SuperContest: Teams get crushed in Week 7

Las Vegas – My co-host of the Fade or Follow Podcast (heard in this space every Saturday/Sunday) is Vegas Matty, a person who has been involved with the SuperContest through his proxy service for over 10 years.

On Monday night during the Eagles-Redskins game, he sent me the following text:

Even if the Skins cover, it's the worst week I've ever seen in the SuperContest

The Eagles won by 10 against Washington to easily cover the 5.5 line and move the SuperContest top 11 selected plays to an unbelievable 0-11 for Week 7.

0-11!

Vegas Matty was right. This was an horrendous and historically bad week for the most popular picks, and it really shook up the standings of the overall contest. After Week 6, the leader had 24 points and was in first place by himself. After Week 7, 25 points led the contest but eight teams are now tied for the lead!

What happened? Well, the contest is known for playing underdogs, and we discussed the run ATS for the 'dog play during Saturday's column. Going into the week, home dogs were 21-10-1 ATS and the majority of teams, including all four of Sports Action's own, continued with that line of thinking for picking games.

The 10-4-1 performance of the favorites caught the majority of the contest off guard.

via GIPHY

In Week 7, road favorites went 4-3, but the bigger shock was that home favorites went 6-1-1. That spelled out bad news for players who took the points being offered and sent all of our teams to a .500 record or below for our five picks this week.

For Team Gamenight (1-4), I only hit on the Bears at home getting three points against the Panthers. I missed badly on the 49ers (+6.5) against the Cowboys, as Dallas crushed San Francisco. It wasn't wise of me to also back the Broncos (+1.5), who got shut out at LA. Finally, I blew it with the Patriots' blowout win of Atlanta (+3.5), and the pathetic Giants (+5.5) continued to be pathetic as they lost and failed to cover against the Seahawks.

It was the same story for our leader after week 6, Team Bet The Process (1-4), who dropped from 91st place down to 171st after a rough week. Just like Team Gamenight, the only correct pick for Bet was Chicago's win. They missed on four dogs including the Packers (+5.5), Cardinals (+3.5), Giants (+5.5) and the Broncos (+1.5).

Our best performer in Week 7 was our computer algorithm, Team Sports Action, who went 2-2-1. Sports Action hit on the Eagles (-5.5) and the Bears (+3.5) and got a push as the Dolphins (-3) came from behind to beat the Jets. It missed on the Packers and Giants.

Finally, Team Beatrix Kiddo went 2-3 on the week and went UP in the contest from 254th to 245th place. That's how bad of a week it was for the contest field. In fact, only 556 teams out of over 2,700 had a winning record this week.

Good thing there are 50 more picks to go!

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