NFL Week 4 best bets: Running backs running wild for Titans and Lions

Free American football tips, best bets and analysis for Week Four of the 2021 NFL season.

Best bets

New Orleans Saints -6.56pm
2pts 8-11 bet365, Boyles

Over 51.5 points in Minnesota Vikings
at Cleveland Browns6pm
1pt 10-11 general

Derrick Henry over 24.5 rushing attempts6pm
1pt 4-5 bet365

D’Andre Swift over 4.5 receptions6pm
1pt 6-5 bet365

New York Giants at New Orleans Saints

6pm Sunday

The Giants take on the role of the unwelcome guest at the Saints’ homecoming party and face being unceremoniously thrown out of the Superdome.

Big Blue dropped to 0-3 with a dreadful loss to Atlanta last week and are still counting the cost of that defeat having lost their defensive leader Blake Martinez to a season-ending knee injury. The Giants also look understrength on offence, despite Saquon Barkley finally showing glimpses of his old self.

They’ll need more than Barkley to stop this Saints team though with New Orleans’s defence amongst the elite units in the league. Their offence remains a work in progress but there were signs of improvement last week when Taysom Hill saw significant snaps, freeing up the field for Alvin Kamara and they should expose a poor Giants outfit.

Minnesota Vikings at Cleveland Browns

Sunday 6pm

The Vikings can count themselves a little unlucky that it took until Week Three to get their first win on the board having played well this season, particularly on offence.

Quarterback Kirk Cousins has been very good, throwing for eight touchdowns and posting a 73.9 per cent completion rate. Cousins has been forced to play well though because Minnesota's defence hasn't been up to scratch, giving up 26 points per game on average this year.

It's been a similar story for Cleveland with questions remaining over their secondary which they tried to fix in the summer but are yet to see a return on their investment. On offence, the Browns are scoring 28.7 points per game but will need to maintain that efficiency to outlast the Vikings in a potential shootout.

Tennessee Titans at New York Jets

Sunday 6pm

Tennessee have been heavily reliant on the rushing ability of Derrick Henry in the past two seasons and could lean even more on him for the trip to New York.

The Titans have injury concerns over their top two receivers, AJ Brown and Julio Jones, with both in danger of missing the game. Should they be sidelined or limited in any capacity then expect Henry to be even busier than usual.

Last season’s top rusher has starred in the last two weeks for the Titans, rushing for over 100 yards in consecutive matches. Henry had 28 rushing attempts against Indianapolis in Week Three and 35 carries seven days earlier when facing Seattle, and there’s unlikely to be a drop in his workload if Tennessee’s offence is undermanned.

Detroit Lions at Chicago Bears

Sunday 6pm

The Lions should smell blood when they make the trip west to Chicago to face a Bears team reeling after their worst offensive performance in 40 years.

The Windy City could be the site of Detroit’s first win of the season but to achieve that they will need another strong showing from their running back core, lead by D’Andre Swift.

Swift has been quarterback Jared Goff’s go-to man so far, racking up 18 receptions from 23 targets and turning that into 166 yards and a touchdown.

With Goff still unwilling to take the deep shots downfield, the former LA Ram is happy to check down with regularity and has only once this season thrown to Swift less than five times in a game. The odds about Swift having over 4.5 receptions makes plenty of appeal to land for a third time this year against a weak Bears outfit.

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