NFL Week 3 features the biggest favorite of the year so far in the Colts, with the public completely off the New York Jets bandwagon after two bad games. Overreactions to primetime performances last week are also creating several value pick opportunities.
Last week, our value pick recommendations on the Colts, Browns, Bucs, and Eagles netted a big 0.5-win advantage over the public in season-long pick’em pools, even with the Philadelphia loss. And our subscriber picks had a 100% survival rate in survivor pools despite avoiding valuable teams like the Chiefs and 49ers in favor of more expendable picks like the Cardinals, Bucs, and Browns. That will be a solid advantage later on.
Now, let’s take a look at the potential picks that every pool player needs to have on their radar screen in Week 3, starting with pick’em contests and then moving on to survivor and knockout pools.
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Value Picks For NFL Week 3 Pick’em Pools
Using Vegas odds, data-driven predictions, and pick popularity data from national football pick’em contests, we’ve analyzed the entire NFL Week 3 slate and identified five picks that offer differentiating value in pick’em pools.
Keep in mind that we are not saying you should make all of the picks below – the upset picks especially. The best Week 3 picks for your NFL pick’em or confidence pool depend on strategy factors such as its size, rules, and prize structure, plus situational factors like your current place in the standings and the number of weeks left in the pool.
(Our Football Pick’em Picks product customizes recommended weekly picks for you based on all those factors.)
What we are saying is that the teams mentioned in this post offer some of the best opportunities to differentiate your Week 3 picks from your pool opponents, or they serve as prime examples of when picking against the crowd is most likely a bad idea.
Note: Win odds and estimated national pick popularity data below may change between publication time and kickoff time. If you want to see the latest numbers, our product updates multiple times per day.
Favorites At A Reasonable Price
The picks below may not be significantly underrated by the public, but compared to other favorites this week, they are a relative bargain in terms of pick popularity. Think twice about picking against them; there are smarter upset pick opportunities on the board.
New England Patriots (vs. Las Vegas)
The Las Vegas Raiders are coming off a big win in their home opener over the Saints in primetime, while the Patriots lost to Seattle by the slimmest of margins (a Cam Newton goal-line stuff by the Seattle defense on the very last play of the game) the previous night.
Primetime game results can provide the fuel for a value pick opportunity the next week if the public reacts strongly, as this game fits the bill.
New England has win odds of 71% in this matchup as a 6-point favorite. In the four other games in which a team is favored by between 6 and 7 points this week, the public is taking the favorite over 90% of the time, but the Patriots only have 76% pick popularity.
Put another way, the public is picking a Raiders upset more than twice as often as other similar long shots this week. Trendy upset picks like Las Vegas mean less reward for still taking on a lot of risk, and that’s a situation you want to avoid.
Buffalo Bills (vs. Los Angeles Rams)
The Bills and Rams face off in a showdown of 2-0 teams. With the game in Buffalo, the Bills opened as a 2-point favorite, and have 60% win odds according to our projections. The public is picking them at a similar rate, taking the Bills 60% of the time, when favorites usually tend to be overrated by the public.
The Rams have gotten off to an impressive start, and they convincingly beat the Eagles on the road as a popular public choice last week. Bills QB Josh Allen, though, has also been playing well through two weeks as the Bills racked up 58 points against the Jets and Dolphins.
To be clear, Buffalo isn’t a huge favorite, and the Rams pulling off their third upset in a row would not be a shocker. But compared to other favorites, you’re getting a relatively decent reward here for keeping the odds to win in your favor.
Value Favorites
2020 NFL Week 3 features several favorites that the public is picking at a lower rate than their chance to win. These types of teams are as close to no brainer picks as you can get in NFL pick’em contests, since you can take the team that’s expected to win, yet still “fade the public” (in relative terms, at least) at the same time.
Baltimore Ravens (vs. Kansas City)
The Monday Night showdown in Week 3 looks like a preview of the AFC Conference Championship, and the winner will have the upper hand in playoff tiebreakers. The public understandably loves the defending Super Bowl champion Kansas City Chiefs, who have now won 11 straight games including the postseason.
