San Francisco vs Kansas City -1 O/U 54
Where do I start here? These two teams have been among the top 5 best in football most of this year, and it is tough to find a huge edge here when these two behemoths face off. One thing that I will say is that is a very high total for a 49er game and I would wonder if it is telling us something. Let’s start logically with the power ratings. I have Kansas City .25 points better than San Francisco. Not much to go by there. Let’s look at strength of schedule, Kansas City’s schedule ranks 16 and the 49ers rank 13th. Not much there either. Let’s look at yards per play. San Francisco has a net 1.2 yards per play with 6.2 on offense and 5 on defense while the Chief’s have net .9 with 6.5 on offense and 5.6 on defense. Slight edge to San Francisco. Both teams were beat up this year and Mahomes missed 2 games so I can’t really look at that measly .3 net yards per play advantage that the 49ers have.
The cool thing about this Match-up is that you have one of the best 2 defenses in football playing one of the best 2 offenses in football and we probably need to see how the other pieces come face off together. Kansas City has significantly improved on defense since some of their guys came back healthy. They literally held the Texas to about 10 points in 3 quarters of football since all the mistake’s happened. KC was also able to stop Tennessee after the first quarter as well. The biggest problem that the Chiefs have is that they will now face a better and more strategic rushing attack. The 49ers have a nice 4.7 yards per attempt while the Chief’s defense gives up a 27th best 4.8 throughout the year. If you look at what the Chief’s have done recently against the run against guys like Derek Henry, it will show vast improvement. Now the Chief’s have a match-up advantage on the 49ers as well. Kansas City is top 2 in passing yards per attempt while the 49ers defense ranks very high at stopping the pass. The 49ers success in stopping the pass is mostly likely due to their strong pass rush and doesn’t take into complete account for the mobile quarterbacks. When San Francisco went up against top 5 passing competition this year, they lost against the Falcons, the Seahawks and gave up 350 passing yards and 5 TDs to Drew Brees and the Saints and barley won that game at the very end. The Niners also struggle against the best mobile QBs losing to Lamar Jackson, Russell Wilson and had a tough time against Kyler Murray. I expect similar production from Mahomes this game.
Let’s look at what these teams are not great at. San Francisco really can’t rely on passing the ball unless the running game opens it up. They rank only 21st in passing yards per game at 221. Kansas City can’t really run the ball with running backs unless the passing game is so good that it opens up the run. Same concept for both teams yet vica versa. The Chiefs only rank 22nd at 100 yards total rushing yards per game. A lot of those yards is Mahomes himself running the ball out of the pocket as well. This is actually where i find a slight edge in this game. When teams are down by more than one score late in the game, they can’t really rely on running the ball because it takes out the clock and doesn’t allow them as much time to score again and pull ahead. This doesn’t bode well for the 49ers with an unproven playoff quarterback in Jimmy Garoppolo. This is where I found a slight edge for KC in this game. If the Chiefs are down, they have a much better ability to come back into the game and win it at the end. Now I am not saying that the 49ers will be down late in the 4th quarter, and if they are actually winning, they might have that power run game that spreads it out through 3-4 running backs and a few wide receivers as well to keep the ball away from Mahomes and not give him another chance to score. These are all the reasons why this game should be exactly at -1 as it is at the Sportsbooks right now. In saying all of this I think I will have a small play on Kansas City. I know that they can go score for score with San Francisco and I am not sure that San Francisco can go score for score with them if they are down. Super Bowls are made for Quarterback play for the most part and I have to give the edge to Mahomes in this game. I also think that at -1, you will get some line value and possibly buy back or hedge it during the actual game. Gonna go with a small play to the Chiefs. Lastly, I think this is a very high total in the game. I don’t want to poke the bear here and try to go under for the full game but do see that the lines are set at 27 per half in which I believe to be wrong. I Think the first half should be 24.5 and the second half 29.5 as most of the scoring during football games happens during the second half of each game in general. Plus, both teams are more risk adverse in the first half in not wanting to throw the ball down the field potentially creating a nasty turnover and momentum shift. I already took the second half over 27 at +100 and will wait until more public bets come in before I hit the first half under. Have a fantastic time watching this game and let me know if you have any questions via twitter @theoddsbreakers!
Chiefs -1 – small play
Over 27 point second half – 3 star premium shared
Under 27ish first half – 1.5 star premium shared
