Miami had the week off due to Hurricane Irma. LA’s rally fell short as they were bested by Denver 24-21 on Monday night.
The Dolphins will have a new QB under center as Jay Cutler takes over for an injured Ryan Tannehill. Cutler can make some great throws but is notorious for throwing back-breaking interceptions. The Chargers have a decent secondary but Miami has several weapons at their disposal. WRs Jarvis Landry, Kenny Stills and DeVante Parker form a solid trio and San Diego’s depth in the backfield will be tested. One thing that will help the pass defense is the strong LA pass rush. They notched 4 sacks vs. Denver and should be able to get good pressure on Cutler. RB Jay Ajayi broke out last season but needs to show better consistency. He posted 3 200+ rushing yard games in 2016 but only 1 other game above 79 yards. The Chargers yielded 140 rushing yards to the Broncos but held them to a 3.9 ypc average.
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Los Angeles QB Philip Rivers placed his team in contention again last week with 2 4th-quarter TD passes and had them in position for a game-tying FG but it was blocked. Rivers threw 3 TD passes last Monday and should do well against a defense that is dealing with injury concerns. The running game stalled in Denver (22-64) but Miami’s run defense gave up 140.4 ypg on the ground in 2016. They also have questions at LB and look for RB Melvin Gordon to get plenty of opportunities to establish the run early.
Public Money Consensus
In this Week 2 NFL matchup between Miami and Los Angeles Chargers have the public evenly split on the point spread at 50%. The over under bettors are favoring this game to go over the posted total line of 45 with over 65% on board.
