Minnesota Vikings vs St. Louis Rams Point Spread Picks

The St. Louis Rams and the Minnesota Vikings are a pair of teams with playoff aspirations and both have come a long way since last season. The Rams have drafted a gem in Todd Gurley, who many have already elevated to elite status, and they may be right. Everyone knows Minnesota has Adrien Peterson, but the Rams have Todd Gurley who became the first running back in NFL history to rush for over 125 yards in his first four starts. Gurley is generating 6.1 yards per carry, unheard of in the NFL. Minnesota's offense is getting better as Teddy Bridgewater is starting to make big plays, but Gurley is a game changer for the Rams, and last week he broke free for a 71 yard TD run. The Rams have reached 24 points in three of their last four games. After scoring just three points in their opener, Minnesota has averaged 24 points per game since. I think these defenses are on a similar level, but I think Nick Foles is in a better position. He has more experience in a big game, which this is for both teams, to get the Rams over the top in a higher-scoring game than most think. The Rams own a 15-7 ATS mark off a 14+ point win in their previous game. The Vikings own an 8-2 mark to the OVER in their last 10 at home vs. a team with a winning record on the season. Take St. Louis and OVER in this one.

The St. Louis Rams have built a strong defense, but are going to be up against it once again. Sam Bradford went down a year ago with a torn ACL, and coming back this season he tore it again and will miss the entire sason. The Rams are picked to finish dead last in the rugged NFC West. They are likely to take on a conservative approach and let their defense try and win games instead of letting their offense losing them. Minnesota has had to rely on Adrian Peterson way too much, and he is not getting any younger. The QB situation does not hold a lot of promise early on even with the drafting of Teddy Bridgewater, who still appears to be a year or two away from being a big factor. The Vikings will still call on Peterson to carry the ball a lot, and will shorten the game with a lot of rushing attempts. Both of these teams have flawed offenses, and while the Rams bring a very strong defensive unit, the Vikings' defense may be just good enough to hold down a team like St. Louis with a limited offense and Shaun Hill, a 13-year journeyman, taking snaps. I don't see a lot of playmakers on the field here, and both will likely take a conservative approach. Take the UNDER.

There isn't an argument to be made here that St. Louis belongs on the field against the Vikings as the Vikes are a perfect 4-0 and the Rams a very imperfect 0-4. We saw on Monday night a Vikings team that looks like Super Bowl material. But that was a huge game for them and Brett Favre. How do they get excited here, on the short week, facing the Rams after that huge Monday Night game? Brett Favre feels like he just won the Super Bowl as beating the Packers was about as important to him. To add fuel to the letdown-fire, the Vikings have monster games vs. Baltimore, Pittsburgh and Green Bay again coming over the next month. If there were ever time for a breather, this week is it. The Rams offense has already been shut-out twice and has produced 21 points for opposing teams while generating just 24 themselves. This has to be as ugly a looking game as you could find on the card. That thought has been embraced by the public as well as they are lining up at nearly 90% on the Vikings, as if they already knew the final score. If the NFL truly worked that way everyone would be a millionaire. Sports bettors would be punching these giveaway easy win games each week and living the high-life in Beverly Hills. The problem for those folks is that the the NFL doesn't work that way. Despite favorites covering at a 67% rate the past two weeks, ugly is what covers in the NFL long term. If it didn't work this way, the bookmakers would be broke. So the argument here isn't to promote St. Louis as a good team, or disrobe a 4-0 Viking team. Instead the case is to be made for how classic an NFL game this is. A similar setup occurred in week six a year ago as the high-flying Dallas Cowboys were installed as a 9-point favorite coming to St. Louis. The Cowboys lost that game by 20! The Lions didn't win a single game last year, but they went on the road in their last six games as a double-digit dog and went 6-0 ATS. The fact is, 0-4 teams are 34-17 ATS since 1990. How ugly do you think those teams looked going into those games? It doesn't get much uglier than 0-4. But, they got the money 67% of the time. Put those same teams up as a double-digit dog and they are 14-4 ATS and if they are a double-digit home dog, they are 3-0! While Joe Square is afraid of the chance he'll have his money on a team that loses 27-3, we aren't Joe Square. We are willing to risk that outcome, knowing that long term we are on the right side. Ugly is where the money is in the NFL and mine is on the Rams.

We faded St. Louis in a big way a few weeks ago on Monday night when they were getting 6.5 points from the Bears. If you recall that pick, we talked about how bad St. Louis really is. They had 5 wins going into that game but they were squeak-out wins against very bad teams. Without the help of a huge positive turnover margin, they wouldn't have even won half of those. They were crushed by the Bears but have since won two straight games. One was a close overtime win last week vs. Washington. The other was a win over Oakland - again with the help of a +5 turnover ratio! The bottom line here is that St. Louis is probably the league's worst 7-7 team. Without a creampuff schedule and +12 turnover ratio, they could easily be 3-11. Minnesota has their own problems which is why they are a home dog here. After starting 4-2 they have lost 7 of their last 9 games. The last two were very damaging as they got spanked by a Jets team they were supposed to beat and they lost in primetime to Green Bay, scoring 7 points. But Minnesota is the better team! They are allowing 5 points per game less than St. Louis. The Rams have allowed 30+ points eight times already this season - more than half of their games! On the road this season they are averaging 16.9 points per game. Were these good teams they faced on the road? Not for the most part as their road opponents included San Francisco, Arizona, Green Bay and Oakland. Minnesota's offense has struggled all year long but they have faced some superb defenses including Carolina, Buffalo, New England, Miami and Chicago twice. Against the remaining teams they averaged a respectable 20 points per game. QB Tavaris Jackson has another full week under his belt as the starter. St. Louis is technically still in the playoff hunt but their hopes are dim. The reason for their recent success has been Steven Jackson. Unfortunately for the Rams, Minnesota has the best run defense in the entire league. The Vikings are 19-7 ATS as a home underdog and we like them a lot here to cover this number.