NFL Survivor Pool: Week 3/Take 3

To recap, the intention of a Survivor Pool is to pick a winner each week with the only restriction being you can’t pick the same team twice. Most reports had about 60% of entrants eliminated in Week 1 this season and with the Week 2 upsets of Baltimore, Cincinnati, Cleveland, Las Vegas, and Indianapolis in Week 2 the ranks are going to be reduced even further.

As a reminder, we had Tennessee in Week 1 and Cincinnati Last week (both now 0-2 to start the season after making the playoffs last year. Let’s see if we can finally get it right in Week 3.

Week 3 Survivor Pick Recommendation

This week we don’t have as many big spreads/favorites as we did a week ago. Only two teams are favored by a touchdown and none are favored by more. A lot of the league’s best teams — Buffalo, San Francisco and the Los Angeles Rams — are on the road so the lines are a little slimmer than they would be otherwise. There are lots of intriguing matchups outside the recommendation below. Some good divisional battles plus a battle of the Bays (Green Bay vs Tampa Bay).

The Pick: Los Angeles Chargers

The Chargers lost a tough game last week at Kansas City. Quarterback Justin Herbert gutted out the end of the game after getting hurt and right now his status is day to day with a rib injury. The line on the game is Los Angeles -7 which tells us the sportsbooks are pretty certain he is going to play. Also, he showed in the loss last week that he can still fling it, even with some discomfort. The Chargers get a pretty nice landing spot after the loss by getting home to take on the Jaguars. Somehow, not only did Jacksonville win last week but they shut out the Colts. That definitely makes them overrated for this one though, though that is less of a concern given this is a Moneyline play. I have no confidence that Jacksonville can play back-to-back strong games, especially having to hit the road.

The other 7-point favorite this week is Minnesota against Detroit. I am not very fearful of the Lions but they do get a small advantage because Minnesota is playing on Monday night (on the road too).  Just not loving that situation whereas the Chargers had a few extra days to prepare and heal up Herbert. I am not too concerned about using a “playoff bound” team like L.A. too early against a light foe. Their next 2 games are on the road and they play in the best division in football so there are not a lot of easy ones on their schedule.