Monday Night Football has a 49.5 projected total as the Cincinnati Bengals (4-8) head to Dallas to take on the imploding Cowboys, who are 5.5-point home dogs. The lofty total and nearly a touchdown spread for this Week 14 showdown demands sharp NFL DFS decisions. Here we will dive into the key NFL DFS ownership projections and player projections for DraftKings and FanDuel as we break down everything you need to build winning lineups for the MNF slate.
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NFL DFS Picks: Bengals-Cowboys Monday Night Football Week 14
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NFL DFS Picks for Bengals-Cowboys Monday Night Football Week 14: Chase Brown
Chase Brown
DFS Salary
DraftKings: $9,800
FanDuel: $12,500
Fantasy Points
DraftKings: 21.23
FanDuel: 18.13
Chase Brown has an interesting matchup against the Cowboys, who have allowed 147.6 rushing yards per game, which are the second most in the league.
Dallas has also allowed four opposing running backs to post multi-touchdown games, including three to Alvin Kamara in Week 2 and a trio to Joe Mixon in Week 11. Across the last four games, the Cowboys are ceding 5.4 yards per carry.
In the four games without Zack Moss, the rest of the Cincinnati running backs have 25 combined offensive plays. Over the last three, Trayveon Williams had one snap in Week 10, while Khalil Herbert had two, four and six. Brown has all 21 targets to the position since Moss went down, and Herbert has the lone non-Brown carry, which came last week.
Cincinnati Bengals Positional Preview
Quarterback | Bengals-Cowboys NFL DFS Picks for Monday Night Football Week 14
Joe Burrow leads the league with 278.1 yards per game while also being atop the standings with 30 touchdowns. Linebacker Micah Parsons is back, and there is talk that defensive lineman DeMarcus Lawrence is getting close to a return, though it does not appear that will occur tonight. The secondary is dinged up with Juanyeh Thomas, Amani Oruwariye, Josh Butler, Caelen Carson, and Markquese Bell all out and Trevon Diggs questionable. While a few of these player hit the injured reserve prior to Thanksgiving, it just shows that the depth is lacking against a strong quarterback.
Six different opposing signal-callers had multi-touchdown games against the Cowboys, including three in the last five games. In this stretch Jalen Hurts rushed for two touchdowns, while Jayden Daniels and Drew Lock each ran one in as well. Advantage Burrow.
Wide Receiver | Bengals-Cowboys NFL DFS Picks for Monday Night Football Week 14
Ja’Marr Chase ranks second in the league with 95.2 yards per game, trailing only Nico Collins (104.0), who has played four fewer games. Tee Higgins ranks seventh with 79.7 yards per game, though he has missed five tilts.
In a wild twist, Higgins has nine more targets than Chase when they have played together, topping him in five games and tying him once. Defensive back DaRon Bland is healthy, but he can’t cover both receivers on the same play.
Andrei Iosivas has been on the field for 68% of the offensive action in the last two games where Higgins has been healthy, seeing three and four targets. Trenton Irwin had five plays and then was inactive in these two games, Jermaine Burton had 18 then just two after the Week 12 bye, and Isaiah Williams had his first three snaps of the season in the last game.
This is a three-man show, with Higgins holding a slight edge when factoring in his DFS salary.
Tight End | Bengals-Cowboys NFL DFS Picks for Monday Night Football Week 14
Drew Sample will be on the field for around 6% to 60% of the action, but the former University of Washington stalwart is a key blocker with just 13 targets on the season. Though, he does have a pair in each of the last two games. Veteran Tanner Hudson has moved back into the rotation with the injury to rookie Erick All Jr., and he did see 50 targets last year prior to the acquisition of Mike Gesicki.
Speaking of Gesicki, he has seen 36 of his 52 targets (69%) in games where Higgins was out. He did have five looks last week, so all is not lost, but this is a spot to tread lightly.
