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Over the past few years, we have given the subscribers of Footballguys.com the Staff Confidence Pool Challenge, where numerous staffers try and pick the winners each week with a confidence ranking, and Jeff Pasquino’s “For The Win” column where Jeff attempts to pick each and every NFL game against the Las Vegas spread. Both of these have been very popular features, so this year Footballguys is proud to bring you the combination of the two. The Footballguys.com Staff Against the Spread Pool Challenge. Multiple staff members (18) will pick the winner of each NFL game against the Las Vegas line. As a tie-breaker, the person who is closest to the total points scored on the last Monday Night game will be the winner. Winners will be announced from week to week and the best overall record will be crowned Against the Spread Champion. Picks and ranks are due on Wednesday, so any late-breaking news may not be reflected in the choices.

Please note, that this contest should NOT be viewed as direct sports wagering advice, especially later in the season. Since the staff is trying to beat one another, picks may be made to go against the grain in an attempt to try and catch up in the standings. This example of game theory is more in tune towards playing a contest such as this - so again, do not use these picks as direct advice towards which games to pick each and every week. Rather, use these picks to see the top choices each week, especially by the staff members towards the top of the standings.

LAST WEEK'S RESULTS

Here are the results from last week:

Vegas Winners - Over 52.8% Hit Rate
Over 50% Hit Rate

NFL Week 11 was crazy with the explosion on Monday Night Football, but that big score put Alex Miglio ahead of Danny Tuccitto due to the tiebreaker. Neither was anywhere close to the point total (all of the staff were at least 31 points below the 105 point total). Alex and Danny logged nine wins on a 13 game slate for Week 11, while the rest of the staff had some struggles on a tough week. The staff getting 15 picks right on the Giants barely countered the loss of Carolina (14), while losses by the Ravens, Texans, and Cardinals against the spread gave the group 13 losses each. The staff overall had a less than stellar week, going 105-129 (44.9%), weakening the collective overall staff record to 1,430-1,613 (47.0%).

Checking the overall standings, eight staffers now have winning records (over 50%) for the year with 81 or more wins out of 161 contests through 11 weeks. Only three of the eight staffers are beating the Las Vegas success rate needed to win overall (52.4% or better), with Jeff Haseley (88) narrowly ahead of Alex Miglio (87) and Phil Alexander (86) in a close race. Just over 37% of the season remains, so there is still time for the staff to catch up the rest of the way.

THIS WEEK'S PICKS

Here are the picks for this week:

CONSENSUS WINNERS

Week 12 has just three teams with a strong consensus for the staff, as Week 12, otherwise known as Thanksgiving Week, is always tough with picks due 24 hours early (late Tuesday night) due to the short week. The staff had a strong lean towards New England (15 of 18 picks), with Houston (hosting Tennessee on Monday) and Cleveland (as an underdog in Cincinnati) both receiving 14 votes this week. Two home favorites tied with 12 selections - Indianapolis (hosting Miami) and the Los Angeles Chargers (hosting Arizona), while another road underdog in the Atlanta Falcons received 11 votes as they travel to New Orleans as a big underdog on Thanksgiving night. To really show how tough this week is, seven games are barely favorites with 10 votes. Four home favorites (Dallas, Carolina, Baltimore, and Tampa Bay) and two road favorites (Jacksonville and Pittsburgh) represent six of the seven 10-vote teams, while one road underdog (Giants at Philadelphia) round out the group. Lastly, two games were split 9-9 right down the middle as the Bears travel to Detroit on Thanksgiving and Green Bay travels to Minnesota for the Week 2 rematch of the 29-29 exciting tie game. This could absolutely be an interesting week for the staff if all the picks play out in their collective favor for this slate. As usual, it will be very fun and entertaining to check the results come next Tuesday.

ODDS AND ENDS

More than half of the season is now gone, and the next set of picks are due by Wednesday night (Tuesday this week!). Most of the staff would agree that picking this weekend's games on Wednesday night is very difficult because you don't have much information about injuries and practice. If your league allows you to pick the later games separate from the rest, take advantage of it and make your Sunday and Monday picks as close to the weekend as possible.

A reminder that these picks are against the Las Vegas lines – so getting above 50% is respectable, above 53% gets you into the profitable zone (accounting for the Las Vegas house odds of taking 10% of every losing wager) – and anything above 60% is outstanding. That may sound easy enough, but it is much, much harder than it might seem.

Good luck this weekend!

Questions, suggestions, and comments are always welcome to pasquino@footballguys.com

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