NFL Thanksgiving Day Betting - Green Bay Packers vs. Detroit Lions

Thursday, November 26 - 12:30 PM ET

Although Detroit has often played well on Thanksgiving Day, Green Bay has been dominant in this series in recent seasons. The Packers won both games last year by scores of 48-25 and 31-21. The year before, they beat the Lions 37-26 and 34-13. In this year's earlier meeting, Green Bay got off to a quick 14-0 lead in the first quarter and coasted to a 26-0 win. All told, Green Bay has won eight straight games against Detroit, covering six of them in the BetUS NFL betting odds.

Here are some NFL football betting trends as they relate to this matchup:

• GB has won four of its last six games SU
• GB has played six of its last nine games OVER the total
• GB has lost seven of its last nine road games SU
• GB has played 15 of its last 23 road games OVER the total
• DET is 0-4-1 ATS in its last five games
• DET has lost 23 of its last 25 games SU
• DET has covered three of its last 14 home games
• DET has lost 11 of its last 13 home games SU
• DET has played five of its last seven home games UNDER the total

Also...

• GB has won the last eight meetings SU
• GB has covered six of the last eight meetings
• Four of the last five meetings have gone OVER the total
• GB has covered four of the last five meetings as the road team
• DET has covered eight of the last 12 meetings as the home team
• GB has won four of the last five meetings SU as the road team
• Four of the last five meetings in Detroit have gone OVER the total

Green Bay Packers @ Detroit Lions >>Join Now to Bet

In that October 18 encounter, Daunte Culpepper started in place of injured rookie Matthew Stafford, but himself had to leave the game with a hamstring problem, leaving things in the hands of Drew Stanton, who completed five out of 11 passes.

Now the Lions have to deal with another injury problem at the quarterback position. In the final seconds of last week's game against Cleveland, and in the process of throwing a Hail Mary that resulted in a pass interference penalty, Stafford was hit and went down on his non-throwing shoulder, knocking it out of place. He luckily got to stay in the game because Browns coach Eric Mangini had called a timeout, and threw the winning touchdown pass, but there is such a short turnaround to play this game that he is most likely going to be watching from the sidelines with an AC joint separation.

That's kind of a shame, because Stafford had thrown for 422 yards and five TD's against Cleveland. It was the first time a rookie had thrown for five TD's in 72 years. In an unusual turn, NFL commissioner Roger Goodell actually said, "That kind of a game can be a game-changer -- not just today, but for the Lions' franchise.''

Well, maybe that development gets set back another week, as it's probably going to be Culpepper playing in this one. For Lions fans, it was nice to see Calvin Johnson having a big day, as he and Kevin Smith both had over 100 yards in receptions.

Remember, though, that Detroit had not topped 300 yards in any of its last four games, and Green Bay offers considerably more resistance than the Browns, working out of the 3-4 alignment. San Francisco had only eleven first downs and 69 rushing yards in Sunday's game, and guess what? Aaron Rodgers was sacked only twice.