The Ravens are no slouches themselves, though, following up last year’s 14-2 record with a 2-0 start where they outscored the Browns and Texans by 49 combined points. Kansas City struggled to give Patrick Mahomes time in the pocket against the Chargers last week, and he completed less than 60% of his passes and averaged less than 6.5 yards per attempt in a comeback win.
Baltimore gets this game at home, which helps make them a favorite of 3.5 points in the betting markets, with roughly 63% win odds. (So far, there hasn’t been any noticeable difference in home-field advantage in 2020 compared to other seasons.) Meanwhile, the public is only picking the Ravens 59% of the time, providing a little sweetener for sticking with the favorite here.
New Orleans Saints (vs. Green Bay)
The recency bias bells are ringing for this matchup. The Saints are coming off a road loss at Las Vegas on Monday Night. The Packers have been a public darling through the first two weeks, and now go on the road after blowing out the Lions.
The Saints are still the 3-point favorite in this one, though, with right around 60% win odds. Yet the public is giving a slight lean to the Packers, with Green Bay drawing 57% of early picks. That means you can get the favorite at a slight underdog or toss-up price.
There was plenty of talk of Drew Brees looking his age against the Raiders, but it would be unwise to completely discount a team like New Orleans based on one early game result. The Saints went 6-0 when Brees was out injured last year and still have plenty of weapons.
Value Gamble
If you’re going to take a gamble on an underdog, you need to make sure that the potential reward if you get it right – that is, how much your odds to win your pool will increase – is big. Take a bunch of extra risk to make a super trendy upset pick, and the joke is on you.
The pick below is definitely not appropriate for all pools. If you’re in a smaller, season-long pool, it’s probably not worth the risk. However, it should be seriously considered for single-week contests or if you only care about weekly prizes.
Miami Dolphins (at Jacksonville Jaguars)
Remember back when everyone thought the Jaguars were the worst team in football, and they were the most popular team to pick against in survivor pools? That was two whole weeks ago.
Granted, Jacksonville has shown signs of life early on, winning a close game against the Colts in a serious upset and losing a close one against the Titans last week.
But with Jacksonville only a 3-point favorite over Miami, a whopping 86% of the public is on the Jaguars. (Contrast that popularity with New Orleans and Baltimore, who are favored by similar margins yet are only drawing 40-60% of the public’s picks.) So a very realistic Dolphins upset would provide a boost over the vast majority of your opponents.
Plus, with the game happening on Thursday night, players in weekly prize contests who can still change their picks for Sunday games would get the opportunity to make future adjustments based on whether this initial gamble comes through.
If you want a slightly less risky upset pick and can stomach banking on a Vikings bounce-back after last week, Minnesota gets Tennessee at home as only a 2.5-point underdog, yet the Vikings are drawing only 28% of the public’s picks so far.
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Week 3 NFL Survivor Picks: Should You Go With the Colts Or Not?
It took three weeks this year, but the public finally has its Obvious Survivor Pick. It’s also another week when the Jets are the most popular team to pick against. Last week, San Francisco was the most popular choice while playing the Jets, and nothing Gang Green did has discouraged survivor players from returning to the anti-Jets well.
Indianapolis Colts (vs. NY Jets)
Survivor Pick Popularity: 45% (#1)
Point Spread: -11
The Colts are the first double-digit favorite of 2020. As a result, the public is fully on board, with about 45% of survivor pool entries nationwide taking Indianapolis. There is a clear safety difference in going from the Colts to any other team this week, as the next largest spread is currently the Browns at only -7. That spread difference equates to about a 9-10% win odds drop-off between the Colts and the next safest option.
Most of the Colts’ future value is now tied up in Week 6, when they host the Bengals and will be one of the bigger favorites of that week, in a week where there is no clear-cut top option as of right now.
A 45% pick popularity is typically a great opportunity to avoid the “obvious” pick and root for an upset that knocks out nearly half of your survivor pool. Because of their relative safety, though, the Colts still have solid expected value this week despite their sky-high popularity.
Whether they are the best pick (or one of the best picks) this week will depend on where the popularity numbers shake out and if any betting line movement reduces the safety premium by the time kickoff rolls around.
