The NFL’s international series wraps up on Sunday as America’s game hits Munich. What have the German public done to deserve this?
As in previous years, the atmosphere and the experience will be wonderful inside a packed Allianz Arena, but ‘wonderful’ probably isn’t going to be an adjective we’ll be using to describe the action on the field.
The game in question is the 2-7 New York Giants taking on the 2-7 Carolina Panthers. A classic, this will not be.
It’s two of the bottom four teams in the league in terms of scoring offence so a points-fest certainly isn’t expected. Between them, they’ve put up 286 points this season. For context, the top-scoring Baltimore Ravens have managed 318 by themselves.
Naturally, this has been reflected in the points betting and the over/under line is set at 40.5 at the time of writing. The under is tempting for sure, but a closer look at the other available markets opens up further possibilities.
No one is expecting a high-scoring game, yet the Panthers have been given 6.5 points on the handicap. This seems like far too much.
Carolina are not a great team by any means and they have plenty of problems to contend with, but they did win their second game of the season just last week. The New Orleans Saints they faced had injuries, sure, but they also had the return of Derek Carr at quarterback and, frankly, divisional games are never easy to win in the NFL.
The Panthers aren’t on a hot streak, but it’s something. They found a way to win and they found a way to win with Bryce Young.
Meanwhile, the Giants are on a four-game losing streak and there haven’t been too many signs of the skid ending.
A game against Carolina is admittedly the best opportunity they’ll have for the foreseeable to get into the win column, but do they have the firepower to beat the Panthers by seven points? I think that’s debatable to say the least, having witnessed the Giants score 20+ points just twice this season.
Looking closely at the occasion itself, there have been three NFL games hosted in Germany over the last few years. None have seen more than 37 points scored and the average margin of victory has been 5.3 points. Only one of the three victors won their game by a clear touchdown, and that was the Patrick Mahomes-led Chiefs in Frankfurt last season.
With all the respect in the world to Daniel Jones, he’s not Patrick Mahomes, and the 2024 Giants are certainly not the 2023 Chiefs.
All signs point to the Panthers covering and with the Giants’ recent record becoming a real burden, Carolina might just utilise their recent winning feeling and get the job done on the continent.
The Minnesota Vikings are at least a touchdown better than the Jacksonville Jaguars at the best of times, and this Sunday we may be seeing the Jaguars relying on their backup quarterback.
On average, Minnesota score 4.4 points per game more than the Jags, and they allow 9.2 fewer points than their opponents on Sunday.
It paints a pretty positive picture for the Vikings and the maths certainly build a strong case for the visitors smashing through a fairly conservative spread of 6.5 points.
That number is our starting point – and a recommended selection – but there’s no doubt that this game has blowout potential, particularly if Jacksonville do indeed start Mac Jones at the quarterback position.
Although they often come out on the losing side, the Jaguars are typically involved in high-scoring match-ups. The ‘over’ has hit in their last five games and, sadly for Jacksonville fans, the reason for that has been a leaky defence.
They’ve allowed 28+ points in four of their last five games and against quarterbacks in particular, the Jags defence has been torrid. Jacksonville allow a league-high passer rating of 113.4, 70.7% of passes against them are completed and they’ve allowed 19 passing touchdowns, second only to the Baltimore Ravens, who have played a game more. They’ve also only racked up two interceptions all season.
With Justin Jefferson and Jordan Addison at his disposal, this is simply music to the ears of Sam Darnold, a quarterback who has surpassed all expectations this season. The last thing this Jaguars team need is to face an accurate passer who can exploit their obvious weaknesses. Darnold has completed 69.8% of his passes and has a rating only bettered by Lamar Jackson and Jared Goff. He’s perfectly placed to cause some damage.
Minnesota’s offence will score plenty of points here, but how far can they stretch the margin?
If the occasion does indeed call for Mac Jones as anticipated, I expect the Vikings to win by two clear touchdowns. Jones threw more interceptions than touchdowns during his ill-fated 2023 campaign with the Patriots and we haven’t seen him since. He has ability, but an abundance of errant throws and poor decisions ended his New England stint prematurely and there’s nothing to suggest we’ll see a massively-improved quarterback on Sunday.
Without any Jaguars turnovers, I’d still expect this to be relatively comfortable for Minnesota, but chances are, the Vikes’ defence will have their way with Jones.
No team has recorded more interceptions this season than the Vikings (13). If this one goes to script, we could see a rout in Duval County.
Posted at 1540 GMT on 09/11/24
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