The biggest game in the wild-card round of the NFL playoffs may be Sunday’s matchup between the New Orleans Saints and Minnesota Vikings, but the latest NFL expert predictions don’t agree.
According to the expert picks surveyed over at NFL Pickwatch, the Saints have earned 97% certainty of beating the Vikings to advance into the divisional round, which would mean a trip to Lambeau Field against the Green Bay Packers. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves.
This Saints-Vikings game is the only match during the wild-card round that experts appear to have real confidence in deciding. The next-best consensus came in for the New England Patriots (80% of picks choose them over the Tennessee Titans), while the Houston Texans (64% ahead of the Buffalo Bills) and the Seattle Seahawks (61% over the Philadelphia Eagles) round out the pack. Compared to that, the Saints are picks to win in a landslide.
It’s worth remembering that while these are educated guesses, they are just guesses. These same experts picked the Saints to beat the Atlanta Falcons with 100% certainty earlier this season; instead, the Saints got run off the Superdome field in a lopsided loss. It was a painful reminder that anything can happen in the NFL. Uneven as this matchup looks on paper, the Vikings are not a team the Saints can take lightly.
