The late game on NFL Monday Night Football is a repeat of Super Bowl 56 as the Los Angeles Rams head to Cincinnati to take on the Bengals (-2.5). Joe Burrow is currently questionable to play with a calf injury, but early indications are that he should suit up as they desperately need to log their first win. The Rams are coming off a divisional home loss to the 49ers last week, but their offense is humming despite some unknown parts. It will be interesting to see the chess match between the master and the disciple in Sean McVay and Zac Taylor. Make sure you check out our Rams vs Bengals predictions on the side and total, but for now, let’s break down my favorite 2 player props of the game.
Line available at Bet365 at the time of publishing.
Higbee went 3/3 in Week 1 for 49 yards but last week struggled against the vaunted 49ers defense (3 receptions for 12 yards). What I did love to see was that Higbee doubled his targets from Week 1 to Week 2 and Puka Nacua is no longer “under the radar”. Bengals HC Zac Taylor was the wide receivers and quarterbacks coach under McVay in 2017-2018 and is well aware of how one receiver (like Kupp) can really wreck a game. My expectation is that he will look to take Nacua out of play on 3rd downs and intermediate situations, which should free things up for Higbee. Higbee is at 10.2 y/r for his career and this should be 3 catches for him on a team that is ranked #1 overall in plays per game. I love picking on over-exaggerations from a prior week (especially when it’s against a top 3 defense in the league). 1.5U
Line available at Bet365 at the time of publishing.
Mixon is quietly averaging 4.4 YPC through 2 games, which is 10th amongst RBs with a min of 25 carries; his yards after contact per rush is ranked 7th overall. Whether Burrow plays or not, Mixon should be expected to have a big day against this Rams defense that’s been pushed around at the line of scrimmage and ranks 26th overall in rushing defense according to PFF and has allowed 5.3 yards per carry to opponents (31st overall). The line of 58.5 implies he would need just over 13 carries to get this done and keeping that Rams offense off the field is going to be a recipe for success against this Stafford-led, high-tempo offense. I like Mixon to be in for 14-16 carries on Monday night and possibly break a big one as we’ve seen Christian McCaffrey and Kenneth Walker do through the first two weeks against the Rams. 1U
