The script is simple enough to follow. The Dallas Cowboys need to beat the Washington Commanders in Week 18 to win the NFC East and earn a home playoff game.
But as football bettors saw last week when Philadelphia fell to Arizona — gift-wrapping the division crown for the Cowboys — things don’t always go according to plan.
Toss in a double-digit spread set by the NFL odds, and Dallas backers have some hard decisions to make in the final week of the regular season.
I run down this sizable spread and Over/Under total and give my free NFL picks for the Cowboys vs. Commanders on Sunday, January 7.
Cowboys vs Commanders odds
Cowboys vs Commanders predictions
A perfect Week …
This week’s Sunday Night Football matchup got a lot more interesting over the past 24 hours, with the Atlanta Falcons finally showing some fight before hosting the Kansas City Chiefs in Week 3.
New-look Atlanta appeared to be a dud for six quarters of the 2024 season, but surged in the second half of Monday’s matchup with Philadelphia and stole a one-point win on the road, setting the stage for this SNF test.
My Chiefs vs. Falcons predictions size up the spread and Over/Under total, as well as the line movement for Sunday Night Football, with my early leans and NFL picks for September 22.
Chiefs vs Falcons predictions
Early spread leanChiefs -3.5 (-115 at bet365)
My analysis
The Atlanta Falcons he…
Premier League players have been told not to spit, clear their nose or surround match officials when the season restarts, and will be directed towards a “celebration camera” after scoring in closed-doors matches.
Before the return of top-flight football in England on Wednesday, the Premier League has issued official guidelines on how games should be staged, played and broadcast amid the Covid-19 pandemic. It has confirmed players will wear Black Lives Matter and NHS badges on their shirts for the remainder of the 2019-20 campaign and a minute’s silence will be held before the opening 12 matches in recognition of those affected by the virus.
Physical distancing and Pogba: what our football writers are looking forward toRead more
ERIK THE RED
Being bystanders to this week’s Big Cup, Euro Vase and even the Tin Pot Brendan’s brave Leicester boys are trying to win, these are dark days for Manchester United. The Ole dream died last winter and Ralf Rangick is a lame-duck caretaker manager/consultant/assistant to the regional manager. The top four, the last possible positive to glean from yet another wasted year, looks a straight shootout between Arsenal and Tottenham, the latter managed by Antonio Conte, someone reportedly scratched from the United candidates’ list for being the type of troublemaker who made José Mourinho look like a form prefect of the Phil Neville variety.
The word among proper journalists is that Erik…
The World Cup had not even finished in Qatar last winter before the question began to be asked: when would it be Saudi Arabia’s turn? Like a mist creeping in off the sea, from nowhere the conversation was suddenly ubiquitous and the outcome apparently inevitable. Now, not even a year later, we know the answer.
Saudi Arabia will host the Fifa men’s World Cup in 2034. Only the most unexpected or disastrous of circumstances will change that. Saudi Arabia, officially, has only “expressed an interest” in being host to the 48-team tournament, but it stands in a field of one. It has the endorsement of the Asian Football Confederation and more than 100 Fifa member nations. Not insignificantly, it is also the apple of Gianni Infantino’s eye…
Rejoice: After the NBA’s self-imposed weeklong layoff, the Boston Celtics and Dallas Mavericks are finally ready to tip off the NBA Finals.A (hopefully) seven-game showdown pitting Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown against Luka Doncic and Kyrie Irving is red meat for the sports betting public.Every journey starts with a single step, so let’s focus on Game 1 today. Here are three bets worth considering for Thursday night’s series opener.Boston Celtics to cover -6.5 (-110 at BetMGM, FanDuel)This one doesn’t require much overthinking. We’ve been treated to an abundance of close playoff games in recent weeks — well, at least out of the West — but the Celtics are favored at -225 to win this series for a reason. They’re the better team top to bottom, they were hardly tested throughout…
Don’t count MVPs before they hatch. Nikola Jokić’s third consecutive MVP has seemed like an inevitability during the first three-quarters of the season. Jokić’s triple-double averages, improved offensive efficiency, advanced statistics, and Denver’s No. 1 seed in the Western Conference all appeared to tip the scales toward Jokić walking away with the award. Trench warfare in the 2023 MVP discourse has reached critical mass in recent weeks. Bleacher Report analyst Andy Bailey almost abandoned Twitter due to the backlash from Philly fans. Kendrick Perkins grasping for straws with his consistent bashing of Jokić sparked a war on First Take with JJ Redick that took the MVP conversation to ghost pepper levels on the Scoville scale. Who’s the MVP favorite now? However, on Frid…
It was another miserable year full of miserable things. Here is some stuff from 2018 that we hope stays in 2018. The Content Maw 2018 is the year we officially ran out of ways to meaningfully produce what the media thinkfluencers like to call “content.” More specifically, this is the year in which the technologies that allow for and even demand the creation of content advanced to a point that the content creators, and thus consumers, have been left choking in the dust. This is a problem that manifests itself in ways both big and small. On the small side, you find writers and publications confronted with an endless array of video and audio and publishing and social media platforms through which to interact with their audiences. Instead of turning away from that void, these writers an…
Some people are fans of the Buffalo Bills. But many, many more people are NOT fans of the Buffalo Bills. This 2016 Deadspin NFL team preview is for those in the latter group. Read all the previews so far here. And buy Drew’s new book here. Your team: Buffalo Bills. Your 2015 record: 8-8, defending Stanley Cup Champions. Although your average Bills season is best measured not by wins and losses, but by parking lot fatalities. I don’t even pay attention to the Bills on the field anymore. All the action is in the stands and the concourse, amigo. While Tyrod Taylor is uncorking a whopping 12 passes per game and the kicker is nailing himself in the fucking face, these fans are getting busy in the bathtub lab, manufacturing their own homegrown brand of Siberian excitement. We got …
Some people are fans of the Detroit Lions. But many, many more people are NOT fans of the Detroit Lions. This 2013 Deadspin NFL team preview is for those in the latter group. Read all the 2013 NFL previews so far right here. Your team: Detroit Lions Your 2012 record: 4-12. And that's no ordinary 4-12 season for the Lions. This was a team that went 10-6 in 2011 before getting torched by the Saints in the playoffs. There was the illusion that this team had actually BUILT something, that they would be able to remain consistently successful, perhaps even, you know, improve. But not only did they go 4-12, they went 4-12 without anything catastrophic happening. Matt Stafford played the whole season. Megatron played the whole season. The core of young talent they assembled remaine…