National Football League

2024 Thursday Night Football prediction, best bet: Can Cowboys cover against Giants?

Published Sep. 25, 2024 10:08 a.m. ET

Co-Host of THE HERD and FOX Sports Betting Analyst

A week ago, the look-ahead line for the Thursday night game was Dallas -7.

The Cowboys have won 12 straight over the pathetic Giants, and those victories have come by an average of 17 points. Last year, Dallas blasted the Giants twice — 40-0 in the opener and then 49-17 in the rematch.

But then last weekend, the Cowboys looked awful, falling behind to Baltimore 28-6 before garbage time made it moderately interesting (28-25 final). Meanwhile, the Giants fell into a 7-0 hole one minute into the game against Cleveland, but rallied for a 21-15 victory.

And now the line is only Dallas -4.

Is that movement of a field goal an overreaction? I believe so.

All summer long, we knew what Dallas would look like: heavily reliant upon CeeDee Lamb, unable to run the ball, and a black box on defense under old school coordinator Mike Zimmer.

Sure, Dallas can’t stop the run — the Ravens averaged 6.1 yards per carry — but the Giants don’t have a run game capable of taking advantage.

Conversely, the Giants offensive line has largely been terrible this season, and expect a Dallas defense that has been bullied the last two weeks to get back to the basics and control the line of scrimmage.

The Cowboys are coming off a bad loss; the Giants are coming off a nice road win. Ignore the overreaction in this week-to-week league.

PICK: Cowboys (-4) to win by more than 4 points

Jason McIntyre is a FOX Sports betting analyst who also writes about the NFL and NBA Draft. Before arriving at FOX, he created the website The Big Lead. Follow him on Twitter @JasonRMcIntyre.

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