NFL Survivor Pool Picks Week 1 | NFL Survivor Strategy | NFL Picks Week 1

[Music] hello and welcome to the week one edition of our survivor podcast it is Matt Brown it is Stephen Anders and Stephen it is finally here we've been waiting what seems like forever but the NFL is finally upon us and with that come these awesome Survivor contest guys each and every week we are going to give you our thoughts our picks what the data is telling us and also maybe some strategy along the way is to try to help you make it to the end because as we know that's the only way you win any money in these things even here we are heading into heading into season I can't even begin to tell you how excited and jacked up I am about all of this and there are a couple of Clear Choices this week in week one Survivor and we'll have to talk about that strategy as well I feel reborn Matt Hope Springs Eternal in NFL survivors so the other thing I'll mentioned in this video too is that I'm going to be kind of pulling from the awesome tools that our partners over at pool genius have I don't play my own NFL Survivor pools without the pool genius tools anymore there's a link in the description everybody watching we've secured a free trial for everybody through week one so you can try it out check out all the awesome tools because it's not just enough Matt as we all know at this point who have played it a lot it's not just enough to pick a winner that week we need to plan ahead we need to look at popularity if we're not just trying to get to the end but increase our chances of being the sole survivor and scooping the entire pot all of this comes into play and I haven't found anybody better than pool genius with the tools guys one thing to remember know your rules of the pool that you're playing in we are going to give you our general thoughts on all this but obviously sometimes there's wrinkles if you're if you're out playing at the big circus Survivor you know like there's a wrinkle with the different weeks in that one sometimes uh they allow you to reup in some of the Survivor Contest out there and so just know your rules we're going to go about this and talk to you as if this is a very basic Survivor contest but again there might be some wrinkles that are involved over there in yours and one of the first things you're going to do each and every week Stephens you're going to go over to the betting odds and you're going to look at the money lines because remember no spreads involved in all of this this is win in advance and we're going to pick out the biggest favorites each and every week and that's at least where you start your research absolutely the the biggest favorite this week Matt Cincinnati Bengals and I get it right playing the New England Patriots Yeah there's a theme here maybe throughout the course of this season and it might be who's playing the Patriots and then just take that team you know that is the strategy it is I mean in at least maybe until Drake May shows up and we give him a week and see if he's actually going to be any good but you know Mike Reese one of the beat reporters over at ESPN for the Patriots he's following them each and every week and you know he had like an emoji bullet point list from their last preseason game of like good and bad and there was like five different things that have are going wrong and are major red flags with this offensive line they're not only just lacking talent but they're injured as well and jacobe brassette clearly was not the better quarterback in the preseason but they don't want to get Drake May killed so they they trade Matt judon one of their two best defensive players they're clearly the like we did our power rankings as a staff this week Matt they are clearly number 32 out of 32 yeah and honestly going about a team and targeting a team that you think is going to be bad is not a terrible strategy when it comes to Survivor and I can tell you for sure in my personal Survivor pools that I'm going to be in Stephen I'm going to be looking each and every week who is playing New England and see if that's one of the you know one of the ways I want to go about it see if I want to roll the dice on whoever is going up against the Patriots that week I don't expect them to win very many games I don't expect them to be competitive in a lot of games as well and so for me there's a obvious answer in Cincinnati this week if you want to play Super safe and super chalk but you know the problem with that is as we talk about you can only use these teams once well you know Cincinnati gets Washington in week three they get Carolina in week four they get the Giants in week six there are other games that you could use Cincinnati for sure if you didn't want to go ahead and I'll you know in air quotes here burn them waste them whatever it might be in week one yeah for me with the Bengals this week in particular there's two reasons why I'm not using them even though I certainly understand why they're probably going you know they have the highest probability to advance this week Market basically if you convert their money line around 79% next closest team is around 70% it's justifiably so with New England they're the most popular team this week it seems you know if you use the pool genius data grid that's available you can sort every team each week by what they project to be the most popular pick in the pool they have the Bengals at 37% for week one the next closest team is 14% so yes I want to pick a team that's going to win in advance and not worry about it but I also want to try and avoid the most popular pick every week that's just my own personal preference that's just me not caring about maybe taking on a little bit more risk you you play 18 