NFL: EAGLES SOLID ROAD CHALK
The battle of the passing games between the Arizona Cardinals and the Philadelphia Eagles in Sunday’s NFC Championship could determine your payday.
Philadelphia has moved up to being a solid four-point favorite in this game after opening up at three.
Bettors are impressed by the way Philadelphia handled the defending champion, New York Giants on the road last week and several media members are calling them a ‘Team of Destiny’ much like the ‘G-Men’ were a year ago.
For quarterback Donovan McNabb, this game is about redemption. He is desperate to make another Super Bowl after playing sub-par in their loss to New England during the 2004 season. McNabb was benched earlier this year against Baltimore in a much publicized move and winning this game would silence most of his critics.
We have a huge amount of props for this game and one of them is whether McNabb passes for more than 254.5 yards. That’s a pretty big number and it suggests that McNabb is going to have to make a lot of plays to keep up with Kurt Warner.
That might be even more necessary as it was learned that Brian Westbrook tweaked his knee last week and could be limited in his explosiveness. The Eagles would love to get the running game going early but Arizona is also playing much better run defense.
We also have a special Donovan McNabb proprelating to the total number of completions he will have. The favorites in this category range from 21-24, as he threw 23 during Wild Card Weekend at Minnesota and 22 last week.
Passing the ball is the focal point for Arizona even though it’s been the effective running of Edgerrin James that has made a big difference down the stretch. James’ Over/Under in rushing yardsis 49.5 this week and that’s giving a lot of respect to the Philly run stoppers.
Warner has an Over/Under of pass attempts of 40.5 and he has only gone of that amount once in the last seven weeks. The oddsmakers clearly feel that Warner is going to have to throw a lot to win. And with Anquan Boldin limited by his hamstring injury, the Over/Under of 96.5 yards for Larry Fitzgerald is very intriguing.
The key to this whole game is whether Warner protects the ball against the blitzing Eagles defense. Warner threw three interceptions in the infamous 48-20 loss at Philly on Thanksgiving night.
Warner only had one other game all year where he threw more than one interception, but few teams like to bring the pressure like Philly, especially if they don’t respect your running game.
If Warner doesn’t get caught up in the moment and has one or few turnovers (fumbles included) then Arizona can win this game.
I am under the belief that Warner will have a couple of key turnovers, and the Eagles defense along with a good game from McNabb, will make them a winner by four points or more.
Primetime Prop Alert
Note we are also offering our Primetime Prop Promotion for this game. This has hit an incredible 10 times this season including last week when thousands of our members had their Player to Score 1st TD prop refunded when Pittsburgh’s Willie Parker scored two touchdowns without scoring the first one.
There are two Primetime Props this week:
If you bet on the ‘Margin of Victory’ prop for this game and it loses due to the last score of the game which occurs within the last minute of the game, your stake will be refunded up to $100.00 for this specific prop.
If you bet on the ‘Total Points Scored’ prop for this game and it loses due to the last score of the game which occurs within the last minute of the game, your stake will be refunded up to $100.00 for this specific prop.
