Det and KC are road dogs: I'm puzzled

Two lines this week have me scratching my head: Detroit is +2.5 visting Cleveland, and KC is in Miami as 2-point dogs.

Now home field advantage is obviously very important, and the Browns haven't been completely incompetent, despite last week's performance. The win over GB and Chicago proved that they have some ability to put up points. But the Lions have been getting better each week, and nearly took down both the Bucs and the Panthers, the former on the road. "Nearly" is obviously the important word here, but Detroit appears to be a team that can hang tough with the good squads, and beat the bad squads, like Baltimore. As always, the right question here is "why am I wrong?"

KC in Miami makes more sense to me, given Miami's trend of smoking good teams at home and losing to anybody on the road. Is the heat still a factor in late October? That's a real question, not rhetorical, as I don't know. Washington played KC pretty tough last week, and they still managed to pull it out. I watched the Mia-TB game, and Miami looked terrible. They were getting lit up on defense (even by TB's backup), and the offense was pitiful. Why am I wrong?

[McGahee]

Every Sunday night I try to predict the next week's spreads without knowing what they are. A lot of times I'm way off, but these games are exactly as I expected.

The Browns were a 3 pt favorite over the Bears at home 2 weeks ago and covered. What's the difference between the Bears & Lions and why should the Lions be a road favorite vs. anybody?

KC hasn't played well since opening day, they were lucky to win at home last week, and Miami has been tough at home this year.

Seems pretty straightforward to me.

[phillydilly]

[ QUOTE ]
Two lines this week have me scratching my head: Detroit is +2.5 visting Cleveland, and KC is in Miami as 2-point dogs.

Now home field advantage is obviously very important, and the Browns haven't been completely incompetent, despite last week's performance. The win over GB and Chicago proved that they have some ability to put up points. But the Lions have been getting better each week, and nearly took down both the Bucs and the Panthers, the former on the road. "Nearly" is obviously the important word here, but Detroit appears to be a team that can hang tough with the good squads, and beat the bad squads, like Baltimore. As always, the right question here is "why am I wrong?"

[/ QUOTE ]


i orginally thought the lions might be a pick here, based on the browns poor play. The the lions are a team in complete disarray. Roy Williams is injured, Charles Rogers is suspended, Kevin Jones left the last game. There is massive dissension on the sideline, during mooch's monday press conference the possibility of starting garcia was brought up relentlessly even though its not even sure he is ready. I would really recommend staying away from the lions here.

I predict KC will be a BSP special this week. Early spread at sportsbook.com is 94-6 KC.

I didn't see the KC-Was game, just the stats and write-up, so I'll take your word for it that they weren't overly impressive. That one makes some sense to me, even if I'm still not fully convinced.

As for Detroit, I presume you mean "what's the difference between the Bears and the Browns?" Probably not much, but there's a difference in the Lions. Since their bye week, they've recorded one solid win, and narrowly lost two winnable games to good teams. Do they not enter Cleveland confidently, and with something to prove? Cleveland, as a side note, has not done much at home, losing to Cinci in week 1, and pulling out an improbable, last-minute win over Chicago in week 4.

Dammit, I'm such a BSP.

[McGahee]

No, I meant Bears&Lions. What's the difference? I think the Bears are slightly better on both sides of the ball. Lions fan? You sound like you're forming your opinions based on what you want to believe. Baltimore self-destructed in Detroit and Harrington was 10-24 for 96 yards in their offensive "explosion". Last week they played a Carolina team that had played poorly in road games vs. Miami & Arizona, they scored 2 defensive TD's, knocked out Delhomme and STILL lost. To me the only remotely impressive game they've played all year was the Tampa game. Cleveland has been pretty solid all year with the exception of last week, which was an absolute must-win for the Ravens at home.

Okay, I was misreading your post then. I'm not a Lions fan, but I watched that game against TB, and thought that they had turned a corner, of sorts. I missed this week's game, and it looks like had I seen it, my opinion would be different. Sounds like the offense was pretty ugly.

Well, as I said, I figured that I was wrong. Sweet.

[MCS]

FWIW the KC-Miami game opened at pk (Pinnacle) and has already moved to -2, which to me says some significant money jumped on Miami early.

The Detroit-Cleveland line is exactly what I expected it to be. Detroit is maybe a little better than Cleveland, but Detroit sucks on the road. HFA worth 3, and voila. -2.5.

[CarlSpackler]

I talked to an nfl scout last week, and he told me that the Chiefs are vastly overrated. I attended the Chiefs-Redskins game on Sunday, and the Redskins clearly outplayed the Chiefs, and would of won by more than 2 scores had they not shot themselves in the foot.

The Skins had a turnover on the opening drive on a 3rd and goal play, and a fumble by their 3rd string rb (who wouldn't have been playing if Betts wasn't injured) on the Chiefs 20 in the 3rd quarter which was returned by KC for a td. And there was another Skins turnover near midfield at the end of the first half which blew another possible scoring chance for them. Despite being on the road and -3 in turnovers, Washington still had a chance to tie the game on their final drive (and yes, Brunell threw for 300 yards again).

Even with Roaf back in the lineup at LT, the Chiefs had no running game -- Priest had less than 20 yards on like 15 carries. Granted, Washington has a top 5 defense, but I found this very disturbing. The Chiefs return game also looked very average, and this was one of the major reasons they had that great season a couple years ago.

The Fish were one of my favorite plays last week, but I didn't get a chance to their loss to the Bucs, obviously. IMO, the Chiefs have no business being a road favorite over anyone except for Houston and possibly the 49ers.