weeks you got to pick 18 teams it doesn't matter what order you pick them in for me you try to eliminate the 14 teams I don't want to pick certainly New England would be in that camp uh but I also want to avoid the most popular pick every week clearly the Bengals are that Matt the other thing too is as we record here on Tuesday afternoon Jamar Chase doesn't have a contract doesn't look like he's going to play unless he gets one so I don't think it's going to matter against New England because we've already discussed how bad they are but I mean certainly doesn't make me feel great if their best weapon isn't going to play no absolutely um there's other things that go into this guys as well too and many of the pods we do moving forward are going to be much shorter than this but D kind of given a little bit of overall strategy stuff and you can course go to lines.com and take a look at some of the strategy articles over there about Survivor but you know it also has do you have three entries do you have five enturies do you have 10 enturies or do you just have a single bullet do you are you doing this because you just want some entertainment along the way because there is uh like Stephen just mentioned he he would rather avoid the most popular team each week and that is certainly a a sound strategy for trying to win pools but if you're not as if you're not if you're not as willing to take on some of the risks out there it's okay to just kind of play the chalk and then figure things out the later on you get in in the contest because at the end of the day as long as you keep winning and advancing you're in as opposed to other people being out of these things and so um you know listen it's just one of those deals where I'm you know I personally will take on a little bit more risk than a lot of people a lot of times but I certainly understand if you just want to play Cincinnati this week and move on and say hey I at least made it through week one of Survivor then I'm not going to I'm not going to look down on you for that at all but I said there is just a lot of there is a lot of future value on this Cincinnati team and they're going to get something done with Jamar Chase and so with that Stephen's kind of like you know where do we go from here do you look at a team like Seattle how much do you believe in Seattle in their first game out of the gate against Denver I mean that is something that is is going to be a question for a lot of people out there yeah if you go by market odds the three teams with the highest probability to win this week the Bengals at home against New England the Buffalo Bills at home against Arizona and you mentioned the Seattle Seahawks against the Denver Broncos if you look at their schedules clearly Seattle is the team out of those three that does not have as much future value for a third place team their schedule's actually pretty tough not just because they're in the NFC West but because the other third place teams that they run into are actually look pretty decent this year too so um I I think Seattle is probably where I'm leaning in week number one Matt I know mon noar's touched on Buffalo in his column you can go read his reasons why at the lines.com but I'm a little bit nervous about Buffalo I want to see it first you know I Arizona was pesky towards the end of last season when Kyler Murray came back they beat the Eagles uh Buffalo if they're going to be as run heavy as they were and after they made the OC change last year that to me brings in a little bit more variance week to week makes turnovers from Josh Allen a little bit more costly if you're playing more of a ball control game with fewer plays and fewer possessions so you know while they are six-point favorites this week I I just am not sure I want to take my shot week one with them um certainly Arizona's defense is terrible but if I'm getting Seattle at 9% projected ownership and buffalo at 14% projected ownership I think I'm looking more Seattle here against Denver with a rookie quarterback in that very loud stadium for his NF debut yeah I it's going to be a decision right up to gate for me and honestly I have multiple entries and I might split them because the thing for me is is I actually think I want to use buffalo because I actually want to get Arizona I think Arizona by the middle of the Season towards the end of the season after Harrison you know kind of settles in and and McBride is like halfway through his second season they might be they might be even more annoying yeah like like they might even be more annoying than they are right now so I kind of want to catch them early and pick them off early and so that does have me leaning a little bit towards towards Buffalo but like I said I could easily see myself splitting between Seattle and buffalo what we don't want to do guys is look and see San Francisco as a big favorite and use them this week there's no point in using them against the Jets the Jets might be really good we don't know the Jets might be really good for all we know and there are much much easier games and a much much easier path with San Francisco literally starting next week whenever they're looking at Minnesota and then there's the Rams and then there's they got New England and then there's Arizona and all these teams that are on the schedule so I there I think there's very three three very clear options this week Stephen and and San Francisco is not one of them yeah some weeks in Survivor you have you know four or five teams you feel pretty good about some weeks you really only feel good about one of them we mentioned those top three the Bengals the bills and the Seahawks after that I'm I'm not feeling great about any of these and I'm going by