The Atlanta Falcons meet the Las Vegas Raiders in the second of two Week 15 Monday Night Football games.
The pregame narrative: I don’t like the way either of these defences has been playing. Therefore, I’m backing Brock Bowers and Kirk Cousins to hit overs in the prop market.
Check out my Falcons vs. Raiders prop picks for Monday Night Football on Dec. 16.
Falcons vs. Raiders Week 15 prop picks
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Best Bet: Bowers over 59.5 receiving yards (-137)
Playing for the Raiders, Bowers has gone under the radar in his rookie season.
But the tight end is truly having an amazing campaign. Here are some of his stats and rankings among NFL receivers:
- 87 receptions (2nd)
- 933 receiving yards (5th)
- 71.8 yards/game (1st for tight ends)
Desmond Ridder is set to start for the Raiders and he looked for his tight ends a lot when he took over in the fourth quarter last week.
In that final frame, Bowers recorded two of the three catches he had in the game, accounting for 37 of his 49 total yards.
He fell under this mark in the end, but that production with Ridder hints at a lot of promise moving forward.
Atlanta doesn’t pose a huge threat on the defensive side, either. The Falcons allow the eighth-most passing yards against per game (229.1) and are coming off a 21-point loss to the Minnesota Vikings where two receivers had north of 130 receiving yards.
Key stat: Bowers has a 24.3% target share, which ranks fourth for TEs.
Quick pick
Cousins over 239.5 passing yards (-125): Cousins was dealing with multiple arm injuries earlier in this season but he’s ramping back into form.
Since the Week 12 bye, Cousins has cleared this mark in back-to-back games, which included throwing for 344 yards in last week’s loss to the Vikings.
The veteran QB tied his second-highest yards per attempt (9.3) for any game this season and that to me is a good sign his arm is healing nicely.
Las Vegas began the season with a competent defence, but the wheels have fallen off in the second half of the season.
Six straight QBs have surpassed this total against the Raiders dating back to Week 8. Las Vegas has allowed 279.2 passing yards per game over that span.
Picks made at 1:39 p.m. ET 12/15/2024.
Spencer is a true sports junkie. A graduate of the Sports Journalism program at Centennial College, he first joined NorthStar Gaming as an intern in 2023. He is now a contributing writer. He loves finding the edge to bet on in all sports but has a deep passion for the NBA and UFC. Previous stops include Sportsnet.