NFL Week 7 Picks: Five Plays and the Costanza Special
Seven weeks in, and the NFL has officially turned into a hostage situation.
The defending champs are sitting at .500. The preseason Super Bowl favorite just lost to Arizona as a double-digit favorite. The Dolphins haven’t won a game, and the Jets are favored by more than a field goal over another professional football team, which should be grounds for a congressional investigation.
At this point, nobody knows who’s actually good, who’s pretending, or who’s just waiting for their quarterback to get healthy.
This is the week the public bets the logos, the talking heads recycle last Sunday’s highlights, and we bet the injury reports.
We’ve got five plays on the board, plus the Costanza Play of the Day, which is a perfect 2-0 and rapidly becoming the most reliable financial advice ever provided by George Costanza.
Let’s get to work.
THE 1:00 PM SLATE
Falcons vs. 49ers: OVER 48
The 49ers are undefeated and scoring points like somebody put a bonus clause in every offensive player’s contract.
San Francisco leads the NFL with a +67 point differential and has scored 23 touchdowns, tied with Buffalo for the league lead. But take one look at the injury report before you start penciling in another dominant performance.
Nick Bosa, Mike Evans, Deebo Samuel, linebackers Luke Gifford and Garret Wallow, and safety Marques Sigle have all been ruled out.
That’s not an injury report. That’s a missing persons investigation.
Half the defense is showing up in street clothes on a short week, and Atlanta has a pretty straightforward solution: give Bijan Robinson the football and let him ruin somebody’s afternoon.
The Falcons are averaging 5.07 yards per carry, third-best in football. Against a defense missing two linebackers, that’s an all-you-can-eat buffet with no sneeze guard.
On the other side, Atlanta’s secondary has been getting torched by just about anybody capable of completing a forward pass. Brock Purdy doesn’t need a fully healthy receiving corps to move the football here.
Christian Kirk is also making his 49ers debut, which is a sentence I never expected to write in 2026.
Indoors. On turf. Two offenses capable of moving the football. Two defenses held together by athletic tape and positive thinking.
What scares me: San Francisco’s receiving corps is thin. If Kyle Shanahan decides to run the ball 35 times and shorten the game, we could end up watching a 27-17 final while wondering why we do this to ourselves.
But the offensive firepower, Atlanta’s rushing attack, and the defensive injuries give us plenty of reasons to expect points.
The Pick: Falcons/49ers OVER 48
Tampa Bay Buccaneers +3.5 at Carolina Panthers
Baker Mayfield is back, and he’s wearing a glove like he’s about to rob a convenience store.
Todd Bowles said after Friday’s practice that Mayfield looks ready to return after missing three games with a dislocated right thumb.
Is Baker suddenly going to save Tampa Bay’s season? Relax. We’re not asking him to part the Red Sea.
In his three starts, Mayfield threw two touchdowns, two interceptions, averaged 205 passing yards per game, and posted an 80.0 passer rating.
Nothing spectacular. But I’ll take that version of Baker over an undrafted rookie in a divisional road game.
Tampa Bay is 1-5, but somehow the Bucs aren’t quite as terrible as their record suggests. Last week, they blew a 13-0 lead against Pittsburgh and lost 26-19 in overtime.
That’s not a dead football team. That’s a team that keeps inventing new and exciting ways to die.
And Carolina isn’t exactly the 1985 Bears.
The Panthers rank 25th in yards allowed, and Bryce Young laying more than a field goal is the kind of situation that ends with a meaningless backdoor touchdown and some poor bastard in Charlotte putting his remote through the drywall.
There’s also the desperation factor.
Pete Prisco recently wrote that Bowles’ seat is getting awfully hot. Coaches fighting for their jobs tend to get a little more aggressive. Suddenly, fourth-and-2 at midfield starts looking like fourth-and-inches in the Super Bowl.
What scares me: Tampa Bay’s supporting cast looks like the waiting room at an orthopedic surgeon’s office. Emeka Egbuka, right tackle Luke Goedeke, and safety Antoine Winfield Jr. are all out.
Mayfield also took 13 sacks and lost three fumbles during the team’s 0-3 start. A questionable thumb, a glove, and a backup right tackle isn’t exactly a recipe for ball security.
But we’re getting more than a field goal in a divisional matchup with Tampa’s starting quarterback returning.
I’ll take my chances.
