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So I'm supposed to be giving you some picks for Week 6 right now, but I have some bad news: There actually might not be a Week 6 because I've written a letter to the NFL asking that all games be postponed until the ROUGHING THE PASSER rule gets completely re-written. 

Based on what I saw over the weekend, tackling the quarterback is now illegal. If you breathe on Derek Carr, you will be penalized. If you look at Tom Brady awkwardly, you will be penalized and probably ejected. If you tackle Brady the wrong way, there's a 50% chance you'll be banned from the NFL for life. 

Apparently, the only time you're allowed to make a huge hit on a QB is if he's a rookie. So, um, sorry Kenny Pickett

If that hit had been made on Brady, Shaq Lawson would have been arrested on the spot. 

It's a good thing Lawson didn't get arrested because he's going to have his hands full with Patrick Mahomes and the Chiefs this week. So who am I going to pick in that game? Let's get to the Week 6 picks and find out. 

Actually, before we get to the picks, here's a quick reminder that you can check out the weekly picks from every CBSSports.com NFL expert by clicking here. If you don't click over, I won't be offended. However, I will be offended if you don't sign up for CBSSports.com's NFL newsletter, which I'm in charge of writing. 

If you do sign up, it's like an early Christmas present for both of us: I get more sign-ups and you get an email from me every weekday, which means it's really more like five presents. If you want to subscribe, all you have to do is click here and enter your email address. I promise not to spam you and I promise not to send you pictures of my cat.

Besides writing the newsletter, I also make time in my schedule to join Will Brinson and Ryan Wilson on the Pick Six podcast four days per week and you can listen to our latest show below. The reason you're going to want to listen is because we spent 45 minutes dissecting every angle of the Chiefs' insane win over the Raiders

Alright, let's get to the picks before I think of something else to promote. 

NFL Week 6 Picks

Washington (1-4) at Chicago (2-3)

Thursday, 8:15 p.m. ET (Amazon Prime)

The forward pass has been used in football for more than 115 years now, but apparently, over all that time, no one bothered to tell the Bears that it's legal. If you've watched the Bears play this season, then you might not even know what a forward pass is because they don't ever use it. The team is clearly using a playbook from 1901, because that's the only way to explain why they refuse to throw the ball in an era where everyone throws the ball. 

Through five weeks this season, the Bears have thrown only 88 passes (17.6 per game), which is the fewest by any team since 1982, but that was a strike that year in the NFL, so what the Bears are doing is way worse. To put into perspective how bad the Bears' passing game has been, one player (Cooper Kupp) has as many receptions on the season (49) as the entire Bears' roster. 

I'd say the Bears are setting football back 95 years, but I used that joke last week, and also, that would be an insult to football that was played 95 years ago. At least they threw the ball forward back then. 

The crazy part about this week is that if there's one game this season where the Bears passing attack might actually show up, it's this one. At some point before Thursday night, the Bears need to download some passing plays off the internet, because they might actually be able to use them while going up against a Commanders defense that has struggled to stop the pass this year. The Commanders have given up the second-most passing touchdowns and opposing quarterbacks have a QB rating of over 100 when playing against Washington, and what all of this means is that if the Bears can't throw the ball on the Commanders, they're probably not going to be able to throw the ball on anyone this year. 

After watching the Colts beat the Broncos last week, I was pretty sure that I had just witnessed the worst Thursday night game in football history and although that could end up being true, I'm going to reserve judgment on that until after this game is played. 

The pick: Bears 20-17 over Commanders 

New England (2-3) at Cleveland (2-3)

1 p.m. ET (CBS)

Any time these two teams play each other, every member of the media is obligated to mention that Bill Belichick once coached the Browns, which you may have already known. However, what you might not know is that Belichick was also once a fashion icon in the 1990s (as the photo below proves). 

Belichick coached the Browns for five seasons before being kicked to the curb after the franchise moved to Baltimore following the 1995 season. For some reason, I feel like he still holds a grudge and he seems like a guy who can hold a good grudge. 

The last time these two teams played each other came last season when the Patriots embarrassed the Browns 45-7, which I guess shouldn't have been that surprising, because at this point in his life, I'm pretty sure that embarrassing the Browns is one of only about five things that Belichick actually still gets joy out of. 

On paper, I feel like the Browns have the better team, but I feel like the Patriots have the coaching advantage and I also feel like Belichick has had half his coaching staff breaking down Browns film for the past five months just so he can embarrass them again.

