There were a lot of upsets on Sunday. Teams with potential playoff spots on the line (Bears, Colts, Panthers) losing to teams with little to no hope of finishing over .500. The Packers somehow losing at home to the Cardinals. Stars re-injuring previous injuries. Just a surprising Week 13 for a lot of teams and fantasy owners (and remember, the Saints got shut out for most of the game a few days earlier). Rough week.
Ravens at Falcons: Ravens defense really good. Falcons playing out the string without a lot of enthusiasm here. Lamar Jackson missed a chunk of this game while being checked for a concussion but was cleared to return. Ravens aren't too exciting but they're looking in good shape for a playoff spot. They could still win the AFC North. Austin Hooper about the only Falcon who helped you. Gus Edward nice rushing numbers, but receiving numbers go to Ty Montgomery and touchdown goes to his quarterback. Again.
Broncos at Bengals: I actually went back last week to see how long Phillip Lindsay was available in my dynasty leagues last summer. A long, long time; late August. Big oversight by all of us, but hey, big oversight by the entire NFL. Anyway, huge game by Lindsay, as expected. A.J. Green aggravated his foot injury during the game, a little reminder for all of us that it's risky starting guys coming off injury. But he's A.J. Green and he was supposedly healthy! What can you say. Burned. Broncos look like they're going to the playoffs. Bengals look like they're cooked. Matt LaCosse, just the latest tight end I've started this year to take a zero. Not the first.
Rams at Lions: Rams offense didn't quite put up the kind of numbers expected in this one, but they did make it to 30 on a second Gurley touchdown (after he stopped short of the end zone after a late breakaway run to help the team run more time off the clock). That Gurley, caring more about his NFL team than our fantasy teams. I don't actually have Gurley anywhere, and he did score anyway, but a nervous time for those who had him. Lions offense was understandably weak with all their best players injured or in Philadelphia. Decent game for Robert Woods.
Cardinals at Packers: This should put an end to articles like the one I saw last week about how Green Bay could go on a run and make the playoffs. And the speculation about when Mike McCarthy would be fired, since he already was. Green Bay underutilized the run (11 carries for Aaron Jones, 50 pass attempts for Aaron Rodgers) against a bad run defense in poor conditions. Couldn't stop Josh Rosen from making desperation heaves for clutch completions. Let Chase Edmonds score 2 TDs, I'm guessing he was started in 0.0% of leagues. Brutal. Like everyone, I was stunned that McCarthy was fired now. I'm with Tony Dungy: bad way to treat a Super Bowl winning coach. It's not like Joe Philbin is going to coach this team next season.
Browns at Texans: So Houston's really good, and I guess you can wonder if all the talk this week about whether Baker Mayfield should or shouldn't have ripped Hue Jackson was maybe a bit of a distraction. Didn't help anyway, Mayfield threw a pair of early picks and the Browns fell into a big hole. Fortunately Nick Chubb punched in a garbage-time score, and he's about the only Brown you should have been starting anyway. DeAndre Hopkins had a good game, Texans win big. Not much out of Demaryius Thomas, though, even with Keke Coutee out.
Colts at Jaguars: In a week of upsets, this was a shocker, considering Andrew Luck had just owned this defense a couple of weeks back. Instead he and the Colts got shut out in a game that they'll point to if they ultimately miss the playoffs. A crusher. Eric Ebron and T.Y. Hilton finished with some fantasy production, but everyone else let you down. So did the Jaguars offense, of course, but this was the defense they were supposed to have all season. Peaking at the wrong time, you might say.
Bills at Dolphins: Well hey the Bills did beat the spread. Didn't win, because they're not that good, but neither is Miami. Zay Jones is tearing it up lately; caught 2 TDs and was wide open for another but Josh Allen simply missed an easy throw. Kenyan Drake scored, I still don't regret not starting him. Josh Allen a fantasy star with 231 passing yards, 2 TDs, and 135 rushing yards. Crazy. That's two fewer rushing yards than Ryan Tannehill had passing yards, but Tannehill had a 3rd passing TD and got the win. Game was even uglier than you might have expected.
Bears at Giants: So the Bears did everything they could to lose this one and still almost won. Gave up trick play touchdowns. Fumbled repeatedly. Threw a pick six to a guy near the line of scrimmage. Chase Daniel might know Matt Nagy's system really well, but I'm thinking there are about 25 other backup quarterbacks in the league who could have won this game. When the Giants let the Bears blunder down the field, score, and recover an onside kick and then march down and score again, I actually thought the Bears should have gone for 2. Because the odds of Daniel actually leading another drive in OT were so remote. They kicked for the tie, and lost in OT. Saquon Barkley had some amazing runs. Both teams had touchdowns thrown by non-quarterbacks, which looked wise given the quarterback play. Bears hope to get Trubisky back next week. The world hopes for it.
