefty Lefty Jared Lorenzon, and handing the ball off to Ward and Droughns for 40 times, then seeing if Tavaris Jackson would throw a pick or two for them. Instead, they lost a home game where the opposing QB threw 13 - 13! - passes... and now they have to to Chicago and face a Bears team that is licking its chops at no longer having Fat Ced "Three Yards and a Cloud Of Lard" Benson clogging things up. So long as the Bears don't let Sexy Rexy face extreme pressure, I like their chances for the, um, upset. There is also this: Plex Burress is looking more and more hurt every week, and really isn't helping the team now.

PITTSBURGH covering 7 against Cincinnati. Will the Steelers' field consist of actual grass this week? Will Willie Parker finally take advantage of another cushy matchup against a terrible defense (he's got over 1000 yards this year with his whopping two touchdowns, all of it against defense that rank in the bottom five of the league) to give his fantasy owners more than a cheap payday? And will the Bengals continue to throw the ball all over the lot and rack up big yards to help cover for their boom-or-break defense? Yes, yes and no, respectively, as the Steelers finally wake up from their two-week coma of playing down to terrible opponents in advance of their showdown with the Patriots. The big key to the game for the Steelers is Santonio Holmes, who should be back in action. The Steelers also have this to worry about: if they want to win their division against those surprising Browns, they can't lose this game. The schedule gets a lot tougher after this.

New England covering 20.5 -- no, 23.5 -- against BALTIMORE. If the Ravens can convince Todd Heap that he's not fat and ugly and hideous and that he should come out of his room and put down the Haagen Dazs... they'd have the kind of middle-field weapon that the Eagles used to great effect last week. Kyle Boller is a little like Jay Feeley, in that he'll be playing this game with no expectations and does have some talent. The Ravens have some serious athletes on the defensive side of the ball, and a good home crowd. New England comes in a little banged up for once, and with some doubts about their ability to run the ball... and none of that will matter that much, because Willis McGahee is not Brian Westbrook, and the ugly truth of the Ravens this year is that they really aren't that good against the pass any more (witness the 21-3 loss at home against the Bengals, which would have been a lot worse with any kind of red zone competence, as the 21 came from 7 field goals). Here comes that Bestus Team Ever talk again.

Last week 10-6
Year to date: 83-82-11 (OVER .500 WITH A VENGEANCE -- 13 games over .500 in the last 5 weeks)