Player props for Brian Robinson Jr., Dalton Schultz, and Jakobi Meyers
The NFL season started with a bang on Thursday night, but it was missing one of the league’s top players. With Travis Kelce out, bettors scrambled to find edges and good numbers on the other weapons for Patrick Mahomes. It served as a tremendous reminder of how many different bet types are actually available for an NFL game and how many ways there are to try and cash a ticket.
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At this point, a lot of the betting handle comes from player props, so these are extremely popular and the obvious overlap between that and fantasy football yields seemingly endless possibilities on a week-to-week basis.
I’ll be taking a weekly look at some player prop options with odds from DraftKings, but it is absolutely in your best interest to shop around for the best lines.
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Brian Robinson Jr. Over 58.5 Rushing Yards
The Commanders are a touchdown favorite on Sunday against the Cardinals, which would imply that they have a lead to squat on in the second half. Robinson Jr. played 12 games last season and went over this total in eight of them. He wasn’t the most efficient per-carry back with 3.9 yards per pop, but he did get the ball a lot.
While Eric Bienemy comes from Kansas City, where throwing the ball is the preferred course of action, he has Sam Howell and not Patrick Mahomes. I would expect Bienemy to create some better pass and run concepts than what Scott Turner had last season and hopefully that will bump up Robinson’s average and help him over the hump. With Terry McLaurin injured, that opens up some more touches for Robinson as well and he only had nine receptions on 12 targets, so they should come in the form of totes.
Dalton Schultz Over 3.5 Receptions
This is my favorite player prop bet of the week. The Texans project to be trailing as almost a double-digit underdog to the Ravens, which should increase the need for passing attempts late in the game. New Texans OC Bobby Slowik was the passing game coordinator for the 49ers last season and a “passing game specialist” in 2021. He’s been an offensive assistant there for the last four seasons and certainly understands the value of the tight end with George Kittle having such a big impact.
Schultz racked up nearly 300 targets over the last three seasons in Dallas and I would anticipate that he is used early and often by C.J. Stroud in his first NFL start. I’d also expect Schultz to have a big year in general. Safety nets are important for rookie QBs, especially those behind subpar offensive lines.
Jakobi Meyers Over 3.5 Receptions
DraftKings has this one at plus-money, as Meyers has to contend with Davante Adams for targets, but there should be an immediate connection between Jimmy Garoppolo and Meyers in the Josh McDaniels offense. Although there was no official overlap in New England, as Meyers was drafted in 2019 and Garoppolo had already moved on to San Francisco, the route concepts and the scheme should be pretty familiar to both parties.
Meyers had over 300 targets from 2020-22 with New England and runs a lot of the underneath routes that allow him to rack up volume. He’s had nearly five receptions per game each of the last two seasons. He does have Hunter Renfrow to contend with as well, but the Raiders have some targets to go around and I’m not sure the tight end will be a big part of the offense at the outset.
