NFL 2024 Season - PS3
Picksfootball
 

Headline Play

Articles published multiple times per week, offering insights and picks on upcoming games.
 
SEASON:

Article Archive

Conference Championships
Top-Flight QB Duel
Looking for a First
Cold Reality
Three and One
Divisional Playoffs
Winter Wonderland
Yes We Can
Getting Better
Three-Peat Begins
Correction
Challenge Accepted
Wild Card Weekend
Early Celebration
QB matchup
Starting and Ending Spots
Wild Card Trend
What to Like
Rookie Quarterbacks
Broken Fever
That's That
Week 18
Checking the Boxes
Needs and Wants
Four and Out
One or the Other
Point Spread Clouds
Fix It
Hollow Revenge
To Win or Not to Win
Week 17
All Knowing
Complicated Made Simple
Advanced Calculus
Glow Dimmed
Brink of Elimination
Game of Survival
Pleading for the Fifth
Need over Nothing
Christmas Grinch
Week 16
Numbers, Numbers, Numbers
Vintage 2018
Penix Debut
Dog Day
Playoff Position
Rest of the Story
Different Sundays
Run Some Tests
Without and With
Week 15
Two Tonight
Playoff Chances
Wild Card Challenge
Best of the Best
Next
Dire Straits
And It's Good
Bloated Lines
Week 14
Running up the Score
Challenge Me
Finding Reasons to Win
Crab Feed
Week Off
Good Enough
Buyers Regret
Pulled the Rug
Week 13
Mile High Hopes
Top and Bottom
Fourth Time the Charm
Bounce Back
Engage Spark
Line Up
Out in the Cold
Thanksgiving Visitors
Good Enough
Motivation on Steroids
Week 12
Second Best
Heavyweight Bout
QB's Ins and Outs
Everybody In
Too Easy
Walk the Plank
Hot to Trot
Try, Try, Try, Try, Try Again
Week 11
Mouse Trap
Must Game
Malfunction
Easy Does It
Old Foes
Falcons Fly into Mile High
Matter of Time
Improv
To the Brink
Week 10
Odd Man Out
Lions come Calling
Rookie versus Veteran
Call to Action
Full Reverse
When 8-0 is 4-4
Game of Contradictions
NFC West Bunch
Early Boarding
Week 9
Not Enough, Too Much
Real or Imposters
Groin Shot
Best Show
Saddle Up
Dull Edges
Telling Actions
Annihilation Formula
Week 8
No and No
Old Glory
Rookie Face Off
Adding it Up
Holding On
Jets Down
Unload and Reload
No Surprise
Career Paths
It Hurts
Week 7
Harbaugh Monday
Kids Camp
Barkley Back
Bird Battle
Mouse Time
Too Many?
Gone Shopping
Not Bad
40 for 3
Week 6
Try New
Night Vision
Trap Door
Looking Up
Wake Up Call
All Good Things
Bad Idea
Unexpected
Fire One
Week 5
Yes & Yes
Old Rivals
Rookie Sensation
So Close
Lunch in Seattle
Wake the Roosters
No Respect
Too Sweet
Turtle Flip
Week 4
Landmine
Bottoms Up
Winners and Losers
Call Me
Short Line
Reality Bites
Like Tonight
Uptick
Challenge Generates Performance
Week 3
Two Times
Reduced Value
Stars Down
The Other 21
Opportunity Knocks
Lots of Questions
Move Along People
Times Up
Week 2
Confidence Game
First and Second Picked QB's
Avoiding the Donut
Do or Die
One for the Road
Likewise
Adjustment Bureau
Down ... Not Out
Week 1
Time Marches On
Cashing the Trade
Start Here
Say What
Quick Up, Quick Down
Brazil Play Date
Top Two Open
Super Bowl Pick
Season Win Totals
Moving on Up
Breakout to Breakdown
Preseason 4
Preseason Wrap
Rookie Playoff Run
Preseason 3
Short Memory
Two In, One Up
Eagles Hunt
Winning Formula
Preseason 2
Quarterback Shuffle
One Two, or Two One
Starters Sit
Remote Control
Money be Damned
Preseason 1
One Season to the Next
Public Shift
Comets in the Night
Offseason
Mahomes Chasing History
All's Well that Ends Well
Ups and Downs
     
 
Super Bowl Winner
by Dennis Ranahan

Picking who is going to win a Super Bowl played months from now offers all sorts of twists and turns. In the prior 42 years, since I founded Qoxhi Picks in 1981, I have made a preseason Super Bowl pick and seven times we have tabbed the ultimate winner.

