NFL Week 4 Picks:

It has been quite the NFL season for bettors to this point, as underdogs have been cashing spread tickets and moneyline tickets at an alarming rate. Well, alarming for bettors. Not for the books. They’re having all kinds of fun thus far.

Things will stabilize and favorites will go on a run. That isn’t just because of the laws of sport or anything like that. It’s also because the sportsbooks will adjust and as their power ratings move around, favorites will be underpriced or properly priced and come out ahead. It’s just the nature of things. It may even happen this week. I guess we’ll find out.

 

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But, I’m not really handicapping to that angle or to satisfy a trend or anything. I’m just looking at the stats and evidence we have so far and how those pertain to this week’s set of games.

Bookmark our Week 4 NFL Hub to get all of our written content on this week’s action.

Here are my Week 4 NFL best bets:

Odds from DraftKings Sportsbook as of 9/24, 7:45 p.m. PT

Cincinnati Bengals (-4.5, 48) at Carolina Panthers

Sunday, 1 p.m. ET (FOX)

There are a lot of people with third-degree burns from the Bengals. I get it. I sympathize. But, I also feel like we’ve got a mismatch here and a line that is simply too low. Andy Dalton’s performance against the Raiders was impressive, but the Raiders are not a very good team and nobody really thought that they would be coming into the season.

The Panthers are definitely not a good team, regardless of what Dalton and Chuba Hubbard were able to achieve last week. Sure, Dave Canales might be a really good play-caller and the switch from Bryce Young to Dalton absolutely worked out. And the Bengals defense may not be very good.

But Dalton is not Jayden Daniels. He’s not Patrick Mahomes. The Bengals are still +0.6 in yards per play differential. They’re still close to a top-10 team in third-down conversion rate. They’re still defending the run pretty well.

Opponents have converted nearly 48% of their third-down attempts against the Panthers defense and have scored on eight of nine red-zone trips. The Bengals are as desperate as desperate gets. And, while Dalton may be an upgrade over Young, Dalton doesn’t play defense and the Carolina unit has to deal with an elite QB and some pretty elite skill guys.

Pick: Bengals -4.5

Kansas City Chiefs (-8, 39) at Los Angeles Chargers

Sunday, 4:25 p.m. ET (CBS)

The Chiefs are off to a nice 3-0 start and have played some decent teams thus far. The Bengals are 0-3, but don’t have the talent of an 0-3 team. The Ravens will be a playoff team and many still believe that the Falcons will win the NFC South. While I grant that those three teams are good, the Chiefs are basically three plays away from being 0-3 themselves. 

Isaiah Likely was out by a toe and the Ravens would’ve gone for two in Week 1. The PI call (correct call) in Week 2 would’ve been different if the DB got there a couple seconds later. The Falcons were inside the 15 with a chance to win it last week. KC may very well go on and win another Super Bowl, but they’ve really run on the right side of variance these first three weeks. They’ve been outgained from a yards per play standpoint each of the last two weeks.

The Chargers are likely to go with Taylor Heinicke and, frankly, that may be a better option than a severely-compromised Justin Herbert. This is also a team with 91 rush attempts against 66 pass attempts and Jim Harbaugh made it sound like he wanted to rely on the run whether or not Herbert was hurt. It doesn’t always mean that the Chargers are going to create explosives or put together long drives,  but they’re at least going to shorten this game and limit the possessions.

With a low-scoring expectation and a high total, Heinicke or not, I like the dog to keep it close.

Pick: Chargers +8

Cleveland Browns at Las Vegas Raiders (-1, 37)

4:25 p.m. ET (CBS)

The Deshaun Watson Experience has not been an enjoyable one for Browns fans. He’s bad. There’s no question about that. However, there are a lot of weapons on this Cleveland roster and the Raiders defense is quite bad. They rank third in Blitz% per Pro-Football-Reference, but fourth from the bottom in Hurry%. They only have five sacks on the season and the third-lowest Pressure%.

So, they’re blitzing a lot and it seems to be rather worthless. They rank 32nd in yards per carry allowed with 5.4 and have forced exactly one takeaway. If Watson can’t figure it out against this defense, then what’s the point? With the Browns at 1-2 and the upcoming schedule, this may be the week that Kevin Stefanski’s patience runs out if Cleveland’s offense is sputtering. And, hell, this is about as good of a matchup as Watson can ask for.

The Browns are 8-for-43 on third down. As terrible as Watson has played, they have to experience some positive regression in that department.

As for Cleveland’s defense, the secondary is doing okay, but Myles Garrett is dealing with foot and ankle injuries and he’s a shell of the player he typically is. The Browns have allowed the fourth-highest average depth of target, in case you’re wondering how Garrett’s ailments have impacted this. Teams want to throw deep on Cleveland and I could see the Raiders finding success with Davante Adams in that regard.

Maybe we do get two completely inept offenses here, but two teams with a limited pass rush and questionable run defenses on an indoor track? I’ll give the Over a look.

Pick: Browns/Raiders Over 37

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