Cleveland Browns Seen as the Stronger Team Despite Away Game
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00:00 The first game up is tomorrow on a Saturday to start off the
00:06 doubleheader in Houston, Texas. The Texans, the champions of
00:11 the AFC South for the first time since 2019 will play host
00:15 to the top wild card team. That's the Cleveland Browns,
00:18 the five seed in the AFC postseason picture but Houston
00:22 despite being at home, Donnie is not booked as the favorite.
00:26 In fact, the Texans a two and a half point home underdog the
00:30 over under 44 and a half. Yeah, I don't think they should be
00:34 the favorite to be honest. I think Cleveland actually is the
00:36 better football team heading into this even though Houston
00:38 did win the division and they're the home team and it's
00:40 hard to win on the road as we say just about in every sport
00:43 particularly in the playoffs. That's going to be a great
00:45 home field advantage for the Houston Texans this weekend.
00:47 That dome is going to certainly be rocking. They'll be excited
00:50 about the young football team where you didn't have a lot of
00:52 you know feelings back in September like well, I guess we
00:55 could have a decent year. Let's just see where our quarterback
00:57 goes. He surpassed everybody's wild expectations and so did
01:00 the Miko Rhynes and this football team, but I do agree
01:02 with the fans of sports book opening this line at one and a
01:05 half and now we sit here today at two and a half other outlet
01:08 showing an even two and I think the line is about right and
01:11 also coming into this game. We did see this rematch or this is
01:14 going to be a rematch from just a few weeks ago, but obviously
01:16 it's hard to grade the rematch when your young superstar
01:19 quarterback did not play there, but the one thing that did
01:22 happen was Joe Flacco and an aerial assault with the Mari
01:24 Cooper. Those two guys will be back for this game in the dome
01:27 and also keep in mind Amari Cooper banged up over the past
01:30 couple weeks been with the heel injury able to take that rest
01:33 week last weekend and said he's healthy and ready to go for
01:36 this game. So Joe Flacco should be bombs away to Amari Cooper.
01:39 The total at 44 and a half does feel for me a little bit
01:42 light here. I think this game goes over the total also keep
01:45 in mind. We're not watching the weather conditions here Ben
01:48 because it's a dome, but you better be watching these
01:50 reports coming out of both sides here on who's going to be
01:52 healthy and who's not the Cleveland Browns mo to get to
01:55 a Super Bowl for me electric front seven dominant on the
01:58 back end. Let's win with some defense along with some great
02:00 play out of Joe Flacco Denzel Ward tweaked his knee on a
02:03 Thursday, which is never a good sign and they're not playing
02:06 Monday night like the Philadelphia Eagles in the
02:08 Tampa Bay Buccaneers are bad. They're not even playing on
02:10 Sunday. So if you're tweaking your knee on a Thursday and you
02:13 gotta go play on turf on the road on a Saturday, that's
02:16 probably not a good sign. Maybe a good thing for the Texans
02:18 here, but for me Ben, it's still going to be the Browns. I've
02:21 liked them all week. I'm not going to change now this late
02:23 here despite that injury possibility to Denzel Ward.
02:26 And DRS. I'm glad you bring up week sixteen because I think a
02:30 lot of people would look back just three weeks ago and say
02:32 well, the Browns blew them out by two touchdowns on the road
02:36 in Houston winning 3622 and Joe Flacco threw for 368 yards.
02:43 Why wouldn't they just do that again? CJ Stroud did not play
02:46 in that football game. It was the second consecutive game he
02:49 missed in concussion protocol. Yes, Flacco went off and we'll
02:53 talk about the quarterback matchup. The rookie versus the
02:56 vet in just a moment, but Cleveland did cover in that
03:00 football game is a three-point road favorite. In fact,
03:03 Cleveland as a favorite this year, nine times in the regular
03:06 season, they won outright eight times and they were seven and
03:09 two against the spread, but the Texans did surpass even the
03:14 wildest of expectations in 2023, a team that entered with
03:19 one of the lowest win totals around the NFL entering this
03:22 2023 campaign at six and a half skied over that number of
03:28 course, and when you surpass expectation, you are often
03:32 booked as an underdog. The Texans were nine times this
03:35 year, six and three against the spread. They are one of three
03:38 teams around the NFL. All three teams by the way did make the
03:42 postseason. The Texans, the Steelers and the Ravens that
03:45 were booked as an underdog multiple times and have a
03:48 winning record outright straight up as an underdog.
03:52 Houston is five and four outright as the dog this year.
03:56 It is what Houston will need to do if the Texans want to
03:59 advance to divisional round of the NFL postseason.
04:06 (upbeat music)