Week 15 NFL Picks: Final Vegas Odds and Predictions for Sunday's Slate

As the holiday season approaches, savvy NFL fans might want to seek out a few favorable spreads to support their Christmas shopping budget (only legally, of course).  With a number of extremely tight contests on the dock this week—six of the remaining 15 games have spreads of three points or less—Week 15 offers tantalizing opportunities for those with particularly strong convictions about a particular team.

Of course, there's also the danger of divisional games, as the familiarity factor will play an understated yet important role in a whopping 10 games on Sunday.  In those instances, bettors must be careful to learn from the first meeting but not to overreact, as divisional rematches don't typically show much repetitiveness.  We're avoiding those divisional games in this analysis, as several other games simply offer better value.

Looking at the last-minute odds via Odds Shark, let's make predictions against the spread for the remaining Week 15 schedule, highlighting three of the most favorable lines for you to exploit.

Matchup	Odds	Pick ATS
Miami at New England	NE -7.5	Patriots
Green Bay at Buffalo	GB -4	Packers
Oakland at Kansas City	KC -10	Chiefs
Jacksonville at Baltimore	BAL -13.5	Jaguars
Houston at Indianapolis	IND -7	Texans
Pittsburgh at Atlanta	PIT -3	Falcons
Cincinnati at Cleveland	CLE -1.5	Bengals
Washington at NY Giants	NYG -6.5	Washington
Tampa Bay at Carolina	CAR -3	Panthers
NY Jets at Tennessee	NYJ -3	Titans
Denver at San Diego	DEN -5	Broncos
Minnesota at Detroit	DET -7.5	Vikings
San Francisco at Seattle	SEA -9	Seahawks
Dallas at Philadelphia	PHI -3.5	Eagles
New Orleans at Chicago	NO -2.5	Saints

Falcons (+3) over Steelers

Kevin C. Cox/Getty Images

The AFC North has beat up on the abysmal NFC South this season, but the Pittsburgh Steelers have been the one exception to that rule.  Pittsburgh somehow dropped games at Heinz Field against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and New Orleans Saints, and now must travel to face a quietly improving Atlanta Falcons squad.

The Falcons have won three of their past five games, with a point differential of plus-15 that ranks as the 12th-best in the league during that span, per Pro-Football-Reference.  That's far from an elite stretch, but it illustrates how Atlanta has risen above the historically woeful levels that the entire NFC South has sat at for most of the season.

The key lies in Atlanta's ability to hit the big play through the air, particularly with Julio Jones.  According to PFR, Jones has accrued a remarkably 27 receptions of 20 or more yards—seven more than the next highest total in the league.  The Falcons as a whole have the fourth-most big passing plays with 51—a strength that matches up ideally with the Steelers' propensity for breakdowns on the back end:

Pittsburgh's secondary does not have the speed to keep up with Atlanta's stretch route concepts, as the quartet of Troy Polamalu, Mike Mitchell, William Gay and Ike Taylor are all relative plodders.  Pittsburgh's offense figures to light up a similarly bereft Falcons defense, but playing at the Georgia Dome, the Falcons are strong candidates to overcome their underdog status.   

Titans (+3) over Jets

James Kenney/Associated Press

Like Atlanta, the Tennessee Titans are home underdogs who match up well against their Week 15 opponent.  Simply betting against the dysfunctional New York Jets should provide bettors comfort, but lest the 2-11 Titans scare you off, there are reasons to believe that Tennessee will snap its seven-game losing streak on Sunday.

One of Tennessee's greatest strengths (relatively speaking) is its pass rush.  The Titans are 15th in sack percentage, per TeamRankings.com, and 13th in Football Outsiders' adjusted sack rate.  Even a moderate amount of pressure figures to submarine Gang Green's Geno Smith-led passing game—a reality the Titans defensive coordinator realizes:

Moreover, Jake Locker faces a relatively soft landing in his return to the lineup.  New York's depleted secondary has conceded 7.3 yards per attempt to opposing quarterbacks—a mark that ranks 25th in the league. Rex Ryan may dust off some of his byzantine blitz schemes in an effort to fluster Locker, but even so, the Titans quarterback has better weapons in Delanie Walker and Nate Washington than his New York counterpart.

This is arguably the ugliest game on the weekend slate and one that many will overlook.  But it's bizarre seeing New York considered as a clear road favorite, so the Titans appear to offer good value on the board.

Saints (-2.5) over Bears

The Monday night game pits arguably the two biggest underachievers of the 2014 season, making this the type of contest many will shy away from.  However, given New Orleans' sudden reverse splits, hitting the road may be the antidote the Saints need to bounce back from their ignominious 31-point loss to the Carolina Panthers.

For one, advanced metrics suggest that the Saints are clearly the better team.  Most rankings place New Orleans ahead of Chicago, and while both teams sit at 5-8, PFR's Pythagorean win expectancy metric suggests that the Saints' point differential gives them 5.9 expected wins, whereas the Bears have just 4.3.  

In case you're not a numbers guy or gal, PFR measures the Saints as closer to a six-win team, whereas the Bears have performed at the level of roughly a 4-9 squad.  That's not particularly flattering to New Orleans of course, but it does imply that the Saints are a clearly better team that should be the obvious favorite, even at Soldier Field.

Indeed, Drew Brees figures to eviscerate the inexperienced Bears secondary with a variety of three-level reads that bait the defensive backs into making either-or reads.  The Saints' all-in offseason approach has backfired significantly this season, but at least for one week, expect New Orleans to pull out a critical win to keep their postseason hopes alive.