Pool Picks for NFL Week 3: Survivor & Pick’em Contests Advice

It's officially Week 3 of the 2023 NFL season, and we're back with data-driven advice for making picks in NFL survivor pools, football office pools, and pick'em contests. Maximizing your edge in football pools isn't just about trying to predict the most likely winners; it requires a deeper understanding of strategy and game theory that is the focus of our Week 3 pick analysis.

Data in this article is current as of Wednesday, Sept. 20 at 6 p.m. ET.

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Week 3 NFL Survivor Pick Advice: Big Favorites Abound, With Different Future Value Profiles

We get our first double-digit favorite of 2023 in Week 3. Also our second. And our third. Kansas City, Dallas, and San Francisco are all favored by that much as of Wednesday.

After two tight weeks with a lot of riskier survivor picks in play, we now have eight different teams favored by at least six points in Week 3. (Only six teams met that criteria over the last two weeks combined.)

That means that survivor pick options are a little safer this week, and there are more of them to choose from. Of course, the flip side of that is most of the teams that look like good Week 3 survivor picks are among the better teams in the NFL, and using any of them comes with an opportunity cost in survivor pools.

Furthermore, the dynamics of Week 3 (pick popularity widely spread out over multiple options, plus several teams with high win odds) mean that the chances of a big public wipeout in survivor pools are diminished. Kansas City (at 22% pick popularity) is currently the most popular pick this week, well below where Baltimore, Washington, and Buffalo ranked in terms of pick popularity over the last two weeks.

In terms of Expected Value, what that means is that a lot of the most popular picks have good, but not great, EV this week. So you're probably considering using a good team as your survivor pick, in a week where the likely upside of doing so isn't all that good. (Having said that, this will surely end up being the Armageddon week where all the big favorites lose.)

So the primary consideration in survivor pools for Week 3 should primarily involve future value, and which specific teams you want to save. San Francisco, Kansas City, and Dallas, in that order, are our three highest ranking teams in terms of future value in survivor pools, but how their future value is distributed week to week looks different.

San Francisco should be a huge favorite over Arizona in Week 4. Then things cool off for a bit, until the 49ers become the most valuable team after Week 11, with several expected high-value spots during the final third of the season. In really large survivor pools and especially those requiring double picks late in the season, the 49ers should be an ace in the hole as the end of the season nears.

Kansas City should be a strong pick option over next month, and then again late in a Week 16 home game against Raiders. But if you're in a smaller pool that's likely to end before Week 16, that late Raiders matchup is likely irrelevant to you.

Dallas has a six-week stretch from Weeks 8-13 where they are one of our largest projected favorites in five of those weeks. So if you hold the Cowboys until the midseason, you're bound to have a very high value play in your hand, as many of your opponents will have used them last week, this week, and in other future weeks.

The right tradeoffs to make all depend on the characteristics of your pools (e.g. their size and rules) as well as your own personal situation (e.g. how many entries you have left and what teams you've picked so far). Our NFL Survivor Picks product takes all of that into account in making pick recommendations, and you can get a free trial below.

NFL Week 3 Pick’em Contest Advice: The Browns-Falcons Exchange In Weekly Prize Pools

To win prizes in weekly pick’em contests, you often have to differentiate yourself from the crowd with a few key leverage plays. Often, those plays are more realistic upset picks (i.e. not huge long shots) that are very unpopular with the public. You take a calculated risk that isn't expected to pay off, but sometimes it does hit, and when it does you gain a huge edge over the rest of the pool.

Other times, you can still find contrarian value sticking with a favorite, because the underdog they are facing is a relatively popular upset pick, and you can maintain an edge against the field while having win odds in your favor. It's a less common scenario, but still occasionally happens.

Week 3 provides a good example of how you can play off the public’s pick tendencies to increase your odds in weekly NFL game winner pools, in this case by making an upset pick on a field goal underdog.

As of Wednesday, there are two matchups in NFL Week 3 where a team is favored by exactly three points, and the moneyline odds are identical: Cleveland (-3) vs. Tennessee, and Detroit (-3) vs. Atlanta. However, the public is picking those two similar games in very different ways.

Our data from the biggest national pool hosting platforms shows that Detroit is being picked 82% of the time in pick'em contests this week, while Cleveland is only being picked 58% of the time. So relatively speaking, you get better payoff if you pick the Browns and the Falcons, than if you pick the Lions and the Titans.

If you trust the betting markets, the odds of those two combinations of picks hitting are identical. You have a 24% chance of going 2-0, a 52% chance of a split, and a 24% chance of going 0-2. Based on the public pick rates, though, we would expect a typical pool entry to pick both the Browns and Falcons only 10% of the time, but pick both the Lions and Titans 34% of the time.

When you're thinking about making an upset pick, you need to consider both risk and reward, but most pick'em players ignore the latter consideration. If you pick the Titans as your upset and also go with the favored Lions, and they both win, you will have to beat about 3.5x more entries across all your other picks to come out tops in Week 3, compared to picking the Falcons as an upset and sticking with the favored Browns (and having both of them win).

If you pick that unpopular Browns-Falcons combo and it hits, you will have a two-game lead on more than a third of your pool, and a one-game lead on roughly another 55% of your pool. In a week in which there are a lot of big favorites and potentially fewer overall upsets, that could easily be the difference maker in winning or not winning a weekly prize.

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Week 3 NFL Confidence Pool Advice: Be Boring With Your High Confidence Point Picks

We noted that NFL Week 3 features a lot of larger point spreads. Often in season-long pick'em pools, entries shoot themselves in the foot by taking on too much risk in the early going, especially in smaller pools.

This can be doubly true in confidence point pools, where the rewards for getting certain picks correct vary drastically. In a full 16-game week, your six highest confidence-point picks (16 through 11) make up over half of your possible weekly points, and your top three confidence picks account for a third of your possible points.

So it’s okay to be boring this week, and set the big favorites as your highest confidence plays. They probably won’t all win, but they give you a chance at the most points and the best path to your highest score for the week. (FYI, out of the biggest favorites this week, Buffalo looks like the team being most "underrated"—in relative terms—by the public.)

Even in weekly prize contests, the top favorites still make sense up top, and you can find your differentiation with a few value upset plays in the middle point totals.

Get Expert Week 3 Football Pool Picks

Giving yourself the best chance to win more NFL survivor pools and football pick'em contests is all about stacking the odds in your favor and understanding when it makes sense to fade the public. The challenge is that it takes a lot of data and math to do it right, and most players don't have the will, the skill, or the time to compete at that level.

At PoolGenius, we do all the data collection and number crunching required for you to play like a pro in your 2023 football pools, from projecting how your opponents will pick in NFL Week 3 to identifying the most compelling opportunities to differentiate your picks.

And thanks to our partnership with Action Network, you can get a no-obligation free trial and exclusive season discounts using the links below. Good luck in your pick'em and survivor pools this week!