Thursday night I'm taking the Jets to win. Every season there is one week where I massively overthink this entire operation... so why not week 2? First quarter, the easy picks! No one in their right mind thinks the 9ers are going to beat the Panthers. Carolina is not going to start 0-2. Cam & Co. win. And as much as everyone loves Andrew Luck (admit it, you LOVE him, you know it, your significant other knows it...), the Denver D is too much for the Colts O and the Colts D... isn't worth the paper its printed on. Denver wins. AlMoST no one in their right mind thinks the Saints, on the road, with a porous D, can put up more points than Odell Beckham Jr & Co. My (metaphorical) money is on the Giants as well. A lot of people would put the Pats-vs-Dolphins in this category, but I'm not (exactly) one of them. The Fins played Seattle tough, and as much as Coach B will try to get his squad ready, I suspect that Miami's defense will knock Garoppolo out of the game... leaving rookie Jacoby Brissett to win it. The thing is, since the Miami O can't seem to score much, Brissett will manage to get his first 'W' as the Pats triumph. Second quarter, bandwagon time! The Jets played the Bengals tough, they must be a playoff contender! Maybe not, but I'll take a hot Jets team over a medocre-looking Bills squad. Of course, the Jets' QB has never beaten a Rex Ryan defense... The Steelers manhandled the Ready-Or-Nots, so they are the team to beat the Pats. Again, maybe, maybe not, but I'll take them to beat the Bengals in Pittsburgh this year. Of course, they blew it at home last year... The Oakland Raiduhs came back and beat an elite QB, they must be destined to win playoff games! Ok, probably not, but I'll take them at home to beat the Falcons. Of course, this is in spite of the Falcons being a team that travels very well, historically. Third quarter, split decisions... Tennessee Tuxedos at the Motor Cittie Kitties. Is Detroit for real? They beat the Colts in Indy, so they might be. On the other hand, in that game QB Matthew Stafford went 27-of-30 (!!) for 247 yards and 3 TDs on passes shorter than 10 yards, and only 4-of-7 on longer passes. What is amazing is not that he was only slightly over 50%, but that they only tried 7 mid-to-deep shots. Alternate explanation: Stafford was a perfect 27-of-27 (!!) on passes to everyone EXCEPT Marvin Jones. Let the word go forth: if your D is not up to snuff, Matthew Stafford and Jim Bob Cooter will kill it. Tennessee lost to the Vikes, and while Minnesota failed to score an offensive TD, QB Sean Hill was 8-of-10 on passes between 10&19 yards alone, and didn't allow a single sack or pick, so Stafford should do better on longer throws this week. The Detroit D allowed QB Andrew Luck to be the highest-rated passer in the league last week so Marcus Mariota will do well, but given his youth, probably will not exploit opportunities as well as he should. Motown wins. Dallas at Washington. Most folks seem to think the problem in Big D is the inability of their RBs to gain traction; I think its only a symptom. For all that Dak Prescott is doing amazingly well for a late-round QB suddenly thrust into the starting role, he was only 1-of-7 on deep passes for 21 yards (making Dez nearly irrelevant), and his accuracy was suspect, which might explain why New York shut down the running attack. When New York brought its defense closer to the line of scrimmage to stop the short passes, that also made it far easier to stuff the run. So, while the Washington RedRyders have a cheesier defense, I think Cousins & Co. can outgun the cowpokes who may be firing too many blanks. Washington wins. Chefs at Texoids. KC has the better QB (and no, I'm not saying anything bad about Brockweiler; Alex Smith has improved), but Houston has the better D. Could be a very good game. That said, this will be a revealing game; if Hoyer's 4-pick playoff performance against the Chefs was a product of the Houston scheme (as opposed to a poor QB), then expect KC to turnover the Texans and win, going away. I'm picking the Texans to win at home. Shehawks at Rams. Welcome to life without Beast Mode, where the QB has to throw 40+ times to eke out 240 yards and the team struggles to get 100 yards rushing. And Wilson is now dinged up. Also remember that Seattle has historically been much better at home, started awfully slow last year, and beat the High-Powered Dolphins(tm) 12-to-10 last week, dodging a bullet to do it. That said, the Rams managed less than 100 net yards against the 9ers, and are they likely to do much better against the legion of whom? I'm picking the Shehawks to win, but this is the sort of over-confidence-perfect-storm which has tripped them up in the past. Note, the Rams won both meetings last year. Another note, the Rams are underdogs, but by less than 4 points, at home. Yikes. To truly get a sense of how weird this game may be, check out: http://www.hawkblogger.com/2016/09/10-facts-know-rams-vs-seahawks.html Tampa at Arizona. You would think this would be a no-brainer, except that Jammies Winston looked awfully good, and Carson Palmer... didn't. I'll take the Cards to win at home, but if any team can walk in, get under-estimated, and pull off the upset, the Bucs can. If the Cards get an easy lead and then let the Bucs hang around,... I can easily see Arizona up 23-to-17, and Winston driving down the field and scoring a TD with 11 seconds remaining. But I'm still picking the Cards. Finally, Packers at Vikings. Normally, I'd say the abysmal failure of the Vikings O to score in Tennessee means that this game will be dominated by A-Rodge, but both of these teams look a lot like the teams that played week 17, last year. The Packers dominated the time of possession 3-to-2 (and had 75 plays to just 49 for MN), first downs 19-to-14, and yardage 350-to-242. How was Aaron Rodgers? 28-of-44 for 274 with 1 costly pick... But wait, I hear you say, Jordy Nelson is back and scored this week!! Yes, he did have a TD, but he caught 6 passes for only 32 yards, and the Packers seemed unwilling to test his deep speed. Also, with Josh Sitton gone, the Vikings D... well, suffice it to say that if Purple&Gold owns the backfield, better receiving weapons and Eddie Lacy's offseason conditioning will not be enough. So why am I picking the Packers? I envision the Vikes losing this one on a late, missed field goal. Go Vikings! Fourth quarter, garbage time! Why is Philly at Chicago on Monday night in week 2? Possibly because the NFL felt they needed to schedule them in prime time, and wanted to do it before everyone figured out how stinky they are this year? Of course, Carson Wentz is doing his darnedest to ruin that script, and - - - durn it, I'm not going to say anything snarky about Jay Cutler again until we see how well or how badly the trade for Sam Bradford plays out. Still, the Chicago D should be much better than the Browns, and I'll take da Bears to win, and end their six-game home skid (the Bears have 1 win in their last 12 home games, believe it or not). The Ravens will crush the Browns, but it won't be pretty. No overthink needed. Welcome to Hangover City, where Jacksonville ("we coulda beaten the Packers") meets San Diego ("we coulda beaten the Chefs"). Six years ago, the Chargers opened the season at KC and lost a game it appeared they were going to win. A week later? They crushed the Jags in their home opener. In 2011, after losing to Denver (in OT), and in 2015, after getting crushed by the Chefs, what did the Chargers do? Demolish the Jagulars. Philip Rivers is 4-and-0 against the Jags, and Blake Bortles is 0-and-2 against the Bolts. Still, favored or not, I'm picking the Jagulars to win this one. I guess I just think that losing Keenan Allen and the game against the Chefs will weaken the Blue-and-Gold, while Jacksonville will be energized realizing that they can hang with playoff teams like Green Bay.