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Thursday 5 sepTember 2019

99th season

was big for Pro ITALICIZED
Picks. What

about No. 100?

By BARRY WILNER
AP Pro Football Writer
Coming off the best year
of Pro Picks — yep, plus-22
against the spread if you’re
counting — the challenge
is to repeat such wizardry in
the NFL’s 100th season.
It all gets started Thursday
night at Soldier Field with
pro football’s oldest rivalry.
In emphasizing its cen-
tennial celebrations, the
league chose to go with
Packers at Bears rather
than having the traditional
matchup hosted by the
Super Bowl champs. New
England gets the spotlight
on Sunday night instead,
with Pittsburgh visiting.
AP Pro32 voters were op-
timistic about Chicago’s
chances this season, rank-
ing the Bears No. 6 in the
preseason poll released
Tuesday. Green Bay, with
a new coaching staff and
tons of question marks, is
at No. 16. But the Pack-
ers have Aaron Rodgers,
who tends to work magic
against the Bears. Re-
member the fourth-quar-
ter rally in their first meet-
ing a year ago? Pro Picks,
which wound up 136-114-9
against the spread in 2018
and 176-89-2 straight up,
envisions the current Mon-
sters of the Midway to be,
well, monstrous enough in
the opener to cover the
3-point spread. BEARS, 23-
16
KNOCKOUT POOL: Two
games figure to be the fo- Berrettini outlasts
cus here, Baltimore at Mi-
ami and Cincinnati at Se- Monfils at U.S. Open
attle. We’ll go with the SE-
AHAWKS. No. 12 Baltimore
(minus 6 1-2) at No. 32 Mi- Matteo Berrettini, of Italy, reacts after winning
ami Let the tanking begin a point in the fifth set against Gael Monfils,
on South Beach. of France, during the quarterfinals of the U.S.
BEST BET: RAVENS, 17-3
No. 24 San Francisco (plus Open tennis championships Wednesday, Sept.
2) at No. 29 Tampa Bay 4, 2019, in New York.
Jimmy Garoppolo and Ja- Associated Press
meis Winston have plenty Page 18
to prove. Going with Jim-
my G here.q