Inside the Lines Vikings-Bears prop cheat sheet: Aaron Jones over, J.J. McCarthy under, D.J. Moore receptions

The SportsLine Projection Model was developed and powered by the Inside the Lines team. You can visit SportsLine for our model’s main market bets (spread, total, money line) but if you are looking for ALL our personal best bets for free, check out our recently launched Inside the Lines blog. For Monday Night Football Vikings-Bears Week 1 these are the 3 of 18 projection based values that standout to me below.

Bet NFL Week 1 at DraftKings, where new users get over $200 off NFL Sunday Ticket and $300 in bonus bets instantly:

Aaron Jones Over 49.5 Rushing Yards (-114 FanDuel)

Jones is now in more of a committee situation with Jordan Mason added to the mix. We actually project him to come under his line of 12.5 rush attempts sot he fact that we project him for nearly 60 rushing yards despite the lack of touches is a positive in my book. This is a fading of the Bears run defense that allowed nearly 140 rushing yards per game last season 4.8 ypc. Bet Aaron Jones’ over at FanDuel, where new users get $300 in bonus bets with a winning $5 wager:

Jones was 11-7 over this line last season in his first year as a Viking and two of his best games were vs the Bears (86 and 106 yards). 

J.J. McCarthy Under 31.5 Pass Attempts (-114 FanDuel)

I can’t unsee that Michigan game vs Penn State where they didn’t pass the ball in the second half. It wasn’t due to lack of faith in McCarthy’s abilities. It was purely because Michigan had the lead and Penn State couldn’t stop their powerful rushing game. I am expecting a similar game script here with the duo of Jones and Mason both having rush attempt lines of 10.5 or more. McCarthy is a good runner as well. Even though the Vikings are known for their elite receivers and Sam Darnold had well over 4000 passing yards they are actually one of the more balanced offenses and passed only 55% of the time last season.

The upgrades the Bears made this offseason was entirely offensive (Ben Johnson, Colston Loveland, Luther Burden). The best way for the Vikings to stop the Bears is to dominate time of possession… through the ground game.

DJ Moore Over 5.5 Receptions (+115 Bet MGM)

Moore ended last season with 8 straight games of 6+ receptions and 7.3 average. This line is based on his overall 5.8 season average downgraded with the addition of both Loveland and Burden. But remember, last season both Keenan Allen (11 targets in WK1) and Cole Kmet (10 targets in WK3) were heavily featured early in ’24. Loveland will cut into Kmet’s usage and Burden won’t get the type of target share in WK1 as as rookie that Keenan Allen got.

Rome Odunze only had 1 catch in his rookie debut. I think in a huge early matchup vs a division rival Caleb will stick to what was working for the last 2 months last season which is pass to Moore for at least 6 catches. Bet Moore at BetMGM, where new users get up to $1,500 back in bonus bets if your first bet doesn’t win:

Two of the three best lines are on FanDuel and if you want to parlay all 3 on FanDuel (DJ Moore at -102) you would get a +598 payout. 

Game Cheat Sheet

We use our proprietary AI to review our projection vs our odds partners’ best prices. This is a list of other good projection based bets for this game.

These are just a fraction of our best bets, which are all free on our new blog. We will be providing our team’s personal best bets for every NFL game during the 2025 season.   

What makes a bet an “Inside the Lines Best Bet?” These are ones where:

1) Best Projection: Our SportsLine Model’s projection shows clear value versus the line and we love certain statistical trends, X’s and O’s and subjective supporting data that supports our side but isn’t directly factored into the model. For example, say we love a running back to go Over 14.5 carries and his backup is projected for 5.5 carries, but the backup is questionable and there’s a chance he can be ruled out, which surely will change our projection to 16.5 (third-stringer gets 3.5) and the line would likely go from 12.5 to 15.5. If we have value on a side and the only unknown factors that will change are in our favor, we’ll consider it our “Best Projection.”

AND

2) Best Price: There is an outlier best price that we should take advantage of before it steams in “our direction.” In most of these cases, the best-priced book is using “standard odds making logic” to set the line, but our team has identified a unique situation where standard odds rules don’t apply. For example, maybe a player is -110 to throw an interception, but in his last three seasons he has averaged just 0.4 interceptions on the road compared to 0.7 at home because the team plays on a fast track at home and averages 5+ more pass attempts at home.

Step 1 provides greater accuracy and Step 2, especially when combined with a nice Profit Boost or Promotion, significantly lowers the bar for being profitable … which is why we like to feature our best line sportsbooks offers.