SANTA CLARA - The San Francisco 49ers return from Australia with the loudest Week 2 price on the board. FanDuel opened San Francisco as a 13.5-point favorite over the Miami Dolphins for Sunday's 1:25 p.m. PT home opener at Levi's Stadium on FOX - the largest opening spread of any game on the Week 2 slate, Heavy Sports reported.
That number arrived four days after the 49ers beat the Los Angeles Rams 27-7 at Melbourne Cricket Ground in the NFL's first regular-season game in Australia. Brock Purdy threw for 205 yards and three touchdowns in the win, Heavy reported, while San Francisco held a Rams team that entered the year with Super Bowl expectations to a single score.
Miami, meanwhile, lost 27-13 at Las Vegas, where Malik Willis took five sacks and finished as the Dolphins' leading rusher with 39 yards.
Oddsmakers had San Francisco as an underdog in Melbourne. By Monday morning, no Week 2 favorite opened closer to two touchdowns. Heavy noted that Baltimore and the Rams each opened as 8.5-point favorites in their games, leaving the 49ers alone at the top of the market's confidence chart.
Travel, Stribling, and the different test at home
The complication is logistics as much as opponent. San Francisco flew roughly 8,000 miles for the Melbourne opener. The league placed that game on Thursday night in U.S. time specifically to give both clubs extra recovery before Week 2, but a cross-Pacific return still frames the first home Sunday.
Depth is thinner at receiver. Rookie De'Zhaun Stribling suffered a deltoid ligament sprain in his ankle against the Rams and is expected to miss at least a month, multiple reports confirmed after the opener. Oddsmakers priced 13.5 anyway - a signal that the market is weighting Miami's early tape more heavily than San Francisco's short-term attrition.
Miami's Week 1 offense struggled to sustain drives even after a Kirk Cousins interception gifted field position near midfield. The Dolphins' lone touchdown came off that turnover, Heavy reported, while Ashton Jeanty topped 100 rushing yards for Las Vegas. San Francisco just limited Matthew Stafford's Rams to seven points. The contrast explains the line better than any single injury report.