It’s worth noting that the public is probably high on the Colts from a recency bias perspective after Indy trounced the Vikings last week, so it will be interesting to see if this line is bet down very late in the week. Our predictive ratings see it as closer to a 9.5-point edge for the Colts.
Arizona Cardinals (vs. Detroit)
Survivor Pick Popularity: 10% (#2)
Point Spread: -6
Arizona is currently the most popular choice among survivor pool entries avoiding the Colts this week. But at 10% popularity, the Cardinals are actually a little more popular this week than they were last week against Washington when Arizona was a slightly bigger favorite.
When compared to other non-Colts options, the Cardinals also don’t stand out in terms of win odds, as five other less popular survivor picks are favored by a similar (or greater) amount.
What Arizona does have going for it is only moderate future value. The only week where the Cardinals project to be favored by more than they are favored in Week 3 is a Week 9 matchup against Miami at home.
Los Angeles Chargers (vs. Carolina)
Survivor Pick Popularity: 9% (#3)
Point Spread: -6.5
The Chargers are a very similar choice to the Cardinals in many ways.
LAC is coming off a strong performance against Kansas City, and it is not certain whether rookie QB Justin Herbert will remain the starter or if the team will go back to Tyrod Taylor, who missed the Chiefs game with a chest injury. The Chargers also get Carolina the week after the team lost star running back Christian McCaffrey for at least a month.
The Chargers have similar win odds to a large tier of teams positioned behind the Colts in Week 3. However, they are a little more popular than some other choices this week if you are avoiding the Colts, which could impact their expected value as a survivor pick depending on where their popularity ends up.
LAC also has some moderate near-term future value, as they are potentially useful in Week 6 (vs. the Jets at home) or Week 8 (Jacksonville at home). That future value, though, isn’t high enough that it would singlehandedly disqualify LAC as a pick to consider this week.
Tampa Bay Buccaneers (at Denver)
Survivor Pick Popularity: 8% (#4)
Point Spread: -6
Tampa Bay draws a Denver Broncos team that played the Tennessee Titans and Pittsburgh Steelers tough, but came up short of a win in both games.
Denver, though, has lost starting QB Drew Lock to a shoulder injury, and will likely start Jeff Driskel in this game; the Broncos also signed Blake Bortles this week. That QB shuffling has bumped up Tampa Bay’s win odds in this game, so the Bucs also join the next-safest tier of teams behind the Colts.
Tampa Bay does have a little higher future value than both Arizona and the Chargers. While there is not any single future week in which the Bucs look like an amazing survivor pick option right now, there are lots of weeks where they look like they will be favored. So if one of their future opponents ends up being much worse than expected this year (or suffers bad injury luck in the future, etc.), Tampa Bay could become a top survivor option in a future week.
Cleveland Browns (vs. Washington)
Survivor Pick Popularity: 6% (#5)
Point Spread: -7
Cleveland is yet another team in the large tier of next-safest pick options after the Colts. Compared to those non-Colts alternatives, the Browns have the highest point spread and implied win odds in the betting markets.
The Browns also have the lowest future value of any of the safest non-Colts options, as this game against Washington projects as the last game in which Cleveland will be a large favorite this year, barring unexpected developments like major opponent injuries. The Browns don’t have a single future week in the 2020 season where we currently project them with more than 60% win odds.
That combination of low future value and decent win odds relative to other non-Colts picks makes Cleveland a potentially attractive choice in some pools.
Get Our Week 3 Survivor Pick For Your Pool
Figuring out the best picks for your NFL survivor pool each week isn’t easy. It takes a lot of data and math to quantify the various pros and cons of each possible pick, and then feel confident you’ve made the smartest choice. Not to mention that a late-week shift in a team’s win odds or pick popularity always threatens to derail your initial conclusions.
As geeky engineer types, we built technology to solve the complexity of survivor pool pick optimization. Our NFL Survivor Picks product does all the data collection and number crunching necessary to identify the best weekly picks for many popular types of survivor pools. It even updates multiple times per day to adjust for the latest data, and provides pick recommendations for portfolios of up to 30 different entries (e.g., “3 Chiefs, 2 Bills, 2 Colts”).
The result? Over the past three seasons, our subscribers have won over three times the prize money as expected in survivor pools. Try it out for free:
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