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Posted Friday at 2:30pm EST and odds are subject to change.

NFL Week: 7

October 23

What you see below is our early leans. Many of the selections below will stay the same and some will be moved into official plays with wagers on Sunday. However, there is also the possibility that we see, read or get a sense that something is not right with one of our selections and change our pick. There are several different criteria we use to grade a game and make it an official play and a lot of things can happen or change between Friday and Sunday. We’ll have all write-ups (except Monday Night Football) posted on Friday but our actual wagers won’t be posted until Sunday morning between 10 AM and 12:00 PM EST

Cincinnati -3½ over Atlanta

9:30 AM EST. Yes, breakfast football in a soccer cathedral, and the pick is Cincinnati -3½, because one of these quarterbacks is playing like a franchise and the other is playing like a turnover subscription service. Joe Burrow has thrown 20 touchdowns against 6 interceptions for a 5-2 Bengals team, while Michael Penix Jr. sits at 10 touchdowns and 11 picks for a 3-5 Atlanta outfit that just got shut out 16-0 by Tampa Bay. That is not a slump. That is an offense that flew to Europe looking for its own pulse.

Start with the simplest math in the matchup. Atlanta converts third downs at a miserable 33 percent clip, and last week it produced a grand total of zero points against a division rival. The Falcons run the ball respectably, 1,078 rushing yards as a team, but when every drive eventually lands in third and long, Penix has to throw, and when Penix has to throw, the other team eventually gets the football. Cincinnati's attack has no such trapdoor. Burrow and his receivers are the entire operation and they know it, the over has cashed in three straight Bengals games because this team plays in shootouts by design, and a 52.5 total tells you the market expects points. In a track meet, take the quarterback who does not give the ball away. Now the part nobody in Cincinnati wants to say out loud. The Bengals' defence is a rumour.

They just needed overtime to survive Tennessee 43-36, their secondary is held together with ankle tape (DJ Turner II, Jordan Battle and Kyle Dugger are all questionable), and Andrei Iosivas is on injured reserve, so the margin for error is thinner than the -3½ suggests. Atlanta's ground game can absolutely shorten this game and keep Burrow sipping coffee on the sideline. All of that is real. It still does not fix the Falcons having to score in the mid twenties to hang around, something an offense missing Zachariah Branch and Samson Ebukam, with Brian Robinson Jr. nursing a hamstring, has shown no recent ability to do. A shutout travels badly.

So the script writes itself. Cincinnati scores early, Atlanta's run game keeps it respectable for a half, and then the game state forces Penix into obvious passing downs against a defence that only has to be opportunistic, not good. One mistake becomes two, the Bengals' passing game cashes both, and a neutral site crowd that came to see touchdowns gets them from the team that actually brought a quarterback. Recommendation: Cincinnati -3½.

Philadelphia +3½ over NY Giants

1:00 PM EST. The Giants are favoured in this building for the first time since 2009, and if that sentence does not make you reach for the home dog plus the hook, nothing will. The pick is Philadelphia in a divisional street fight where the total is 38.5, a number so low it practically begs you to take points, because in a game priced for a rock fight, three and a half points is a wheelbarrow full of gold.

Let us get the ugly part out of the way first, because it is genuinely ugly. Jalen Hurts is on injured reserve and done for the season. The Eagles are 2-6, they have lost six straight, they scored zero second half points in a 27-10 loss at Washington last week, and Tanner McKee fumbled once and threw a late pick in that game. DeVonta Smith, Dontayvion Wicks and Saquon Barkley are all questionable, and Lane Johnson is out. There. That is the whole horror show, printed in full. And after all of it, the road team is laying points with J.J. McCarthy, its third different starting quarterback of the season, because Jaxson Dart's year ended in Week 2. The Giants lead the division at 4-2-1, full credit, but they just put Tyrone Tracy Jr. on injured reserve, Cam Skattebo is questionable with a hamstring, and their offense is exactly the kind of modest, careful unit that lets a desperate home team hang around until the fourth quarter. That is the bet.

Not that Philadelphia is good, because right now Philadelphia is not good. The bet is that a wounded divisional rival at home, in a game with a total under 40, against a backup quarterback and a thinned out run game, does not lose by more than a field goal. Vic Fangio's defence is still coached by Vic Fangio. The crowd will be feral by the second series. Barkley, if he goes, is running against the team that let him walk, and even a hobbled version of that storyline has produced sillier results than a three point game. Every point of this +3½ is doing work in a game script that projects punts, field goals and one late possession deciding everything.

