The Bengals receiving corps took another hit when Chad Johnson/Ocho Cinco allegedly overslept for an 8:30 pm team meeting this week - a gaffe that has resulted in Johnson being deactivated for this game and in predictions for the game being swung ever more so in favor of Pittsburgh. Earlier this week, Cincy lost Antonio Chatman for the rest of the season with a back injury, which must also affect the picks on the game.

These losses will likely result in dumb thug wide receiver Chris Henry taking COC’s spot in tonight’s starting lineup. Never a good thing, unless your prediction is that Pittsburgh will win.

Not helping matters even if the team had a plethora of great receivers other than T.J. Houshmanzada suiting up for this game is that fact that Carson Palmer is still out and Ryan Fitzpatrick is still starting at quarterback for the perennialy struggling Bengals franchise.

While not awful, Fitzpatrick has not turned out to be a Matt Cassell for the team - both are in their fourth season in the NFL. He has 5 TD passes and 6 picks and a 71.3 rating in his seven starts. Palmer had six touchdowns in one game against the Browns last season, and Cassell threw for almost 40% of Fitzpatrick’s 1,050 yards in only one game last week.

What has remained the same for the Bengals is their head coach. Marv Lewis probably should have lost his job before this season started, but his lack of ability to motivate this team, combined with him having little power over personnel (see how the owner brought Chris Henry back for proof) and, thus, little respect from his players, means his pink slip is already stamped if not yet actually in the mail.

Marvin Lewis' ability to manage the Bengals has made television headlines.

In his sixth (and likely final) season with the team, the Bengals site head coach page quotes Lewis as saying before the start of this 2008 season, “I don’t know that you could add more urgency to me. You’d be hard-pressed.” Unfortunately for Lewis, injuries and personality conflicts have rendered his ability to transfer his own sense of urgency to his players quite impossible at this point.

What has remained the same for the Steelers is their resolve to play hard every down - something that keeps them in every game and something the Bengals organization might want to take a stab at if they ever want to stop being doormats. Pittsburgh is tied with the New York Jets for the AFC’s second seed right now and while some teams with poor coaching might be caught looking ahead of the schedule (see Philadelphia Eagles) when playing the Bengals, that will not be the case with Mike Tomlin’s team.

Also rendered quite impossible is me being able to pick the Bengals to win this game tonight. My pick at FanYard for the Bengals at Steelers game is for Pittsburgh to win by 18 points. FanYard’s unique fan-generated point spread, the Yardstick, predicts an 11-point Steelers road win.

Free to join and fun to play, FanYard gives you a new angle to take when making your football predictions. Don’t be scared. You can probably do it…Sure, on a 30-40% of-the-time basis. Don’t believe me?

Join FanYard and give your football predictions more meaning than ever before. You’ll also get your own Yard, find fans of the same teams you like in the team pages, make friends and be able to make comments on each game you wish to.

Crennel has a HUGE head, but very small shoes...should anyone try to fill them.

Just like the Browns gave up that big lead last Thursday, the Bills have stumbled in losing all three divisional games they have played this season, and now both teams have what amounts to very little hope to make the postseason this year. In fact, Browns players Jamal Lewis and Josh Cribbs literally said some of their teammates gave up late in that Broncos loss, something head coach Romeo Crennel denies.

Anyone with a head on their shoulders, however, and any knowledge of football, must know that Crennel is merely staving off the inevitable pink slip he must be handed sometime before next year’s draft if the Browns are to have any chance at becoming a better team by next season.

Crennel has been nothing like the head coach the Cleveland franchise thought they were getting when they hired the former Patriots assistant coach away from New England. His 23-34 record in that time shines brighter than it should due to a 10-6 mirage that came with an over-achieving Derek Anderson quarterback year combined with an easy schedule last season.

The benching of Anderson during this more realistic schedule in 2008 only underlines the bad decision-making that has marked Crennel’s tenure in Cleveland. Crennel was instrumental in getting Anderson and the Browns to agree to a fat, multi-year contract in the offseason that many pundits questioned based on the tangible evidence that pointed to the likelihood of last season being an anomaly for the oft-erratic QB, which it was.

"Don't worry, D.A., I've got you covered," Quinn says, as he stretches for the ladies.

With Crennel saying there is no locker room friction and that he and his team has no quitters, I must believe the opposite. After all, that’s the way things go with most things that have come out of the coach’s mouth over the past three seasons. Sometimes good assistant coaches don’t make good head coaches, call it Norv Turnerism, and Crennel fits that mold.

