Super Wild-Card Weekend is capped off Monday night with an NFC West showdown. The Cardinals and Rams meet for the 3rd time this season after splitting the regular season series. Before I get to my favorite bet, be sure to check out our full game picks and analysis.
These teams bring plenty of firepower. Both are flush with stars on both sides of the ball, which should translate to some quality football tonight. With that in mind, my best play of the game focuses on Arizona’s signal caller Kyler Murray. I’m looking at him to rack up one specific statistic tonight.
Read our same game parlay for Cardinals vs Rams (+1845 odds!)
Kyler Murray (ARI) over 23.5 completions (+102)
Line available at FanDuel at time of publishing.
The Cardinals quarterback is coming off a very solid all-round season, leading Arizona to their first playoff berth in his 3-year tenure. Murray has eclipsed this line in half of his 14 games this season, including both previous matchups against the Rams.
DeAndre Hopkins will miss tonight’s game, and potentially the rest of the playoffs. Without his best pass catcher, Murray has not been as efficient pushing the ball down the field. His yards per attempt in 4 games without Hopkins is 6.2, compared to 8.7 with the All-Pro receiver. This has meant many more short passes to Zach Ertz and Christian Kirk. In those games, Murray averaged 25.1 completions.
Against the Rams’ 5th-best rush defense DVOA (per Football Outsiders), it’s likely that the offense will rest on Murray’s arm tonight. This is especially the case given James Conner’s questionable tag, and Chase Edmonds’ inefficiencies when given a bigger workload. The Rams allowed the 4th-most completions per game in the regular season (24.4), at the 11th-lowest average depth per target.
Overall, I see a lot of short passes for Murray tonight. I have the former Heisman winner projected at 26 completions.
Check out our full game analysis of Arizona Cardinals vs Los Angeles Rams
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