AI Model Picks For Week 1, 2025

Posted on August 29, 2025

I think the best way to experience these picks is the same way Jeremy and I do each week. We start with Jeremy’s analysis before he sees The Model results. Then I’ll show The Model results, compare them vs Jeremy’s notes and see where they overlap. We will lay off the games Jeremy and The Model disagree, bet on the game they agree on, and bet hard on the games they agree on with confidence.

Jeremy’s Analysis

In future weeks, I’m going to record our phone calls, mostly because they are hilarious, but also because there’s tons more insight from Jeremy than I’m able to get down in my notes.

For this week, here are my notes from the call. (The items in bold are ones where the model agrees.)

• Eagles will win vs Cowboys, but worried about covering 7+ points. Eagles had to retool their secondary and the Cowboy’s passing game could be very effective this year.
• Chargers with 3.5 points. The Chiefs start slow. Rice is out. Harbaugh has a plan and a defense.
• Steelers over Jets to win and cover.
• Buccs over Falcons to win and cover. No confidence in Michael Penix.
• Bengals over Browns to win and cover.
• RE the Dolphins game. What am I missing here? Miami should beat the Colts easily. No confidence in Daniel Jones.
• Patriots over Raiders to win, maybe cover, especially at home.
• Cardinals over Saints to win.
• Washington over Giants to win, but too many points to cover week 1.
• Panthers and Jaguars both suck. I guess Jaguars if I had to pick.
• Broncos over the Titans to win, but not cover.
• Niners over the Seahawks to win and cover.
• Lions over the Packers to win. It’s warm out. And the Lions get the points!?!
• Rams at home minus the points. Texans have key injuries. [Jason’s Note: I don’t know what he meant by “minus the points”, but the model is picking the Texans, so I didn’t bother pushing.]
• Ravens will go into Buffalo and run the ball down their throat. And they get points!?! Too much new stuff for the Bills to play their best. Bet this game alone because the Ravens always let us down.
• Leaning Bears over the Vikings. No confidence in JJ McCarthy starting.

The Model Picks

Here are The Model Picks for the first week of the 2025 NFL season. (Click here to learn more about how to read these picks.)

So a couple of things I’m noting: lots of overlap between the model and Jeremy, and lots of underdog picks.

As an aside, despite the name of this website, The Model’s underdog picks are no better than any of the other picks The Model makes. Across 830 games for the past few years, The Model has picked the winner ~59% of the time (vs ~64% for the odds) and has picked correctly vs the spread ~58% of the time. So I pay attention to the underdog picks, but they aren’t necessarily locks.

Another thing I noticed is that both Jeremy and The Model are expecting the Jaguars/Panthers game to be closer than the moneyline implies. However, they disagree on who will win. This could be a good game to bet for an overtime and/or a tie.

The teams that both the model and Jeremy picked to win include: Philadelphia, Pittsburg, Miami, Tampa Bay, Washington, Cincinnati, San Francisco, Denver, Detroit, and Baltimore. That’s 9 teams. I will try to group those into 3 groups of 3 moneyline parlay bets.

A few games where both Jeremy and The Model are confident are:

• Tampa Bay to cover vs Atlanta
• Miami to beat Indianapolis as the underdog
• Detroit to beat Green Bay as the underdog
• Baltimore to beat Buffalo as the underdog

I will look to bet on all of these teams vs the spread or with the points. I might make 2x sized bets on Tampa Bay and Detroit since Jeremy and The Model seemed most confident in those games.

I’ll share the exact bets I’m making a little further down in the post.

Past performance is not indicative of future results.

The Model has performed incredibly well Week 1 in the past. This is surprising considering The Model has no idea what happened offseason. It’s basically running the games as if the teams from the end of the prior year went head to head.

My guess is that a high percentage of betters in Week 1 OVER ESTIMATE offseason changes, and so our more conservative model comes to the less fun conclusion: teams that are usually good are still good, and teams that are usually bad are still bad.

That all said, last year the model did just okay, picking the winner 11/16 games (vs 13/16 for the odds), and beating the spread in 9/16 games for a 56.25% win rate.

I wasn’t tracking our bets well last year, but we made really good money early on, and ended the year up over 100%… even with all the silly player parlays we bet in the playoffs. This year, I will have all of our proposed bets tracked on this blog, and will track our official bets with more detail.

Bets I’m Making

These are the exact bets I’m making here for this week, literally right now as I write this. If I make any other bets before Sunday, or if I pay to cancel a bet early, I’ll mention it in an future post.

I’ll work on a general “betting strategy” post for the site that shares some of my thinking on the kinds of bets we make and how we size things, but for now here is just a list of the bets:

• $10 on a 9 game, moneyline parlay for the following teams to win: PHI, TB, MIA, DEN, SF, DET, WAS, CIN, PIT (Basically every team we bet to win below. Pays $665. This is a fun way to keep track of the bets and pays extra if we have a good perfect week.)
• $5 on a 13 game, moneyline parlay for the following teams to win: PHI, KC, WAS, CIN, PIT, AR, TB, MIA, DEN, SF, DET, BAL (Basically every team Jeremy and The Model agree on the winner, including the Ravens :/. Pays $1,365.)
• $50 Moneyline Parlay for the following to win: Philadelphia Eagles, Pittsburgh Steelers, and Miami Dolphins.
• $50 Moneyline Parlay for the following to win: Tampa Bay Buccaneers, Cincinnati Bengals, and San Francisco 49ers.
• $50 Moneyline Parlay for the following to win: Denver Broncos, Detroit Lions, and Washington Commanders.
• $10 for overtime (pays $140) and $5 for a tie (pays $230) for the Jacksonville Jaguars vs Carolina Panthers game.
• $100 on the Miami Dolphin +1.5 points.
• $200 on the Tampa Bay Buccaneers -2.5 points.
• $200 on the Detroit Lions +2.5 points.
• $100 on the Baltimore Ravens +1.5 points.

This is about $750 bet to win $1745 for our primary bets. And another $30 to win $2400 on those long shot bets.

These are my personal bets and opinions, not betting advice. Wager at your own risk and within your means.

Good luck everyone!