With Week 1 in the books for most teams, sportsbooks face a question that needs to be answered quickly: How much should they adjust their priors based on 60 minutes of game action? But they aren't the only ones running their models immediately: We've cranked up our Football Power Index following the conclusion of the late-afternoon window to see how our numbers compare to the early lines.
Most of the time, FPI and the spreads are fairly aligned. After all, FPI builds its preseason ratings largely off of win totals and bases its adjustments on Week 1 production. But there are usually a few inconsistencies -- and that's true as we look ahead to Week 2. While FPI doesn't have a bank account, if it did, this is where it would put its money -- on these early disagreements.
All lines courtesy of Caesars Sportsbook.
Week 2 games
New York Giants at Washington Football Team (-4, 42.5)
FPI says Washington -1.9
I'm not that surprised to see FPI on the Giants' side here considering it favored Big Blue in Week 1, but the interesting part has to do with the quarterback situation in Washington. After Ryan Fitzpatrick suffered a hip injury that knocked him out of Washington's opening game against the Chargers, we're having FPI operate under the assumption that Taylor Heinicke is Washington's QB in Week 2.
Evidently, our model thinks the drop-off from Fitzpatrick to Heinicke is larger than the oddsmakers do. To give a sense of the drop-off in our eyes: Going into the season, our quarterback projections gave Ryan Fitzpatrick a 98% chance to be better than Heinicke in terms of quarterback EPA per play. 98%! Remember, Fitzpatrick ranked 6th in QBR over the last two seasons in Miami, despite having played behind a poor offensive line. And Heinicke is 28 years old with two career starts to his name. FPI thinks Washington should only be favored by 1.9.
FPI's side: Giants +4