Monday Night Football recap: Chargers cover to close NFL Week 16; Circa Survivor down to 3

63

Monday Night Football wraps up NFL Week 16

The Los Angeles Chargers covered as 3.5-point favorites in their 20-3 win at the Indianapolis 20-3 on Monday Night Football to wrap up NFL Week 16.
After a scoreless first quarter, the Chargers scored first on a 1-yard TD run by Austin Ekeler with 8:41 left in the second quarter. The Colts answered with a 46-yard FG by Chase McLaughlin with 4:21 to play before halftime but never really threatened to get back into the game. The Chargers’ Cameron Dicker added a 24-yard FG as time expired in the first half for a 10-3 lead, then added a 21-yard FG in the third quarter while Ekeler added a second 1-yard TD run in the fourth quarter to close the scoring. 
The defenses dominated (or the offenses struggled, depending on how you interpret that) and the game never came close to the betting total of 44.5 points.

NFL Quick Links:
Super Bowl | Betting Splits | Odds | Picks | Matchups

 

Circa Survivor has 3 live entries

The Chargers’ victory clinched an AFC wild-card berth, but it was also good news for a Circa Survivor entry using the alias of THE ENEMY WITHIN-2 as they stayed alive in the $6.133 million prize pool, joining BROWNA-1 and JED 4-in advancing to next weekend.
For those who don’t know, Circa Survivor requires contestants to pick one NFL winner (ties lose) a week and can’t use the same team twice. This contest also has extra “Thanksgiving” and “Christmas” weeks, so there were 14 live entries entering the holiday weekend but 10 were eliminated in Week 16a that included the Thursday and Saturday games.
Maddog-2, who won with the Vikings (barely in 27-24 win vs. Giants on 61-yard FG as time expired) on Saturday, was within 46 seconds of scooping the whole pool as the other three remaining players had the Steelers, who weren’t winning for 59:14 of their game against the Raiders on Saturday night.
But the Steelers rallied for a 13-10 win and the Final Four had to submit plays by 9 a.m. PT Sunday from just the four games on Sunday/Monday.
Maddog-2 went with the Dolphins and was eliminated by the Packers’ 26-20 victory. BROWNA-1 and JED-4 were again on the ropes with their choice of the Buccaneers, who trailed the Cardinals 16-6 in the fourth quarter before Tom Brady rallied them for a 19-16 victory in OT.
JED-4 started with the maximum 6 entries at $1,000 apiece. THE ENEMY WITHIN-2 started with just 2 (and both were alive before one of them lost with the Jets last Thursday). BROWNA-1 is alive with their one and only entry (note: when five players won $1.2 million apiece from Circa Survivor’s $6 million pool last year, Las Vegas’ very own Chris Piper did it with a single entry).
The three remaining players move on to NFL Week 17 with some interesting decisions to make with their available teams dwindling (for example, none of them can use the Chiefs, the biggest chalk of the week, against the Broncos). Here is the "availability chart" for the last 3 Survivors.

NFL Week 16 betting stats

NFL favorites went 10-6 SU on the holiday weekend but split 8-8 ATS as the Giants (+4.5 in that 27-24 loss at the Vikings) and Cardinals (+7.5 in that 19-16 OT loss vs. the Buccaneers on Sunday Night Football) covered as dogs in SU losses.
Home/road teams split 8-8 SU and ATS on the week.
Unders led 10-6 in NFL Week 16 and primetime Unders swept 4-0 (Thursday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday nights).

NFL season-long betting stats

On the season, the Chargers’ win improved faves to 152-82-2 SU with 4 pick-’ems while dogs still lead 125-104-7 ATS (54.6%).
With the Colts’ loss, home teams dipped to 128-104-2 SU with 6 neutral-site games and a slim lead at 116-112-6 ATS (50.9%).
Unders improved to 132-106-2 (55.5%) with primetime Unders improving to 31-19-1 (62%).