I like the under in tonight's game as both teams should take a run first approach. Starting with the Giants they are really banged up without Hixon or Nicks and without David Diehl. Even without Ahmad Bradshaw we should see a heavy dose of Brown/Wilson in the running game because Eli is smart enough to know without Hixon and Nicks and with Carolina likely double teaming Cruz that he will have to get the running game going against a vulnerable run defense.
Unfortunately for the Giants they haven't been good enough to run the ball and I think Carolina will shut it down creating a low scoring game as they have the linebackers to do it and the Giants lack the skill up front to block even though Carolina is allowing nearly 150 yards on the ground this year. On the flip side you would assume Cam Newton and Carolina would like to open it up offensively and they did in week 1 with poor results. Look for more ground in pound from Cam and the rest of the bunch as he likely does not want to take three step drops and get hit by the ferocious pass rush of the Giants. The best chance for the Panters is to get their running option attack working. Both teams have struggled to convert on third downs while the defenses have been pretty good on third downs. The Giants and the Panthers are only converting 36% of their third downs which tends to lead towards unders in this situation.
More than anything both teams are banged up a bit and are playing on extremely short weeks early in the season. The offenses do not have much time to put in any crazy game plans so expect a vanilla approach and for both defenses to be well prepared.
