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Edgar Chaput
49ers vs. Commanders Point Spread: NFL Week 17 Odds, Prediction
San Francisco’s ambitions of having the road to the Super Bowl in the NFC go through the Bay Area took a massive hit on Christmas night. They hosted the also sturdy Baltimore Ravens and were pulverized 33-19. A chance to rebound beckons when they visit the Washington Commanders, whose season is essentially awash. They visited the Jets last Sunday and lost a close one, 30-28.
The NFL odds believe Kyle Shanahan’s group will handle its business with ease, placing the 49ers as -13 favourites.
NFL Point Spread and Betting Analysis
Despite that both franchises have headed in opposite directions for a few years, the Commanders, or Washington Football Team, have played the Niners tough. The clubs have split the past four games, with Washington stealing a game in California in 2020 and the Niners barely escaping with a 9-0 win in 2019.
If there is anything to make betters doubt San Francisco, it’s the ATS record. For all the justifiable praise heaped on this group, it’s only 8-7 ATS. Moreover, the Niners failed to cover two of their past three opportunities and are 3-3 in the past six. To be fair, they didn’t cover ridiculous -13.5 and -16.5 spreads versus the Buccaneers and Seahawks. But that’s what happens when expectations are so high. They can’t all be met.
That’s not the say that Washington is a model of how to handle the spread either. At 6-8-1, they haven’t shown much either to encourage betters to take a chance on them. To that point, their cover on Sunday versus the Jets was the first success in five weeks. It should be noted that the club is limping into this game with a six-game losing streak.
San Francisco 49ers
The events of Monday night were a lot like what happened a few weeks prior when the 49ers waltzed into Philadelphia and hammered the Eagles. It was an emphatic display of superiority. The problem on Christmas was that it was the Ravens who gave the emphatic display, winning 33-19.
If that score doesn’t look as bad as the author is making it out to be, consider that the hosts earned a TD late in the fourth quarter when Sam Darnold was slinging it in a comeback attempt that fell short. It was already 33-12 at that point. In a nutshell, the match was bewildering. Everyone knows the Ravens are a good team, that’s not the issue. It was seeing the 49ers manhandled with such ease that was shocking. At home, no less. Brock Purdy was yanked after four picks, the team committing five turnovers in total. The overall stats weren’t even bad, but Baltimore made all the right plays at exactly the right time, so San Fran’s 429 total yards were completely meaningless. Christian McCaffrey’s 103 yards and touchdown? Didn’t matter. George Kittle’s seven receptions for 126 yards? Forgettable.
Increasing the challenge is an astonishingly long list of players who have been limited in practice this week, starting with OT Trent Williams (groin).
Washington Commanders
If anything, the Washington Commanders and New York Jets put on a heck of a show on Christmas Eve for fans in attendance at MetLife Stadium. The 30-28 final score suggests a close game, which it was. Just not for the reasons one might suspect.
It wasn’t a back-and-forth affair at all. The Jets turned on the after-burners in the first half, racing out to a 20-0 advantage and making the Commanders look like the most inept team in the NFL. Sam Howell was picked off, a punt was blocked, the defence let New York run rampant, etc. And yet, with less than two minutes left, it was 28-27 for the visitors. Switching to Jacoby Brissett at QB game the club a spark (one TD toss), as did RB Chris Rodriguez Jr., who ran for two scores. By the way, Brissett will be the Commanders’ QB for Week 17.