The Pick: Buccaneers +3.5
Miami Dolphins +4.5 at New York Jets
I know.
I KNOW.
The Miami Dolphins are 0-5 with a -62 point differential. Malik Willis is completing 56% of his passes, the worst mark in football, behind an offensive line allowing sacks on nearly one out of every ten dropbacks.
I’m not here to tell you Miami is good.
I’m here to remind you who they’re playing.
The New York Jets get inside the red zone and turn into a Long Island Rail Road delay. Nobody knows what’s happening, nobody’s going anywhere, and somehow everybody involved is having a miserable afternoon.
The Jets are converting just 37.5% of their red-zone trips into touchdowns, dead last in the NFL.
Last week against New England, they went 0-for-3 inside the 20 and settled for field goals.
With a game total of 38.5, getting four and a half points feels like buying a mansion with a swimming pool at a foreclosure auction.
The Jets will probably kick three field goals, Robert Saleh’s ghost will look confused on the sideline, and we’ll be sitting there begging for a Miami garbage-time touchdown that nobody outside of the gambling community has any interest in watching.
There’s also an actual football argument for Miami.
The Dolphins average 4.9 yards per carry, fifth-best in the league, and they’re coming off a bye. They’ve had an extra week to work on protections, clean up their red-zone offense, and hopefully remember that the forward pass is legal.
What scares me: Miami’s pass defense is an absolute crime scene. Opposing quarterbacks are completing 76.6% of their passes, with 11 touchdowns allowed and just four sacks through five games.
If Geno Smith gets a clean pocket all afternoon, even the Jets might accidentally discover the end zone.
Eventually.
I hate that I’m doing this. But I hate laying more than a field goal with the Jets even more.
The Pick: Dolphins +4.5
And now, if you’ll excuse me, I need a shower.
THE 4:25 PM SLATE
Los Angeles Rams -3 at Las Vegas Raiders
This is your classic buy-low spot.
The Rams entered the season as one of the Super Bowl favorites. Six games later, they’re 2-4 and coming off an embarrassing loss to Arizona as double-digit favorites.
The entire football world watched that disaster and decided Los Angeles had forgotten how to play football.
Perfect.
One ugly Sunday in the desert doesn’t erase the talent on this roster, and I’m not ready to bury the Rams because of one embarrassing performance.
Vegas isn’t exactly inspiring confidence, either.
The Raiders are 3-3 with a point differential of precisely zero, which might be the most Raiders statistic ever recorded. Six games into the season, and the scoreboard has essentially declared them a waste of everyone’s time.
They’ve also lost three straight.
Historically, this matchup has favored Los Angeles, with the Rams covering five of the last six meetings.
What scares me: Davante Adams landed on injured reserve October 20, and Puka Nacua is questionable.
If Puka can’t go, Matthew Stafford might be throwing passes to guys whose Wikipedia pages haven’t been created yet.
And give Kirk Cousins some credit. He’s thrown 14 touchdowns against five interceptions with a 98.0 passer rating. The Raiders are also 5-1 against the spread this season.
They’ve figured out how to lose football games while still ruining your bets. An incredibly annoying talent.
But I refuse to believe the Rams suddenly became a bad football team overnight.
This is still a talented roster with a veteran quarterback and a coach who knows how to respond after getting embarrassed.
Bad week. Good team. Bounce-back spot.
The Pick: Rams -3
SUNDAY NIGHT FOOTBALL
Seattle Seahawks -3 vs. Kansas City Chiefs
The undefeated Kansas City Chiefs are getting points on Sunday Night Football.
Patrick Mahomes. Prime time. Underdogs.
You can practically hear the public sprinting toward the betting window.
And that’s exactly why I’m going the other way.
Take a look at the offensive line Mahomes is bringing into one of the loudest stadiums in professional sports.
Starting right tackle Jaylon Moore is out with a concussion. Left tackle Josh Simmons was placed on injured reserve this week.
Both starting tackles.
Gone.
Rashee Rice and running back Brashard Smith are also ruled out.
So Mahomes is heading into Lumen Field with backup bookends, a depleted supporting cast, and 68,000 lunatics screaming like somebody just announced that Starbucks is closing permanently.
And Seattle’s defense isn’t exactly welcoming visitors with a fruit basket.
The Seahawks have 16 sacks and are allowing opponents to convert just 28% of their third downs, third-best in the NFL.
