One of, perhaps, the blue-chip primetime island games of the NFL season kicks off tonight when the resurgent Los Angeles Chargers, under new HC Jim Harbaugh, face off at home against the Baltimore Ravens, whose longtime head coach is John Harbaugh—Jim’s brother. The Harbaugh Bowl! The HarBaull! The Harbowl! Justin Herbert, Lamar Jackson, Ladd McConkey, Derrick Henry, J.K. Dobbins, et al. will be active and raring to go for Week 12 Monday Night Football.
Ladd McConkey appeared to injure his shoulder on a first-down grab on Sunday Night Football in Week 11 against the Bengals, but he was evaluated for an injury and later cleared to return. We all expected this to impact his practice participation, and it did. He missed Thursday’s session altogether, but logged limited sessions the rest of the week.
We’ll assume he’s getting a full workload, as we’ve heard nothing otherwise. Having said that, here’s my favorite Ladd prompt for the Harbaugh Bowl on Monday Night Football.
Best Ladd McConkey prop bet for Chargers vs. Ravens on Monday Night Football
Ladd McConkey Longest Reception o23.5 yards
The Ravens’ secondary is susceptible
The Baltimore Ravens defensive unit has allowed 88 explosive passing plays (defined by NGS as plays of 15+ yards), the most in the NFL by a margin of 11. That’s a uniquely-vulnerable secondary Justin Herbert’s going up against. Not coincidentally, Baltimore also leads the league in explosive-passing-plays-allowed rate, with 18.1% of their total dropbacks faced resulting in passing plays of fifteen-or-more yards.
This bodes well for our rocket-armed prince in electric blue, no? The Ravens also only generate pressure on the quarterback a below-league-average 30.3% of the time when rushing with four defenders, and rush four defenders 76.3% of the time. That’s good for fifth in the NFL. This is all to say: Justin Herbert should have a relatively clean pocket with which to operate.
LAC’s passing efficiency
The Chargers are fourth in the NFL in deep throw percentage, at 13.1%, and have a league average EPA/dropback of 0.3. Herbert’s completion percentage over expectation (CPOE) is good for eleventh in the league at 1.4%. Match that with his receiving core’s catch rate over expectation (CROE) of 1.5%—also eleventh in the NFL—and you’ve got a good shot that Herbert hits a deep shot and blows by this number.
And McConkey has been his most impressive target over the last five weeks. Conk has a 140.2 NFL Next Gen Stats receiver grade over the last five weeks, and has a 10.2% catch rate over expectation (CROE), 102 receiving yards over expectation (RYOE), and 123 yards after the catch. 35 of his YAC are over expected.
Bottom Line
Since Week 7, McConkey is fourth in the NFL in total receiving yards. He’s been among the league’s best on an ascending offense. Barring an unexpectedly efficient showing by the Ravens secondary, McConkey should have at anywhere between three-to-five opportunities to clear this number just at the catch-point. Far more if you consider his YAC ability.
Best Bet: Ladd McConkey Longest Reception o23.5 yards
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