Panthers at Bucs: Were all of the early games upsets? Not all, but most, including this one. When the Bucs play well, like they did here and did at times early in the season, you think, coaching is a much bigger problem with this team than talent. Carolina melted down with a series of Cam Newton interceptions. Panthers have lost four straight and what at one point looked like a certain playoff team no longer does. But hey the NFC might put at least one .500 team in as a wildcard, why not Carolina. Big game for Christian McCaffrey, again. Devin Funchess caught a touchdown and had another erased by a penalty, disappointing for those who started D.J. Moore. Oh, and Greg Olsen left with a foot injury. Adam Humphries scored again, a little toss from about 10 feet away.
Kansas City at Raiders: I said a few weeks back that the Raiders have been surprisingly competitive despite their low level of ability, and that continues. Gotta give Jon Gruden credit for that if nothing else. And maybe even with the bye, both the Rams and Kansas City had a bit of a hangover after their last game. Plus KC had some distractions this past week. Not a great game for Spencer Ware and the team is talking about a possible committee going forward. Patrick Mahomes still putting up big passing numbers, with Travis Kelce the main beneficiary this time. Couple of near-miss plays involving Tyreek Hill; could have had a couple of long touchdowns, instead he was a bust. The nature of Hill. Raiders will probably score 10 points against Pittsburgh next week, of course.
Jets at Titans: Play to the level of their competition is a fair description of the Titans most weeks. They're also just not that good, as they showed today. They pulled out the win because there's some grit in them and some choke in New York, that's about it. Both of these teams are really tough to enjoy both for NFL and fantasy purposes. Wideouts have busy games and score one week and then don't even catch a pass the next; it's difficult to project with any degree of accuracy. Titans kind of on the outskirts of playoff contention; hopefully we're all spared that this season.
Vikings at Patriots: When it was still a game, there were a pair of end-zone plays on a series where it kind of sort of looked like the Patriots got away with blatant pass interference and it wasn't called. My main takeaways from this game were that Dalvin Cook looked really good and should have got more work, and that the Patriots are awfully tough to beat up in Foxboro, so KC needs to hold onto the AFC's top seed like grim death. Vikings currently on the outside looking in for the playoffs and they have to play in Seattle next week, so things don't look great right now.
49ers at Seahawks: So another one of those "player aggravated ankle injury in pregame warmups" affected Matt Breida this week. What are players doing in warmups that are so damaging these days? Anyhoo, you got burned with Breida thanks to that. Plus San Francisco is severely outclassed by a really good Seattle team. Chris Carson was having a good day until leaving with a finger injury; Rashaad Penny a good day as the No. 2. Pete Carroll says Carson will be fine, but we all know he'd have said that even if Carson's arm had fallen off during the game. Some nice garbage-time production for San Francisco, and while no one should be buying Nick Mullens, Dante Pettis and Jeff Wilson are in the discussion to come into some fantasy value, perhaps, the rest of the way. Especially Wilson if Breida misses time; looked good running the ball and caught 8 passes.
Chargers at Steelers: What a game. In the first half, those of us starting key Chargers were just hoping they didn't get blown out so badly the team didn't decide to give Philip Rivers an early seat. It looked that bad for them, with their offense unable to do anything and the Steelers marching up and down the field. But then LA got a gift touchdown pass on an obvious false start penalty that the officials somehow missed, and it was a game. And then a Rivers to Keenan Allen touchdown occurred on a pass that bounced off two colliding Steelers. And a punt return. And a clutch drive for a field goal which the Chargers actually made (on the third try). Just nuts. I have a Steelers fan friend who I'm afraid to even talk to this morning, so I won't. And oh yeah, Justin Jackson firmly took the handcuff job away from Austin Ekeler; he's your hot pickup this week (and he faces the Bengals in Week 14).
Monday, Monday: Big game for the NFC East and this playoff picture, but less fantasy impact (for my leagues) than I'd expected. Hard to believe Washington can hang around in the NFC for much longer with Colt McCoy at the reins (anyone else have to check themselves to make sure they've got Colt McCoy/Cody Kessler lined up with the right teams? No?). You keep waiting for the Eagles to look like the defending champs. Maybe this week. Eagles 27, Washington 17.