Yes, I know, late again. I wrote a bunch at the beginning of this week and I did realize that I hadn’t done this by Thursday night when the Dallas/Chicago game was on, and I still didn’t feel like writing this post so I didn’t. I also don’t really feel like making the commentary on all of the games like I usually do, so I thought I’d do something a little different. First of all, remember early this season when I was just posting the Packers.com infographics and talking only about the Packers game for that week? Yeah, I stopped doing that in favor of making my picks for the week and that’s when I decided to name this column “By The Numbers.” I don’t want to stop with this, but for the past couple of weeks I’ve felt less pressed to do it. I think the problem is that I usually have posts lined up for the week, and by the time Thursday rolls around, if I haven’t already made that week’s picks, I feel like I have until Sunday to get them out. Call me old fashioned, but I remember the days when there wasn’t Thursday night football, and I still am in that mode a bit. Most of the time I forget about football on Thursday unless my team is playing that day. Really, this whole season I haven’t watched many games outside of the Packers’ games, whereas in the past few years I watched multiple games every Sunday and always watched MNF as well. Anyway, since I’m late again, I’m just going to give you the Packers infographic, and then make my picks without commentary. This might be the format I’ll use for the rest of the season, since I like the infographics and they don’t come out til later in the week and I am feeling lazy about making picks. Right now I’m more hyped about my team and their potential for the post season.

So, for the naysayers out there who try to say that Aaron Rodgers shouldn’t be included in the elite quarterback talk, look at that stat line for 100th career start. Those aren’t the only records A-Rod has broken either; he’s broken many NFL and franchise (Packers) records. He doesn’t have the amount of Super Bowl appearances as Manning or Brady, but he’s still about mid-way through his career, and still has time to do so. Besides, if you just go by wins, he’s right there with Manning, and he’s broken records of Manning’s. Also, Brees is usually in that discussion, and he only has 1 super bowl appearance and 1 win. So yeah, I don’t think his status as elite should be contested.

This week the boys play Atlanta. Given Atlanta’s record and struggles this season, I would normally call this a sure win, but this is a team that has been winning lately, and has been looking better than their record would suggest. Plus, it’s when good teams get complacent that they lose to a team with a sub-.500 record. I think that we’ll see the best the Falcons have to offer because they are trying to hold onto their division lead to get into the playoffs. It might be another one of those sad years where we have a 7-9 playoff team, and this could be them. Either way, I expect it to be a decent game, but the Falcons do have the worst pass defense in the league, so we might just carve them up and cruise to the win. We’ll find out on Monday Night.

As for the rest of the games, here’s my picks:

Steelers 27, Bengals 21
Colts 28, Browns 17
Lions 31, Buccs 10
Texans 21, Jags 13
Ravens 27, Dolphins 24
Vikings 20, Jets 3
Saints 34, Panthers 10
Giants 17, Titans 10
Rams 24, Skins 6
Chiefs 20, Cards 17
Broncos 37, Bills 20
49ers 42, Raiders 9
Seahawks 27, Eagles 24
Pats 31, Chargers 17
Packers 31, Falcons 10

#bythenumbers #nfl #picks