Thursday Night Football this week will feature a matchup between 2 excellent teams in the NFC West.
The Seattle Seahawks and Arizona Cardinals both enter Week 4 with 2-1 records and legitimate playoff aspirations. This game could go a long way toward determining seeding in the NFC this year.
Seahawks vs. Cardinals betting odds, predictions
Here’s what the up-to-date betting odds look like for this matchup:
Here’s what you need to know about both teams before placing a bet on this game:
Seahawks fact sheet
- The Seahawks are 2-1 so far this season. They’ve beaten the Steelers and Saints by multiple touchdowns in back-to-back weeks.
- Sam Darnold is picking up where he left off in Minnesota last season. He’s averaging a career-high 9 yards per attempt.
- Darnold has also already thrown 2 interceptions this year. He’s been one of the most interception-prone quarterbacks in the NFL for his whole career. Since his rookie season in 2018, Darnold has a 2.9% interception rate. That’s the most in the NFL among QBs with at least 2,400 pass attempts over that span. His INT rate so far this season with Seattle is 2.7%.
- The Seahawks have about a 52.4% rush rate this season, which ranks third in the NFL and is about 10% above league average.
- Running back Kenneth Walker III is having an uneven start to the year. He averaged over 8 yards per carry against the Steelers in Week 2 but has been under 2.5 yards per carry in Seattle’s other 2 games. Still, his success rate for the year is 51.3%, which would be a career-high if he keeps it up.
- Jaxon Smith-Njigba has been incredibly efficient to start the year. He’s averaging 14.7 yards per touch, which leads the NFL. His 4.61 yards per route run also leads the league among qualified receivers, per PFF.
- Seattle has been dominant against the run so far this season. The Seahawks rank 4th in the NFL in rush defense EPA and 8th in rush defense success rate.
- The Seahawks have been more vulnerable against the pass — 20th in pass defense success rate. Of the offenses Seattle has faced so far, only San Francisco ranks in the top half of the league in EPA per drop back.
Cardinals fact sheet
- The Cardinals are 2-1 with wins over the Saints and Panthers and a loss to the 49ers in Week 3.
- Kyler Murray is averaging just 6.1 yards per attempt as a passer this season, which would be his lowest mark since the 2021 season. He’s also been sacked on over 7% of drop backs so far this season, which would be his worst mark since his rookie season.
- Arizona lost James Conner for the season last week to a leg injury. Trey Benson is expected to receive the majority of the work at running back now with Emeri Demercado also likely to receive some opportunities.
- Marvin Harrison Jr. is off to a nightmare start in Year 2. He had a couple of high-profile drops in Week 3. Of the 8 receivers in his draft class to earn at least 15 targets this season, Harrison has the fewest number of targets (16) and has the second-fewest receptions (10).
- Tight end Trey McBride is Kyler Murray’s most-targeted pass catcher by far. He has 24 targets this season.
- Murray loves to throw the ball to tight ends and running backs. Arizona’s receiver room ranks dead last with a 37.1% target share. The league average so far this year is 57.4%. Both Benson and Conner were in the top 10 in targets for Arizona through 3 weeks, so it will be interesting to see how Conner’s reps are re-distributed now that he’s on the shelf.
- Defensively, Arizona ranks 13th in EPA per play allowed and 26th in defensive success rate.
Seahawks-Cardinals predictions
I’m targeting Sam Darnold’s interceptions prop for this game. As mentioned above, Darnold has the highest interception rate in the league since he was drafted among quarterbacks who have played substantial snaps. That INT rate increases to 3.1% on the road. The betting markets have Darnold projected for about 30 pass attempts in this game, which translates to about 0.93 expected interceptions. Darnold has also thrown at least 1 interception in 56% of games where he’s attempted at least 25 passes. At the current market price, Darnold over 0.5 picks seems like a great bet.
Pick: Sam Darnold over 0.5 interceptions (+100 on BetMGM)
Jaxon Smith-Njigba appears to be on the cusp of a breakout season. He’s got the volume — he’s averaging almost 10 targets per game to start the year. And as mentioned above, he’s arguably been the most efficient receiver in the league this season. He’s gone over 95 yards in every game to start the year. It goes against my instincts to buy a player’s “over” coming off of 3 great performances, but the price is still so low that I think it’s worth it in this case. Smith-Njigba is getting tons of targets and may actually be a bit unfortunate to only have 22 receptions so far this year. It’s also worth noting Arizona’s top coverage corner this year is rookie Will Johnson, who hasn’t practiced all week due to a groin injury and is listed as doubtful for this game.
Pick: Jaxon Smith-Njigba over 70.5 receiving yards (-115 on BetMGM)
Spenser is a news editor for Saturday Down South and covers college football across all Saturday Football brands.
