We are a mere 50 days away until the UFL kicks off its season with the Birmingham Stallions visiting the Louisville Kings, but until we get there, we’ve got one more NFL game to concern ourselves with.
With that in mind, here’s my official prediction: Seahawks A Lot, Patriots A Little.
Way I see it, the Hawks are a better team by virtually every single metric. And the stats don’t lie. Aaron Schatz’s DVOA (defense adjusted value over average) — which I consider to be as good as any advanced metric out there — agrees, and then some.
Including playoffs, the Seahawks have a DVOA of 44.9% for the season. Not only is that tops in the NFL this year, it’s good for sixth-best all time (well, at least since 1985). The Seahawks are historically awesome.
The Patriots? DVOA of 16.5%. Good. Not great. Seventh-best in the NFL this year.
On top of that, the Seahawks are better than the Patriots in every aspect of DVOA. Rush offense vs. rush defense, rush defense vs. rush offense, etc.
On paper, the Seahawks should win and relatively easily. So that’s my official stance: Seahawks laying the 4.5 points.
But that’s no fun.
You know what’s fun? Firing off a bunch of SGPs that tell stories about the game and hoping against hope you cash out a big win as you wait for the Stallions-Kings matchup.
So here are five stories to tell yourself and some why-not just-for-fun bets to make. I’m building all of these at DraftKings for explanation purposes, but as always, shop around, especially for SGPs.
Patriots surprise
Maybe the Seahawks can’t get Kenneth Walker III going, so they have to lean on Sam Darnold. Maybe Sam Darnold starts seeing ghosts again. Maybe Drake Maye, on the other side of the ball, plays Superman. If that’s the set-up you like, how about this: Darnold 2+ interceptions (+304), Drake Maye over 40 yards rushing (-104), and a Drake Maye anytime touchdown (+280). This comes in at a juicy +1600.
Seahawks romp
What if the Seahawks are one of the best teams in NFL history? What if they just simply have their way with the Patriots? If that’s the case, they’ll almost certainly get Walker going. This is an easy one to build: Walker over 100 yards rushing (+287) and a pair of scores (+275). All told, that’s a +700 hit.
Not so correlated
Here’s a crazy one, but if you squint, it makes a ton of sense. While the Seahawks will be doing everything in their power to free up Jaxon Smith-Njigba from Christian Gonzalez’s coverage, there may be a space for Rashid Shaheed to have a big play or two. Shaheed is more or less the Seahawks version of Marvin Mims, who caught a 52-yard bomb in the conference championship.
So how about this: Shaheed over 40 yards (+227), under 1.5 receptions (+104), and an anytime TD (+350). That’s a +16000 whopper. Godspeed.
JSN to the moon
Smith-Njigba might be the best combination of route-runner and athletic freak in the NFL right now. Did you see that out-of-the-endzone catch he made against the Rams? It was … not of this world. His whole season has been like that.
So let’s just build a JSN monster game: Give him a tuddy (-105), over 100 yards receiving (+105), and 7+ receptions. This comes in at a meh +238, so if you want to add a little spice, let’s assume the reason JSN is catching so many balls is because the Patriots are having their own success. So throw a Drake Maye 2+ touchdown passes in there at +122 and now we bump this up to +550.
Pull out the stops
It’s time to empty the playbook. As such, let’s look at one player on each team who could benefit from this. For the Seahawks, it’s George Holani, who got six touches against the Rams. Give him a touchdown at +550. Pair him with the Patriots’ explosive, and thus far in the playoffs underused, TreVeyon Henderson, and give him a touchdown at +475. Put ‘em together, you’re at +3400. Why not.
Good luck, have fun, and don’t forget: less than two months until the UFL kicks off.
