The perfect season continues to march on for the Cincinnati Bengals, and there is little doubt in the eyes of the oddsmakers or the betting public that they'll continue that march to 9-0 at the expense of the Houston Texans on Monday Night Football. However, if there's a way you can bet on the Texans and win in this one, it's doing so via fantasy football matchups. The fight between A.J. Green and DeAndre Hopkins could end up being epic.
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The fact of the matter is that Green hasn't really been anything special this season thanks to the fact that the Bengals have spread the ball around a ton. Guys like Mohamed Sanu and Marvin Jones are stealing the thunder which Green has built up over the years, and having a legitimate two-headed monster in the backfield with Gio Bernard and Jeremy Hill steals a lot of red zone targets, too.
The raw numbers are great for Green, as he is averaging a healthy 13.6 fantasy points per game. However, he's also had five games in which he has failed to reach 10 fantasy points and three games in which he didn't even get to eight.
That said, when Green is good, he's awesome. He went off for 10 catches, 227 yards and two touchdowns against the Ravens in Week 3, and he was good for 11 grabs, 118 yards and a TD against the Steelers a couple weeks ago. He's got a favorable matchup against a Houston secondary which he just been a flat out sieve all season long. Kareem Jackson's history against top-notch receivers is awful, and Green could really capitalize.
The biggest issue we see with Green though, is the possibility that the game is going to be so far out of hand that he just isn't going to get much in the way of usage, particularly in the second half. We've seen this happen three times already in Texans games this year. Bill O'Brien doesn't take his foot off of the gas pedal, as he lets his offense continue to play out the string, and that's how Hopkins has really racked up so many fantasy points this year.
Nuk has averaged 18.2 fantasy points per game, and it isn't surprising that he's been a far more consistent option than Green. Hopkins has had at least five catches in all of his games this year, and he's posted six games with at least 94 receiving yards.
The Bengals haven't exactly faced a ton of elite receivers this year, and their history isn't great even when they have. Antonio Brown had six catches for 47 yards and a TD, while Steve Smith went off for 13 grabs, 186 yards and two trips to the end zone. Arguably the next best receiver this team has run into this year is Keenan Allen, so it should be a surprise that Cincinnati has such a good pass defense.
In the end, pure usage is going to win the day. Even if the Texans by chance are playing this one from ahead, they don't have Arian Foster in the backfield any longer, and there's really no confidence in Alfred Blue to keep the ball moving on the ground. As far as the rest of the receivers go, we don't really trust Nate Washington or Cecil Shorts either, though both have proven to come up with big games from time to time.
Green is a great big-play option here for football fantasy this week, and we love him for a potential 20-point game, but even then, we wouldn't rule out Hopkins from going over the top with a game in which he has something like 10 catches for 150 yards and a TD.
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