Week 9’s Monday Night Football game features an NFC North battle between the visiting Detroit Lions and the Green Bay Packers. Brett Hundley will get his second start and the Packers Nation is hoping for a better outcome than their last game. The Lions are hoping to exact revenge against Green Bay at home for their dominance in this rivalry during the 2000’s. Kickoff inside Lambeau Field is at 8:30 PM ET.
Green Bay has won 7 out of the last 10 meetings between these two teams and 19 out of the last 23. The Packers are 4-1 at home versus the Lions since 2012 and have also won three straight overall games in this divisional rivalry. The Lions have not beaten Green Bay since November of 2015.
The Lions (3-4) started off the season at 3-1, but have lost three straight games. Detroit played inconsistently against the Steelers last weekend, but had a chance to win the game late in the 4th. The Lions hope to turn things around this week as they take on the Packers without Rodgers.
Green Bay (4-3) is still trying to figure out how to deal with the loss of their franchise player – Aaron Rodgers. They were an NFC Super Bowl contender with Rodgers, now they will probably not even finish above .500 on the season with Brett Hundley at QB. They will need to lean on rookie running back Aaron Jones to have a chance in this game and the rest of the season.
The spread opened at a Pick before moving to -2 for the Lions. The Over/Under opened at 43 points and has gone up to 43.5 total points.
Until the Packers can win a game with Hundley under center, I’m betting against them. Detroit has the quarterback advantage in this one and they also have the #5 ranked rush defense to limit Green Bay’s running attack led by Aaron Jones and Ty Montgomery. They allow only 82.1 rushing yards per game and held Steelers elite running back Le’Veon Bell to just 76 yards on 25 carries.
The Lions will force Green Bay to throw the ball by stacking the box and daring Hundley to beat them. In his two games played, he has thrown 4 picks already. That’s bad news for Green Bay because the Lions already have 16 takeaways and 10 picks on the season.
On the offensive side of things, the Lions struggled to score touchdowns against Pittsburgh last week. Unfortunately, it’s also been a struggle all season. They rank in the bottom of the league for red zone efficiency and settled for 5 field goals last weekend, despite Matthew Stafford throwing for 423 yards.
The Packers allow 237 passing yards per game and I believe Stafford will eclipse this mark. In fact, it will be a close first half before the Lions pull away in the second half. I don’t see Hundley having a great deal of success against this Lions defense. I also don’t see Green Bay breaking 100 yards rushing in this one. The only chance Green Bay has is by holding the Lions to just field goals like the Steelers did last week. However, Pittsburgh relied on Big Ben to win the game for them and the Packers don’t have a quarterback that can do that.
Green Bay is 2-4 ATS in their last 6 games and could only muster up 13.5 ppg in their last 2 games. I don’t see them scoring more than 17 points in this one and I pick the Lions to win 26-17. And, yes, they will kick three more field goals in this game, but put the ball in the endzone at least twice. Detroit is 6-0 ATS in their last 6 games during the month of November.