The Giants deserve respect for surviving their own quarterback graveyard, and their defence can absolutely strangle a McKee led offence for long stretches. But favourites cover on the road in division games by being clearly better, and nothing about New York's current roster is clearly better by four points. Ugly beats pretty when the hook is free. Recommendation: Philadelphia +3½.

Carolina +126 over Denver

1:00 PM EST. The logic starts with a question: what exactly is Denver laying here? The spread is 2.5 points, down from 3 earlier in the week, which means the market itself is quietly admitting this is close to a coin flip. When a game is a coin flip, you do not lay the short price with the road team. You take the plus money at home and let the coin land.

Denver is 6-2 and sitting on top of the AFC West, so let us not pretend the Broncos are frauds. But look at what they are carrying into Charlotte. Safety Talanoa Hufanga is out with an ankle injury, his partner Brandon Jones is questionable with a hamstring, running back RJ Harvey is on injured reserve, and receiver Pat Bryant is working back from an ankle of his own. That is the spine of a defense getting thinner by the week, on the road, in a 1:00 PM Eastern kickoff that asks a Mountain Time team to play on its body clock's morning. Meanwhile Bryce Young is fine. Dave Canales said the left knee is not an issue, Young has thrown for 1,921 yards and 13 touchdowns, and Chuba Hubbard gives Carolina a real 540 yard ground presence to lean on while the makeshift parts of this offense settle.

The counter case is loud and it deserves its paragraph. Carolina's run defense is a welcome mat: 30th in the league at 140.7 yards allowed per game, dead last in rushing touchdowns surrendered, 28th in points allowed. The Panthers have lost two straight, Young took six sacks at Green Bay in a 27-19 loss where the offense managed 258 yards, the offensive line is patched together with Damien Lewis questionable and reinforcements only just returning to practice, and an interim defensive coordinator is calling the shots after a staff shakeup. Denver's run game against that front is a legitimate problem, full stop. If the Broncos control the line and the clock, the plus money dies quietly.

But coin flips get decided by which team has fewer ways to lose, and right now Denver's secondary is one tweaked hamstring from starting a raffle winner. Young at home, healthy, with Hubbard keeping the Broncos honest and a crowd smelling a winnable game against a banged up favourite, is a live dog in every sense. The line drift toward Carolina all week is the market whispering the same thing. Take the home team to win a sloppy one outright. Recommendation: Carolina +126.

Indianapolis +5½ over Dallas

1:00 PM EST. Before we talk about a single player, talk about the line, because the line is the story. This game opened at Dallas -1.5. It now sits at Dallas -5.5, and nothing about the Dallas Cowboys changed this week. What changed is that Indianapolis lost 42-7 at Jacksonville last Sunday, on television, in front of everybody, and the market did what it always does after a public execution: it overcorrected. Four full points of steam for a 3-5 road team with the worst defence in football by yardage. Somebody has to take the other side of that, and the other side is us.

The football case is not hard to build once you look at what Dallas actually is. The Cowboys score, 27.4 points per game, seventh in the league, with Dak Prescott at 2,046 yards and 14 touchdowns. They also defend like a screen door in a hurricane: 385.4 yards allowed per game, dead last, 26.6 points allowed per game, 27th. A team like that laying five and a half on the road is a team begging to be backdoored, and Indianapolis owns the exact tool for the job. Jonathan Taylor has 610 rushing yards this season, Dallas has been gashed on the ground all year, and the Colts at home in a dome with a 51.5 total are playing in the highest scoring environment on the Sunday slate. Points will be available, early and late, and +5½ in a game with points available is a cushion that breathes. Dallas also arrives with its own training room roll call: George Pickens questionable with a hamstring, Jake Ferguson questionable with an ankle, safety Caleb Downs in the concussion protocol and KaVontae Turpin likely out.

Honesty paragraph, because this one needs it. The Colts are 2-6, they have lost four straight, their turnover differential is minus 11, worst in the league, and Daniel Jones has thrown five touchdown passes all season. Alec Pierce is on injured reserve and the passing game is close to decorative. If Dallas plays a clean game, protects Dak and jumps ahead two scores, Indianapolis does not have the firepower to chase, and 42-7 was not an accident so much as a warning label. All true. It is also all priced in, then priced in again, then steamed another point for good measure. You are not betting that the Colts are good. You are betting that a historically leaky road favourite is not four points better than the team the lookahead line said was nearly its equal.

