{"id":20370,"date":"2011-12-19T00:09:00","date_gmt":"2011-12-19T05:09:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/?p=20370"},"modified":"2011-12-19T00:09:00","modified_gmt":"2011-12-19T05:09:00","slug":"monday-night-football-picks-pittsburgh-steelers-visit-san-francisco-49ers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/monday-night-football-picks-pittsburgh-steelers-visit-san-francisco-49ers-20370\/","title":{"rendered":"Monday Night Football Picks: Pittsburgh Steelers visit San Francisco 49ers"},"content":{"rendered":"

Pittsburgh Steelers at San Francisco 49ers
\nMonday, 12\/19\/11, 8:30 PM EST, TV:\u00a0 ESPN
\nOpening Point Spread:\u00a0 San Francisco -2.5
\nCurrent Betting Line:\u00a0 San Francisco -3
\nOpening Total:\u00a0 39
\nCurrent Total:\u00a0 37.5
\nOdds Courtesy of Bookmaker<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Steelers
The Steelers are hoping Ben Roethlisberger will start on Monday night against the 49ers despite an ankle injury.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The Pittsburgh Steelers are hopeful quarterback Ben Roethlisberger will be under center when they visit the San Francisco 49ers on Monday Night Football.\u00a0 Roethlisberger practiced on Saturday but remains questionable for the Steelers (10-3) on the injury report due to a sprained left ankle.\u00a0 He has missed just one start due to injury in his career, so bettors should not be surprised to see him on the field.<\/p>\n

Pittsburgh is fighting the Baltimore Ravens for first place in the AFC North and can move one game ahead with a victory at San Francisco (10-3).\u00a0 The Ravens (10-4) own the tiebreaker with the Steelers because they swept the regular-season series, but they lost 34-14 at San Diego on Sunday night to put Pittsburgh in position to take the lead.<\/p>\n

The Steelers will already be playing without linebacker James Harrison, who was suspended on game for his vicious hit on Cleveland Browns QB Colt McCoy in a 14-3 win last week.\u00a0 Center Maurkice Pouncey was also declared out with a sprained ankle, so Roethlisberger could have a tough time if he plays as expected and gets pressured by the 49ers defense.<\/p>\n

San Francisco (-3, O\/U 37.5) has dropped two of three games and needs a victory to keep pace with New Orleans for the second seed in the NFC.\u00a0 The Saints (11-3) crushed Minnesota 42-20 on Sunday, and they and the 49ers also have an outside shot at the top seed following the first loss of the season for the Green Bay Packers (13-1) on Sunday at Kansas City.<\/p>\n

The two recent losses for San Francisco both came on the road.\u00a0 The 49ers have won five straight home games both straight-up and against the spread.\u00a0 Their last two home games have been decided by a combined 42 points, and the total has gone UNDER in three of their past four overall.<\/p>\n

Pittsburgh will be facing the NFL\u2019s top scoring defense in San Francisco, allowing just 14 points per game.\u00a0 The Steelers are right behind at 15.2 points per game, and they are giving up 97 rushing yards per game.\u00a0 The 49ers are surrendering a league-low 70.5 yards per game on the ground and trying to become the first team in history not to allow a rushing touchdown.<\/p>\n

San Francisco RB Frank Gore is averaging just 54.4 rushing yards per game over the last five after averaging 126.8 during the team\u2019s five-game winning streak prior to that.\u00a0 Pittsburgh RB Rashard Mendenhall has rushed for more than 76 yards only once this season, although he has still managed to score eight touchdowns.<\/p>\n

Don\u2019t miss out on a winning season and let the NFL handicappers<\/a> at Maddux Sports line your pockets with cash.\u00a0 Long term packages are available now!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Pittsburgh Steelers at San Francisco 49ers Monday, 12\/19\/11, 8:30 PM EST, TV:\u00a0 ESPN Opening Point Spread:\u00a0 San Francisco -2.5 Current Betting Line:\u00a0 San Francisco -3 Opening Total:\u00a0 39 Current Total:\u00a0 37.5 Odds Courtesy of Bookmaker The Pittsburgh Steelers are hopeful quarterback Ben Roethlisberger will be under center when they visit the San Francisco 49ers on […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":194,"featured_media":4281,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1444,132],"tags":[349,441,1772,1930,1922,346,2757,299,6141],"class_list":["post-20370","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-headlines","category-nfl-handicapping","tag-ben-roethlisberger","tag-monday-night-football","tag-nfl-betting","tag-nfl-odds","tag-nfl-picks","tag-pittsburgh-steelers","tag-pro-football","tag-san-francisco-49ers","tag-week-15"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20370","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/194"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20370"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20370\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20375,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20370\/revisions\/20375"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4281"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20370"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20370"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20370"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}