Monday Night Football

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Stuff I saw on Sunday

• If you believe strongly in “let down” or “sandwich” games, that was a hell of a Bills performance for you. Josh Allen even mentioned how the game plan is likely scaled back for games like this.

• I think Penix had a pretty okay first start, but he also played a very bad Giants team that wasn’t interested in trying to stop the constant short passes. I’d like to say that we’ll get a better understanding of him soon, but the Falcons close the year out with the Commanders and Panthers: two more bottom-ten defenses.

• I don’t know that Kenny Pickett was that bad, honestly. That loss was more of a letdown from the Eagles’ defense than anything.

• Sam Darnold has been quietly solid in late-game situations for the better part of two months. The NFC playoffs are going to be an absolute grind for whoever gets through.

• Good for the Panthers! This is a crazy bad roster, and they willed their way to another win on the back of a much-improved offense. Still a ton of work to do, but I think they may have a good foundation in place. I’m coming around on Canales again.

• DTR isn’t very good. You’re supposed to score 20+ points just be showing up to the stadium against the Bengals defense, like writing your name at the top of the SATs.

• A bad win for the Raiders! They dropped like six spots in the draft order.

• A nice day for the newsletter plays from yesterday, even if none of them were easy. Wild sweat on the Patriots team total over after going up 14-0 early in the 2nd quarter.

All the injury news I was able to gather from this week’s games:

Market

Lookahead and opener here were at -13.5 and even that wasn’t enough for the market as a whole. This was but up to -14 and hasn’t really shown any sign of coming back.

The total has bounced a bit, getting pushed down from the opener of 43 as low as 41.5 before seeing some resistance and heading the other way

Injuries

LB Quay Walker (ankle) and DB Javon Bullard (ankle) are both out this week for the Packers’ defense.

CB Jaire Alexander is looking more likely to come back after getting three days of full practice this week. He, along with S Evan Williams, CB Corey Ballentine, and TE Luke Musgrave, are all listed as questionable for Green Bay.

The Saints will again be without a bunch of important offensive players, including QB Derek Carr, RB Alvin Kamara, WR Chris Olave, and WR Bub Means. WR Marquez Valdes-Scantling is listed as questionable. DE Chase Young is off the injury report and is good to go.

Matchup

It’s been a long time since we all collectively wondered, “Are the Saints really good?” after a 2-0 start. It’s a lot more complicated than just “lol, no” with the number of injuries they’ve had, but at the same time, it wasn’t ever going to be a team that competed with the top teams in the NFC.

Even with an interim head coach trying to keep the guys motivated, it feels like things are not getting any better as the season winds down.

The Packers are coming off of a nice bounce-back win, and while all three games are important for seeding, it feels like the only one that really matters is the showdown with the Vikings next week. They’ll likely be around an eight-point favorite hosting the Bears to close out the season. Two “take care of business games” on either side of the Minnesota matchup.

I suppose the game plan should be pretty simple here with all the injuries to this Saints team. They’ve gotten progressively worse against the pass in a season where stopping the run has been near the bottom of the league (4th worst in EPA/play, 3rd worst in success rate). While Jordan Love has looked better as a passer and is moving around more comfortably, I don’t understand how this isn’t just a Josh Jacobs game.

The wildcard is Spencer Rattler. He looked solid last week in relief, but sometimes you’ll have that when a team has prepped for a QB and then has to face someone else mid-game. A little more film prep and a much better defensive opponent will probably see him looking much less efficient this week.

Betting

It’s the time of year when we have a beat-up, eliminated teams just trying to get 11 guys out there to compete against actual Super Bowl contenders.

We’ve got a 14-point spread, a backup QB heading to the Frozen Tundra, and a low-ish total. I’m just going to stick to the obvious prop. It’s a team giving up damn near 5 yards per carry and has a couple of guys who can get pressure on deeper drops. Run the ball, get out of there with a win in a tidy 2 hours and 45 minutes, and get ready for Christmas.

Bonus: very small bets on Chris Brooks anytime touchdown (+650) and LAST TD scorer (+3300). This game could be a blowout that sees he and Wilson getting touches on the final few drives.