Expect a sloppy, entertaining mess: Taylor ripping chunks, Dallas answering through the air, and a one score game in the fourth quarter where the Colts, playing at home with nothing left to protect, are the side holding the points. The favourite escapes and the dog eats. That is the whole idea behind taking an inflated number off an overreaction. Recommendation: Indianapolis +5½.

Miami +6½ over Detroit

1:00 PM EST. The total of 50.5 is the whole argument in one number. The market expects a track meet, and track meets are where fat home underdogs go to cash. Detroit rolls in at 5-2, winners of three straight, scoring 29.0 points a game behind Jared Goff and his 15 touchdowns against a single interception. Nobody here is pretending the Lions cannot score. The bet is that they cannot stop anybody either, and in a game priced for points, a home team catching nearly a touchdown against the worst defense in football only has to keep showing up on the scoreboard.

Because that Detroit defense is not a figure of speech. The Lions rank dead last in the league in yards allowed at 417.4 a game and dead last in passing yards allowed at 320.9 a game, and the secondary making the trip to South Florida looks like a hospital ward. Safety Kerby Joseph is out with a knee injury. Brian Branch is questionable with a concussion. Corner D.J. Reed is questionable with a hip. Linebacker Jack Campbell, the quarterback of that defense, is doubtful with a neck injury. Jahmyr Gibbs ran for 153 yards last week and Goff directed the winning drive against Minnesota, and it still took every bit of it, because this defense gives it back as fast as the offense gets it. Detroit is 2-4-1 against the spread this season for a reason. Laying seven on the road with that back end is an act of faith.

Now the ugly part, stated plain. Miami is 1-6. The Dolphins score 16.7 points a game. Malik Willis has thrown six touchdowns against five interceptions and has been sacked 21 times, and the protection in front of him leaks. All true, and none of it changes the shape of this bet. Willis threw two touchdowns last week and had New England down 13-3 at halftime before losing 24-19, Ollie Gordon II gives this offense a floor on the ground with 408 rushing yards and four scores, and Willis can extend drives with his legs against a pass rush missing its signal caller. Miami is 4-3 against the spread because it keeps wandering into one score games at home. In the November heat at Hard Rock, against a defense held together with tape and hope, the Dolphins only need to lose by a field goal. Take the points and enjoy the chaos. Recommendation: Miami +6½.

Cleveland +3½ over New Orleans

1:00 PM EST. It starts with a question the Saints have not answered all season, how does a team that is winless in its own building get to lay points against a 5-3 football team? New Orleans is 0-4 at home, 2-5 overall, losers of four of its last five, and the total for this game sits at 42.5. Points in this building are rationed. When points are rationed, three and a half is not a spread, it is a life raft, and the Browns are exactly the kind of ugly, stubborn team that rides it home.

The Saints cannot run the ball, and that is not an insult, it is a statistic. In their last game before the bye, a 16-10 loss to Pittsburgh in Paris, New Orleans rushed for 18 yards as a team and got shut out in the second half. Kendre Miller leads the Saints in rushing this season with 159 yards. Total. Alvin Kamara is questionable with a bad back and Travis Etienne Jr. is on injured reserve, so Tyler Shough has to throw it close to 40 times a game because there is no other door to walk through. Shough has been respectable, 13 touchdowns against six interceptions, but one dimensional offenses stall, settle for field goals and leave the backdoor wide open. Yes, the Saints are rested and healthier coming off the bye. Rested and one dimensional is still one dimensional.

Here is the Cleveland truth, no varnish. The Browns score 17.4 points a game, they have taken 33 sacks, the worst sack rate in the league, and Deshaun Watson spent the week in concussion protocol, which means Shedeur Sanders, owner of two career passing yards, might start a road game in a dome. Ugly. And yet this team is 5-3 and 5-3 against the spread because it drags every game into the mud and refuses to leave. Harold Fannin Jr. caught 10 passes for 154 yards at Pittsburgh last week, Watson threw for 324 yards in that loss, and if he clears protocol this number looks generous. If Sanders goes instead, the plan shrinks to Quinshon Judkins, short throws to Fannin and a defense that tackles the game. Recommendation: Cleveland +3½.

