Last week got off to a great start. I was 5-0 in the early games. Then came the Bears and the Raiders. Both games, and my bets, were done well before half time. No excuses on those two, I was just flat wrong.

However, the trend of betting on heavy favorites, and winning, continues. Convential wisdom says that you shouldn’t bet on heavy favorites, because they usually don’t cover. Vegas knows that the public likes to bet on favorites, so they usually pump the line up to catch the sucker bets. But this year, Vegas is getting absolutely killed. The bad teams aren’t covering. They aren’t even coming close.

ESPN said that this past weekend tied some record for total margin of victory. It’s not that the good teams are great. It’s that the bad teams are really, really bad. The Sunday afternoon games here, and everywhere, were a complete waste. The final scores of the games I watched? 31-3, 38-0, 45-10. I’m a huge football fan, but even I’m going to tune out of games that combine to 114-13. This huge disparity, while an anomaly this year, can’t be making the NFL happy. But it is making my fake betting wallet happy.

Last Week (against the spread): 5-2 (Guaranteed Winners: 3-0; Fillers: 2-2)
Season (against the spread): 21-13 (Guaranteed Winners: 5-2; Fillers: 4-3)

You can read my full Week 7 Picks here. A brief recap below:

GUARANTEED WINNERS

W – Indianapolis Colts (-14) at St. Louis Rams: Yes, it’s that easy. Vegas can’t give away enough points in the lopsided games this year.

W – New England Patriots (-15.5) at Tampa Bay Buccaneers: Ditto.

W – Green Bay Packers (-7) at Cleveland Browns: Ditto^2.

That could be the easiest 3-team parlay in the history of the world. Obama needs to legalize online gambling soon, I’m losing money missing out on these opportunities.

FILLERS

W – San Diego Chargers (-5.5) at Kansas City Chiefs: One of the ‘trendy’ expert picks for the week was to pick Kansas City to beat San Diego. They are idiots.

L – New York Jets at Oakland Raiders (+7): One of the ‘trendy’ expert picks for the week was to think Oakland would keep it close against New York. Oops.

L – Chicago Bears (+1.5) at Cincinnati Bengals: I was on the Bengals bandwagon for one week and then quickly jumped off when they got beat by the Texans. I guess this just means that the Texans are a much better team now than they were a few weeks ago, because Cincinnati absolutely toyed with the Bears. I was in awe watching Carson and Cedric tear apart that Bears defense. Chicago is in trouble on both sides of the ball. I’m no longer worried about them contending with the Packers for a playoff spot.

W – Minnesota Vikings at Pittsburgh Steelers (-4): Thank goodness for a couple defensive touchdowns to help me cover the spread.

So, why fix what’s not broken? I’m going to continue to take the big favorites this year. They aren’t going to lose. The only thing that would prevent me from laying big points is if Vegas finally waves the white flag and starts making NFL spreads like College Football games (20+ points), which I don’t think they’ll do. That means they’ll be easy money every week, this week included:

GUARANTEED WINNERS

Cleveland Browns at Chicago Bears (-14)

I have now watched 120 minutes of Cleveland Brown football this year (The Vikings-Browns and Packers-Browns games). It has been the worst 6 hours of television I can remember watching. And both of those games were in Cleveland. There’s no way they play any better on the road. Chicago is faltering, but not faltering enough to not kill the Browns. Chicago, 38 – Cleveland, 2.

San Francisco 49ers at Indianapolis Colts (-13)

One half of Alex Smith football, and everyone is back on his bandwagon. Unbelievable. People have very short memories. Set aside the fact that Peyton will go 27 for 29 in this game, even against a pretty good defense (but one that just got shredded by Matt Schaub). Indy’s Defense is good enough to shutdown the suddenly anemic San Francisco Offense. Indianapolis, 34 – San Francisco, 13.

Carolina Panthers at Arizona Cardinals (-10.5)

Carolina is arguably one of the worst teams in the league when Delhomme is playing. They killed Buffalo in every stat category, except turnovers…and the score. If they lose to Buffalo at home, Carolina doesn’t come within two touchdowns of an Arizona team that just had a really, really impressive win in New York. Arizona, 30 – Carolina, 7.

Atlanta Falcons at New Orleans Saints (-10)

Outside of a fluky game in San Francisco, Atlanta has been a terrible road team (at Dallas and at New England). On the other hand, New Orleans has been unstoppable at home. It’s a divisional game on Monday Night Football, so anything can happen, but I look for the Saints to destroy Atlanta in their first truly national TV game this year. New Orleans, 44 – Atlanta, 17.

Seattle Seahawks at Dallas Cowboys (-10)

I was really tempted to put this in the ‘FILLERS’ category below, because I still don’t trust Dallas. But, I think the Seahawks, outside of one big win against Jacksonville at home, are a terrible team. Matt Hasselbeck is a good QB, but he can’t stay healthy. And I think the Cowboys might have figured some things out during their bye week, after a very surprising, and dominating, win against the Falcons. Dallas, 30 – Seattle, 14.

FILLERS

New York Giants (+1) at Philadelphia Eagles

Now that I’ve run out of double digit point spreads, I’m on to a couple fillers to round out my seven weekly picks. The Giants have had two bad losses in the last two weeks. And they don’t have any good wins, unless you count a mediocre game at Dallas earlier this year. But that far outclasses Philly’s resume-to-date. Wins over Washington, Tampa Bay, Panthers, and Chiefs. Teams with a combined 5 wins. If you dig a little deeper, you realize that those 5 wins are against Washington (2), Tampa Bay (2), and the St. Louis Rams (1). Nowhere in the Eagles chain of games can you find anything that proves they are even a marginally good team. And they have a loss to Oakland! The only ‘good’ team they have played this year? New Orleans. And they lost that game by 26 points at home. The Eagles even looked terrible in their win against Washington. They got an easy defensive touchdown on a bad pass that Eli won’t throw. The DeSean Jackson end around and the deep pass (which was terribly underthrown by McNabb) wouldn’t happen against a decent secondary that can cover/tackle. So 21 of their 27 points were a complete sham that wouldn’t have been scores against a halfway good team. Philly sucks more than anyone, but me, realizes. That’s why I’m taking the Giants for the straight up win. New York Giants, 24 – Philadelphia, 13.

Miami Dolphins (+3.5) at New York Jets

I think the Dolphins are one of the scariest teams in the league. Their record doesn’t reflect nearly how good this team is. They are in the handful of teams that I really wouldn’t want the Packers playing this year (along with Indy, New Orleans, and the Pittsburgh Steelers). It seems like the Dolphins haven’t played an away game yet this year, so it should be interesting to see how they perform on the road. If this game were to happen last week, before the Jets destroyed the lowly Raiders, and Miami blew a huge lead to the amazing Saints, the Dolphins might be favored. So, I’m going off those impressions and ignoring what happened in Week 7. Miami, 31 – New York Jets, 23.