NFL Picks Week 2: Predictions for a League of Parity Early in the Season

Forget the weather:  forecasting NFL games early in the season has become the hardest activity in the art of fortune-telling.

With the parity the league suffers from breeds in its teams, it has become more likely that you know the full roster of every team in your fantasy league better than that of your favorite real team.

Now of course there are some exceptions to this rule.  We know those select few teams that are probably decent and those select few that are not so decent.  But don't delude yourself:  that's all we know.

Every year, there's this over-reaction period where public opinion crowns a champion.  Beware: this team is rarely the champion.

Every year, there's a team that is pronounced awful that ends up playoff-bound.

The truth is that everyone knows very little about how the season is going to shape out, at least before Week 6.

Statistics have been invented, gathered, and analyzed in an attempt to make predictions more accurate.  The problem with this is that with the high rate of roster turn-over that occurs in the salary capped off-season, most statistics become meaningless.  After all, this is a team sport:  What can one gather from how a player performed with different players around him?  And what can one gather from a team's past performance with different players?

Of course, there are exceptions to this.  Tom Brady's probably going to perform well while the Patriots' offense will be potent.  However, more often than not, when we believe one thing will happen, some monkey wrench is thrown into the equation that makes sense because of one magical statistic:  hindsight.

So what am I saying with this opening?

That I, like you, am a spectator to what is going on early this season.  Below in my predictions, I grade my predictions on a scale of 1-10 for my certainty.

Do not be fooled: 10 on this scale means that I am about 75 percent sure this will happen.  Nothing would be surprising at this point.

Bears (+6.5) over SAINTS

Last Thursday, the Saints defense looked a little weak.  Granted, they were playing Aaron Rodgers: perhaps Rodgers is still on his super-human run and no team could have stopped that, but the Saints D hasn't been the sturdiest in the past.  With Brian Urlacher probably playing this game with his heart on his sleeve, the Saints may need to rely on their defense, and I'm not sure that spells success at this point.

Grade:  4

LIONS (-9) over Chiefs

Do I trust the Lions at this point in the season?  Absolutely not.  But you know what?  They played pretty poorly last week against the Bucs, and won.  The Chiefs, on the other hand, looked awful against the Bills, and were blown out of the water.  And that was at Arrowhead, the only place the Chiefs looked good last year.  Blow-out in the making?

Grade:  7

Jaguars (+9) over JETS

Don't get me wrong, I don't expect the Jaguars to win this game.  With Luke McCown at quarterback, the Jaguars just got lucky to see an equally anemic Titans offense across the field last week.  But the Jets haven't had a particularly potent offense the past two years either, especially last week.  The Jags won't ever look like winning the game, but I expect this to end between a field goal and a touchdown difference.

Grade:  3

BILLS (-3.5) over Raiders

The Bills looked like a sleeper last week.  The Raiders looked lucky to play a team that refused to capitalize on their mistakes.  Combining this with the Raiders flying out east to play a Sunday day game after a late Monday night game spells a comfortable win.

Grade:  7

Cardinals (+3.5) over REDSKINS

Much has been said about the Cardinals secondary after Cam Newton threw for 400+ yards against them last week in his first NFL start.  From watching the game, one can see that it was because of the incessant and sometimes reckless blitzes new defensive coordinator Ray Horton threw at the rookie.  This week, they line up against Rex Grossman, a notoriously poor performer against the blitz.  I do not expect the Skins offense to have as much success against Arizona as it had against an extremely depleted Giants defense.

Grade:  5

Ravens (-6) over TITANS

After the Ravens destroyed the Steelers last week, a game they were emotionally invested in, I thought this may be a let-down game.  I even thought about picking against them.  Then I remembered one thing that persuaded me:  Matt Hasselbeck.  Can he be a success for the Titans in the future?  Maybe.  Just not yet.

Grade:  10

STEELERS (-14) over Seahawks

After that humiliation in Baltimore last week, who doesn't expect to see a motivated Steeler team this week?  The good news for them: just in time for Tarvaris Jackson and the Seahawks, who looked abysmal against the Niners.

Grade:  9

Packers (-10) over PANTHERS

Now that Cam Newton doesn't have the element of surprise on his side, don't expect him to put up similar numbers as last week against the Packers defense.  This compounded with the loss of Jon Beason and how poor defensive coverage looked last week for the panthers, I would've picked this line at -20.

Grade:  8

Buccaneers (+1.5) over VIKINGS

The battle of two teams who played beneath my expectations last week.  The only difference is that I think that the Bucs can snap out of it.  Could the 39 yards that McNabb posted last week signal that he is in fact done?

Grade:  7

Browns (-2.5) over COLTS

Gift of a line.  The Browns played poorly last week, but if there's one thing those Bengals-Browns games have taught us over the years, it's that they don't indicate anything.  Those teams always play each other tight, and one loss should not make us write off the Browns.

On the other hand, Kerry Collins looked pretty terrible last week against that vaunted Texans pass defense.

Grade:  10

Cowboys (-3) over NINERS

Lost in that awful fourth quarter Romo played last week:  the Cowboys should've beaten the Jets last week.  The team that was in the past two AFC Championship games.  Sure, that end-game was bad, but I take more positives than negatives away from that.  Meanwhile, the Niners were unable to produce offense against the Seahawks, and only pulled away in the fourth quarter, thanks to special teams.

Grade:  7

Texans (-3) over DOLPHINS

This is the toughest game of the week, mostly because we don't know enough about their opponents last week.  Just how bad are the Colts?  Just how good are the Patriots?

In the end, the Dolphins looked just bad enough at home against the Patriots for me to have to go against them.

Grade:  1

Chargers (+7) over PATRIOTS

The Chargers barely got by the Vikings last week after a poorly played game.  The Pats looked amazing against the Dolphins in a blowout.  Both teams are probably really good, so this has all the makings of a one-score game.

Grade:  3

Bengals (+3.5) over BRONCOS

As I said above, I didn't take anything from the Bengals-Browns game last week because that rivalry always produces wacky results.  

What I did take, though, is the Broncos awful play on Monday night against a team in the Raiders that looked like they really didn't want to win.  And then the fans turned on the team.  And now their home again.

The Bengals will win this game and be 2-0 and I will have no idea how good they really are.

Grade:  6

FALCONS (+2.5) over Eagles

Did anyone else realize how Steven Jackson ripped apart the Eagles defense on the one play he was healthy for last week?  Forget the long throws of Matt Ryan being the key to this game, it's Michael Turner.  This combined with the home-field for the Falcons, who were 7-1 in the Georgia Dome last season, look for a grinding Falcons win.

Grade:  6

GIANTS (-6.5) over Rams

The Giants' defense is depleted and looked poor last week, but with injuries to Sam Bradford, Steven Jackson, and Danny Amendola last week, they won't have too much to worry about (even if they play injured).  In fact, injuries all across the Rams' roster may make this a much-needed win for the G-Men.

Then again, the Giants are pretty injured too...

Grade:  2

Season:  10-5-1