Washington +4½ over LA Rams

1:00 PM EST. This is a game that feels like an elimination bout for both sides, the 4-4 Rams sitting outside the playoff picture and the 2-4-1 Commanders hanging on only because the NFC East is a mess. Desperate home underdogs are dangerous animals, and this particular one just played the best game of its season. A week ago Washington fell behind Philadelphia 10-0, then scored the final 27 points of the afternoon, sacked Tanner McKee five times, picked him off once and held Saquon Barkley to 30 yards on 13 carries. That is not a fluke performance. That is a defense that found its teeth.

The teeth get fed again on Sunday, because Matthew Stafford is walking into this with a sore shoulder and an offense that could not buy a first down last week. The Rams beat the Chargers 24-9, sure, but they did not record a first down until late in the second quarter, Stafford threw for 157 yards, and he spent the aftermath icing that shoulder. On the other side, Jayden Daniels has not thrown an interception all season, six touchdowns against zero giveaways, and he was clean and efficient against Philadelphia, 16 of 29 for 217 yards and a touchdown to Stefon Diggs, who has five scores on the year. A home dog whose quarterback never gifts the ball away, backed by a pass rush coming off a five sack game, is a problem for a road favorite laying more than a field goal.

The Rams secondary makes it worse for the visitors. Corner Jaylen Watson is out with a shoulder injury. Trent McDuffie is questionable with a back problem and safety Kam Curl is questionable with a foot, which leaves Daniels picking at backups while Diggs works the seams.Washington just lost defensive tackle Daron Payne to season ending surgery this week, and that is a gut punch against Kyren Williams, who has 548 rushing yards and six touchdowns for a Rams team that ran for 129 last week. Washington also allows touchdowns on 79.2 percent of red zone trips, among the worst marks in football, and the Rams have won two straight. Fine. Put it all on the scale and a banged up road favorite with a quarterback icing his throwing shoulder still has to beat this team by five in its own building. We will take our chances with the points. Recommendation: Washington +4½.

NY Jets +9½ over Kansas City

1:00 PM EST. The logic is simple enough to fit on a napkin. Kansas City is 5-2 and unbeaten at home, but this version of the Chiefs has forgotten how to bury anybody. They are 3-4 against the spread, they have lost two straight, and last Sunday in Denver they led 24-13 in the fourth quarter and lost 28-24, coughing up 15 unanswered points, watching Harrison Butker miss from 54, and getting stood up at the goal line in the final minute with the game on the line. Patrick Mahomes threw for 321 yards and three touchdowns without a pick in that game and it still was not enough. When the best quarterback alive plays that well and you still lose, your margin for error is gone, and margins are what a 9.5 point spread is made of.

The cover case rests on a Jets offense that is far more functional than the 2-6 record suggests. Geno Smith owns a 104.5 passer rating with 12 touchdowns against only three interceptions. Last week against Las Vegas, New York scored on its first six possessions, Braelon Allen ran for a career high 147 yards, Adonai Mitchell posted a career best 142 receiving yards, and Garrett Wilson sits at 527 yards on the season. Kansas City's corner room remains a patch job, with Mansoor Delane questionable yet again, and that is a lot of weapons to chase for four quarters. The Jets do not need to win this game. They need to do what they did for three quarters last week, move the ball, score in the twenties, and make Kansas City earn every inch of a two score margin it has shown no interest in building lately.

The respect is real, so let us state it. The Chiefs defense is top four in points allowed at 18.7 a game and has surrendered only 12 touchdowns all season. The Jets have lost three straight, their own defense folded late against the Raiders, and Arrowhead in November is nobody's idea of a holiday. All of that is exactly why the number is 9.5 and not 6.5. At some point the price becomes the pick. Kansas City grinds, Kansas City sweats, Kansas City wins its home games by a score and goes home annoyed about it. The Jets have the quarterback play and the ground game to hang around inside two scores all afternoon, and if it comes down to one late drive with the backdoor standing open, Geno Smith has been good enough this season to walk through it. Recommendation: NY Jets +9½.

LA Chargers +5½ over Houston

4:05 PM EST. This is a bet on arithmetic as much as football. Houston is 2-5. A 2-5 football team is laying five and a half points on the road, in a game with a total of 40.5, the joint lowest number on the Week 9 board. For the Texans to cover this, they do not just have to beat the worst team in the league. They have to beat them by two scores in a fist fight where points are priced like they are being rationed. That is a big ask for an offense that scores 23.6 a game.

