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Week 13 Analytics Update

Week 13 Analytics Update

All The Analytics You Need To Win The Holiday Season

Brett Yarris
November 28, 2024 • Estimated Reading Time: 11 minutes

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Week 13 is here, and with it means a Holiday schedule of games to remind us WHY we love Football. And Food. And maybe Family. Some Family. Sometimes.

Quick Profit Report

For the Pigeon Picks+ Subscribers who tail us:

We are 30-15 (66.6%) in the Month of November, and 679-379-15 (64.1%) All-Time over three NFL seasons, with a 37.17% ROI (tracked 3rd Party by Pikkit).

We’ve got rankings updates, but first, some Thanksgiving and Black Friday Picks and Projections:

Thanksgiving Games

We like the surging Lions to win this one easily. In recent memory, we have all at one time or another asked ourselves: “Why do we have to watch the Lions EVERY Thanksgiving?!”

Well, this year we get to see them on the holiday as a LEGIT Super Bowl Contender. In fact, if you asked us to declare today, we have them repping the NFC as it stands right now.

In this game, we have them winning by at least 13 points. The Bears defense is regressing by 20% week over week and has allowed at least 0.85 points per minute of opponent possession time in three of their last four games.

By contrast, the Lions offense has scored 0.9 points per minute of possession time or more in six of their last eight games, growing by 14% week over week throughout the season.

Adding to that is their defense holding opponents to under 0.5 points per minute in four of their last five games while improving by 28% throughout the season, week over week.

They’ll face a Bears offense that’s has scored less than 0.5 points per minute in four of their last five, and while they scored 0.8 points in Week 12, that feels like an outlier as they scored 10 points in the last 2 minutes of the game off of outlier events (55 yard kick return to set up a TD, and an onside kick recovery to set up a field goal).

Good luck replicating that in Motown. And if you are interested in WHY we get the Lions every year on Thanksgiving, here is a video we made a few years ago breaking it down!

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This is a “Stay Away” game. Dallas is ranked 25th in the Football Behavior Consistency Score and the Giants will be entering game two with the most manufactured hype around a practice squad-level QB in recorded history.

There is nothing enticing about this game. Yes, our model projects a most likely outcome, but the confidence level is low given the extreme changes in each team’s environment in recent weeks, the Cowboys inability to make sense as a football team, and the Giants disintegrating rapidly in front of our eyes.

Happy Thanksgiving?

This game is one we have High confidence in our projection but run into having not a ton of edge against the books. But it is enough to get us to bite.

It is also the most evenly matched game, behaviorally speaking, of Week 13. We have it as a virtual tie, separated by just 0.07 points towards Miami.

Adding to that, if we just look at Miami’s behavior since the return of Tua, both have a Margin For Error Score separated by just 0.2 points, 50.5 (GB) to 50.3 (MIA).

With a 3.5 spread from the books, that gives us a little room to think Miami keeps it to a field goal in a game we have as a tie.

Regardless it should be GREAT game to end the best day of the year for the three F’s: Food, Family, Football.

Black Friday Football

This is a game we have EXTREMELY HIGH confidence in our model’s projection. And this is even with the switch at Quarterback for the Raiders.

The truth is, some quarterbacks don’t matter. And an even harder truth is, it doesn't matter who is at QB for the Raiders in there 2024 performance environment.

In fact, in 3 games under O’Connell the Raiders offense saw a ~40% drop in their scoring behavior rate from the previous three games under Minshew. The Raiders then saw 42% rise in their scoring behavior after switching from O’Connell back to Minshew.

So, if anything, expect a much lower scoring output from the Raiders, which is relief for the Chiefs who’s defense is regressing at a 12% rate week over week, and is currently 45% worse than their 2023 counterparts.

Luckily the KC offense is beginning to find life and has hit the 0.8 points per minute mark in four of their last five games. The only challenge is that we don’t have a ton of edge from the books who have this is as a 12.5 spread, while we see it as 14.

Little edge means heavier risk, so proceed accordingly.