The Cleveland Browns (2-4) head to Edward Jones Dome to play the St. Louis Rams (2-3) this week. Kickoff is at 1:00 p.m. ET on Sunday, Oct 25 and will air on CBS.
In its last game, St. Louis fell to the Packers 24-10. Todd Gurley had a great game running the ball in the loss, rushing 30 times for 159 yards. Cleveland also fell short, losing in a close one against the Broncos 26-23. Gary Barnidge had a solid performance for the Browns, pulling in three receptions for 39 yards and two TDs.
The Browns are a five-point underdog against the Rams and the Over/Under (O/U) for the matchup is sitting at 42 points.
Sitting at 2-3 for both Straight Up (SU) and Against The Spread (ATS), the Rams will look to improve heading into Week 7. St. Louis will look to make the running game a priority. They face a Cleveland run defense that ranks last in the league with 149.8 yards allowed per game. Crossing over to the defensive side of the ball, the Rams look to have a distinct advantage in certain spots. The Browns will need to stop St. Louis’s defense from getting to their quarterback in order to be successful in this game. The Rams rank third in the league in sacks with 3.8 per game. The Rams hope to succeed against Cleveland’s defense during the third quarter, when it allows eight points per road game. Special teams is a weakness for Cleveland that the Rams may use to their advantage. On average, the Browns have allowed 105.3 return yards per game.
Shifting to the opposition, the Browns head into Week 7 with records of 3-2-1 ATS and 2-4 SU. Other teams have had favorable outcomes throwing the ball against the Rams. It might be in Cleveland’s game plan to take advantage of St. Louis’s inability to prevent completions in its own stadium, a league-worst 80.3%. Moving on to the Cleveland defense, it has some favorable matchups that it may be able to take advantage of as well. Cleveland’s top-five passing defense, allowing 57.9% of passes to be completed, has a good chance of shutting down its competitor’s passing game. St. Louis will want to keep its intensity through the fourth quarter against the Browns, who average 10.2 points in the final 15 minutes of regulation. The Browns should not have difficulty keeping St. Louis’s offense off the field. This season, the Rams have had an average time of possession of 28:47 per game, ranking 30th in the league.
Predictions: SU Winner – StL, ATS Winner – Cle, O/U – Under
Notes
St. Louis is 2-6 SU in its last 8 games.
St. Louis is 2-6 ATS in its last 8 games.
The total has gone UNDER in 4 of St. Louis’s last 6 games.
Both teams are 1-0 SU when leading at the half this season.
Cleveland is only 1-3 SU this season when allowing at least 3.0 sacks in a game. The St. Louis defense is currently averaging 3.8 sacks over the last five games.
St. Louis is rated higher in the ground game on both sides of the ball. Its 13th-ranked rushing attack will face the bottom-ranked run defense of Cleveland, while its 21st-ranked run defense will look to contain the 25th-ranked rushing game of the Browns.
