Bold Predictions for Week 12: Avoiding a probable Stafford clunker

Recapping last week’s picks:

1. Green Bay beats Baltimore by 2.5+ points.

Outcome: (Grade: D) Ouch. I’ll leave this prediction at that. Ouch.

2. New Orleans puts up 24.5 points or less against Washington Redskins

Outcome: (Grade: C) It looked like the Redskins had them against the wall but I forgot that much like the Browns, the Redskins have a knack at finding ways to choke. New Orleans would rally with 18 points in the 4^thquarter and eventually win in overtime.

3. Doug Martin has not had a TD since October 15th, he will have 1 this weekend as well as 75 rushing yards against the Dolphins.

Outcome: (Grade: D). 38 yards and 0TDs as Doug struggled yet again.

4. 15th ranked Kansas City D/ST (81% owned) is a top 2 Defense in Fantasy this week.

Outcome: (Grade: C). They held New York to just 12 points and had an interception but they lost and didn’t achieve what Baltimore and LAC did.

5. Nathan Peterman (4% owned) in his first NFL start puts up 200 yards and 2TD’s against the LAC.

Outcome: (Grade: Z). Of all the predictions I’ve made this year, can we just ignore this one? Ignore the 5 Interceptions in 14 passes. Ignore what was quite possibly the WORST QB PERFORMANCE EVER?

Week 12 Bold Picks:

1. The Dallas Cowboys put up at least 20 points.

Background: Since Zeke has been out they have failed to even put up HALF of this. Well, against the Chargers they know they need to wake up if they are to have any chance as salvaging this season. LAC has given up at least 20 points to 3 of their last 4 opponents.

2. Matthew Stafford fails to put up 240 yards for the first time in five games.

Background: The Minnesota Vikings have limited opposing QB’s to 212yards on average. Watching them pick apart Jared Goff was quite impressive and I’m buying in on a repeat performance on Thanksgiving.

3. The Cleveland Browns win this week.

Background: Woah woah woah, you mean the 0-10 Browns? The ones who ONLY need 47 things to happen to make the playoffs? It comes down to three things: 1. Hue really wants to beat his former team. 2. Despite their repeated paltry seasons they had at least 1 win against the Bengals in 2012, 2013 & 2014 (despite being the lesser of the two teams each year). 3. Corey Coleman is now back, the defense is in full force and the naïve fan in me is believing one of these weeks they won’t find a way to lose.

4. The Oakland Raiders (15% owned) are the worst fantasy D/ST this year by a mile. Against Denver they are a top ten team this week.

Background: Denver SHOULD be hungry off the embarrassing loss last week and yet, I think this is just a sunk season for them. Elway’s comments on them being ‘soft’ will drive an impassioned defensive push but I don’t see their offense doing a whole lot. Add to this the news that Ken Norton has been fired and John Pagano will take over. This was a divisive move which will upset some players but could get good for them longterm.

5. Greg Olsen is a top 5 TE in his triumphant return from IR.

Background: All reports sound like he is healthy and looking strong. Cam lost one of his top targets in Kelvin Benjamin and has been dishing out to Devin Funchess and Curtis Samuel over the last two weeks. You better believe he will be all too happy to dish it out to Olsen this week.

2017 Report card:

A – 11

B – 9

C – 11

D – 19

Here is how I will be grading my Bold picks this year

A – The bold pick happened as I stated

B – The bold pick did NOT happened as stated but the idea behind it was there (example I predicted Jesse James would have 0 TDs and fewer than 20 yards in week 2, he had 27 yards, the general idea to avoid him in fantasy was present.

C – The bold pick did NOT happen and the overall feel for what occurred had you saying “meh”

D – The bold pick was nowhere near accurate