Every Saturday morning, I'll take a quick look at all the week's games, offering my own brief take on what I think will happen, as well as touching on significant injury news since our Weekly came out. I'll check in every so often over the course of the day to answer lineup questions, too.
What follows is a brief look at all the games with how I'd react in my own lineups to injury developments or other news. The official rankings are the ones in the Weekly. Those take precedence. But sometimes players are very close, and in those cases I'm glad to offer opinions on how I'd approach those situations. Sometimes I like certain players more or less than Ian, and sometimes I have different risk tolerance with injuries etc. If I don't get to your question, either I missed it (it happens) or the rankings are very clear.
Kansas City at Denver: Kansas City needs to win to have a shot at the No. 1 seed. They also need the Titans to lose to Houston, but hey that's actually happened. No Clyde Edwards-Helaire, helping Darrel Williams, and Denver is missing several key defenders and probably doesn't care about this one, helping the passing game, plus at least some coaches will and should be fired. The Kansas City offense should be very good. I'm mostly just hoping Javonte Williams gets through this one healthy since I have him in dynasty.
Dallas at Philadelphia: I don't know what the NFL was thinking making this the primetime game on Saturday night. They didn't move it until after they knew the situation: largely meaningless for both teams. What's the point in moving games at all if you're going to move this one? Having said this, I need to come up with an alternative game that they could have moved, and I suppose it needs to be an NFC game since the other one is AFC? That might have been a consideration. And if you move Seahawks-Cardinals, and the Cardinals lose, the Rams don't have the same motivation. Tricky. But I think they could have done better than this, where Cowboys starters might play a series or two (at most) and the Eagles probably aren't going to play anyone. We'll see, but I'm staying well clear of this thing in single-game competitions. I'd consider Gardner Minshew, that's about it.
Packers at Lions: Green Bay might open with starters like Aaron Rodgers and Davante Adams, but those guys probably won't play for long. Even a half could make them viable in fantasy leagues, but risky to rely on them -- exactly why most fantasy leagues played their Super Bowl last week. Certainly don't expect to see Aaron Jones and probably AJ Dillon either. For Detroit, committee backfield, modest passing game most likely. Amon-Ra St. Brown needs 197 yards for 1,000? Eh, probably not.
Colts at Jaguars: It would very much be the Colts and Carson Wentz to come out and stumble their toes here, enabling the Ravens or Steelers to maybe sneak into the playoffs. But how? The Jaguars don't score points and haven't stopped opposing offenses much all season. Clinging to the Bills struggling here and the Colts not winning in Jacksonville since 2014...well, not me. Colts should win comfortably.
Football Team at Giants: Antonio Gibson is playing and has a chance at 1,000-yard rushing season, so maybe Washington helps him get it. Terry McLaurin even closer to 1,000. It's a 17-game season now so 1,000 yards isn't what it used to be and I'm definitely uncomfortable about NFL records being set with one extra game, but what are you gonna do. The 14-game season guys had to live with 16-game players breaking their records, so I guess the 16-game guys have to too. I like both defenses here, particularly Washington facing Jake Fromm only starting because New York has no other choice. Not that injured Mike Glennon wouldn't have been a great matchup.
Bears at Vikings: The Matt Nagy and Mike Zimmer stars have sure fallen. Meaningless game, coaches going to be fired, Justin Fields not available. I suppose this could be a game with huge numbers for David Montgomery and Dalvin Cook, but I think it's also possible both teams say, would suck to get these guys hurt in Week 18, let's dial it back a little. That's where my mind would be as a Bears or Vikings fan, anyway. But I guess we need to assume they'll play it straight and those guys will put up good numbers.
Titans at Texans: Houston has been competitive in some games and beat Tennessee earlier, so maybe. Titans haven't been so strong to say they can't come out flat and lose to a bad team, since they've done it a couple of times this year. But I'll go ahead and recommend D'Onta Foreman and A.J. Brown anyway, and heck maybe Julio Jones gets through a game healthy, but not a great track record. Houton has secured Rex Burkhead for 2022, making some great team-building moves there. But maybe he's a great locker room guy. In any case, might be a competitive game, both teams should be playing hard.
Steelers at Ravens: One of these teams can actually go to the playoffs if the right things happen elsewhere, but of course the Colts losing at Jacksonville is the key one, which is unlikely. Baltimore stopped playing with confidence about a month ago, no Lamar Jackson, and not much else of note. But these teams typically play close games and this will probably be another one. Diontae Johnson cleared the COVID list in 2 days, which proves you really can't count anyone out if they land it under the ever-shifting protocols. Steelers seem a little more likely to put together a good game, but if the Colts go up 17-0 in their game, well, the emotion will disappear from this one fairly quickly.
