After considering all of the matchups for the weekend, Ian Allan settles on Julian Edelman as the best and safest of the receiver choices for Sunday's games.

Sorry for the delay on this. I had some other commitments that knocked me out of action for part of the day. (And then I've spent way too long over-analyzing it).

WIDE RECEIVERS:
I’m not going to spend a huge amount of time with the wide receivers. We’ve already settled on what we believe the passing attacks will do (see quarterbacks article). Now it’s just a matter of divvying up that production amongst the pass catchers.

The wide receiver rankings will flow out of the following team projections, which are almost identical to what appeared in the QB and TE stories. Contents continue to shift and settle as the week rolls by and I’m playing with things.

With the 49ers, it’s a three-man receiving group. We already talked about Vernon Davis, who’s caught over two thirds of their touchdowns. But they’ve also got Michael Crabtree, who was their receiving standout in the Green Bay game, going over 100 yards. And they’ve got Anquan Boldin, who went over 100 against Carolina. Any one of these three guys could be their best receiver in this game.

Davis is the best scorer of the game. That’s in stone. But for yards, we think Boldin and Crabtree are both better. Boldin has gone over 90 yards in five of his last eight games. He’s gone over 130 in two of his last three. In his last game at Seattle, Boldin caught only 1 pass for 7 yards. But he played nicely in the Week 14 game (6 for 93). We’re putting Boldin first in yards.

Crabtree, in our eyes, is very similar to Boldin. He missed most of the year, but he’s been coming on. He went over 100 yards in the Week 16 game against Atlanta, and then he had the big game at Lambeau. Overall, however, we’re talking about lesser passing stats for the 49ers, and production that will be split three ways.

Julian Edelman is the most clearly defined No. 1 option on any of the four teams. He’s their main guy, and they’re really pumping the ball to him. It was against Denver in Week 12 that the Patriots decided that Edelman, not Danny Amendola, was the guy best suited to fill the old Wes Welker slot role. Since that time, Edelman has caught 60 passes in seven games – over 8 catches per game. Exactly 80 yards per game in those seven (and not that the Patriots have been under 200 passing yards the last three weeks). If you’re in a PPR format, Edelman looks like an easy choice as the No. 1 guy. He’s caught 4 of the team’s 11 TD passes in those games, as well as a pair of 2-point conversions. We think it logically makes sense to slot him for over a third of their scoring potential. Edelman was huge in the earlier Denver game – 9 for 110 yards and 2 TDs.

Amendola is pretty ordinary. As they’ve started to use Edelman more, his role has decline. Amendola has averaged 52 yards in his last eight games, with no touchdowns. He’s been over 45 yards in only three of those eight games. Best we can say on his behalf is that with Chris Harris hurt, maybe that causes him to become a much bigger part of the game plan – maybe Tom Brady likes the matchups Amendola is in.

It’s possible that another New England receiver gets more involved. Aaron Dobson and Kenbrell Thompkins had some serviceable games early in the year. But the Patriots seem to have moved away from those guys. Maybe they’re not experienced enough? They’ve had injury problems, but combined they’ve caught only 3 passes in the last six games. They’re both practicing, so they should both at least play.

The Denver wide receivers are working with the biggest pie. Peyton Manning should finish with more yards and touchdowns than any other quarterback, so it’s more likely his receivers will post better numbers. But less than what we saw in the regular season. Manning is averaging over 340 yards and over 3 TD passes per game, but we’ve got him at 285 and 2.1 for this game (so those receiver numbers need to come down).

Demaryius Thomas and Eric Decker are the big yardage guys. They averaged 89 and 81 yards in the regular season. Trouble with Thomas, I think, is that the Patriots will stick Aqib Talib on him, and he’s pretty good. Talib won that battle in Week 12, with Thomas catching only 4 passes for 41 yards and a touchdown (in 9 targets). That was in Foxborough, though, and it was weather added, with the 22 degrees and 22 mph winds.

Decker and Wes Welker didn’t do much in that earlier game either. Decker caught only 1 pass for 5 yards (3 incompletions). Welker caught 4 of the 8 balls thrown his way, for 31 yards. They’re all going to be better in this one, but you can see the potential in that New England secondary – they know how to cover.

Welker averaged 60 yards in the regular season – about 20 fewer than either of the outside receivers. He has less downfield ability. Not a ton of difference between these guys as scorers. Thomas leads them with 15 TD catches. Decker has caught 11, but 8 of those have come in the last six games. Welker has caught 11, but he’s missed three games. When you toss in tight end Julius Thomas, all four of those guys have about a 25 percent chance of being the guy on any given touchdown pass.

With Seattle, I’m going with contingency rankings because I’m not sure if Percy Harvin will play. He didn’t practice on Wednesday or Thursday, so I’m not sure if he’ll pass the necessary series of concussion tests in time. He was their main wide receiver last week – the guy they were trying to feature. This week, though, even if he plays he will do so without having been on the practice field for at least two of the practices. I think that changes things.

If he plays now, Harvin becomes more of a “maybe he’ll be their best wide receiver” or “he’ll probably be their best receiver”. Would he return kickoffs? I’m not sure.

If there’s no Harvin, then we’re left mulling whether to go with Golden Tate or Doug Baldwin. They both caught 5 TDs in the regular season (about 19 percent of the team’s total for each of them). Tate averaged 56 yards. Baldwin averaged 49. Tate played one of his better games in the last San Francisco contest, catching 6 of the 8 passes thrown his way, for 65 yards. Baldwin caught 3 for 36 on 4 targets. In the Week 2 meeting, they both caught just 1 pass, but Baldwin’s went for 51 yards.

In the home game against San Francisco last year, Baldwin caught 4 passes for 53 yards and 2 TDs. Tate has the added dimension that maybe you get lucky and he returns a punt for a touchdown. Probably about a 5-8 percent chance of that happening.

With the boxscore of the Week 14 game here in front of me, I am reminded that Luke Willson caught 3 passes for 70 yards in that game, including a touchdown. I should have mentioned this in the tight ends wrap-up. So he’s another guy who might pop up and make an impact, especially if Harvin doesn’t go.

So rankings should look something like this. The “current” numbers for Seattle is where I’d slot them right now. The other numbers are where they’ll wind up once it becomes clear that Harvin will or will not play.

-- Ian Allan