With Ben Roethlisberger’s retirement, the Pittsburgh Steelers held a competition during training camp and named newcomer Mitchell Trubisky as their starter for Week 1’s contest against reigning AFC champion Cincinnati. Despite reaching the NFC Championship Game, the San Francisco 49ers have elected to switch from Jimmy Garoppolo to Trey Lance for their opener versus Chicago. With all the quarterback changes this season, which NFL prop bets and NFL player props should you target in Week 1? The latest 2022 Week 1 NFL odds from Caesars Sportsbook list the over/under on passing yards for Trubisky at 227.5 and Lance at 204.5. You also can bet on whether 2016 NFL MVP Matt Ryan will go Over or Under 28.5 pass attempts against Houston in his debut with Indianapolis. Those are among the many NFL Week 1 props. Before locking in any NFL player prop bets of your own, be sure to check out the picks and predictions from SportsLine NFL props expert Alex Selesnick.
Selesnick (aka PropStarz) specializes in NFL, MLB and NBA prop betting, where he implements a combination of research, statistical analysis and mathematical modeling. His background playing competitive fantasy sports, poker, Scrabble and backgammon helped form the foundation of his sports betting approach.
The expert was an impressive 53-37 on his picks during the 2021 NFL regular season for SportsLine and is 58-31 (+20.66 units) on MLB prop plays this year. He’s also up nearly 235 units on NBA props and futures plays over the past two-plus seasons.
With the NFL Week 1 schedule quickly approaching, Selesnick has evaluated the NFL player props from Caesars and found three strong bets. You can only see them here.
Top NFL player prop bets for Week 1
One of the Week 1 NFL prop bets PropStarz is backing: Kansas City’s JuJu Smith-Schuster will go Over 46.5 receiving yards against Arizona in his debut with the Chiefs. The 25-year-old likely will be targeted often by Patrick Mahomes considering the 2018 NFL MVP had a career-high 658 pass attempts last season and no longer has Tyreek Hill as an option.
Smith-Schuster is more than capable of hauling in a high number of passes, as he had a career-best 111 catches with Pittsburgh in 2018, also the career-high total Hill recorded with the Chiefs last year. A second-round pick in the 2017 NFL Draft, Smith-Schuster gained at least 47 yards 12 times that season and should be able to do so on Sunday on an offense that was fourth in the league in passing (281.8 yards) in 2021.
“Smith-Schuster appears set to be Patrick Mahomes’ primary target outside of Travis Kelce,” PropStarz told SportsLine. “With Tyreek Hill and his 159 targets vacating KC’s offense, I expect JuJu to be the biggest beneficiary.” You can see all of PropStarz’s Week 1 prop picks here.
How to make NFL player prop bets for Week 1
PropStarz has locked in two other Week 1 NFL prop picks, including calling for a running back to exceed his projected rushing attempts against a weak defense. You can only see which 2022 NFL Week 1 props to jump on at SportsLine.
Which Week 1 NFL prop bets should you jump on? And what running back is a must-back? Visit SportsLine now to see the best NFL Week 1 prop bets, all from the expert who has dominated in prop betting across the sports spectrum for years, and find out.
