The Rambling Gambler, TRG: Week 11 Recap

Last week was tough with a couple of games coming down to the wire, but at the end of the day, we're looking at a 4-2 week and the fifth winning week in a row. Success! Big favorites San Francisco and New England both covered easily. With so many injuries to QBs at this point, there are going to be quite a few more "good defense vs. backup QB" games in the future. I know I'm going to be picking some of those! Dallas blew it, but at the same time, it looks like the Redskins have a little more fight in them with Grossman at the helm. Buffalo seems to have begun their annual late-season meltdown; you know it's bad when Sanchez and the Jets, fresh off a loss to Tim Tebow and the Broncos, are installed as 8.5 favorites. Furthermore, the Bills lost Fred Jackson to injury for the season, and any chance of contending for a playoff spot is all but gone now. Major, season-changing injuries seem like the norm at this point. All you can do is hope they don't happen to you. Here's last week's recap:

PS
Happy Thanksgiving everybody! I hope everyone has a great holiday. Thought I'd throw in something festive, so here's my Thanksgiving tradition, the Turkey Day Parlay! I'll still have a full 6 picks coming later this week, so keep an eye out.


SPECIAL TURKEY DAY PARLAY
Detroit +6.5
Dallas -7
San Francisco +3
LOSSES


Buffalo +1.5 over MIAMI: Lousy Bills. This team has no luck and is beginning more and more to resemble the team everyone thought they would be before the season started (hopeless). Miami is suddenly streaking and showing some life. Matt Moore and the offense may have found a spark.

Say goodbye to RB Fred Jackson. Get well soon!

Dallas -7 over Washington: Dallas could never quite pull away in this one. It never really seemed like the Redskins were going to win, but the Cowboys never seemed like they were going to cover that spread, either. Washington definitely seems to respond a bit better with Grossman starting at QB.


WINS

Baltimore -6.5 over Cincy: Phew, that was close. I really thought Baltimore would put the Bengals away more easily than that. With SF coming to town, it might be tough sledding for the Ravens offense. Cincy has to be encouraged that the defense performed well enough to keep them in it, but they clearly need A.J. Green back on the field to spark that offense.

Pats -15 over KC: My favorite moment in this game was the Patriots getting that TD with a minute to go. Good ol' Belichik loves running up the score. Kansas City picked up Kyle Orton (QB) today, but he's very unlikely to start this week, which means it'll be Tyler Palko against the Steelers D. I'm sure you can guess what one of my 6 picks will be this week. The Chiefs were TERRIBLE against New England.

Roland Bartel (QB) finished out the game for the Cards. Wait, who?

San Francisco -10 over Arizona: The consistency the Niners provide is great. A few early field goals, a touchdown here and there, the defense gives up a score to rekindle some interest, and then that's it. They are now 9-0-1 against the spread. Huge game tomorrow against Baltimore. The Cardinals came back down to earth after Skelton had to play a good defense. In fact, he got himself benched. Don't hear anybody talking about a QB controversy now, do we? The Cardinals offense may survive against bad teams, but they will struggle mightily against good defenses until Kolb returns.

Chicago -4 over San Diego: Well, the Bears got the win and the cover, but they lost Jay Cutler. Tough luck... it'll be interesting to see how they do moving forward. San Diego can't cover anything right now, so Denver getting 6 looks like an automatic bet to me.


2011 Stats


Total Record: 35-30-1




Games: 31-23-1
Over/Under: 4-7
Home Teams: 14-6-0
Road Teams: 16-17-1
Favorites: 22-14-1
Dogs: 8-8


TRG
@ELaurinovics