Belichick's specialty is taking away what his opponent does best, and this week, I'm thinking that means he's going to do everything possible to shut down Nick Chubb, which will put a lot of pressure on Jacoby Brissett

I think the Patriots are going to go all-in to stop the run: They're not going to let Cleveland's best offensive player (Chubb) beat them, which means if the Browns are going to win, Brissett's going to have to dice up the Patriots defense, which isn't great news for the Browns, because Brissett isn't the type of guy who can dice up a defense. He's averaging just 212 yards per game through the air this year and he's thrown at least one interception in three of Cleveland's past four games (The Browns have lost all three games where he's thrown an interception). It also doesn't help the Browns that Belichick knows Brissett pretty well since he coached the quarterback during his rookie year in the NFL. 

Part of me wants to take the Browns here, but that's not the part of me that's in charge of making football picks, so I'm taking the Patriots. 

The pick: Patriots 22-20 over Browns

Baltimore (3-2) at N.Y. Giants (4-1)

1 p.m. ET (CBS)

I'm not going to lie, I thought an apocalypse would destroy civilization before we'd ever see the Giants start a season 4-1, but here we are, it's actually happening and civilization is still standing (just barely). The Giants are off to their best start since 2009 and I was about to jump on their bandwagon, but then I saw they were playing the Ravens this week. 

Look, I don't want to take anything away from what the Giants have done, but I have to say, I'm not completely sold on them just yet. Three of their four wins have come against Ryan Tannehill, Baker Mayfield and a Bears team that doesn't throw the ball forward. Their most impressive win of the season definitely came in Week 5 when they beat the Packers, but it's worth noting that they played that game in London. The reason that's notable is because the Giants have decided NOT to take their post-London bye, which means they had to fly straight back to New York to begin preparations for this game. 

There have been a total of seven teams in NFL history that chose not to take a bye following their London game and those seven teams are 4-3 the following week. Of course, only two of those seven teams were an underdog the following week -- like the Giants are in this game -- and those underdogs went 0-2. Basically, the Giants still have a banged-up quarterback and a bunch of injured receivers and the Ravens are one of the better teams in the NFL. Plus, now that they're 4-1, they're not going to be able to sneak up on anyone anymore. 

Also, if there's one quarterback in the NFL I'm not going to pick against in an AFC vs. NFC matchup, it's Lamar Jackson. Since taking over the starting QB job in 2018, Jackson is a PERFECT 12-0 against NFC teams. 

The pick: Ravens 24-17 over Giants

Buffalo (4-1) at Kansas City (4-1)

4:25 p.m. ET (CBS)

I don't want to say that this is going to be the best regular season game of the year, but I feel like it's going to be the best regular season game of the year. The last time we saw these two teams on the field together came back in January during a playoff game where they combined for 25 points in the final two minutes of regulation. The Bills appeared to have the game won when they scored a touchdown with 13 seconds left to play, but this is the Bills we're talking about and no one does heartbreaking playoff losses like the Bills, so we all know how that ended. . 

I probably don't need to share the clip below, but I'm going to do it anyway. 

Bills fans, you should watch that clip five or six times and then forget about it for life. It's time to move on. Actually, don't listen to that advice. When it comes to moving on from things, I'm the least qualified person in the world to be talking. I don't think I've ever actually moved on from anything in my life. 

Anyway, I can't say this for sure, but I feel like the Bills' entire offseason plan revolved around one thing: Adding players who could help them beat the Chiefs. Their biggest signing was Von Miller, who was brought in for this exact type of game. He's someone who should be able to get some pressure on Patrick Mahomes, which is something the Bills didn't do a good job of in January. 

To me, this feels like a revenge game and I've seen enough "Revenge of the Nerds" movies to know that if those guys can get revenge, anyone can. All the Bills have been thinking about all offseason is 13 seconds. They were 13 seconds away from an AFC title game appearance, they were 13 seconds away from finally beating Patrick Mahomes in the playoffs and now, I'm 13 seconds away from making my prediction for the game.

The Bills are an unstoppable freight train right now and when you add in the revenge factor, this feels like a game they should win. 

The pick: Bills 34-27 over Chiefs

Dallas (4-1) at Philadelphia (5-0)

8:20 p.m. ET (NBC) 

If Bills-Chiefs is the main course on Sunday, then I think this qualifies as the dessert, which is fitting, because I bet Cooper Rush loves dessert. 

