Survivor Clean Slate Week 14: Steelers & Jags Disappoint

With Week 14 on the horizon, the playoffs are bearing down on us now. The Cardinals and Commanders will enjoy the final bye weeks of any NFL outfit, and all 32 will compete in every week as the sprint to the postseason rolls on. At this point in the season, your Survivor contest has likely ended, especially given the carnage among the popular picks of Week 13. If that’s the case for you, then I hope you won. If not, then there is another opportunity available that shouldn’t take as long as the last contest or contests you entered

Splash has a new Survivor contest ready for Week 14, and it shouldn’t take long for the cream to rise to the top. In the Week 14 Splash NFL Survivor Sprint, all entrants are required to correctly pick four winners each week to remain alive for the $6,000 guaranteed grand prize awarded to whoever is the final person standing. I don’t know about you, but it would surprise me if it took until the end of the regular season to determine the moneymaker.

To get there, some luck would be helpful, but as always, a healthy dose of skill is absolutely mandatory. You need as much information as you can get heading into the first week of the contest. You also need as much information as you can get if you are still alive in a different contest. This money isn’t going to make itself.

In Memoriam

Thirteen weeks of NFL football is a long time - plenty long enough for something to go wrong in Survivor. Even if you made it through all of the first 12 go-arounds, the odds that you got through the bloodbath that was Week 13 are not as friendly as many of you would have liked.

Of the 26 teams in action last week, 13 of them received at least 1 percent of the Splash Survivor entries. Of those 13, six of them let their believers down, including the most popular pick.

The Steelers amassed 25.21 percent of entries for their challenge with the Cardinals, the most among all Week 13 participants. That means that one-fourth of Splash Survivor players expected Pittsburgh to deliver Arizona its 11th loss of the season. Instead, the Cardinals handed the Steelers defeat number five, 24-10, complicating their path to the playoffs and tearing to shreds more Survivor entries than anyone else.

Pittsburgh was the biggest disappointment, but the Jaguars let quite a few Survivor players down, too. Jacksonville had the third-most support among the 26 teams that took the field in Week 13 with 13.86 percent of entries behind it. Unfortunately for those who attached themselves to the Jags, the Bengals made them pay, 34-31, on Monday Night Football. It doesn’t matter that Cincinnati needed overtime to do it - an L is an L in the NFL standings and in NFL Survivor.

The Jets, Chiefs, Broncos, and Titans authored the same fate for their respective backers. Each of those teams had between 1 and 5 percent of Splash Survivor entries in their pockets, and each of them put their pickers in the same place: on the outside looking in. If you were unlucky enough to have relied on any of the unsuccessful six, then you are looking for answers in Week 14’s matchups. Let’s clean the slate.

If You Want This Week’s Biggest Favorite…

It seems like the Dolphins mingle among the top favorites every week, so you are probably accustomed to seeing them float around here. Given that 4-8 Tennessee is scheduled to tango with the ‘Phins at Hard Rock Stadium in Week 14, you shouldn’t be surprised to see them feature in this series again.

The home team is favored by 13.5 points in this matchup, the largest line of the week. The Dolphins have a three-game lead atop the AFC East and are winners of their last three, most recently routing the Commanders, 45-15. In the other corner stands the visiting Titans, who have dropped four of their last five games, the lone exception a one-score escape from the one-win Panthers, and find themselves in a three-game hole at the bottom of the AFC South. These teams are on extremely different trajectories.

Miami boasts one of the most prolific offenses in the NFL due in part to its top-ranked passing attack, which is averaging 285.1 yards per game. The Titans’ secondary is giving up more than 230 yards per contest through the air. You put the pieces together.

If you want to bet on who the books think is most likely to not only win but win big in Week 14, then here is your answer.

If You Want This Week’s Next Biggest Favorite…

In Week 12’s Thursday night showdown, the 49ers went to Seattle and beat up on the Seahawks, 31-13, which extended their winning streak at the time to three. Now, just over two weeks later, the teams will spar again, this time on San Francisco’s home turf.

The Niners improved their successful streak to four last weekend with a waxing of the Eagles, 42-19, in one of the most impressive displays from any team in the league so far this season. Meanwhile, the Seahawks have taken an opposite route as of late. Losers of three in a row, Seattle is searching for answers that the books don’t expect it to find in Santa Clara.

San Francisco is a 10.5-point favorite in this pairing, the second-widest spread of Week 14. Nobody has held the Niners below 27 points in more than a month, while the Seahawks are fresh off of spotting the Cowboys 41 points in Week 13. With a middling run defense, it will be a tall task for the Seahawks to slow down Christian McCaffrey, who ran for 114 yards and two touchdowns in their first meeting earlier this season.

Things don’t look great for Seattle this week, but according to the books, things will look great for you if you hop on the San Francisco bandwagon.

If You Want A Value Pick…

The Falcons are equipped with one of the more formidable defenses in the NFL. They rank within the league's top 10 in quarterback hurry percentage (8.5 percent), quarterback knockdown percentage (10.0 percent), and quarterback pressure percentage (23.2 percent), all factors in the team giving up an average of just 315.9 yards per game to its opponents, the 10th-best mark in pro football. This is one reason why I like Atlanta as a value pick this week.

Another reason is because Tampa Bay has struggled mightily since starting the season 3-1. The Bucs are 2-6 in their last eight games, with the only triumphs coming in home games against the Titans and Panthers. The team has had issues offensively, ranking 30th in the league in rushing yards per contest (85.2) and in the NFL’s bottom half in passing yards per outing and points per game.

Those themes rang true the first time these two shared a field back on Oct. 22. The Falcons held the Bucs to just 13 points that day, forcing three punts and three turnovers in the process. Atlanta has not progressed all that much with the ball in its possession since then, but if its defense can stifle Tampa Bay again, then Desmond Ridder won’t have to do much for his team to prevail.

It’s a risky play. These are two fairly matched teams with a lot on the line, and the Falcons are a slim favorite by just 2.5 points. But if you want a value pick that most other Survivor players will likely pass on, then I would look here.