Straight order of most likely to win if you convert the money Line Odds 49ers against the Jets Saints against the Panthers Bears against the Titans lions against the Rams bucks against Jaden Daniels and Washington Miami against Jacksonville and the Chargers against Las Vegas believe it or not I think the Chargers would be the the team I'd feel best about on that list but I don't feel comfortable with any of those options compared to the top three here this week no not at all I mean guys for me like I said it is how you want to go about this contest right so if you only have one entry and you want to feel really good about advancing I understand putting in the Bengal not like I said not going to look down on you for that at all for me I don't have a clear two and three with Seattle and buffalo I think both of them are same and I think that both of them are out there with reasons that you would maybe want to go ahead and use them now again I said I want to kind of catch Arizona before they get good I mean Bon Nick I wasn't a fan of Bon knck in college I but who knows Bon knck might be good like and so like let's you you could take the strategy too of of being able to go and pick on him while it's still new there in Denver so I think there's a lot of Merit to Seattle and to Denver I mean lot a lot of Merit to Seattle and buffalo this week and so I really did Cincinnati is a clear one for me but not going to be my pick and then two and three between Seattle and buffalo honestly put them in a hat pull them out I think that there's a really good case for both this may annoy people but I'm I'm not even going to put the the most popular pick each week in my top three that's just going to be my process until we get down towards the end of the year and then maybe it becomes a little bit different because you're just running out of teams but for now I'm not even going to put Cincinnati in my top three although I acknowledge they are the most likely to win this week for me number one is Seattle they don't have any future value they do get New England on the road next week but that's about after that in terms of games I feel extremely comfortable playing them uh and it's also an early kickoff going across country for Seattle versus this week at home in front of the fans with a rookie quarterback and you know all that so Seattle's clearly number one for me and if you go to the pool genius tools and click on the optimal path tool you know instead of trying to plot out each week who to pick uh manually and trying to figure that out they literally have a button you just click the button and it tells you what the path is and which team you should pick each week regardless of whether you just want to get to the end and you don't care if you wind up splitting the pool or or if you want to have a Max expected value and try to be the sole survivor in either of those scenarios they have Seattle as the pick in week one so I like Seattle for week one I'm going to take on a little bit more risk I'm fine with that um I I really don't want to take Buffalo I really don't I don't feel great about it um I I think the offense is good enough for for Arizona to at least be pesky this week I'm not going to put buffalo in my top three I know monoir very much disagrees with me I'm I'm I'm sure you disagree with me too I'm I'm just not comfortable with it so beyond Seattle it's a big big gap between them and the next team I would consider oh God Atlanta against Pittsburgh at home I don't know Kirk Cousins hasn't played all year Lo Las Vegas I mean the Chargers against Las vague I I don't feel great about any of these to be honest with you it might just be Kansas City against Baltimore on Thursday night I don't want to burn them though so I to what you're hearing Matt is that I'm having a hard time coming up with three teams I feel great about from a game theory perspective so to me in week one it's Seattle with a bullet the looking ahead to next week guys uh Baltimore going to be a really a big favorite Over Las Vegas that one's going to be out there San Francisco will be on the table again against Minnesota Dallas will have New Orleans Detroit will have Tampa Bay the Jets have 10 tenee Houston has Chicago so there will be a lot of discussion next week as well but we got to survive in advance this week before we can worry about next week again over atth lines.com free trial over at pool genius be sure and take advantage of that and also we have some strategy articles over there and let you know where we're going to go like I said I'm going to be I'm going to be on Buffalo I think I'm going to split entries this week go be on Seattle and be on Buffalo both and we'll go on from there but not going to burn Cincinnati not going to burn San Francisco for hey Matt wait bonus for everybody bonus if you're watching this before week one go to play.the lines.com again play.the lines.com we are hosting a free pro football Survivor contest and the winner taking home $5,000 cost you absolutely nothing to join and you can Win $5,000 so again go to play.the lines.com thanks to everybody who hung around towards the end of this video wanted to make sure that you guys got access to that for sticking around so long we'll even throw the link in the we'll throw the link in the description too and go down there and get that as well guys this is it it's here the NFL we got to make it to the end we're going to be here each and every week guiding you along the way hopefully we have some sweats with you guys uh I didn't make it past week six SL that's that's we get knocked out we can Reby next week H it's neither in here nor there we'll get that all figured out for Stephen I'm Matt good luck on all your week picks