I’m taking the Bills by ten at home against a non-AFC East foe. At FanYard, the Yardstick calls for a seven-point Bills victory. And that’s with about 15 minutes until kickoff.

Make your own pick on the Browns at Bills Monday Night Football game at FanYard, where your prediction can be taken into account for the Yardstick - the only fan-generated point spread.

Free to join and fun to play, FanYard gives you a new angle to take when making your football predictions. Don’t be scared. You can probably do it…Sure, on a 30-40% of-the-time basis. Don’t believe me?

Here’s Week 12, make my day. See you on the Leaderboard, punk.

Join FanYard and give your football prognostications more meaning than ever before. You’ll also get your own Yard, find fans of the same teams you like in the team pages, make friends and be able to make comments on each game you wish.

By joining FanYard and making your NBA picks, you’ll add your voice to the Yardstick and, thus, add to its value. In just a few minutes, you can join FanYard, have your own Yard where you can meet like-minded fans, and start making picks on all the major basketball and football games in America. Get points for being predicting the winner of games within ten points of the actual outcome and find your spot on the Leaderboard.

Sound easy to get within ten points? Sure, you’re a knowledgable fan, right? It might be a little more challenging than you think. Take a few minutes and give it a try. We have a new way of doing things, and we’re betting you’re going to like it!

Here are today’s NBA predictions.

First, we must take into account the revival of Tony Romo’s season. Will the play of the star quarterback be enough to turn around what has recently been a disappointing (to their fans) recent spate of games played by the Cowboys, or do the problems run much deeper? Of course the problems run deeper, and the entire team will have to pick up its socks if they want to be taken seriously at any time the rest of this season.

Wade Philips - Lame Duck Walking (Waddling, Actually)

What about on the Redskins side of the ball? Defensive stars Jason Taylor and Shawn Springs will suit up for the Redskins, but the biggest question remains the status of the NFL’s leading rusher, Clinton Portis, who has been listed as questionable.

The most recent reports have Portis doing drills on the field while being watched by the coaching staff. We won’t know, however, if he will actually play until about an hour from now. If Portis is out, I’ll be changing my pick of the Redskins to win by ten, to taking the Cowboys by three. Yes, I believe he is worth that much to the home team.

What do I mean by saying I’ll change my pick at FanYard? Well, I want to get points and raise my place on the Leaderboard, and I want my contribution to the Yardstick for the game to be a positive one. The Yardstick is determined based on the predictions of fans on the game.

We aggregate all the picks from all fans on every game and we publish what we call the Yardstick for each game, and the Yardstick shows who the fans think will win the game and by how many points. It is the only fan-generated point spread, and we want you to be a part of it.

After all, being by the fans and for the fans, the Yardstick is only as powerful as those who take part. Right now, we have hundreds of football fans, but we want to have thousands…or more.

Free to join and fun to play, FanYard gives you a new angle to take when making your football predictions.

Join FanYard and give your football prognostications more meaning than ever before. You’ll also get your own Yard, find fans of the same teams you like in the team pages, make friends and be able to make comments on each game you wish.

We are 7-1-1 on the morning games today, and the Yardstick, were it a person picking, would have 300 points so far.

Here is the Yardstick for the Cowboys at Redskins.

You make NFL predictions, and you get a win for picking the winning team. However, at FanYard, you also have to pick how many points you think that team will win by. If you are within ten points of the actual outcome, you receive points. 100 points for a direct hit, then ten points less for each point you are away from the actual winning margin.

Pick the Exact Score and Get 100 Points for a Direct Hit

Sound easy? Yeah, right. Give it a try and see how you do. We’re betting you find it a little harder and a lot more interesting than you might think.

What do we do with all these picks? We aggregate all the picks from all fans on every game and we publish what we call the Yardstick for each game, and the Yardstick shows who the fans think will win the game and by how many points. It is the only fan-generated point spread, and we want you to be a part of it.

After all, being by the fans and for the fans, the Yardstick is only as powerful as those who take part. Right now, we have hundreds of football fans, but we want to have thousands…or more.

Free to join and fun to play, FanYard gives you a new angle to take when making your football predictions.

Join FanYard and give your football prognostications more meaning than ever before. You’ll also get your own Yard, find fans of the same teams you like in the team pages, make friends and be able to make comments on each game you wish.

Alright, pitch made! Here are your free Week 11 NFL predictions at FanYard.

Enjoy the games!

FanYard, as always, has college football predictions for every major college game across America. Our NCAA football picks are shown as a Yardstick for each game. The Yardstick is the only fan-generated point spread, and we’d love to have you join forces with the hundreds of football fans already on board to help us set a more powerful Yardstick for each game.

