3 Sunday Night Football Best Player Prop Bets: Rams at Lions

No matter how far apart the Los Angeles Rams and Detroit Lions seem to drift, they always seem to find each other again in massive spots.

After the Jared Goff-Matthew Stafford deal, these teams met in the Lions' first home playoff game since 1991 last season. Detroit eeked out a one-point win to move on, but both teams once again have aspirations for the big prize in 2024 -- and it starts with this post-Carrie Underwood matchup.

Player props can be useful in a variety of ways -- from taking advantage of them straight up in the betting market to measuring a player's potential to produce in NFL DFS on FanDuel. Here, we're going to focus on the former.

Using the NFL odds at FanDuel Sportsbook as a guide, here are the best prop bets for this week's edition of Sunday Night Football.

All NFL projections via our numbers at FanDuel Research, and NFL odds references are to FanDuel Sportsbook. Lines may change after this article is published.

Sunday Night Football Best Player Prop Bets

Jahmyr Gibbs Anytime Touchdown (-130)

A perilous choice in the anytime touchdown market looms with David Montgomery (-140) and Jahmyr Gibbs (-130) both laying chalk to score. In Week 1, we're guessing a bit on how these two's roles will shake out in Gibbs' sophomore season.

There's definitely an argument that things might swing a bit more the former first-round pick's way in 2024. In the final six games these two played together last regular season, Gibbs received 3.8 red zone opportunities per game to Montgomery's 2.7, which is why the latter scored just 4 touchdowns in this stretch after starting the season with 9 in his first 11 contests as they eased the then-rookie into the fold.

With that the case, I'm not sure Gibbs should have shorter odds to be the one to score in this game when Detroit's team total (28.5) implies they'll score plenty. I definitely want one of them in a projected positive script against numberFire's seventh-worst projected run defense entering the season.

Jared Goff Under 268.5 Passing Yards (-113)

In my Sunday Night Football best bets column, I forecasted the Lions to cover the spread in a game that's a bit more lopsided than oddsmakers indicate now.

That's on the basis of Detroit, owners of the best offensive line in football, pummeling nF's eighth-worst schedule-adjusted defense with promising additions to their own defense in the secondary. Should that forecast end up correct, you'll want to be on this side of Jared Goff's passing prop.

In 10 contests where the Lions won by at least five points last year, Goff totaled just 261.8 passing yards and only 33.8 passing attempts in those games. As Detroit gets ahead, their eighth-highest rush rate over expectation tends to take over.

Our Week 1 fantasy football projections expect just 259.0 median yards from Goff on Sunday night, so we'd set an under at this line closer to -263.

Cooper Kupp to Record 25+ Receiving Yards in Each Half (+145)

Expecting the Rams to trail, this seems like a nice spot to target a game for Cooper Kupp to get back on track early and often.

After a 2023 marred by injury, the offseason reports for Kupp have been glowing that the 2021 leader in receptions, receiving yards, and receiving touchdowns is back to his old self and ready to assume the lead role in L.A.'s pass game.

Even with the injuries, Kupp commanded 8.0 looks per game (a 25.7% share in the offense) and produced 12.1 yards per reception a season ago. If that gets closer to his 31.6% target share in 2021, this prop could cash with ease.

The FanDuel Research team is pretty aligned on Kupp this week. Our Skyler Carlin loves him in his FanDuel DFS picks, Austan Kas likes him for stacks in NFL DFS, our Kenyatta Storin looked toward him at MVP in single-game DFS for Rams-Lions. I'm on board.

Projected for 72.5 total yards by FanDuel Research in the game, I'll take the underdog odds that the Rams get him involved from the start and keep going to the well when trailing late.

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The above author is a FanDuel employee and is not eligible to compete in public daily fantasy contests or place sports betting wagers on FanDuel. The advice provided by the author does not necessarily represent the views of FanDuel. Taking the author's advice will not guarantee a successful outcome. You should use your own judgment when participating in daily fantasy contests or placing sports wagers.