NFL Predictions Week 6: Early Odds, Picks and Projections for Upcoming Schedule

Week 6 of the NFL season could end up being a proving ground for a number of the league's surprise teams.

Teams like the New York Giants, Houston Texans, Buffalo Bills and Dallas Cowboys came into the year with low expectations but have exceeded them with winning records through five games. However, each one of them gets a tough test this week that will hopefully separate the contenders from the pretenders.

Meanwhile, a few struggling squads can get back in the win column with favorable battles on Sunday.

This has the potential to be a crazy week of football, but here are predictions for each game in Week 6.

Date	Away	Home	Pick ATS*
Oct. 9	Indianapolis Colts	Houston Texans	IND -2
Oct. 12	Detroit Lions	Minnesota Vikings	MIN +3
Oct. 12	Denver Broncos	New York Jets	DEN -9
Oct. 12	New England Patriots	Buffalo Bills	BUF +3
Oct. 12	Baltimore Ravens	Tampa Bay Buccaneers	BAL -3
Oct. 12	Carolina Panthers	Cincinnati Bengals	CIN -7
Oct. 12	Jacksonville Jaguars	Tennessee Titans	TEN -6
Oct. 12	Pittsburgh Steelers	Cleveland Browns	CLE -1
Oct. 12	Green Bay Packers	Miami Dolphins	GB -3
Oct. 12	San Diego Chargers	Oakland Raiders	SD -8
Oct. 12	Chicago Bears	Atlanta Falcons	ATL -3
Oct. 12	Washington Redskins	Arizona Cardinals	ARI -4
Oct. 12	Dallas Cowboys	Seattle Seahawks	DAL +8.5
Oct. 12	New York Giants	Philadelphia Eagles	NYG +3
Oct. 13	San Francisco 49ers	St. Louis Rams	SF -3

Best Bets

Indianapolis Colts (-2) at Houston Texans

ESPN's Adam Schefter was one of the many upset at the lack of close battles on Thursday night this season:

Unfortunately for fans, this does not seem like it will be any different despite the Houston Texans' strong play so far this year. Houston is 3-2 with just an overtime loss on Sunday away from a 4-1 record.

The problem is at quarterback, where Ryan Fitzpatrick has just five touchdowns compared to six interceptions. Turnovers have been a problem his entire career, and it is once again limiting the offense around him.

Compare this to Andrew Luck, who also has six interceptions but makes up for it with a league-leading 14 touchdowns. This week he came through despite a few early mistakes to help the Colts win a tough game against the Baltimore Ravens.

Teammate Pat McAfee said all you need to know after the game:

The Colts have the best passing attack in football and an improving defense, which will make things difficult for Houston on both sides of the ball. This could end up leading to an easy win for Indianapolis.

Denver Broncos (-9) at New York Jets

It is almost too easy to predict a big effort for Peyton Manning, with his wide array of receiving targets, to have a big game against a defense that has struggled in the secondary all season. The quarterback remains the best in the sport and just torched an elite Arizona Cardinals squad for almost 500 yards.

In order to keep things from getting out of hand, then, we should simply take a look at how the New York Jets offense matches up against the Denver defense. Unfortunately, this is pretty one-sided as well.

While the Broncos have had their problems, they are coming off one of the best efforts of the season, holding the Cardinals to just two touchdowns—one of which came on a five-yard drive after a turnover, and the other which was a fluky 81-yard score.

Linebacker Danny Trevathan explained after the game, via Ben Swanson of DenverBroncos.com: "We can be great. I believe we’ve reached some peaks today, second half we reached a whole bunch of our peak of it but at the same time we have to put together four quarters. We keep saying that but we played our ball today and I’m glad with it. I’m going to take the ‘W’ and move forward."

The defense has a chance to look even better against a Jets offense that was shutout by the San Diego Chargers and managed just 151 yards and 2.8 yards per play in the loss. 

Manish Mehta of the New York Daily News explained how bad things were during the game:

Whether Geno Smith or Michael Vick is under center, there doesn't seem to be a line too high for the Broncos in this one.

Green Bay Packers (-3) at Miami Dolphins

Jonathan Daniel/Getty Images

While the Packers might have had an inconsistent start to the season, they showed last Thursday exactly what can happen when they are playing well. Green Bay embarrassed the Minnesota Vikings and went up 42-0 before the game finally ended, 42-10.

Bleacher Report's Adam Lefkoe made this bold statement during the game:

Tyler Dunne of the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel also noted the defense has improved in its ability to limit big plays:

The Dolphins will try to get the ball deep to Mike Wallace but otherwise do not have much big-play ability on the offense. In fact, just completing the short passes has been a problem for quarterback Ryan Tannehill, who ranks 28th in the NFL in Total QBR among 32 qualified players.

Miami will have a good chance of moving the ball on the ground against a weak Packers front line, but this is unlikely to be enough to keep up on the scoreboard against a high-powered offense.

This game could remain close in Miami, but Green Bay is a superior team and should be able to pull away for the win.

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