Here are your Week 12 college football predictions.

Free does not mean "without value." Join FanYard.

By joining FanYard and making game predictions, you will add value to this unique service, and it is free to do.

You will be able to track your predictions at FanYard for every game and get points for every correct pick within ten points of the actual outcome. Track your picks, make friends and set up your very own Yard and profile.

Get the FanYard RSS feed for NCAA Football Predictions. ]]> http://blog.thefanyard.com/football/week-12-college-football-predictions-at-fanyard-76326.html/feed/ http://blog.thefanyard.com/football/jets-at-patriots-predictions-thursday-nfl-at-fanyard-48428.html http://blog.thefanyard.com/football/jets-at-patriots-predictions-thursday-nfl-at-fanyard-48428.html#comments Thu, 13 Nov 2008 09:59:04 +0000 FanYard Blake http://blog.thefanyard.com/?p=750 If you had told Jets coach Eric Mangini to make a prediction on the outcome of this game at the start of training camp for this 2008 NFL season, and then told him that you were going to give him a pretty healthy New York Jets team and Brett Favre as his quarterback against the New England Patriots in Week 11, you’d have to think he’d be pretty stoked on his chances.

If you then told him that both Tom Brady and Laurence Maroney would not be playing, and that Randy Moss would have less than 600 yards on the season and only four touchdowns, and then told Mangini that the Patriots starting quarterback would be starting just the ninth game of his career…

I’m pretty sure the Jets coach would have predicted that his team would have to be the favorite going into this game against his arch-nemisis and former mentor Bill Belichick.

He would be wrong.

The Yardstick for the Jets at Patriots game tonight is predicting a six-point Patriots win.

A fan-generated point spread, the Yardstick is there for you to be a part of at FanYard. Make picks and get points for being within ten points of the actual score differential, as long as you pick the winning team. Find other fans of your favorite teams, make friends and set up your very own Yard. All for free.

Join FanYard today.

Join FanYard and make picks on games for free. Your picks will be tracked across seasons and you’ll get points for being within ten points of the actual winning score margin as long as you’ve picked the winning team. Help FanYard put the power of predicting games back into the hands of the fans and out of the hands of the gamblers.

Jay Cutler led the way with 24 completions on 42 attempts for 447 yards through the air. Cutler also had seven carries for 29 yards and threw one interception. His quarterback rating for the evening was 107.9.

This Was the View the Browns Had All Thursday Night

Cutler’s big day ruined the first start for Browns quarterback Brady Quinn. Quinn had a 131.1 rating at the half and had already thrown for two touchdowns at that point. He ended the night with a 104.3 rating and had 239 yards on 23 completions with 35 attempts. Quinn threw no interceptions and looked very good against one of the worst passing defenses in the NFL.

The Yardstick at FanYard for this game - the only fan-generated point spread - swayed earlier in the week from the Broncos to the Browns with the announcement of Quinn’s first start, called for a four-point Cleveland home win. That prediction looked very good through most of the game, but Cutler staged a great comeback helped by a Kellen Winslow turnover and penalty and left Quinn with just 1:14 on the clock with which to attempt a final score to win the game from his own 33-yard line.

After a nine-yard completion to Winslow, three incomplete passes sealed the victory for the visitors, who are still atop the AFC West with a 5-4 record. With the loss, the Browns are 3-6 and have likely ended any hopes at a playoff spot this year.

By waiting so long to put in Quinn after Derek Anderson’s weak start to the season, Browns coach Romeo Crennel could very well be out of a job before the start of next season. This was a team many expected to make a strong playoff run, although those expectations should have been tempered by the schedule and the fact that Anderson’s season last year came against many awful pass defenses.

Coincidentally, the Broncos will have the chance to make history after this offensive outpouring when they play the Atlanta Falcons in NFL Week 11. Make a pick on the Broncos at Falcons.

Brady Quinn will get the chance to get his first NFL win when the Browns go into Buffalo next week. Make a pick on the Browns at Bills.

College Football Hottie Fans

The only fan-generated point spread, the Yardstick tells you who fans think will win each game, and by how many points. Joining FanYard is free and easy, and by making picks, you’ll add to the value of each Yardstick, putting the power of predicting games back into the hands of the average fan. By doing this, you’ll take away some of the value of betting lines, which are not even predicting the outcome of games, but are simply there to divide the betting dollars in half.

Today’s college football games are:

Maryland at Virginia Tech

TCU at Utah

Join FanYard and add your voice to the people’s picks.