Kicker | Bengals-Cowboys NFL DFS Picks for Monday Night Football Week 14
Evan McPherson is on the injured reserve, so Cade York will be handling the kicking duties. York was the Browns’ fourth-round selection out of LSU in 2022. He lasted one season, losing the job to Dustin Hopkins in training camp. Since then he has spent time on the practice squads for Tennessee and the New York Giants before landing back in Cleveland. The Browns moved him to Washington for a conditional last-round pick, but York was released after missing two field goals in the first game of the season. His distance is decent, but accuracy leaves a lot to be desired, hence the nomadic NFL path.
Defense | Bengals-Cowboys NFL DFS Picks for Monday Night Football Week 14
The Bungles have only 21 sacks this season, tied for the second fewest in the league with Miami, though still six ahead of Atlanta. Dallas is in the middle of the pack, ceding 30 quarterback takedowns, but the team has allowed one, five, one and zero sacks since losing Dak Prescott. Cincinnati is averaging one takeaway per game, though there may be opportunities tonight with the Cowboys having suffered 21 turnovers, which are the second most in the NFL.
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NFL DFS Picks for Bengals-Cowboys Monday Night Football Week 14: CeeDee Lamb
CeeDee Lamb
DFS Salary
DraftKings: $10,600
FanDuel: $14,000
Fantasy Points
DraftKings: 17.04
FanDuel: 13.71
CeeDee Lamb had at least 12 targets in five of his six performances prior to Thanksgiving. Though he is not operating at the same All-Pro level that we saw last year, he has done the best he can with shaky quarterback play and a non-existent rushing attack. Heading into this week, Lamb led the league in targets with just over 10 per game, though he has only 880 yards and four scores.
The volume should be there again tonight, as will the attention of the defense. In the last six games, the Bengals have allowed seven wideouts to post at least 70 yards, with seven also finding pay dirt. Four more touchdowns have gone to the tight end position, and five tallied at least 68 yards.
Jake Ferguson has missed the last two games with a concussion, which he suffered in Week 10. That game saw Cooper Rush target Luke Schoonmaker 10 times and Brevyn Spann-Ford five times. In the last two games, Schoonmaker saw four and six targets, while Spann-Ford had two and zero. Ferguson should resume his typical on-field role with a quarterback who is not looking downfield. Best guess is that Schoonmaker showed enough that he may have moved ahead of Spann-Ford, but that is supposition. Prior to Ferguson going down, this duo had relatively even snap shares.
Brandin Cooks returned last week after missing seven games, which saw Ryan Flournoy banished to the shadow realm. The veteran was on the field for 30 plays, with Jonathan Mingo getting 26 and Jalen Brooks 23. Expect Cooks to take away a few more from this duo tonight. Jalen Tolbert saw a downtick as well, though he still led the team with a 72% snap rate.
Turning our attention to the targets for this motley crew, Cooks had seven, while Mingo and Tolbert each had four, with Brooks seeing one lonely look. Returner and burner KaVontae Turpin had five targets, which were more than he saw in the preceding three games combined.
Dallas Cowboys Positional Preview
Quarterback | Bengals-Cowboys NFL DFS Picks for Monday Night Football Week 14
Rush will definitely be tossing around the ol’ pigskin tonight, though touchdowns and yardage have not really been his forte. Clearly, the passing game has had to carry the burden for an anemic running game. Rush is the quintessential game manager, and he now has a 7-3 record as a starter. It was one thing to go 4-1 in 2022 when the team had a better defense and a younger Ezekiel Elliott; to his credit, a 2-2 record is not the end of the world, and there is a chance he can push the Cowboys to a third consecutive victory.
On his 185 attempts this year, Rush is averaging 5.4 yards and 5.5 air yards. When you hear the phrase “pop-gun offense,” this is what is being described. Do not expect any rushing production, with 16 carries for 10 yards this season, though being sacked “just” seven times in four games is actually sort of impressive.
