Game Analysis
*Houston (+6.5) over CINCINNATI
*Under (38) – CINCINNATI vs Houston
Thursday – 5:25 pm Pacific
The Bengals were definitely unlucky to come away with 0 points from 3 Redzone trips against the Ravens. Still, Cincinnati had the 5th worst offensive performance of week 1 in adjEPA/play against a Baltimore defense that ranked 11th last year in adjEPA/play – last season Houston’s defense ranked 5th in adjEPA/play even without JJ Watt for most of the season.
The Bengals lost their two best offensive linemen from last season, including left tackle Andrew Whitworth, who went to the pro-bowl the last two seasons. Whitworth graded very highly according Pro Football Focus (a 91.3 rating) and had just 10 blown blocks the entire season. Cincinnati’s new left tackle, Cedric Ogbuehi, recorded a 39 rating on Pro Football Focus in 2016 and has 21 blown blocks at right tackle last season, including 4.5 that led directly to sacks. Cincinnati gave up 5 sacks in week 1 and it doesn’t get any easier against the Texans talented defensive line. To make matters worse, Andy Dalton is one of the worst quarterbacks in the NFL against pressure. According to Football Outsiders, Dalton ranked 7th amongst QBs when facing no pressure but ranked just 25th passing while under pressure in 2016.
Many people are expecting a much improved Texans offense with Deshaun Watson under center for a full game after he led Houston’s only touchdown drive in week 1. However, Watson still had a very low -0.85 EPA/pass play in week 1, much worse than his rookie counterpart Deshone Kizer’s +0.01 EPA/pass play. Week 2 games when the total is less than 40 points are 117-62-8 Under since 1980 and 42-19-3 Under since 2003. That angle, combined with the our belief that Cincinnati’s offensive struggles last week are more of an indication of a decline in the Bengals’ attack than the market is factoring in, is enough to make the Under a 1-Star Best Bet at 38 points or higher (Strong Opinion down to 37 points).
The early season model also suggests that the market has punished Houston considerably more than Cincinnati for poor week 1 performances and perhaps don’t trust a rookie quarterback making his first start. However, I don’t see Deshaun Watson being any worse than Tom Savage has been and our model projects the true line in this game at Cincy by just 4.8 points. In addition to the line value, Houston applies to a 37-9 ATS early season situation that plays on road underdogs when both teams are coming off a bad game and Cincinnati applies to a 3-40 ATS subset of a 31-89-2 ATS situation that plays against favorites off a bad performance. I’ll take Houston in a 1-Star Best Bet at +6 points or more and for 2-Stars if the line goes up to +7 or more.
- Team Stats
- Game Log
- Texans
- Bengals
Pass
- Pass Plays 46.0 21.0
- Succ Pass Plays 34.8% 52.4%
- Sack Rate 21.7% 0.0%
- Int Rate 2.8% 0.0%
- Deep Pass Rate 16.7% 19.0%
- Big Pass Yards 23.6% 16.0%
- NYPP 2.4 6.0
Rush
- Rush Plays 23.0 41.0
- RB YPR 3.7 3.6
- Stuff Rate 17.4% 17.1%
- Succ Rush Plays 60.9% 41.5%
- Big Rush Yards 0.0% 45.9%
- Yards Per Rush 4.0 3.8
Game
- All Snaps 69.0 62.0
- Early Down Succ 44.6% 53.3%
- Succ Rate 43.5% 45.2%
- Big Yards Rate 12.8% 32.6%
- Yards Per Play 2.9 4.5
- Fumble Lost Rate 4.3% 0.0%
- Time Per Play (sec) 26.1 29.0
- Run Ratio 33.3% 66.1%
- Starting Field Pos 26.5 38.2
- Game Control -11.9 11.9
- Points 7.0 30.0