Week 12 Results:
Bing Predicts was 10-6 in Week 12, starting Thanksgiving strong with correct picks for Detroit and Carolina before suffering a setback with Chicago’s big upset of Green Bay in the nightcap. Sunday’s highlights included correctly predicting Indianapolis, Seattle, and Oakland while the lowlights included Atlanta losing again, which puts them currently on the outside looking in for the playoffs, and Cleveland’s last second loss on a blocked kick being returned for a touchdown in the Monday night game.
Each week Bing Predicts picks the winners of every professional football game. Every Tuesday, for the rest of the season, we’ll update our prior week’s results, share our upcoming week’s predictions on Bing and provide insights into how we make our picks.
Week 13 Predictions:
Carolina, the lone unbeaten team, will keep their win streak alive with a win at New Orleans. Green Bay will get revenge from their surprising Week 10 loss against Detroit by winning this rematch on Thursday night. Washington will finish the week on Monday night beating Dallas and keeping them surprisingly on top of their division. Also notably on Sunday, Minnesota hosts Seattle in what would be a wild card match-up if the season ended in Week 12. Of course, it’s only hypothetical, but the reality is Minnesota strengthens their hold in the division and conference with a win. The battle of New York takes place where Gang Green is the ‘road team’ despite playing in their home stadium. We expect the G-Men to take this game in what counts as a home game for them despite this effectively being a neutral site game.
Here are the predictions for the rest of Week 13 games:
- Arizona gets another road win against a divisional rival in Saint Louis and keeps pace for a first round bye.
- Buffalo gets back on track, beating Houston to bring both teams to 6-6.
- Chicago continues their strong turnaround in beating San Francisco to get to 6-6 after starting 2-5.
- Cincinnati sweeps Cleveland and stays in contention for the first round bye.
- Denver continues to win on the strength of their defense, keeping pace and setting up a week 16 showdown with Cincinnati for who will get the first round bye (see below for our current prediction on that game).
- Jacksonville completes the season sweep against Tennessee.
- Kansas City, currently on a 5 game win streak, beats Oakland on the road in what might be the most difficult game remaining on their schedule. Their favorable schedule puts them in great position for the top wild card position.
- Miami beats a road weary Baltimore team who has to play a Monday night road game and follow it up with yet another road game in Miami.
- New England bounces back at home against a Philadelphia team which has given up back-to-back 45 point games.
- Pittsburgh beats Indianapolis in a game between two 6-5 teams who may both be missing their starting QBs.
- Tampa beats Atlanta as both teams become 6-6, a major development considering that when they earlier met, Atlanta was 6-1 and Tampa was 2-4.
Playoff Picture:
With 5 weeks to go, many enthusiasts start tracking their team’s playoff chances. Since the pre-season, we’ve continuously published the predicted playoff positioning for the league. New England and Carolina, two teams with the leading candidates for MVP playing QB, are in solid position to have home field advantage throughout the playoffs. Denver, currently predicted to beat Cincinnati in the Week 16 Monday night game on Dec 28th, will get the 2nd seed by virtue of that win and the coveted first round bye. Denver at that point would have beaten Green Bay, New England, Minnesota, and Cincinnati, which shows their strength as well as good fortune of having all four of those games at home. Kansas City, as alluded to earlier, could potentially end the season on a 10 game win streak to secure the top wild card slot. In the other conference, we predict Green Bay and Minnesota end up with the same record with Green Bay taking the tiebreaker. Finally, we project Arizona maintains their hold for the 2nd seed and a week off in early January.
– Walter Sun, Bing Predicts Team Lead