Sunday morning update: With Carolina no longer an option, Baltimore becomes the safest play — the Ravens project to be one of the better teams in the league, but their remaining schedule is very tough and they don't have any options remaining that look better than facing the Lions.
I still want to avoid taking the Broncos, who could see 40% of picks. Instead, root for the Jets to pull off the upset and see a big chunk of your pool get knocked out.
Editor’s note: The following was written before Thursday Night Football.
Another week without a big upset means most players made it through Week 2 of survivor pools. A smattering of entries were knocked out with the Raiders upset in Pittsburgh but that's about it.
We now have two weeks of games to use as data, but I still think most people are overreacting to a small sample size of what we have seen so far.
As an example, my model still isn't a believer in the Denver Broncos yet. Two road wins are great, but games against the Jacksonville Jaguars and New York Giants aren't enough to suggest they should be double-digit favorites in Week 3.
You can see my model's projection for that game and all others below. (Note that I do not include Week 18 because many teams will rest and it's difficult to provide an accurate prediction.)
Here are the top options for this week along with their key statistics. A reminder that for Expected Value (EV), anything above one is positive and below one is negative.
Normally I go through each team and discuss their merits, but I think this week is pretty simple.
The Pick: Carolina Panthers (at Texans)
Carolina has the best chance to win, the highest expected value, and is only being taken by 10% of entries. That's the trifecta we want.
The Bills have a high expected value too, but they have so many remaining weeks as options whereas the Panthers are projected to be in a lot of toss-up games.
Road teams on Thursday are dicey, but I can make an exception with a good defense going up against rookie quarterback Davis Mills.