Look at what Houston actually is. C.J. Stroud has been tidy, 1,867 yards with 11 touchdowns against a single interception, and the Texans have given the ball away only three times all season. But tidy is not the same as explosive. Houston has scored more than 27 points once in seven games, a 34-31 shootout win over Jacksonville, and its only comfortable win came against Tennessee. The rest of the résumé is a pile of one score games in both directions, five points to Buffalo, two to Indianapolis, six in overtime to the Giants last time out. This team lives in the mud with everybody it plays. It does not bury people, and now it has to do it away from home with David Montgomery out of the backfield.

None of that is a defense of the Chargers, so let us say the ugly part out loud. Los Angeles is 0-7, it scores a league worst 14.1 points a game, and it has managed 15 total points across its last two outings. Justin Herbert has thrown an interception in every game this season, ten in all, behind an offensive line missing Rashawn Slater. Derwin James is on injured reserve, and Will Anderson Jr., who has 7.5 sacks and leads the league in tackles for loss, gets to hunt that battered line all afternoon. All of it is priced in. It is why a home team with a healthy Justin Herbert is getting five and a half points in the first place.

What is left is the spot. A winless Jim Harbaugh team at home in mid November is not a fun afternoon for anybody, and this defense has shown it can keep a game in the mud early, the way it held the Rams to three points well into the second quarter last week. Herbert still threw for 257 yards in that loss, Omarion Hampton is back carrying the ball, and Houston has to fly across the country and produce its best road performance of the season to cash this ticket. The Texans might win. They have been winning almost nothing by margin all year. Take the points and make a 2-5 team prove it can separate. Recommendation: LA Chargers +5½.

San Francisco -9½ over Las Vegas

4:25 PM EST. This one starts with the hottest quarterback in the conference walking into the friendliest matchup he will see all season. Brock Purdy is completing 69.2 percent of his passes for 1,748 yards, 15 touchdowns and four interceptions, San Francisco scores 28.1 points a game, fourth best in the league, and the 49ers convert exactly half of their third downs. Across from him is a Las Vegas defense allowing 28.8 points a game, next to last in football, giving up 235.5 passing yards a week and sitting near the bottom of the league against the dropback pass. Kyle Shanahan with two weeks to scheme against that secondary is not a fair fight.

The schedule does the rest of the work. San Francisco is 6-1, leads the NFC West by two and a half games, and comes in off its bye, rested, at home, in its sixth week out of eight without a road trip. Las Vegas is on its second straight road game after a track meet on the East Coast last week, a 38-33 win over the Jets that snapped a four game skid but also confirmed what this defense is. The total has been bet up from 46.5 into the fifties because everyone expects points, and in a scoring game the deeper, healthier, better coached roster pulls away late. The Raiders also cannot run the ball a lick, 77.3 yards a game, 31st in the league, with Ashton Jeanty averaging 3.1 a carry and in danger of losing the starting job to a rookie. A one dimensional team asking Kirk Cousins to throw forty times on the road is a team asking for sacks and turnovers.

Now the honesty, because there is a real pile of it. San Francisco is a hospital ward. Brandon Aiyuk is out, and Christian McCaffrey, Deebo Samuel and Mike Evans all missed practice this week with hamstring, hamstring and rib and Achilles problems respectively. Their statuses are the one thing that can change this game, so check the final report. The Raiders are also no pushover at the window, 6-2 against the spread this season, with Cousins playing his best football since 2023, 2,124 yards and 19 touchdowns, and Brock Bowers healthy and back to full practice. Cousins will score. The question is whether he can score enough

The answer is no, because his defense cannot get off the field and his run game cannot shorten the afternoon. Meanwhile the San Francisco defense is quietly getting its teeth back, with Nick Bosa practicing for the first time since September and DeForest Buckner arriving in a bye week trade to wreck the interior of a line protecting a stationary quarterback. Purdy has carved up better defenses than this one with spare parts before, and he still has Brandin Cooks, Jacob Cowing, Jordan Watkins and Christian Kirk working against a secondary that may be missing starting corner Darien Porter. The 49ers win the shootout and cover the number doing it. Recommendation: San Francisco -9½.

