Week 8 NFL Picks – TJ’s Weekly Picks Against the Spread

With the darkness and losses of the beginning of the season behind us, we truly turned the corner in Week 7 and will be back rolling Week 8. If you want to check out how Week 7 went, you can find the recap here.

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With no games currently in danger of being moved or cancelled, let’s get to our five NFL expert picks for Sunday. You will see a trend of bettors being slow to react to some of the atrocious defenses in the league, and bringing big value to some over plays.

1PM EST
Opening Line: Colts -3 and 51.5
Current Line: Colts -3 and 50

The Colts are a 4-2 team, but are not nearly as good as their record suggests. Their current defensive rankings are second in yardage allowed and fourth in scoring defense. Both of those figures will consistently dip for the remainder of the season as they move past the Charmin soft portion of their schedule. They have also been worse on the road, already losing in Cleveland and have a truly horrific loss in Jacksonville. The offense is extremely limited and can essentially only go as far as the running game takes them. Quarterback Philip Rivers is about ready to be put out to pasture and he is truly a liability. Any deficit late in a game will be essentially insurmountable with Rivers current skill set. It is a difficult pill for me to swallow why this team would be favored in any road game against a capable offense.

The Lions have righted their ship, winning two straight after a 1-3 start. The three losses came against good teams, ones with a combined 14-5 record. They also have just one loss by more than a single score, and have been a competitive team in all their games but one. The one they were not competitive was on the road against the best version of the Packer offense, and there is simply a vertical threat with that team that does not exist from the Colts.

The Lions offense is one that is capable, finding balance and will put up a solid number of points on anyone. They are averaging 28 per contest over their last four, and are finally utilizing D’andre Swift and have not even required a massive splash game from ace receiver Kenny Golladay. Golladay has been fantastic, he just hasn’t been called on for the big volume games we have become accustomed to. Jusst using that 28 point scoring average, if they score exactly that figure and pit it against the Colts outputs thus far this season, the 28 points would have a record of 3-2-1.

While the Lions aren’t built to completely shut down any offense, even one as one dimensional and limited as that of the Colts, they won’t get run through and they will score effectively. The wrong team is favored in this game and we should look for the Lions to get a home win. Take the points here.