The Gold Sheet Picks, Betting Predictions, and Capper Bio

Over the last ten seasons, the Jets have averaged 4.9 wins per year and they have only gone over this 5.5 win total three times. You can point to injuries and in-season trades as a big reason why last season was a failure, but we now have a ten-year sample size of this being one of the worst organizations in the NFL. Geno Smith was brought back to the franchise after a disastrous run in Las Vegas with the Raiders, but we're struggling to see the upside. The Athletic just released a comprehensive QB ranking that was voted on by coaches and front office personnel. Smith was voted as the 30th-best quarterback heading into the 2026 season. One defensive coordinator was quoted as saying, "He looked terrible on the film we saw." Another defensive coach put more blame on the Raiders' system around him, saying "Once you get hit and keep getting hit and hit and hit, how good are you going to be? They had no identity on offense. Geno got a bad rap. He was getting murdered out there." That's fair, but why is there any reason to believe things are going to be any better with this team? Head coach Aaron Glenn was retained, but nearly every assistant coaching position was flipped after last year’s 3-14 campaign. Frank Reich has been brought in to lead the offense, but Reich hasn't coached in the NFL since 2023 when he went 1-10 with the Carolina Panthers. Bill Musgrave was hired as the quarterbacks coach. Musgrave was the Browns' QB coach last season and Cleveland had arguably the worst offense in the NFL. We're really struggling to see how the Jets are going to double their win total from three to six this season. It's not like this team was knocking on the doorstep and suffered a couple heartbreaking losses along the way. They finished with a -203 point differential, allowed the second-most points in the league and suffered eight double-digit losses. When the NFL schedule was released, DraftKings released opening point spreads on every game for every team for the upcoming season. The Jets are not projected to be favored by more than a field goal in any game this season, and only five games have a point spread between -2.5 and +2.5. So in order to eclipse this win total, the Jets would have to go 5-0 in those toss-up games (vs Cleveland, Las Vegas, Arizona and Miami x2) and still would need to pull another upset along the way. We don't see that happening.

They’re getting a bit antsy in Cincinnati, where the Bengals haven’t made the playoffs since 2022 and a return to the Super Bowl for Joe Burrow, which once seemed inevitable after he reached the finale vs. the Rams in his second year in the league, is now starting to draw comparisons to Dan Marino, who never got back to the Super Bowl after also making it in his second year with the Dolphins. Of course, Burrow staying in one piece for an entire season would be a nice start after he’s missed large chunks in three of his six campaigns in the league, with last year’s eight games the fewest in his career. Indeed, Joe’s presence means almost everything to the Bengals, who were 1-8 without him a year ago, and why lingering questions along the OL, which has allowed Burrow to get sacked 213 times in his career (the fourth most in the league since 2020) and has the worst pass-block rate in the league across that span, remain an obvious red flag. For the moment, Burrow is upright, however, and Zac Taylor is looking forward to a rebuilt defensive line wreaking havoc with foes on the Bengals’ schedule now that wrecking machine DT Dexter Lawrence II has arrived from the Giants along with other disruptors on the defensive front. Yet keep in mind that Cincinnati has been a notorious slow starter in recent years, failing to cover in its last four openers. Injuries also figured in the Bucs' demise a year ago and failure to defend the NFC South crown they had won the previous four seasons, and Todd Bowles is crossing his fingers that some of the walking wounded from the summer like wideouts Emeka Egbuka and Jalen McMillan (the presence of both more important now that Mike Evans has moved to the 49ers) will be ready to go for the opener. The clever Baker Mayfield also looks a proper elixir to Cincinnati’s supposedly juiced-up pass rush, and Bowles’ own new adds in the defensive front seven could expose the main Bengals question mark--protecting Burrow. Moreover, any points from the oddsmakers are always worth considering with the low-variance Bucs, after their last six games a season ago were all decided by four points or fewer. Play Tampa Bay Bucs