Bik's Week 14 Thursday Night Pick

Texans (-3) over JAGUARS

I'm taking the Texans simply because I don't think we should be operating in a world in which the Jacksonville Jaguars win 4 games in a row.

Rest of Week 14 picks on Friday

Last Week: 4-11-1

This Season: 86-88-7

Bik's Week 12 Thursday Night Pick

Don’t call it a comeback! Back after ANOTHER above .500 week (which included 3 pushes – how brutal was that!)  and we’ll keep going with what works. Keeping things quick and simple.

Onto the Thursday Night Pick. Home team in CAPS:

Saints (-8.5) over FALCONS

I really did everything I possibly could to find a way to take Atlanta. The only thing I could come up with was that with their season effectively over, how great it would be for them to jam up their rival Saints from home-field advantage in the playoffs. It would just be too sweet right? But to do that, you actually need a good team and I just flat out don’t think they have any makings of a decent team. They’re too banged up and will once again fail to win in the trenches. They struggle with the pass-rush and if you’re giving Brees even an extra second, he’ll find a way to hurt you. I do hate going against the HOME DOG, but I gotta!

Rest of Week 12 picks on Friday

Last Week: 7-5-3

This Season: 73-83-6

Bik's Thursday Night Week 11 Pick

TITANS (+3) over Colts

Gimme the HOME DOG! I think Chris Johnson can run all over this Colts D and Fitzpatrick can do enough to not lose at home to the Colts. And the injuries might start catching up to Indy.

Last Week:9-4-1

This Season: 66-78-3

Bik's Thursday Night Week 8 Pick: We Know Nothing

Let me start off by saying thanks.

Thanks for reading. Because the truth is we know nothing. We can pretend to know. But we just don’t. In a game that featured 2 explosive offenses, and poor defences – the Dallas Philadelphia game produced a combined 20 points. 20. As a point of reference, the anemic Titans offense put up 17 points in 1 quarter.

After getting 12 carries inside the 5 yard line last year converting 7 of those runs into TD’s, Alfred Morris got 1 in Week 7 for a 2 yard gain. His backup Roy Helu had 2 carries, both converted to TD’s from 3 yards out. Much to the dismay of fantasy owners.

But this isn’t just for football. On Monday night in the NHL, the Sharks played the Red Wings while the Penguins faced off against the Avalanche. 4 teams dripping in offensive power.... Combined for 1 goal. The Sharks-Wings game went to the lovely shootout to produce a winner.

This is me lamenting going 5-10 last week.... We know nothing (and yes I’m dragging you down with me, sorry). So since things are spirally out of control, it’s time to do the opposite. Yes, I’m channeling my inner George Costanza.

Onto the Thursday Night Pick. Home team in CAPS: 

Bik's Thursday Night Week 7 Pick: Power Ranks v2.0

I was originally going to do my power ranks every 4 weeks but then I realized, waaaay too much happens in just 2 weeks in the NFL Season to not do this every 2 weeks. So back again are my current power ranks for the NFL. The Number in brackets are the teams rank from Week 5:

Bik's Thursday Night Week 6 Pick

Home team in CAPS:

BEARS (-7.5) over Giants

What exactly is inspiring about this Giants team right now? They had a divisional game last week vs. the Eagles at home and got rolled. They can’t slow anyone down defensively (over 31 Points against in every game), can’t control the clock (averaging league low 25 minutes time of possession), and among the leaders in Sacks allowed. To top it all off they don’t generate a lot of takeaways (7 takeaways) and because the defense is so porous their starting field position is among the league’s worst (26^th), so even when the offense get the ball they have a long distance to travel to put up any points.... BUUUUUT they can’t even move the ball efficiently per drive (ranking 30^th).

Now the reason I’m pointing out all these flaws and highlighting none of the Bears flaws is because these aren’t things you can fix on 4 days rest when you have to travel and you lose a day to prepare anyways. Their spot to show something was last week vs. the Eagles and it didn’t come to fruition. What they need to fix these things, maybe fix is the wrong word...... What they need to remedy these problems back to a more average mark is a full week to prepare and home game. I’m fading them this week but might look to play them next week vs. the Vikings.

Rest of Week 6 picks on Friday

Last Week: 6-8

This Season: 36-39-2

Bik's Thursday Night Week 5 Pick: Identifying Identities

Through 4 weeks in the NFL season we’ve learned some things. Now in years past I’ve felt the things we’ve learned at this time of the year to be fake. After all Arizona recently started the year 4-0, Bills started 4-1, Raiders were 3-2, and Falcons were 2-3. But for some reason this year some of the fast starts seem very authentic. The teams that were supposed to be good, actually are good. Now there might be a few surprises here and there, but certainly not to the same level we’ve seen in years past. Considering who the Chiefs opened the season against, it wasn’t a crazy notion to see them start the season at least 3-1, so 4-0 isn’t that big of a stretch. More of the surprise teams are in that 2-2 range where we didn’t expect them to be as good and really they’ve just been unlucky so far (I.e. San Diego, Tennessee) but we still don’t know enough about them.

Bik's Thursday Night NFL Week 4 Pick: Under The Weather

So I’ve been under the weather....... Then under the sea..... Then under the Earth..... Then under the next 150 Earthly elements that exist that come next till we get to “hell”.... because I was on FIRE!!! Or as the Spanish would say: ¡En Fuego!

11-4-1 Last week. Now let’s get more of that goodness.  But really I’ve been sick for most of the week so this week might be really awkward and also we’re just going straight to the pick.

Home team in CAPS:

49ers (-3) over RAMS

I wrote in Week 2 that if the Falcons had any plans on going to the playoffs they couldn’t afford to go 0-2. They avoided the catastrophe as they won that game. The same scenario applies here. It’s early I know, but it’s not exactly ideal to pay catch-up in the NFC especially since some other decent teams are also 1-2 (See: Atlanta, Carolina, and Green Bay). San Fran despite the myriad of problems is still the better team, and their designs are for championships whereas the Rams, while rapidly developing, are still in a fact-finding mode as a franchise. It’s a backs to the wall game for the 49ers. They can’t be cute by not showing all their cards and have to employ everything they got in their arsenal. Back to the Atlanta analogy for a second... who did they play when they needed that win? ST. LOUIS RAMS!

I picked against the Rams last week as well vs. the Cowboys because I said it was a bad scheduling spot as they’d be gearing up for it and then didn’t apply that same logic to the 49ers who then watched the Colts walk all over them. The Niners came out flat and looked lost on Sunday, can’t afford to have that happen 3 games in a row. It’s a hockey team that good teams don’t lose 3 in a row, and you especially don’t hear it in football because it’s only a 16 game season, but this is the defining mark now for the 2013 49ers. I’m gonna bet on them to show something here and resurrect their season otherwise it’s essentially kaput for them this season.

With the receiving core woes as they are, the team isn’t totally built to play from behind with a double digit deficit which is what they’ve had to go up against the past 2 weeks. Enter St. Louis that has held a lead for all of 40 seconds this year. Gimme the ‘Niners.

Last Week: 11-4-1

This Season: 22-24-2

Like our Facebook page or follow Bik or TJ on Twitter