Now, that wouldn’t be such a big accomplishment if my selections were the New England Patriots during the years they won six themselves or some other highly touted favorite heading into a season. But, for a season-long wager, I am looking for teams with longer odds than any of the teams the books will list among the top five. I’m looking for odds of 12 to 1 or higher for a Super Bowl selection. When we picked the New Orleans Saints before the 2009 season their odds were as high as 22 to 1, and our most recent Super Bowl winner, the Baltimore Ravens in 2012, also opened the season with double-digit odds.

In the mid 1980’s, I thought I had the perfect method for picking the Super Bowl winner. Just take the team that lost the National Football Conference Championship Game the prior year. In 1983, the San Francisco 49ers lost the NFC Championship Game to the Washington Redskins, and the following year beat the Miami Dolphins in Super Bowl XIX.

On their way to Super Bowl XIX, the 49ers downed the Chicago Bears in the NFC Championship Game and the following year the Bears won the Super Bowl. In 1986, we won with the New York Giants, who hadn’t lost the prior season’s championship game but had a stack of edges that made them our choice.

On their way to the Super Bowl XX title, the Giants had downed the Washington Redskins in the NFC Championship Game, and that made Washington my choice in 1987. That was the year the Minnesota Vikings cleared the path for Washington by upsetting the San Francisco 49ers in a Divisional Round Game. Washington downed the Minnesota Vikings in their title game and two weeks later beat the Denver Broncos in Super Bowl XXII.

In 1987, the Vikings Championship Game loss to the Super Bowl Champion made them my pick to win the Vince Lombardi Trophy in 1987. The streak of Championship Game losers winning the Super Bowl the next year ended there, and in the past 35 years has hit paydirt eight times, most recently the Kansas City Chiefs over the San Francisco 49ers following their Championship Game loss the prior season to the New England Patriots..

I like the odds of the Super Bowl winner being a loser in the prior season’s championship game. The Cincinnati Bengals, who got beat at Arrowhead Stadium by the Kansas City Chiefs before Andy Reid’s squad went on to win Super Bowl LVII, are in the crosshairs of this tendency that has illuminated eight Super Bowl winners in the most recent 38 years.

I am also very high on the team that lost the NFC Championship Game last season to the Super Bowl losing Philadelphia Eagles, the San Francisco 49ers. The Nick Bosa holdout doesn’t help, but if Brock Purdy is as good in his sophomore season as he was in his rookie campaign, the 49ers prospects go right through the roof.

The Bengals and 49ers are both listed with odds at 8 to 1 to win it all, and those numbers are a shade below what I would like for a season long wager.

On the other end, I have a team with long odds that appears perfectly poised to win it all while listed at the books at 45 to 1. That team is the Pittsburgh Steelers.

The Steelers season win total has been shaved to 8½ games, more based on the tough competition Pittsburgh meets in the AFC North Division than a slam on the Steelers talent. This is a Steelers team that last year appeared to be on their way to saddle Mike Tomlin with his first losing season as the Steelers head coach. Instead, this young Steelers squad won seven of the nine games they played after their midseason bye week. It also required winning their final four games of the season to avoid Tomlin’s first losing campaign.

Now, we have empirical evidence that if a team wins their final four or more games and fails to make the playoffs, their won/loss record the following year is below the season they closed out on a winning streak.

There is a logical reason for this, a team that wins four or more games to close out a season and doesn’t earn a playoff slot must have been pretty bad before the win streak. And second, that winning run at the end of the year is certain to provide more confidence than their talent may warrant, creating serious motivational problems.

Do the Steelers fall into these common pitfalls?

I think not.

This is a Pittsburgh organization familiar with success and their efforts last year in winning seven of nine games to close out their 2022 season is an indicator of a team coming together. Quarterback Kenny Pickett enters his second pro season now firmly entrenched as the team's starting quarterback. The fact that he got a great deal of experience last year and appeared to benefit from it, offers good reason for him to continue to excel in the Steelers surge.

Finally, Pittsburgh is not overrated, even in their own minds. The Steelers are motivated by looking up at three teams in their division that on most league rankings are listed higher than the Steelers. The Bengals are among the AFC favorites, the Baltimore Ravens could fly high with the return of Lamar Jackson to their offense and the Cleveland Browns add quarterback Deshaun Watson to their improved arsenal.

What that leaves us with is a resilient Steelers squad that recognizes the challenges ahead without any chance of complacency, and history shows that Super Bowl winners often emerge from divisions that provided the highest competition.

The battles in the AFC North Division will go a long way to prepare the Steelers for the wars they will fight on their way to a surprise win in Super Bowl LVIII.

Qoxhi Picks: Pittsburgh Steelers (45 to 1) to win Super Bowl LVIII