Detroit Lions at Cincinnati Bengals
Thursday, August 13, 2026
7:00 PM ET, Paycor Stadium (NFL Network)
Real football is back. Preseason football, but I’ll take it.
Thursday night’s opening slate has six games on the card, and it kicks off with Detroit at Cincinnati at 7:00 PM ET from Paycor Stadium. It’s the first NFL bet I’ll have made in over seven months and I’m ready.
The books have hung Cincinnati at -3.5 with a total of 37.5. That -3.5 is the largest home spread on the entire Week 1 preseason board. Fourteen of the sixteen games this week are sitting at 2.5 points or less. When the books stick their neck out that far on a preseason line, they usually have a reason.
Here’s the reason.
Zac Taylor has already told reporters he’s playing his starters Thursday. He wouldn’t commit to how many snaps, but Joe Burrow, Ja’Marr Chase, and Tee Higgins are going to be on the field. That’s a big departure from the way most head coaches treat their preseason opener, where the starters typically watch from the sideline in bucket hats while the backups play a full 60 minutes.
And there’s a wrinkle on the Detroit side worth paying attention to. The Lions don’t have any joint practices on the calendar this year, which has been their usual way of getting starters “good on good” work leading up to the preseason games. Without those joint practices scheduled, and with Cincinnati playing their starters, Dan Campbell is at least considering running his own first-team offense and defense out there for a series or two. He hasn’t committed to it, but the reporting out of Detroit says he’s leaning that way.
More starter snaps means better offense, and better offense usually means more points.
That brings us to the coaches’ preseason histories, and this is where the play really starts to come together.
Dan Campbell has gone 10-6 to the Over during his time in Detroit, hitting the Over 62.5% of the time. Across his full career as a head coach, including a brief stint in Miami, he’s 13-7 to the Over at 65%. Zac Taylor’s preseason totals record with Cincinnati sits at 11-8, right around 58%. Neither of these guys treats August like it’s some clock-management exercise. They want their teams putting points on the board, and their preseason records show it.
Combine two coaches who lean Over historically with a game where starters are actually going to play, and the Over 37.5 looks like a solid number.
The line opened at 38.5 and has been bet down to 37.5, which means the sharper money has been coming in on the Under. That doesn’t scare me off. Preseason line movement is often driven by professional bettors making systematic plays based on limited public information, and I’ve watched the market get this exact scenario wrong plenty of times.
I looked at the side too. Bengals -3.5 at home with starters playing is a legitimate consideration. But in preseason football I want the play with the least variance I can find, and totals almost always give me that. A single pick-six or a botched punt return can flip a spread in a hurry. Totals are harder to swing.
For me, the Over is the play.
The Pick: Lions/Bengals Over 37.5