That’s a nightmare matchup for an offensive line trying to communicate with a silent count.
Mahomes might need a chiropractor, a priest, and a police escort out of the stadium.
Seattle also has the rest advantage.
The Seahawks lost 17-14 in overtime at Denver last Thursday, giving them ten days to sit around and think about it.
Nothing motivates an NFL team quite like having an extra three days to be furious.
And then there’s Kenneth Walker returning to Seattle in a Chiefs uniform.
Sixty-eight thousand people booing a running back for three hours? That’s the kind of petty entertainment I tune in for.
What scares me: Two words.
Sam Darnold.
Seven touchdowns. Seven interceptions. Two picks last week.
Darnold is capable of playing three beautiful quarters of football before making one throw that leaves an entire stadium staring at the scoreboard in disbelief.
Kansas City’s defense is also legitimate. The Chiefs held the Chargers to six points last week, and Seattle could be missing pass rusher Demarcus Lawrence and safety Nick Emmanwori, both questionable.
Check the inactives before kickoff.
But this matchup comes down to the trenches.
Mahomes is incredible. He’s also human, despite considerable evidence to the contrary.
Two backup tackles in Seattle on Sunday night is a problem even he might not be able to solve.
The defending champs protect the house.
The Pick: Seahawks -3
COSTANZA PLAY OF THE DAY (2-0)
Detroit Lions -3 vs. Green Bay Packers
You know the drill.
George Costanza spent his entire life making the wrong decisions. Then one day, he realized that if every instinct he had was wrong, the opposite must be right.
He started doing the opposite of everything his brain told him.
He got a girlfriend. He got a job with the Yankees. His entire life improved.
We’re applying that same groundbreaking scientific principle to the NFL, and so far, we’re 2-0.
This week’s victim? The Green Bay Packers.
Every instinct tells you to take Green Bay getting a field goal.
They’ve won three straight. They’re 4-2. They’re catching points in a divisional rivalry against a Detroit team whose defense has been giving up points like Halloween candy.
The hot underdog. The momentum. The rivalry.
It all looks so obvious.
Which is exactly why we’re doing the opposite.
And the beautiful part? The football numbers actually back us up.
Detroit is coming off its bye with a nearly fully healthy roster. Brian Branch and Cade Mays are back, the Lions lead the NFL in sacks, and Jared Goff has thrown 12 touchdowns without a single interception.
Twelve touchdowns. Zero picks.
Goff hasn’t thrown an interception in a month and a half. At this point, he treats opposing defensive backs like they’re not even eligible to catch the football.
Now look at Green Bay.
The Packers are averaging a miserable 2.87 yards per carry, dead last in the NFL by a considerable margin. They’ve also committed 57 penalties, more than anybody in football.
They can’t run the ball, and apparently nobody has explained to them that holding is illegal.
Jordan Love was hit eight times and sacked three times against Dallas, and now he’s dealing with a sore back.
So we’ve got a one-dimensional offense with a sore-backed quarterback heading indoors to face the league’s most productive pass rush.
Wonderful.
Linebacker Zaire Franklin is also ruled out, adding another problem to Green Bay’s afternoon.
What scares me: Detroit’s defense has been anything but trustworthy, and the over is 5-0 in Lions games. With a total of 53.5, this could turn into a track meet where a late Packers field goal ruins our lives.
But that’s the Costanza experience. If it felt comfortable, we wouldn’t be doing it.
George would’ve taken Green Bay and spent Monday explaining to Jerry why the Packers were the obvious side.
We’re laying the points.
The Costanza Pick: Lions -3
THE WEEK 7 CARD
- Falcons/49ers OVER 48
- Buccaneers +3.5
- Dolphins +4.5
- Rams -3
- Seahawks -3
- Costanza Play of the Day (2-0): Lions -3
Six plays. Five regular picks. One man following the gambling philosophy of a short, stocky, slow-witted bald man.
What could possibly go wrong?
The Costanza Play is 2-0, the injury reports look like hospital admission sheets, and somewhere in New York, a Jets fan is convincing himself this is finally the week everything turns around.
It isn’t.
Shop your numbers, protect your bankroll, and remember: the sportsbooks didn’t build those billion-dollar palaces because they’re generous.
See you on the other side. Hopefully with six winners and absolutely no reason to check our bank accounts.
