ESPN Boston picks for Pats-Colts...

Jackson 2 said:

I honestly never never heard of any of those guys.

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There the fantasy dorks at NFL (I don't do fantasy, BTW. Just watch the Podcast snippets occasionally). Rosenthal's a Patriots guy.

Froob said:

It's not that crazy to pick Indy to win. They're a really good team especially at home.

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Froob said:

It's not that crazy to pick Indy to win. They're a really good team especially at home.

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Plus the Pats struggle on the road...but I think that changes tonight

I believe the Pats will win but given their track record on the road the last few years and this year to date an Indy pick isn't over the top. They had a stat on sports radio that the Pats coming out of the bye the past 6 years are 0-5-1 vs the spread and 4-2 overall. I don't remember the numbers but the offense in particular struggles to get going and lack continuity in the first half after a bye. Getting off to a good start and making the Indy offense one dimensional is pretty key so I hope their timing isn't off.

Footballoutsiders has a write-up on the game. Unfortunately they tasked probably their two worst contributors (Kacsmar is a Manning honk who goes to extreme measures to discredit Brady and NE) so it is mostly full of mild misinformation and things that are common knowledge. They spend a bunch of time talking about how similar NE and Indy are across the board, which is interesting enough, but never once mention how much NE has improved of late.

When referencing Luck's improved play this year they say:

So the Patriots are not facing the same quarterback they picked off four times in the rain last January. The Patriots are facing a quarterback who takes markedly fewer sacks than he did in his first two years, down to 3.4 percent of dropbacks from 5.3 percent and 6.1 percent his first two years.

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But fail to mention that this is a substantially better secondary than Luck has faced. Oddly enough, not only do they neglect to say this, they insinuate that nothing has changed with this comment:

Over the last three years, the Patriots have been relatively bad on defense, but good at forcing interceptions on downfield throws.

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Not quite what I was hoping for when I clicked the link, but there are a few decent nuggets.

The Patriots have forced a below-average number of interceptions when the pass travels 15 yards or less, but the most interceptions in the NFL (and the fifth-highest rate) on passes traveling more than 15 yards.

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That is pretty interesting. Considering how poor the LB coverage has been for a few years, it isn't a surprise that shorter passes aren't picked much, but that they've been able to coddle such a high pick rate on longer throws with the DB quality of late is a testament to the coaching. There is also this:

Sometimes, splits happen. That's true at least to some extent here, as the Patriots are 6-1 on the road since 2009 against teams that finished the season at 8-8. They finished ranked first in overall road DVOA in 2010, 2011, and 2012, too, which makes sense given that their road losses have often been very close.

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This is, of course, regarding NE's lousy win/loss record on the road against good teams. Sheds a different light on things, particularly the fact that DVOA considered them the best road team in the league for three of the overlapping years.

NFL Gameday - Faulk and Sapp pick the colts. Warner,Irvin and Mooch Pick the pats.
Then they debated who is the best team in the AFC, everyone picked the pats except the pats because Denver's 'Quality of losses' - vs Seattle and Denver is better than NE's and we have seen this before last year too and Denver are the defending AFC champions.

Over/under 2 TDS for gronk?

SVN said:

NFL Gameday - Faulk and Sapp pick the colts. Warner,Irvin and Mooch Pick the pats.
Then they debated who is the best team in the AFC, everyone picked the pats except the pats because Denver's 'Quality of losses' - vs Seattle and Denver is better than NE's and we have seen this before last year too and Denver are the defending AFC champions.

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Before they even made their selections, I told my daughter who Irvin, Sapp and whiner would choose.

hard to beat good teams on the road.
idk.....hoping for a fast start. gotta play from ahead!

Gronkowski123 said:

hard to beat good teams on the road.
idk.....hoping for a fast start. gotta play from ahead!

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Agree. More pressure is on colts in this game IMO. But if pats lose they go from #1 to #3...so also a big game for them standings wise comes playoffs

Bradshaw on Fox picked the Colts tonight and said Miami "easily" wins the east

Here's a website with alotta the pix in one place each week...56% pick the Pats over Indy this week: http://nflpickwatch.com/

Brady_to_Moss said:

Agree. More pressure is on colts in this game IMO. But if pats lose they go from #1 to #3...so also a big game for them standings wise comes playoffs

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It is a a week to week thing but for our schedule , every game has the potential for going fro #1 to #3. We could win today and lose in lambeau and SD and be back to #3. Indy and Denver have really easy schedules down the stretch compared to us.