Week 1 Recap: The Full Locks & Losses Tally

Week 1 is officially in the books, early window, afternoon window, and Monday Night Football all included. Here’s the final scorecard for every pick we made across all three posts. We missed the Sunday night football game, but good thing we did because I thought America’s Team was going to be better than they were.

Early Window: 7-1

• Bears -3.5 → WIN (59-37)
• Bengals -3.5 → WIN (33-27)
• Ravens -3.5 → WIN (41-23)
• Bills -1.5 → WIN (36-31)
• Lions -7.0 → LOSS (won 31-30 in OT, missed the number by six and a half points)
• Jets ML → WIN (23-10)
• Steelers -6.5 → WIN (20-13, covered by half a point)
• Jaguars -8.5 → WIN (34-10)

Afternoon Window: 3-1

• Vikings ML → WIN (39-22)
• Raiders -3.5 → WIN (27-13)
• Eagles ML → WIN (24-22)
• Chargers ML → LOSS (Cardinals pulled the upset, 26-14)

Prime Time Pick: 1-0

• Chiefs -2.5 → WIN (31-10, never really in doubt)

Final Week 1 Record: 11-2 straight up and against the number

Eleven wins, two losses, across thirteen picks. That’s a strong week no matter how you slice it, and both losses share the same thread: they were our two “Best Bet” calls of the week, Lions -7.0 and Chargers moneyline, and both were also the exact legs that sank our parlays.

Parlays: 0-for-3 on the week

Rough day for the multi-leggers specifically, even with the picks themselves hitting well.

• Early window 8-leg parlay (+9912): Seven of eight legs cashed clean. Detroit needed overtime and won by exactly one point, six and a half short of the number, and that was the only thing standing between us and a $991 payout.
• Afternoon 4-leg parlay (+455): Three of four hit. The Cardinals upset was the one leg that got away, same story as the straight bet.
• Prime Time 3-leg same game parlay (+800): Bo Nix’s interception was the one leg that landed. Mahomes finished well under the 226.5 passing number (184 yards) working through his first game back, and Travis Kelce’s stat line, three catches for 71 yards, never found the end zone. Two of three legs missed.

Three parlays, zero cashes, and in every single case it came down to just one leg. That’s the game sometimes.

A few things worth remembering from Week 1

Kenneth Walker III’s Chiefs debut (191 all-purpose yards, two touchdowns) looks like exactly what that offense needed behind Mahomes. T.J. Watt joined Julius Peppers as the only players in NFL history with 100+ sacks and 10+ interceptions after his pick-six against Atlanta. The Bears and Panthers played the highest-scoring Week 1 game ever. And the Lions’ late-game issues from last season followed them right into this one, the same team we flagged as a bet-with-caution pick going in nearly blew a 21-point lead in regulation before escaping in overtime.

Solid start to the season. On to Week 2, let’s see if we can clean up that parlay luck.