Alexander Mattison is healthy again and saw his snap share rise to 40 percent last week. Beyond Minnesota's offensive line injuries, this is a difficult matchup considering the Lions are playing their starters and have allowed 2.7 yards per carry over the past three games. Chandler managed 17 yards on eight carries vs. Detroit two weeks ago.

Despite missing nearly half the season and only appearing in nine games, Justin Jefferson finds himself 118 yards shy of 1,000. Jefferson is likely licking his chops as he gets to face a Lions pass defense that hes averaged 125 receiving yards over his career and rank in the bottom 5 in nearly every defensive passing metric including dead last in explosive pass %. Ceedee Lamb just went nuclear against the Lions for 227 yards and considering the Lions may pull their starters after the first half, it's hard to imagine the Lions keeping Jefferson in check. I also much prefer to see Nick Mullens under center for Minnesota as he is clearly not afraid to put some 50/50 balls up for Jefferson.

Mullens will chuck the ball around. Lions are strong vs the run and even when they go to their backups the better matchups will be pushing the ball downfield, which Mullens is never shy about doing. Vikings are still alive - barely - and the whole reason why they went back to this QB is because he will push the ball and take some chances, He's over 300 in his two starts this season and another 300 here seems very attainable.

Minnesota still has a slim chance to make the playoffs and the Lions can possibly move up to the no 2 seed by the end of the week, so I expect both offense to be firing on all cylinders. Nick Mullens is back, which means the Vikings will actually be able to move the ball against shoddy Detroit defense, especially against NFC North rivals. The Lions are 4-1 to the over in divisional games this season. Minny's defense isn't much better either, they've been among the leagues worst with 3 straight Overs hitting. The Lions are good offense at home, averaging almost 31 points at Ford Field. This one could be a shoot out.

Right now the Vikings are hanging onto postseason hopes by a thread, needing a win and some help. Detroit has to be fuming with how last week's game against the Cowboys ended. Now, they may rest some starters in this game, but with the way Matt Campbell coaches, it wouldn't shock me to see the reserves come out playing hard just like the starters.

Dan Campbell seemingly announced his intentions with his starters at the beginning of the week, which caused the market to hammer the Lions. But this line has fallen back to Detroit -3, maybe because the market isn't buying they'll play the whole game. I believe Campbell will assess how other games are going at halftime and then potentially rest players, but that still means a half of beating up on a Vikings team that cannot find an answer at quarterback. I'd make the full-game spread double digits if I was sure the Lions were going all out, so I love this value on the first half spread.