Posted:
#1
NFL Week 1 Play: Patriots +3.5 (-114) Sports 411
Good luck.
NFL 2026 Season ATS Picks Thread
Posted:
#4
Back for another season. For those who followed along last year, we finished 65-39-1 on full plays, 0-1 on props for +59.67% total.
All plays were posted right in this forum:
Nfl 2025 season ats picks thread - Page 11 - NFL Betting Forum | Covers
I’ll be running the same basic approach with a model that got a full rebuild this offseason. For anyone new, here's what this thread is.
What I do:
My plays come from two layers. The first is a quantitative model I've been building for several seasons. It predicts the actual margin of victory for every game, compares that to the current number, and only flags a side when the edge clears a meaningful threshold. The second layer is old-fashioned situational handicapping – rest, travel, coaching, motivation, injuries – which I use as annotation on top of the model, not as a replacement for it. If the numbers and the situation disagree, the number wins or I pass.
What changed this offseason:
This was the biggest offseason of work I've put in. The short version:
- Rebuilt the feature set from scratch and pruned it down to 37 inputs that actually earned their keep in out-of-sample testing. Everything that didn't hold up got cut, including a couple of ideas I liked.
- Built a proper strength-of-schedule engine and a stronger home-field calibration step.
- Added a more robust backup-QB adjustment
- Tested coaching-change effects – kept the one that held up, threw out the ones that didn't.
- Tested using the market total as a volatility input, with real gates for whether it helped out-of-sample. It did, so it stayed.
- Ran a full dress rehearsal on past seasons before locking anything.
- Killed more than one workstream I'd spent real time on because they didn’t test out of sample well.
The model was frozen before Week 1. No mid-season tinkering – what you see is what was tested.
How the plays work:
- Every play is logged, win or lose, at the price I specify
- Flat staking, to win 3% of bankroll per play. No chasing, no "5-star locks”.
- Volume will be moderate. Some weeks there will be two or three plays, some weeks more. I don't force action.
What I'm hoping to accomplish:
Last year's over 60% is not something I expect to repeat – anything north of 55% over a full season with positive CLV is a real result, and that's the target. Beyond the record, the goal is transparency: post the number and the book played at, log every result, and let the thread hold me accountable.
Questions, pushback and support are all welcome. That's what makes these threads worth doing.
Looking forward to getting rolling. Good luck to everybody this season!
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