Green Bay +3½ over New England

4:25 PM EST. This is the rare case of the better quarterback room getting points plus the hook. Both teams are 5-3, and this game will be decided by the two young arms. Jordan Love leads the entire NFL in passing yards with 2,246, averages 280.8 a game, has thrown 16 touchdowns, and has tossed multiple touchdown passes in eight straight games. Green Bay has basically handed him the franchise and asked him to carry it, and he keeps answering. Getting three and a half with that guy, in a game priced as a coin flip, is the whole bet.

The hook matters more than usual here because of how this matchup is built. New England wins with discipline and Drake Maye, and Maye has been superb, 1,983 yards, 15 touchdowns, a 100.4 rating and 8.5 yards an attempt. But look at what is left around him. A.J. Brown is out with an ankle injury, Mack Hollins is on injured reserve, Hunter Henry is questionable with a foot problem, and TreVeyon Henderson spent the week sick. Maye has been dealing anyway, six total touchdowns across his last two games while completing better than 78 percent of his throws, but the margin for error shrinks every time another pass catcher lands on the report. Green Bay does not need to stop Maye cold. It needs to trade scores with a thinned out offense and let the extra half point do its job at the end.

The counters are real and they start in the trenches. Micah Parsons is still out recovering from his knee surgery, which takes the Packers best Maye deterrent off the field against a quarterback who creates with his legs. Christian Watson is questionable after fracturing ribs, though he did briefly return last week. Green Bay also cannot run the ball to save its life, which is why Love is throwing it all over the yard in the first place, and New England is 3-0 at home this season in what will be a loud, cold looking building with the wind up around ten miles an hour. If the Patriots drag this into a field position game and Maye keeps freelancing, the home team can absolutely win by a touchdown.

But that script asks a lot of a favorite laying points with a backup cast. Green Bay has won four of its last five, it just went and won at Carolina, and its quarterback is the most productive passer in football right now, working a full deck of targets with Tucker Kraft and Matthew Golden healthy. Maye is also playing through a right shoulder issue, full practices or not, and the Packers only need to stay within a field goal to cash. In a game this even, with this quarterback, take the points and the hook and let Love throw you home. Recommendation: Green Bay +3½.

Seattle -8½ over Arizona

4:25 PM EST. Yes, Sam Darnold is out, ruled out Wednesday with a quad injury and a cracked rib he picked up Monday night. Yes, the market took one look at the words Drew Lock and hacked three full points off this spread, from 11.5 down to 8.5. That is the kind of panic we happily shop in. The Seahawks did not become a bad football team because their quarterback got hurt. They became a cheaper one, and there is a difference.

Start with the side of the ball that actually decides this game. Seattle owns the stingiest defense in the league, allowing 263.1 yards a game, the fewest in football, 156.0 passing yards a game, the second fewest, and 19.9 points a game. Nobody has run for 100 yards against them in 37 straight games, the longest active streak in the NFL, and they have piled up 13 takeaways. Walking into that buzzsaw is Gardner Minshew, a journeyman on his umpteenth team, named the starter on Tuesday after one relief outing against Dallas. Minshew Mania is a fun story in August. In November, in that building, against that defense, it is a short story. Trey McBride is a genuine problem, 66 catches already, the most any tight end has ever caught through eight games, and Arizona has quietly won three road games this season, tied for the most in the league. Stated plainly, the Cardinals are friskier than their 3-5 record. It still does not get them to 20 points in this building.

Now the part the market got flat wrong. Drew Lock is not some clipboard holder being thrown to the wolves. He threw for 422 yards and four touchdowns in his relief work earlier this season, and Jaxon Smith-Njigba does not need a franchise quarterback to eat. The man has 64 catches for 985 yards and nine touchdowns, is averaging 123.1 receiving yards a game, and gets to run routes against a defense allowing 29.8 points a game, dead last in the NFL, a unit that has surrendered 238 points in eight games and got carved for 45 by Detroit. The honest catch, since we keep it honest here: Lock has been nursing a sore right elbow, he was the emergency third quarterback the past two weeks, and if it barks, Seattle is down to rookie Jalen Milroe. Noted, and priced in twice over. Seattle has also lost three of four and got embarrassed at home on Monday, which is exactly why a proud defense with the Lumen Field crowd behind it shows up angry. The champions cover this with room to spare. Recommendation: Seattle -8½.

