Week 5 survivor picks: Playing a Motown classic
Except for roughly 10 minutes late Sunday, that was as easy as we expected, with the 49ers beating the Cardinals comfortably. However, there were no catastrophic upsets elsewhere, as the Chargers won comfortably by their standards, and the Chiefs escaped MetLife Stadium with a victory.
Unfortunately, we crossed arguably the league's best team off our list of those available to use. But at least we survive another week, where there's a pair of standout options to use and not much else.
While most everyone picked San Francisco last week, this week sees another fork in the road that should see close to a 50-50 split between those selecting the Lions and those taking the Dolphins.
Every week until we get knocked out, we've mapped two paths to make it to the end of the season undefeated. As long as one of our entries still stands, we'll use the moneylines for our picks to show the odds of making it the distance traveled along the path. Once we're out, though, we're out.
We could provide a series of theoretical rules to follow - like never take a road team - but the moneyline reflects a club's likelihood of winning each game. We can easily translate that into an implied win probability, listed in descending order in the chart below.
Week 5 moneylines
| TEAM | MONEYLINE | IMPLIED PROB. |
|---|---|---|
| Dolphins | -600 | 85.7% |
| Lions | -425 | 81.0% |
| Commanders | -280 | 73.7% |
| Bills | -240 | 70.6% |
| Chiefs | -225 | 69.2% |
| Eagles | -210 | 67.7% |
| Ravens | -190 | 65.5% |
| 49ers | -185 | 65.5% |
| Bengals | -165 | 62.3% |
| Falcons | -130 | 56.5% |
| Packers | -130 | 56.5% |
| Broncos | -125 | 55.6% |
| Patriots | -120 | 54.5% |
| Colts | -115 | 53.5% |
| Titans | -105 | 51.2% |
| Saints | +100 | 50.0% |
| Jets | +105 | 48.8% |
| Raiders | +110 | 47.6% |
| Texans | +110 | 47.6% |
| Cardinals | +140 | 41.7% |
| Cowboys | +155 | 39.2% |
| Steelers | +160 | 38.5% |
| Rams | +175 | 36.4% |
| Vikings | +190 | 34.5% |
| Jaguars | +200 | 33.3% |
| Bears | +230 | 30.3% |
| Panthers | +340 | 22.7% |
| Giants | +450 | 18.2% |
Survivor Path A
Knocked out in Week 3. Thanks, Ravens. Matt Gay missed a 47-yard field goal indoors this week. Lamar Jackson was awesome. Of course.
Survivor Path B
| WEEK | TEAM USED | IMPLIED PROB. |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Falcons | 64.9% |
| 2 | Cowboys | 80.0% |
| 3 | Chiefs | 88.9% |
| 4 | 49ers | 90.9% |
| SURVIVAL PROBABILITY | 42.0% |
In our more conservative route - where we had a 42% chance to get this far by betting math - we've used three of the NFL's best teams, so now it's all about picking our spots for survival from here on out.
We'll go back to how we won in Week 1 - fading the Panthers. There were high hopes for Carolina to get its first win of the season last Sunday, and it had every opportunity to when it took an early lead. Instead, Bryce Young fumbled that away, and the Panthers couldn't muster any offense to try to pull off a comeback.
Now they're supposed to go back on the road, two weeks after almost false starting their line of scrimmage into the Pacific Ocean because of Seattle's crowd noise, and win in Detroit? I don't think so.
You may be tempted to take the Dolphins - given they have the biggest moneyline of the week - but what if I told you we could fade Carolina again next week when Miami hosts the Panthers?
Pick: Lions
Matt Russell is the lead betting analyst for theScore. If there's a bad beat to be had, Matt will find it. Find him on social media @mrussauthentic.