{"id":11983,"date":"2010-12-30T03:37:57","date_gmt":"2010-12-30T08:37:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/?p=11983"},"modified":"2010-12-30T03:37:57","modified_gmt":"2010-12-30T08:37:57","slug":"free-football-pick-browns-vs-steelers-nfl-game-preview","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/free-football-pick-browns-vs-steelers-nfl-game-preview-11983\/","title":{"rendered":"Free Football Pick: Browns Vs Steelers NFL Game Preview"},"content":{"rendered":"

Pittsburgh Steelers at Cleveland Browns, Cleveland Browns Stadium, Cleveland, OH
\nSunday, January 2, 2011, 1:00 pm EST, TV: CBS
\nOpening Line: Steelers -6
\nCurrent Line: Steelers -5.5
\nOpening Total: 38
\nCurrent Total: 37
\nMoney Line: Steelers -480 \/ Browns +380<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"troy
Pittsburgh S Troy Polamalu could use an extra week off before the Steelers play their first playoff game<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The Pittsburgh Steelers (11-4) have some work to do in the final week of the regular season when they visit the Cleveland Browns (5-10) on Sunday with the AFC North title on the line.\u00a0 The Steelers (-5.5) must either win this game or have Baltimore lose at home to Cincinnati in order to capture the division along with a first-round bye as the #2 overall seed in the AFC.<\/p>\n

If the Steelers lose to the Browns and the Ravens win, Pittsburgh will have to play the following week as the #6 seed without rest.\u00a0 That could be very critical to the team\u2019s postseason success, especially considering All-Pro safety Troy Polamalu is still recovering from an Achilles\u2019 injury.<\/p>\n

Polamalu has missed the last two games, including a 27-3 home win against Carolina last Thursday night.\u00a0 The extra rest should benefit him, although a break here against Cleveland followed by another week off during the bye week would be ideal for a team that has aspirations of winning the Super Bowl for the third time in six years.\u00a0 The Steelers won Super Bowl XL as the #6 seed but would prefer not to have to duplicate that feat of winning three straight road games.<\/p>\n

Pittsburgh will not be taking Cleveland lightly after losing to the Browns last season on the road, 13-6.\u00a0 That was Cleveland\u2019s only win of the season and completed a five-game losing streak for the Steelers that prevented them from making it to the postseason.<\/p>\n

The Browns are a much better team this year with quality wins at New Orleans and at home against New England, which is the last loss the Patriots suffered.\u00a0 However, they have still lost 13 of the last 14 meetings with Pittsburgh despite last year\u2019s victory, going 4-2 against the spread in the past four games between the teams.<\/p>\n

Cleveland rookie quarterback Colt McCoy made his first NFL start at Pittsburgh in Week 6, throwing for 281 yards with one touchdown and two interceptions in a 28-10 loss.\u00a0 McCoy had tossed only one pick since then before throwing three in a 20-10 home loss to Baltimore last week.\u00a0 He figures to be the starting signal caller next year and was on the field in the team\u2019s biggest wins of the year against the Saints and Pats.<\/p>\n

The Steelers are one of three teams in the league with a 6-1 road record, going 4-3 ATS in those games.\u00a0 They have definitely tightened the screws defensively down the stretch, holding their last seven opponents to an average of less than nine points per game with the UNDER cashing six times.<\/p>\n

Maddux Sports is on a monster winning sports picks run for members.\u00a0 Visit the NFL football picks page and get signed up today!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Pittsburgh Steelers at Cleveland Browns, Cleveland Browns Stadium, Cleveland, OH Sunday, January 2, 2011, 1:00 pm EST, TV: CBS Opening Line: Steelers -6 Current Line: Steelers -5.5 Opening Total: 38 Current Total: 37 Money Line: Steelers -480 \/ Browns +380 The Pittsburgh Steelers (11-4) have some work to do in the final week of the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":194,"featured_media":8020,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1444,132],"tags":[4277,360,2539,2508,1930,1922,346],"class_list":["post-11983","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-headlines","category-nfl-handicapping","tag-browns-steelers-preview","tag-cleveland-browns","tag-football-betting","tag-free-nfl-pick","tag-nfl-odds","tag-nfl-picks","tag-pittsburgh-steelers"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11983","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/194"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11983"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11983\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11984,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11983\/revisions\/11984"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8020"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11983"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11983"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11983"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}