The start of the 2012 NFL season hasn’t been particularly kind to Jeff or I. With two weeks in the books Jeff’s current record (15-16) represents the kind of unpredictable season it’s been. While my own abysmal record (9-21-1 and 2-7-1 in Top 5 picks) represents how poor of a feel I’ve had for this whole season.
I try to remind myself that all gamblers have losing streaks and even losing seasons. That’s why you need several hundred games worth of data before you can properly assess your skill. My picks the first two weeks left me uneasy and I’m feeling a lot more confident coming in to Week 3. Hopefully that’s a sign of an impending turnaround, because not feeling confident in your picks and losing is one thing but feeling confident and losing is a red flag.
| Expert | Game Analysis and Prediction |
|---|---|
| New York Giants PK @ Carolina Panthers – Thursday September 20th 8:20 PM (ET) | |
| Jeff | The Giants are coming off a hard fought victory at home against the upstart buccaneers but did not come out of the game unscathed as WR Hakeem Nicks, OT David Diehl, WR Domenik Hixon, and RB Ahmad Bradshaw that combined with the short week and travel for big blue does not bode well. The Panthers on the other hand had a home game last week and came out of it relatively healthy and not having to travel helps. In the victory against the Saints it looked as if the Panthers let Cam off the leash more in the running game which could be a trend going forward. That will make the Panthers a much harder team to defend. It has been surprising that after two weeks the Giants pass rush has been nowhere to be found. All that leads to a Carolina victory. Panthers 24 – Giants 14 |
| Sean | It always frightens me when I want to agree with Jeff but Giants lackluster performance so far has me concerned. What happened to that defense? Even the terrorizing pass rush of Jason Pierre-Paul and Justin Tuck hasn’t been able to slow anyone down and Football Outsiders has them ranked as the 26th defense in the league. Eli Manning was able to overcome that last week with his full complement of weapons, but losing Nicks is a huge blow for this game. The Panthers meanwhile are off to a bit of an uneven start, but a recommitment to the running game last week in New Orleans led to an offensive explosion. Defensively they still aren’t anything to write home about, but at home against a depleted Giants offense I expect them to do enough. (PANTHERS PK) |