NFL Week 17 & Wild Card Weekend!

Spring & The Prince Get Ready For The Play Offs!

Last weekend couldn’t have gone much better for me! Well, yeah it could have. I would have liked to see the Saints win, but it appears Evils Panthers figured out how to play football. How’d that happen? Nothing was as wonderful as my Redskins taking down Dallas on Sunday night! Yeah baby! It’s the best rivalry in all of football if you ask me. I’d say second to that is Minnesota and Green Bay. But it’s a distant second.

All in all, it was still a great weekend with 12 winner picks vs 4 losses. That’s a 75% win rating for the week! I can live with that. And with 144 wins on the regular season, with the 1 tie included for 145; my win rating for the season so far is 65%. In full disclosure the Prince and I didn’t make picks for the first 2 weeks (that’s an additional 32 games we’re not counting here).

Though there were some surprises. Like how did Atlanta lose to Tampa Bay? My only guess is they didn’t play their starters since they’re already in the playoffs. I hate when teams do that. I can understand it, but I still don’t like it.

I had a feeling Cincinnati and Baltimore was going to be a toss up game. I do wish our neighbors to the north would have played better and taken that game. It was well fought out though. And then there’s Green Bay at Minnesota; another nail biter. But they’ll be able to resolve their differences this weekend in reverse of course. Minnesota at Green Bay for wild card weekend. Wonder how many times that’s happened?

The Prince finished his regular season picks about normal, which is to say the 9 year old was around 50% in his picks. In this case “around” means less than as he finished the week with a 43% win ratio. For the regular season he posts a 46% win rating. Now that may not sound great, but I compared that number to some “professional” prognosticators and he’s better than some of those guys. So I don’t think the kid has done to badly.

He’s sticking with his method of picking. I’m not sure when he’ll change that pattern, but as long as he’s having fun I can live with that too.

So here’s how our final regular season weekend panned out.

Week 17
SUN, DEC 30 Spring’s Picks Results Prince’s Picks Results Game Results
Tampa Bay at Atlanta Atlanta L Tampa Bay W 22 – 17
NY Jets at Buffalo Buffalo W NY Jets L 9 – 28
Baltimore at Cincinnati Baltimore L Baltimore L 17 – 23
Chicago at Detroit Chicago W Detroit L 26 – 24
Jacksonville at Tennessee Tennessee W Tennessee W 20 – 38
Houston at Indianapolis Indianapolis W Houston L 16 – 28
Carolina at New Orleans New Orleans L New Orleans L 44 – 38
Philadelphia at NY Giants NY Giants W Philadelphia L 7 – 42
Cleveland at Pittsburgh Pittsburgh W Pittsburgh W 10 – 24
Oakland at San Diego San Diego W Oakland L 21 – 24
Miami at New England New England W New England W 0 – 28
Arizona at San Francisco San Francisco W San Francisco W 13 – 27
St. Louis at Seattle Seattle W Seattle W 13 – 20
Kansas City at Denver Denver W Kansas City L 3 – 38
Green Bay at Minnesota Green Bay L Minnesota W 34 – 37
Dallas at Washington Washington W Washington L 18 – 28

Results: W = 12 / L = 4   of 16
Season: W = 144 / L = 79 / T = 1   of 224
{Didn’t make picks in Wks 1 &2 – Total: 32 Games = 256)

Results: W = 7 / L = 9   of 16
Season: W = 102 / L = 121 / T = 1   of 224
{Didn’t make picks in Wks 1 &2 – Total: 32 Games = 256)

 

Wild Card Weekend

But enough of the season that was. Let’s talk about Wild Card Playoffs!

Saturday begins in Houston at 4pm eastern. Houston hasn’t been playing well here at the end of the season and I don’t think that’s because they’ve been resting players. I think it’s because they’re beat up and they’ve lost focus. This to me is the big toss of game of the weekend, but I’m going with Cincinnati. I think they’re pretty evenly matched overall; but I’m giving the edge to the Bengals.

Last weeks rematch Minnesota at Green Bay. The Vikings pulled off the win at home last Sunday, but I don’t think they can carry that effort forward to Lambeau Field.

The Colts showed the Texans they came to play and win on Sunday and I think they’ll do it again this weekend. It would be a nice day to see Tony Stewart‘s team and my Team (and DaleJr‘s team) win on the same day. So let’s go Colts! And a bigger let’s go Skins!

With the late breaking news, I’ve changed my pick for the Colts v Ravens. Both teams will be playing with some deep emotions today. Ray Lewis (who I Love!) announced his retirement. But the Colts offensive coordinator Bruce Arians was taken to the hospital this morning before the team left their hotel. Both sides have something big to play for. But I’m going to go with Baltimore now, emotion doesn’t call plays and without Coach Arians; I’m not sure Indianapolis will have the better game.

Wild Card Weekend
Sat Jan 5
Game Spring’s Picks Prince’s Picks
Cincinnati at Houston Cincinnati  Houston
Minnesota at Green Bay Green Bay  Minnesota
Sun Jan 6
Indianapolis at Baltimore Baltimore  Baltimore
Seattle at Washington Washington  Washington

.© This material is the intellectual property of Author Springwolf
© 2012-2013 Evilwordsmith.com. All Rights Reserved. Springwolf, D.D., Ph.D.