Bengals at Browns: What I talked earlier about the Vikings and Bears maybe doing with their franchise running backs; the Browns started doing it with Nick Chubb on Monday night. I don't think we can count on any Browns getting a heavy workload. I don't really understand the drama around Baker Mayfield and the Browns entering the offseason. He was a disappointment. The entire offense was a disappointment. Might the Browns want an upgrade, sure, but better quarterbacks are hard to come by. Might Mayfield want a different offense, sure, but other teams aren't going to be beating down his door like he's Matthew Stafford. A divorce is possible, but finding great quarterbacks isn't easy, nor is finding takers for disappointing former No. 1 overall picks. Bengals will be resting starters in this game, if I were interested in anyone it might be rookie Chris Evans more than Samaje Perine, Evans seems more likely to be featured.
49ers at Rams: Hey, it's a good game! Sounds like the 49ers are going to start Jimmy Garoppolo, or at least try to. Or they want the Rams to think they're going to. Tricky. Can't start him, and can't start Trey Lance unless Jimmy G is inactive. Receivers and main running backs from both teams look good, also tight ends, kickers and defenses. Definitely interested in this game, and we'd all (or most) rather see San Francisco in the playoffs than New Orleans.
Panthers at Buccaneers: Tampa Bay is playing for a higher seed, which is worthwhile (being the No. 2 probably means an extra home game). So I think they'll play starters. Bruce Arians was talking up KeShawn Vaughn this week, who will likely start at running back. I'll go along with it, and the Bucs don't have much choice unless they want to start LeVeon Bell, but my impression of Vaughn every time I see him play is bad. Opportunity counts for a lot, but I wouldn't be pursuing Vaughn in dynasty leagues or anything. Carolina, eh, they might mix and match quarterbacks and running backs in this one and probably get smoked. DJ Moore the only healthy wideout and still doesn't look great with what the team has at quarterback.
Seahawks at Cardinals: Seattle showed some life last week and maybe that will be there again. Better defense here, though. Arizona has to win to get a home game, if the Rams lose, so should be playing hard. James Conner at running back. Russell Wilson might be interested in putting more good stuff on tape, but he's going to have a market regardless if the Seahawks have decided to shop him. Which I hope they have, because it would be a lot more interesting than another year with Pete Carroll.
Saints at Falcons: Sounds like Kyle Pitts is playing and there's a rookie tight end receiving record out there, so that's of interest. Otherwise the Atlanta offense can be set aside. For New Orleans, Kamara and Hill and Callaway, sure, the Falcons defense doesn't do much in resistance. The fact that New Orleans is such a reasonable candidate to make the postseason is frankly alarming. I haven't looked too closely, but I think there's a chance they'd open at... Tampa Bay? Which is winnable. Or maybe the Rams, since LA needs to win to get the Saints in. Whatever. League didn't do us any favors by adding a seventh playoff team or a 17th game.
Patriots at Dolphins: Patriots will be playing to win, as usual, although they've struggled at times in Miami. But I expect they'll be running it plenty with Damien Harris first and Rhamondre Stevenson next, and probably finishing with good numbers. Miami's offense will go with the committee backfield and throwing a lot of passes to Jaylen Waddle, who's about the only viable option. Midseason me liked Mike Gesicki, but his heavy involvement was a long time ago. Supposed to rain in this one, so even more to argue against the passing games.
Jets at Bills:Bills should win this one fairly easily. Strange things happen all the time, but I think more likely than a loss we get just a fairly disappointing offensive performance in like a 24-10 win or something. But start your Bills. Jets have Jamison Crowder back and Braxton Berrios out, and Michael Carter looking to finish strong at running back. Bills have everyone but Emmanuel Sanders against a bad defense.
Chargers at Raiders: League caught a break with this matchup determining a playoff spot in the AFC. Both teams better on offense than defense and both better passing it than running it, so I'm expecting an entertaining, higher scoring game, and I'm interested in the skill guys from both teams. A little bit too much written this week about both teams being able to get in with a tie. So what, they're not going to tie, there's no incentive to anyone to try to tie rather than win, ties just happen on occasion by chance. Raiders have Jacobs and Waller as game-time decisions. Uh, there's no tomorrow, I think they're going to give it a go.
Enjoy the games? Eh there are some good ones at least.