NFL

Monday Night Football Betting: Can the Browns Get Past the Raiders to a Division Lead?

The first of two games Monday showcases two teams with their playoff hopes on the line as the Las Vegas Raiders visit the Cleveland Browns. With this game being rescheduled from Saturday due to COVID-19 issues and recent news that Cleveland will be without quarterbacks Baker Mayfield, Case Keenum, and their head coach Kevin Stefanski, the line for this game has been all over the place.

With a win, the Raiders can get back into the thick of the wild card race. If the Browns come out on top, they will put themselves in control of their own playoff destiny atop the AFC North. A loss for Cleveland drops them to last in their division – no pressure or anything.

Here is how numberFire ranks each team heading into tonight’s game using our nERD metric and Net Expected Points (NEP):

Team nERD nERD Rank Off NEP Rank Def NEP Rank
Cleveland Browns -1.6 19 19 18
Las Vegas Raiders -4.43 24 14 29

Inside the Standard Bets

Even with Cleveland missing their lot of players, our model just barely favors the Browns, having them winning outright 51.9% of the time. The Browns moneyline odds sit at +120 (implied probability of 45.45%), which we have rated as a two-star bet. The spread has the Raiders as 2.5-point favorites over Cleveland which out model given them a 43.58% chance of covering. We have Cleveland getting 2.5 points as a one-star bet.

With the recent news about which players are actually available, the point total line dropped to 40.5 and our model thinks that taking the over (-110) is the best value wager of the game. It has a massive, four-star rating. That makes sense with both defenses in the bottom half of the league in Defensive Net Expected Points (NEP) per play.

Player and Team Prop Value Bets

Browns running back Nick Chubb is still able to play today, and with so many other offensive pieces out -- including Kareem Hunt -- expect him to be heavily involved.

The Raiders have given up 18 total touchdowns to running backs this year – 12 rushing (sixth-most) and 6 receiving (third-most) – so the best prop of the day is taking Chubb to score (+105).

While I like still Cleveland to win tonight, I see value in taking the Raiders to win the third quarter (-124). The Raiders have averaged 6.5 points in the third quarter (9.0 points on the road) this year. Cleveland. conversely, has struggled to start the second half of games, averaging 3.9 points.

Final Notes

-- Both teams are 5-8 against-the-spread (ATS) this season.

-- Cleveland is 2-5 ATS at home and Las Vegas is 3-3 ATS on the road.

-- Both teams have had the over hit on their game total in 7 of their 13 games.