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NFL Survivor Pool Advice for Week 4: Picks & Predictions (2023)

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All survivor pool contestants can usually point to one week in the season as the “massacre week,” where several big favorites lose and wipe out more than half the remaining field in one fell swoop. Did we experience this year’s massacre week as early as Week 3?

Last week was seemingly set up to be the most manageable week yet thus far, with three double-digit favorites and five teams with spreads of -8 or higher. However, three of those teams (Dallas Cowboys, Jacksonville Jaguars, and Baltimore Ravens) all lost. And despite favorites going 10-5 SU (Chargers-Vikings kicked off as a pick’em), which was the most successful week for favorites after going 8-8 and 10-6 in Weeks 1 and 2, survivor pools around the country are much thinner after three of the five biggest favorites all took losses. Hopefully plenty of people followed last week’s contrarian play and backed the Seattle Seahawks, who cruised to a 37-27 victory over the Bryce Young-less Carolina Panthers.

Like last week, my selections for this week will be broken down into the following categories: safest picks, riskier plays that will be popular, and contrarian plays to beat a large pool. Even though survivor pool rules say you cannot pick the same team twice, I will outline multiple scenarios if bettors wish to navigate their own path.

Here is a list of odds for all the favorites to win their matchups in Week 4 (odds courtesy of FanDuel).

NFL Survivor Pool Advice

TEAM ODDS
San Francisco 49ers -900
Philadelphia Eagles -420
Kansas City Chiefs -420
Dallas Cowboys -300
Los Angeles Chargers -250
Minnesota Vikings -172
Denver Broncos -166
Pittsburgh Steelers -162
New Orleans Saints -158
Jacksonville Jaguars -148
Buffalo Bills -144
Cleveland Browns -138
Cincinnati Bengals -136
New York Giants -130
Detroit Lions -122
Indianapolis Colts -120

Safest Picks

San Francisco 49ers (-900), Kansas City Chiefs (-420), Los Angeles Chargers (-250)

This might be the week to buckle down and use one of the NFL’s best teams (the 49ers or Chiefs), given the overall lack of quality options further down the odds leaderboard. San Francisco has the luxury of extra rest this week after playing last Thursday night. We are still making the 49ers a safe play despite facing a Cardinals team that scored on their first five possessions (two touchdowns, three field goals) against the vaunted Cowboys defense. Perhaps Dallas had culture shock getting used to life without cornerback Trevon Diggs, who is now out for the season with a torn ACL. But this is still an Arizona team that had lost nine consecutive games and six straight home games before beating Dallas. We do not expect it to beat San Francisco on the road, as Brock Purdy has won eight straight regular season starts, and the team has won 13 consecutive regular season games in all.

New York Jets fans are already up in arms that head coach Robert Saleh declared coming into this week that Zach Wilson will remain their starting quarterback, and it doesn’t seem like any calls to veterans around the league have been placed. As long as Wilson is under center, the Jets will remain a team relying on their defense to win games. New York has scored 22 or fewer points in eight straight games and has just two offensive touchdowns this season, and that will not cut it against an offense as high-powered as Kansas City’s.

The Chargers are a couple of bounces away from being 3-0, as their first two losses were by a combined five points. It may seem risky to put your survivor pool life on the line with a team that has had all three games decided by four or fewer points. Still, quarterback Justin Herbert looks like a bonafide MVP candidate after throwing for 939 yards and posting a 6-0 TD-INT ratio. At the same time, the Raiders may have a quarterback issue on their hands, as Jimmy Garoppolo is in the concussion protocol. Even if healthy, Garoppolo has thrown an NFL-high six interceptions, while Josh Jacobs is averaging 2.4 yards per carry, neither of which gives confidence that the team can take advantage of the Chargers’ leaky defense.

Riskier Plays That Will Be Popular

Philadelphia Eagles (-420), Dallas Cowboys (-300), Minnesota Vikings (-172)

Philadelphia’s defensive front should be licking its chops to face a Washington Commanders team that allowed nine sacks and committed five turnovers against the Buffalo Bills last week. In fact, Buffalo had the second-highest pressure rate in Next Gen Stats history in that game. However, Commanders quarterback Sam Howell is still a respectable 3-1 in his young career, and one of Philadelphia’s three regular-season losses last year was a 32-21 loss to Washington in which the Commanders ran for 152 yards and held the Eagles to 264 total yards.

Many will be cautious in using the Dallas Cowboys in survivor pools just one week after they lost as the biggest favorites of the week. Dallas scored just one touchdown in five red zone possessions last week, and now a stingy Bill Belichick-coached defense comes to town. Those looking for a silver lining in picking the Cowboys can take solace in the fact that since the start of last season (incl. playoffs), Dallas is 2-6 on grass and 13-1 on turf.

The Vikings-Panthers matchup is one of two on the Week 4 slate between winless teams. Minnesota has lost its three games by 13 total points and is 0-3 in one-possession games after finishing 11-0 in the regular season in such games last year. The silver lining is that Kirk Cousins is the fifth quarterback with 325-plus passing yards and two or more touchdown passes in each of the first three games of a season. But we have trepidation that the Vikings may get in their own heads if this game is close late, and Panthers wide receiver Adam Thielen should be able to give his coaching staff great insight into the tendencies of his former team.

Contrarian Play to Beat a Large Pool

Denver Broncos (-166)

Many will suggest we need to get our head examined after tipping the Broncos as a contrarian play just one week after their defense was torched for 70 points and 726 total yards (the second-most in NFL history) by the Miami Dolphins. And while Broncos head coach Sean Payton is 0-3 for the first time since 2016 as head coach of the Saints, Chicago may be one of the few teams in a worse position than them. The Bears are the only team to lose all three games by double digits this season, and they have allowed 25-plus points in 13 consecutive games, which is tied for an NFL record. Matt Eberflus is 3-17 as Bears head coach, and the team is amid a franchise-worst 13 straight losses, so survivor pool contestants could do much worse than picking Denver if they were determined to continue to save some of the NFL’s elite teams for later in the season.

Make sure to check out our other best bets for Wednesday:


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Mike Spector is a featured writer at BettingPros. For more from Mike, check out his archive and follow him @MikeSpector01.

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