Week 16 Gameplan
Tails Angles, SGP's, PFF Forecast
Happy Holidays everyone!
We’re going to hit on this note a bit early considering that I will be offline from sundown tonight till nightfall tomorrow. This does, unfortunately, mean that there will be no GameTrade this week. But fear not, we will be back in full force for week 17.
In this note we will cover some tails angles to consider for Saturday’s games, SGP’s, and a link to the PFF Forecast for my alt play of the week and live betting angles.
Matchup Angles:
MIN vs NYG— Bet: Jones yds parlayed with spreads
With a solid run defense—3rd in YPC allowed and 6th in D Rush EPA—MIN forces teams to throw against them often. They have faced the 3rd most attempts and have allowed a 2nd to league worst 279 yards passing allowed. And since their bye in week 7, the team has a bottom 10 Pass EPA allowed so both volume and efficiency should be on Jones side. Jones has not put up big passing numbers all year but he has been limited to only 29 attempts a game. Should we see a spike in volume, this figures to be a spike week for Jones’s passing yards. I’ll be starting with betting on Jones passing over at 220 and NYG +7.5(+210)—both teams have penchants for 1 score games— and getting increasingly more aggressive with Jones and Giants alt spreads.
CIN vs NE— Bet: Burrow Yards and alt spreads(parlayed and separate)
Same SGP logic as below, but I’d be comfortable rolling with Burrow passing props & even further alt spreads considering how large of a gap exists fundamentally between these teams when factoring in the NE D success is a bit deceptive(see below!).
LV vs PIT: Carr passing yards & the alt spreads.
Yes, Josh Jacobs has gotten insane volume over the last 6 weeks, but that has depressed Derek Carr’s passing props significantly. Despite recent success against Darnold, Anthony Brown, and Mariota, the PIT D is not one to fear. They have the 7th worst pass EPA and were allowing 265 Yds(3rd worst in NFL) per game before this recent stretch of dreadful QB’s faced.
I like this angle because there are multiple conceivable angles for this to really hit. Either LV finally turns to the air as the path of least resistance and with their full weapons back, or, even on low volume, Carr takes advantage of a PIT D allowing the highest rate of explosive pass plays. Carr already has 4+ games of 295+ yards, and while they haven’t come recently, that is only depressing the price and the reasons for a spike week are certainly in place. (FD props are not yet out, but I’m feeling full unit on Carr 300 LV -5.5 + 3100 type vibes).
SGP’s
Story: Taysom Hill plays most of the game in brutal CLE winter elements
The weather is as ugly as can be in CLE, with a real feel of -10, and most importantly, winds sustained at 30 MPH and gusting to 50MPH. These kinds of elements make it near impossible to throw the ball even semi downfield, which will limit the passing games altogether. I expect both teams to tilt extremely heavy to the run which will mean fewer plays as runs will keep the clock moving.
On the Saints side, it doesn’t help that they will be without WR’s Jarvis Landry and Chris Olave and the team refuses to allow Alvin Kamara to run routes– he ran the same number of routes as David Johnson last week. The team is lacking in receiving options.
While it would make no sense to announce so before the game, given the elements, it would be thoroughly unsurprising to see the Saints turn to Taysom Hill–who played a season high % of snaps at QB last week– for most of this game. In this event, Dalton would not throw enough passes to come close to his already tanking props, and Hill would carry the ball often against a Browns Rush D last in Rush EPA and 2nd to worst in Yards Per Carry.
CZ Build: +2500
Andy Dalton U 140.5 Passing Yds
Andy Dalton U 0.5 Pass TD’s
Taysom Hill O 34.5 Rush Yds
Taysom Hill anytime TD
Story: Burrow carves up the NE Pass D en route to Bengals win.
While the Patriots D’ is #1 in Pass EPA over the full season, that number is a bit deceiving considering the team has faced a slew of backup QB’s. In games against starting QB’s, their D’ Pass EPA drops to 19th, and Drive Quality to 24th.
But the NE Run D has been strong throughout the entire season–top 10 in Rush EPA and Yards per carry– and their efficiency defending the run has only improved over the second half of the season.
This should tilt the Bengals to the air– not as if they’ve needed the plus matchup to do so.
The Bengals have been one of the highest passing teams in the NFL week-in-and-week-out, especially since the bye in week 10.
While the prop market is pricing in a significant efficiency downturn, look for Burrow and the Bengals to pile up passing volume to their elite duo of Chase and Higgins and do so with success against a middling NE pass D.
FD Build: +2698
Joe Burrow 325+ Yards Passing
Cincinnati Bengals (-5.5) Spread
Tee Higgins 70+ Yards
Ja'Marr Chase 70+ Yards
Story: Darnold finds Moore for deep TD en route to a big passing day.
The Lions defense has faced the 2nd most deep attempts all season and they have struggled on such attempts allowing 4th most yards and 3rd highest EPA.
DJ Moore has the 7th most deep targets in the league and has a 95.7 PFF grade this season when targeted deep.
And while Darnold has struggled in most areas, so far this season, he ranks 2nd in Raw PFF grade on deep balls and is 5th in Yards per attempt on those balls.
Against a scheme that invites teams to throw deep, look for Darnold to take some downfield shots with Moore and if one or two hits that should be enough to cash this bet.
FD Build: +2361:
Darnold 250+ Passing
DJ Moore 100 Yds Receiving & TD
Media:
PFF Forecast: Live bets and alt line play of the week.
Again, happy holidays to all, and I will hopefully be back in this space Sunday AM with some more bets and angles loaded for Sunday/Monday. Let’s get it!!