Each week I’ll be breaking down my strategy for a single entry into the $21M Survivor contest, using the PredictQ Survivor Optimizer to help along the way.
Week 2 was carnage. Both 8.5-point favorites went down. Tampa Bay lost at home to Cleveland, Baltimore lost at home to New Orleans, and between them that is close to 30% of the field gone in one afternoon.
Week 2 there were too many solid choices to pick just one. Week 3 is the opposite problem. There isn’t a team I want to pick and burn.
KC: Kansas City is an 11.5-point favorite at Miami, around 80% to win, and initially projected at around 29% of entries. The next two, Buffalo and Seattle, are both 7-point favorites at around 70% to win. Those are 3 of the top 4 teams ranked by future value and not ones I want to burn in Week 3.
But you go to the next tier (DET, GB, and PHI) and they’re all still likely playoff teams with strong future value. The only one I can confidently rule out is GB because in Week 15, they are the largest favorite in a tough double-pick week.
My current lean is to just take the biggest favorite in KC, give us a little more time to better identify who are the good and bad teams, and accept we’re burning a strong team either way.