Tampa Bay +5½ over Chicago

8:20 PM EST. Everybody watched Chicago walk into Seattle on Monday night and hang 34 on the champions, and everybody promptly forgot the rest of the sentence. That game was Monday night, across the country, and this is Chicago's third straight game under the lights with a bye week waving at them from the other side of it. Tampa Bay, meanwhile, spent the week at home in its own beds after winning two straight by a combined 46 points. Short weeks and sleepy favorites are where road dogs go to eat.

Because Tampa's whole personality is built to ruin a favorite's evening. The defense is the real deal: third in the league in yards allowed at 285.9 a game, fifth in points allowed at 18.9, second against the run, and first in the NFL in both interceptions with 12 and total takeaways with 16, with opposing quarterbacks limping along at a 74.9 passer rating. And the offense has turned into a battering ram. Tampa owns the top rushing attack in football, with Bucky Irving at 728 yards, and the Bucs have run the ball 105 times in the past two games for a combined 584 yards, including a franchise record 324 against Atlanta. Teams that run it 50 times and take the ball away do not get blown out. They shorten games, strangle the clock, and turn fourth quarters into coin flips, which is all a 5.5 point head start ever asks.

Now the part pinned to the fridge so nobody accuses us of selling sunshine. Caleb Williams has been superb since returning from his hamstring injury, completing 73 percent of his throws with four touchdowns and no interceptions, and Chicago has scored 31, 30 and 34 in those three games. The Bears rush defense ranks fourth in the league and just added Jeffery Simmons at the trade deadline, so Tampa's ground game is running into a wall that knows it is coming. Baker Mayfield is playing through a thumb injury and has attempted just 14 passes in two weeks, Emeka Egbuka is questionable with a foot problem, and edge rusher Yaya Diaby is out. All true, and none of it changes the shape of this game. This spread sat at Chicago minus 3.5 before one loud Monday night in Seattle moved it two and a half points, and Tampa does not need to win a shootout to cash. It needs to do what it has done for a month: run the ball, hunt turnovers, and be standing there at the end. In a slugfest between two top five caliber defenses, take the points and the team that brought its lunch pail. Recommendation: Tampa Bay +5½.

Minnesota +3½ over Buffalo

8:15 PM EST. The headline screaming all week is that Kyler Murray is out, ruled out Thursday with a hamstring strain, week to week, no injured reserve. The headline is real. It is also mostly beside the point, because the Vikings were never riding their offense anywhere this season. They are 6-1 because of the meanest defense in football, and that defense does not have a hamstring problem.

Brian Flores is sending extra rushers on nearly three quarters of dropbacks, a blitz rate nobody has tracked higher in a decade, and the result is the hardest team in the league to score on. Andrew Van Ginkel has 6.5 sacks, Dallas Turner has six, and last week this unit held a Detroit offense that scores on everybody to 19 points on the road. Fair warning, stated plainly: if one quarterback alive can punish a blitz happy defense, it is Josh Allen, who has thrown for 1,793 yards and 11 touchdowns and run for 270 yards and nine more scores, while James Cook has 707 rushing yards at 5.1 yards a pop. Buffalo has the most points in the league, has topped 30 in three straight games and five of seven, and just bullied Baltimore 36-10. Nobody here is pretending the Bills cannot score. The bet is that in that dome, with that crowd noise and Flores throwing the kitchen sink at him, Allen spends enough of the night on his back and off schedule to keep this thing in the low 20s, where a home dog with a hook lives like a king.

Which brings us to the understudy, because Carson Wentz is nobody's idea of a white flag. This is career start number 101 for the man. In his relief work this season he has thrown for 276 yards with three touchdowns and zero interceptions, and Minnesota won both games he played in. Kevin O'Connell will hand him Justin Jefferson, Jordan Addison and T.J. Hockenson, Aaron Jones to lean on, and a Buffalo defense that is the soft underbelly of an otherwise terrifying team, giving up 352 yards and 25.9 points a game. The ugly truth, printed in full: the Vikings offense ranks 29th in the league at 279.4 yards a game, has scored the second fewest touchdowns in football, and managed 15 points against a lousy Detroit defense last week. Minnesota is not winning a track meet on Monday night. It is winning a knife fight in a phone booth, at home, with the best defense in the sport and three and a half points in its pocket. That is a fight we will pay to watch every single time. Recommendation: Minnesota +3½.