The Cardinals have proved me wrong a few times this year, but I still believe they are losers. There is a bigger loser from Arizona that IS a favorite, though: John from the Biggest Loser. The guy has a Tebow-esque work ethic and lost 100 pounds quicker than anyone else in the show's history. Okay, if you don't watch, hop on the bandwagon. Even Tim Tebow is doing it.
Overall: 17-8-1
Dallas -4.5 at Arizona: LOSS
The Cowboys collapsed against Arizona in a game that was theirs to lose. The biggest mistake wasn't Jason Garrett icing his own kicker. Rather, it was just poor clock management. Brian Burke put together a great post on Advanced NFL Stats to this end. Props to Chris Liss for seeing this coming; the stats just absolutely hate Arizona.
New York Jets -3 at Washington: WIN
This game took a bizarre twist towards the end with the Jets scoring 21 points in the 4th quarter. The Jets 3rd ranked defense held Washington late and Sexy Rexy did his best Rex Grossman impression, throwing the game away late. Washington's 28th ranked offense returned to its natural state, in shambles.
Week 14 Predictions:
San Francisco -3.5 at Arizona
Obviously, I'm not a huge fan of the 3.5 spread, but the 49ers are a far superior team. San Francisco has the 2nd best run defense in the league, preventing 30 points from being scored that a league average defense would have allowed. Arizona's only forte (too soon?) is their run game, where they ranked 3rd in the league after adjusting for strength of opponents. We have San Francisco as 9-point favorites on the road.
Jacksonville +1 vs Tampa Bay
Jacksonville's offense is unbelievably bad - their passing offense ranks 31st in the league, only ahead of St. Louis. Their defense, although the Chargers game might not reflect it, actually ranks 7th overall (7th in both opponent-adjusted rushing and passing D). Tampa Bay has regressed after a good 2010 campaign and is almost as brutal on offense as the Jaguars. The Bucs score about 7 points per game less than a league average offense would. Give me the Del Rio-less Jags at home with the points.
The most accurate weekly projections from numberFire.com based on wall-street style analytics. numberFire outpredicted two of the most trafficked fantasy sites 70|PERCENT| of the time and are 54-55|PERCENT| against the spread over the last 3 seasons.