NFL Picks Week 10: Random Numbers Favor Bears Over Vikings

The random list and number generators didn't do very well in their first attempt this year, during NFL Week 8, going only 5-8 in the 13 games.

Nevertheless, we tried it again -- and emboldened by the 8-5 mark in Week 9 games, bringing its overall mark to 13-13 (try doing that, expert prognosticators!), we're doing it again. We're posting this on Wednesday because the NFL is beginning Thursday night games this week; the Ravens will be playing the Falcons on the NFL Network Thursday night at 7:20 p.m. CST.

SB Nation Chicago is particularly proud of these random number choices from week 9, which were reasonably close to the actual score:

Prediction: Chargers 31, Texans 17 Actual: Chargers 29, Texans 23
Prediction: Giants 30, Seahawks 14 Actual: Giants 41, Seahawks 7
Prediction: Raiders 24, Chiefs 14 Actual: Raiders 23, Chiefs 20
Prediction: Packers 38, Cowboys 0 Actual: Packers 45, Cowboys 7

That last one, matching the exact margin of victory for the Packers, is the random number generator's finest hour to date.

A reminder of how this works: I use random.org's list generator and its true random number generator to sort the teams playing in a random order, then generate random numbers to match with each team name as a score prediction. The number range to be 0-44, since 44 is the highest number of points scored by anyone this year except for the outlier 59 scored by the Raiders a few weeks ago. One more caveat: without regard to where each team was in the order on the list, if a random number came up that was an unlikely football score ("2" was a popular choice this week), I threw it out and generated another one.

Here, then, are SB Nation Chicago's official Random Number Picks for NFL Week 10 (14 games this week, the final week of byes, home team on bottom):

Ravens 20
Falcons 35

Bengals 43
Colts 27

Jets 31
Browns 30

Vikings 16
Bears 23

Titans 14
Dolphins 10

Texans 19
Jaguars 7

Lions 37
Bills 41

Panthers 0
Buccaneers 14

Chiefs 34
Broncos 37

Rams 10
49ers 35

Cowboys 36
Giants 37

Seahawks 35
Cardinals 33

Patriots 14
Steelers 41

Eagles 21
Redskins 40

The random numbers favor the Bears for the second straight week, and by a somewhat realistic score. Since we're not picking against the spread nor do we care how many points a team actually scores -- just pick the winner -- the numbering system saved us from picking the Cowboys over the Giants by a single point, and makes that Steelers over Patriots pick look better (no, they probably won't win by 27). I'm thinking some of the rest of these don't look so good (the Redskins over the Eagles by 19? I'm hearing that Windows Phone commercial "Really?"), but some of last week's picks did a week ago and then upsets made them... not so good after all

As always, have fun with these. SB Nation Chicago is not responsible for actual money you might lose making legal wagers with these picks.