I wish you wouldn't say something is a lock because you know as well as anyone here that "when is a lock not a lock" ? When someone says or tells you so.
With that said I played a similar one to the above but it was on carries and not yards gained. I will give my reasons and I suppose you could use the analysis to support your so called LOCK.
Rushing attempts by Antowain Smith. Over/Under 17.5 attempts? = UNDER -110
I like the UNDER in this prop, and if you can find a total rushing yards prop (I have seen numbers from 76.5 to 80.5) I also like the Under in that, for all of the same reasons I am about to detail.
Smith played in only 13 regular season games, meaning his 182 regular season carries average out to 14 carries per game. He was 2-11 to the Under in this prop in the regular season, with one of the Overs being an 18 carry day so it clearly could have gone either way. Something that happens 85% of the time (his Under ratio) should be much more than a -120 favourite. Antowain was 1-1 on this prop in the playoffs, 16 carries vs. the Titans and 22 against the Colts. He did have 18 carries in the Super Bowl against the Rams a couple of seasons ago and was 1-1 to the Over in the playoffs that season, giving him a 3-2 Over mark in the postseason. However, both this playoff run and that one included a couple of cold weather games, and Bill Belichick makes no bones about the fact that Smith is his cold weather back. Rest assured, it will not be snowing inside Reliant Stadium for this game, meaning that it is quite likely that Kevin Faulk, who had only four less regular season rushes than Smith, will be the main ball carrier. That is also a likelihood since speed, not strength, is needed to have success running against Carolina.
New England is all about team, with the matchup dictating who plays the most and what the offense does. The setting and the matchups concerning Faulk's speed favor the Under in this one, and one final look at the stats shows that Smith averaged just 11.6 carries per game prior to December this season with that number dropping down to 10 per game on artificial turf. One last note, Smith had just eight carries on Nov 23rd when New England visited Houston. The UNDER is the way to go here.
