Thanksgiving Football Bonanza 2021 Edition
Game 1: Bears at Lions
Kick-off 17.30
An argument should be made that the Lions lose their right to a football game on Thanksgiving. For those who don’t know the tradition, every year, on Thanksgiving, the NFL played 2 football games, both the Lions and the Cowboys would host home games. Why the Lions? I have no idea, but the football gods were being spiteful that day. Now, in the modern day of squeezing every bit of advertising revenue that you can, the NFL, in their eternal wisdom decided that they needed a 3rd game, so, for the last 14 years, the NFL has added in a late game… and for no reason in particular, honestly, it wasn’t planned this way, honest… the NFL decided it would put that 3rd game on their swanky new NFL Network channel (which was barely 3 years old at the time). Just good timing really.
Back to the Lions/Bears - make sure your turkey isn’t burning! There is no reason for you to be concerned with this game if your turkey is in the oven. Keep pouring the juices from the turkey back over the top, it will keep it moist and help to brown the skin. Andy Dalton, the starter turned backup and now starter again (due to new starting QB being injured) is actually the better QB in Chicago. But, he’s what Bill Parcells use to call ‘a progress stopper’ - someone older, who had a clear limitation in skill, that, if played, would stop a better player in reaching his higher potential. The Bears have had the worry of their head coaches future in question. Rumours have been hushed that he was getting fired after the game, but really, the writing is on the wall, if he’s not fired tomorrow, Matt Nagy won’t see next season with the Bears.
Prediction (32-22 through week 11)
The Lions are so bad, you just want them to win, I really hope they do, just for the sanity of their fans. They have no direction offensively, they do have a great RB duo with Jamaal Williams and DeAndre Swift, but they aren’t used well, the running scheme is too basic, even I can read the running route before the snap. It’s a hard game to predict because both teams are so poor, the only shining light is the Bears defence can play well at times, they can keep teams to under 24 points when they play the right team, and this Lions team will be struggling to score, again.
Final Score: Bears 23 - 17 Lions
Tips
DeAndre Swift to score anytime TD 11/10
Game 2: Raiders at Cowboys
Kick off 21:30
You should be on to the dessert by now, or, depending on where you are in the world, you should be at least knee deep in turkey.
When the Raiders played the Bengals last weekend, they showed us who they are, a middling team that will struggle to beat other middling teams. The Raiders are the Leicester City FC of the NFL, the Argentina Rugby Union team, New Zealand Cricket, or maybe England in International Soccer (pre-Southgate).
The Cowboys are coming off a loss that was a head scratcher. I did say that the only way the Chiefs beat the Cowboys last week was if the Cowboys beat themselves, and did they ever! The Chiefs didn’t have a passing TD, no rusher went over 100 yards, but still the Cowboys fluffed it up, three turnovers, odd passing, injuries, giving up on the run game (they had 5.6 yards per carry - just f*&king run the ball 40 times and you win) but the Cowboys wanted to play Madden NFL on the PS4 and not actual football.
I can assure you that the Cowboys will run the ball minimum 23 times today. They have the skill players at RB to win that way, if they go away from it, then I’m removing my coach of the year vote from Mike McCarthy. One thing that I do feel is strange about the Cowboys, if they do well defensively, defensive coordinator Dan Quinn gets the praise, if they score a lot of points, offensive coordinator Kellen Moore get praise. If the Cowboys do poorly, then head coach McCarthy gets the blame? Makes no sense.
For the Raiders, since they sacked their head coach for racist, homophobic, sexist, and just down right awful emails, they’ve slowly fallen down hill. They don’t know how to function, they have scored 16, 14, 13 points in the last 3 games, in todays NFL that’s nuts.
Prediction (32-22 through week 11)
Put all the betting chips on the Cowboys. They run the ball better, they defend better, they pass better, they have better players, better coaches, if the Cowboys don’t win, I’ll write my obituary next week.
Final Score: Raiders 17 - 34 Cowboys
Tip
Fizzy drinks helps to digest food quicker, if you’ve over eaten, try drinking some cola or lemonade.
Cowboys to cover the -7.5 and Tony Pollard to score anytime TD 6/4
Game 3: Bills at Saints
Kick-off 01:20 (tomorrow morning)
The Saints have lost 3 on the bounce and look every bit the fraudsters that they are. They’ve managed to stay in some games and score late, but mostly, this is a trick pony offence that struggles to score points consistently. They score a bunch in the 4th quarter, but that’s because teams are playing a prevent defence. Defensively they can play good football, but they got found out against an average, but improving, running game from the Eagles. The Saints are slowly slipping into irrelevance at the moment, and they need to look at next year as a bounce back year, but to do that, they need a functional QB. Right now, they have a defence that can put you in winning positions, but an offence that can’t find the end zone with a map.
The Bills just got their reality check last week. Touted as the best team in the AFC, the Bills would have thought that winning was going to start coming easy, but now they have been humbled by the Jags and then embarrassed by the Colts, they have to bounce back in this game and show us who they really are - are they the great pretenders who show promise in September but wilt in December, or are they finally going to stand up and be counted as the team to beat in the AFC?
Prediction (32-22 through week 11)
The Saints don’t have Kamara again - and with Trevor Seimian playing QB again, it’s more of the stuttering same. Through wilful stupidity or just ignorance, the Saints have been the cause of their own troubles. WR Michael Thomas wasn’t kept on a short leash during the offseason and waited too long for his ankle surgery and is missing all year, they didn’t get a solid QB room for when Jameis Winston messed up or got hurt (he got hurt) and now they have lost Kamara to injury and have brought back Mark Ingram to run for them, which is good, but 1 skill player on offence and a lot (A LOT) of plug-and-play guys are not going to get you to the playoffs this year, not with the NFC stacked with great and good teams.
The Bills have a simple tasks, rewind the clock, look at what you did 5 weeks ago, and do that again. If you’re not going to put away this Saints team, then most people are going to give up on the Bills, the team everyone wants to see win, everyone wants to see succeed over the Patriots (in the same division) if you can’t do it, then we’ll move on. Show us you can beat the Saints.
Final Score: Bills 35 - 24 Saints
Tips
Don’t mix your drinks, not after eating so much food.
Try and see if you can get the highest scoring quarter to be the 4th quarter on your betting platform, should be around 12/5. The Saints score most of their points in the 4th, and the Bills will gladly run up the score on any team right now.