I never thought I'd say I'm excited to watch Cooper Rush play, but that's where I'm at right now with the Cowboys backup QB, who in four short weeks has easily become the most popular person on the planet named Cooper. 

Here are my current Cooper rankings: 

1. Cooper Rush
2. Bradley Cooper
3. D.B. Cooper  
4. Cooper Kupp 
T-5. Amari Cooper
T-5. Winnie Cooper
7. Alice Cooper
8. Anderson Cooper

I will be updating these rankings every week for the rest of the season. Actually, probably not. That seems like a lot of work. 

As good as my Cooper rankings are, they will not have any bearing on who wins this game and there's a good chance that Cooper Rush won't, either. Even if he starts on Sunday -- and there's a good chance he will since Dak Prescott still can't really grip a football -- this game is going to come down to whether the Cowboys defense can slow down the Eagles offense. 

With Jalen Hurts running the show, the Eagles rank second in the NFL in total yards and fifth in total points with an average of 27 points per game. Of course, scoring 27 on the Cowboys won't be easy considering that NO TEAM has even scored 20 on Dallas this season. The fact that the Cowboys have yet to surrender 20 points in any game this year is extremely impressive when you consider that they've already faced Tom Brady along with both Super Bowl teams from last year. 

The Cowboys are surrendering just 14.4 points per game, which ranks third in the NFL. What I'm trying to say here is that this game is the unstoppable force (Eagles offense) against the immovable object (Cowboys defense) and based on what I know about physics, the immovable object always wins. Just kidding, I know nothing about physics, but I'm still picking the Cowboys. 

The Cowboys need this to be a low-scoring slugfest if they're going to win. If it turns into a shootout, that would definitely favor the Eagles, so I'm going to predict a slugfest. 

After spending most of the past five years complaining every time the NFL put an NFC East matchup in prime time, I would like everyone to know that I will not be complaining this year. I will not be complaining about NFC East matchups anymore. Instead, I'll be directing all my energy to complaints to the NFL about their ambiguous roughing the passer rule. 

The pick: Cowboys 20-19 over Eagles

NFL Week 6 picks: All the rest

49ers 24-20 over Falcons
Packers 23-20 over Jets
Jaguars 20-16 over Colts
Vikings 26-23 over Dolphins
Bengals 27-24 over Saints
Buccaneers 23-16 over Steelers
Rams 27-17 over Panthers
Seahawks 34-27 over Cardinals
Chargers 24-16 over Broncos

BYES: Titans, Raiders, Texans, Lions

Last Week

Best pick: Last week, I predicted that the winless Texans would go into Jacksonville and shock the Jaguars, and guess what happened? The winless Texans went into Jacksonville and shocked the Jaguars. Now, did I know that the Jaguars were going to flashback to last season and play like Urban Meyer was still their coach? Of course, I did. They were playing the Texans and if there's one game every season where the Jaguars fall flat on their face, it's always against Houston. Since the start of the 2020 season, the Texans are 5-0 against Jacksonville and 4-28-1 against everyone else. Think about that:  More than half of Houston's wins over the past two and a half years have come against Jacksonville. 

The Texans have also somehow won nine straight against the Jaguars, so I think what I'm trying to say is that I'm just going to go ahead and pre-pick the Texans for their rematch in Week 17.  

Worst pick: If there's one time you should always pick against the Bengals, it's when they play on the road in a prime-time game. Going into Week 5, the Bengals had lost an NFL-record 11 straight prime-time road games and they had also never won a Sunday night game on NBC, which took over the SNF package in 2006. Knowing all of that, I still picked the Bengals to win on Sunday night.

I'm pretty sure Justin Tucker was taunting me personally with this celebration. 

Finally, if you guys have ever wondered which teams I'm actually good at picking, I'm going to start sharing that information with you now that we're five weeks into the season. Here's a quick look at my best and worst teams when it comes to picks this year. 

Teams I'm 4-1 picking this year (Straight up): Patriots, Bills, Commanders, Vikings, Buccaneers, Saints, Rams.

Teams I'm 1-4 picking this year (Straight up): Browns, Dolphins, Colts (1-3-1)

Every other team is somewhere in the middle. 

Picks Record

Straight up in Week 5: 12-4
SU overall: 45-34-1

Against the spread in Week 5: 8-7-1
ATS overall: 33-43-4 


You can find John Breech on Facebook or Twitter and if he's not doing one of those things, he's probably getting ready to answer all the hate mail he's going to be receiving for having Winnie Cooper so low in his Cooper rankings.