ASA TOP PLAY 10* ON Under 45 Points, Tampa Bay @ Chicago, Thursday at 8:15 PM ET - This is a low total by today’s standards but we still like the UNDER in this game. This number opened 45 and has dropped to 44.5 which is also telling as most of the totals this year are moving up from the opener and now down. We have 2 of the top defenses in the NFL here with Tampa ranking 2nd in Football Outsiders defensively with Chicago coming in at 7th. On a yards per play basis, these 2 defense also both rank in the top 7 in the NFL. The Bears offense was putrid last week vs Indy scoring just 11 points and they had only 3 points under 2:00 minutes remaining in the game. They tallied only 269 total yards and 90 of those came on their final drive while the Colts were in prevent defense mode. It wasn’t a complete surprise as Indy’s defense ranks #1 in Football Outsiders defensive DVOA but let’s not forget Tampa ranks 2nd so not a huge difference. Chicago has scored 85 points on the season and nearly half of those points (42) came in the 4th quarter of their games vs the Lions & Falcons when they had to make big comebacks vs teams with terrible defenses. Tampa is coming off a big offensive output last week as they had to come from 24-7 down at home vs Chargers to get the 38-31 win. Their defense played poorly allowing 6.5 YPP which is well above their average of 5.1 YPP allowed. Expect a much better effort tonight. Overall offensively TB is a middle of the pack team averaging 5.7 YPP which ranks them 18th in that category. We don’t foresee Brady having a huge night (5 TD passes last week) vs a Chicago defense that ranks 6th in the NFL in yards per pass attempt allowed. The Bucs offense is also banged up with WR Godwin, RB Fournette, RB McCoy, and TE Howard all out tonight. Their top WR Evans is also dealing with an ankle injury. Take the UNDER in this one.