2023 NFL picks, score predictions for Week 15

San Francisco 49ers (10-3) @ Arizona Cardinals (3-10)

Sunday, December 17, 4:05 PM ET

At this point, you just expect the San Francisco 49ers to win by a mile in just about every game. I know the Arizona Cardinals are an NFL team and they are coming off of a bye week, so they deserve respect, but it’s hard to see anything happening in this matchup other than the 49ers winning by a couple of scores.

The Cardinals did win heading into their bye week, a nice win against the Pittsburgh Steelers to help a lot of playoff-hungry AFC hopefuls. With Kyler Murray back in the fold, I guess you can’t rule out the possibility of the Cardinals playing spoiler.

But the 49ers are just too talented. They have too much margin for error. San Francisco is favored by 13.5 points in this one and that is obviously indicative of how Vegas thinks this one is going to go. And by that I mean, they think it’s going to get out of hand.

The 49ers didn’t play the cleanest game against the Seattle Seahawks, and while they did win by 12 points, they were a bit sloppier than normal going up against a Drew Lock-led team that kept it close late into the third quarter. Obviously, that could have provided the 49ers an opportunity to refocus so this Cardinals game doesn’t become a “trap” game for the 49ers with a matchup against the Baltimore Ravens looming in Week 16.

Prediction: 49ers win 34-17