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Game Overview

Our first Monday Night Football betting battle of the campaign takes place this week at the O.Co Coliseum, as the Oakland Raiders play host to the Dallas Cowboys.

The Cowboys are going to be under a lot of pressure this year, knowing that many think that they should be in the postseason. QB Tony Romo is going to start off the affair, but the real advantage that the boys from Big D has is in their backup quarterbacks. QB Kyle Orton has a history of starting in this league, and though he won’t ultimately play as much as some of the backups, he definitely should prove to give Dallas an effective quarterback in the game for at least the first full quarter and change. Beyond that, it is going to be up to QBs Rudy Carpenter and Stephen McGee. These two have had a good history of playing in the preseason, and that means that we are likely to see Dallas at least showing the potential of scoring on every single drive, something that not every team can lay claim to. Historically, the defense hasn’t played all that well for the Cowboys in the preseason, but we do see how DC Rob Ryan is going to want his unit to get off to a better start to this very crucial campaign.

The Raiders finally have their man that they are going to build around this year under center in QB Carson Palmer. Palmer didn’t have a preseason last year to work with, and that might make him a bit rusty. Or, one could use the contrary argument, that he is going to be on the field more because he didn’t have a preseason to work with last year, and that might give the edge to the Oakland offense. QB Matt Leinart will probably get some extra work as well, as this is the first time that he is going to see game action since getting injured while he was with the Houston Texans last year. This will also be the pro debut of QB Terrelle Pryor, who should be an interesting one to watch in his first year out of Ohio State.

Prediction

There could be a heck of a lot of offense in this game, relatively speaking. We don’t think that either club is going to be able to get into the 30s, but if both can put a couple of TDs on the board, we should be golden. These defenses just aren’t good enough and aren’t deep enough to be able to make this work and keep quarterbacks with some hype and some experience out of the end zone. Oakland 24 – Dallas 20