NFL Week 15 features two Saturday evening games, with the Bears vs Lions kicking things off at 4:30 PM in Ford Field Detroit. The Chicago Bears (out of the playoff race) are 4-1-1 against the spread in the past six meetings against the Lions, a squad that currently trails the first-place Minnesota Vikings by 3 games but have not yet been mathematically eliminated in the NFC North race. The Lions will be playing their hearts out in this game.
On the road this season, Chicago is 2-4 straight up and 3-3 against the spread while the Detroit Lions are currently 2-4 SU and ATS.
Chicago had their highest scoring game of the season as they beat up Cincinnati 33-7 on the road. For the second straight game Mitch Trubisky put up a QB rating of over 110. I still don’t like his receiving options but as the season progresses he is becoming more reliable. Jordan Howard was beast against Cincinnati and should still be the focal point of the offense. He went over 1000 yards the game, rushing for 127.
Shifty Tarik Cohen re-emerged with 80 rushing yards. He can break a long one on every play which keeps the defense more honest. Kendall Wright caught 10 balls which was good for his fantasy owners but he is not a #1 receiver and will find it harder against a better secondary. The Chicago defense did a great job of bottling up Cincinnati, holding the Bengals to less than 250 yards of offense. Anytime they do that this team will be in the game.
The lone weak spot was they had trouble bottling up Gio Bernard, especially as a receiver and the Lions do love throwing to their running backs. It was nice that the offense showed up but this team has to get a strong defensive effort to have any sort of chance to win. Sacks and turnovers will be harder to come by against Matthew Stafford than Andy Dalton.
All week long there was some doubt as to whether Stafford would be ready to play in this one but he did and the Lions got the road victory they needed to stay in the playoff hunt at Tampa Bay. Stafford threw for 381 yards and completed 81% of his passes against the Bucs but threw a couple of interceptions as well. He has picks in three straight games and needs to tighten things up for the Lions to keep winning.
The running game was what is was all season, not much. At this point it is what it is so I am not expecting it to get better. Similar to Chicago the Lions don’t have an ace receiver. They do have a way better collection though Eric Ebron is a wild card at TE. He is coming off a strong game.
Detroit’s defense is nothing special, which is part of the reason they are always playing catchup. They lack players you need to gameplan around. I look for them to be aggressive against Chicago. There is no reason not to throw everything they can think of at Trubisky.
Writer’s Prediction
I think this number will hold steady for a little while..but if it gets to 7 there will definitely be Chicago money. These teams played a close game won by Detroit in the earlier meeting at the Bears. At home I expect the Lions to be more comfortable. Detroit will not have to worry about coming from behind and Stafford will be sharper in this one. Pick: Lions (-5.5)
