Bengals at Seahawks, 4:05 p.m., CBS

Line: Seahawks -9.5. Total: 44.

There’s plenty of reason to believe that Coach Zac Taylor has something special about him and that he can modernize a stagnant Bengals approach. After all, he’s one of just four head coaches in the N.F.L. who got there without having first been an offensive or defensive coordinator at the pro level. But is Andy Dalton the quarterback to run the type of frantic play-action offense that Taylor will presumably have brought over from the Rams? A road game in Seattle seems like a terrible time to find out. Seattle should win, but covering such a wide spread is far from a given. Pick: Bengals +9.5

49ers at Buccaneers, 4:25 p.m., Fox

Line: Even. Total: 51.

Most of the chatter has been about the return of Jimmy Garoppolo at quarterback, but based on his uneven play in the preseason, the 49ers’ key to improvement in the early going might be more dependent on a rebuilt defensive front, where the team added a superstar rusher in Dee Ford and a solid linebacker in Kwon Alexander, and drafted a potential difference-maker in Nick Bosa, who is expected to play in Week 1 despite working his way back from an ankle injury.

Tampa Bay has the potential to improve a great deal on the offensive side with Coach Bruce Arians running the show and Byron Leftwich, the team’s first-year offensive coordinator, calling plays. But in terms of overall talent, San Francisco has an edge, even on the road. Pick: 49ers

Ravens at Dolphins, 1 p.m., CBS

Line: Ravens -6.5. Total: 38.5.

Whether the Ravens can continue to run roughshod over the entire N.F.L. with a scheme unlike anything the N.F.L. has seen since the 1950s will have to be determined another week. It’s hard to get any sense of a team’s quality when it is going up against a team like Miami, which seems more interested in compiling assets for the future than winning football games. The spread, however, is a bit excessive for a run-centric team like Baltimore going against an opposing quarterback, Ryan Fitzpatrick, who has been known to put points on the board. That makes things a bit of a coin flip, but Lamar Jackson will probably be trying to prove a point, and that may give Baltimore the edge it needs to cover. Pick: Ravens -6.5