Running Back | Bengals-Cowboys NFL DFS Picks for Monday Night Football Week 14
Dalvin Cook was seen for a total of 24 offensive plays in Weeks 8 and 9, with Deuce Vaughn getting 19 in Week 11 when Hunter Luepke was out. Elliott is still making appearances, but he FINALLY had only 47 combined plays across the last three games, while Rico Dowdle had 41, 40 and 53 in this same stretch. Luepke is likely to be on the field for 30% to 40% of the plays, though he mostly serves as a blocker.
In the last three games Vaughn had four carries for 13 yards in his outing, while Elliott took six totes for 18 yards and Luepke had three for four yards. The rest has been Dowdle, who capped things off on Thanksgiving by recording the first 100-yard rushing performance for the team, along with the third touchdown for the running backs. Elliott has the two other rushing touchdowns, and Dowdle has both receiving scores.
Kicker | Bengals-Cowboys NFL DFS Picks for Monday Night Football Week 14
Brandon Aubrey is the new kid on the block, but he is giving all-timer Justin Tucker a run for his money. Aubrey is 10 of 11 from 50-plus yards this season and 20 of 21 for his career. He also has a 65-yarder this season, falling just shy of Tucker’s 66-yard record. In his rookie campaign, Aubrey was the NFC Pro Bowl kicker and the first-team All-Pro. The only knock against him is that he is “only” 27 of 32 (84%) on his field goals this season.
Defense | Bengals-Cowboys NFL DFS Picks for Monday Night Football Week 14
The vaunted Dallas defense has struggled this year, collecting only 14 takeaways, though the ‘Boys do have 34 sacks. Cincy has ceded 30 sacks and just over one turnover per game.
NFL DFS Picks for Bengals-Cowboys Monday Night Football Week 14: Rankings
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Now let’s break down the final rankings for the Bengals-Cowboys Monday Night Football slate.
Top 10 NFL DFS Showdown Picks for Bengals-Cowboys
- Chase Brown: Captain, My Captain.
- Ja’Marr Chase: Tops the DraftKings and FanDuel salary sheets, as appropriate.
- Tee Higgins: What a wingman!
- Joe Burrow: Too bad the defense hasn’t held up their end of the deal.
- CeeDee Lamb: Better on DraftKings with the full-PPR scoring.
- Jake Ferguson: Would be sweet if he sees the same volume that Schoonmaker did over the last three games.
- Brandon Aubrey: May have surpassed Justin Tucker as the best active kicker in the league.
- Rico Dowdle: Meh.
- Cooper Rush: Double-Meh.
- Cade York: “The name’s Level, Replacement Level.”
Secondary Options
- Brandin Cooks: Hard to know if the trend will be his friend since he has less time with Rush than the others. He should be the clear WR2 by Christmas.
- Andrei Iosivas: Being on the field is half the battle.
- KaVontae Turpin and Jalen Tolbert: Coinflip with their similar salaries; let personal preference be your guide. Turpin is the main punt and kickoff returner.
Lottery Tickets
- Khalil Herbert: Contingent value only, but at some point the Bengals are going to stop trying to ground Brown into dust.
- Mike Gesicki and Tanner Hudson: Truly a DraftKings coinflip with Gesicki at $5,600 and Hudson at a low $2,000.
- Cowboys D/ST: Yes, this includes homefield advantage.
- Cincinnati D/ST: Yes, this includes Rush as the quarterback.
- Ezekiel Elliott and Hunter Luepke: Abandon hope, all ye that tread here.
- Jermaine Burton, Trey Lance, Deuce Vaughn and Droppa Deuce: Never say never.
- Cam Grandy, Ryan Flournoy, Kendric Pryor, Charlie Jones, Jalen Brooks, Isaiah Williams, Trayveon Williams, Pharrell Williams, Paul Williams, Sherwin Williams and Will.i.am: Similar outlooks, which is saying something.
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