 What's going on everybody? Welcome to week 15. Pretty crazy week. A week full of injuries in COVID news that honestly makes it extremely difficult to break down the weekend. Tonight we still have some issues as far as injuries and COVID news goes but this weekend I know I'm going to get a lot of start-sick questions and frankly the answer for a lot of them will be I don't know yet and we'll just have to track the news but welcome on in to the Thursday Night Football Fandall Fantasy Q&A. I'm your host Brandon Gadoula from the Managing Editor at Numberfire.com. You can find all of my content over at Numberfire and specifically for tonight I took on the single game preview. So I have some detailed notes, some simulations are up there in that article talking about some trends that I'll go over here as well but that's a good reference for tonight and then for the weekend I have a start-sick column and if this is anybody's first time talk about this often but my start-sick column looks at basically every relevant fantasy football asset and goes through the odds that they finish at a certain threshold. That's for quarterbacks and tight ends. It's top 12 weeks. There are odds to be a top 12 performer for running backs and receivers. It's top 24. Now a lot of that is going to change based on the news that we've gotten. I'll need to make updates to that. I'll do my best to keep that as updated as I can but again I know I'm going to get start-sick questions even though we're focused on the single game slate for Thursday night. I'm going to try to keep that updated. I'll tell you to go there. Check that out as I can update stuff. Check out the Player News section on Number Fire. Have the Fandal Scout app to get push notifications sent to you. It's just one of those weeks. There's not a whole lot we can do. I mean we can kind of try to read the tea leaves but for the most part this week is going to come down to being really proactive to the news. I think that kind of covers the editorializing that I feel like I need to contextualize how this next half an hour is going to go because again I'm going to do my best. I can run some stuff through the simulations but we find out a player's rolled out. That's going to change things. I'm going to do my best so just bear with me. The COVID list is long. The injury list is long. It's just one of those weeks where there's no way around it. So get those questions in. I see a whole bunch of questions coming in already. You can hit up the chat on YouTube, Facebook, Twitter or Twitch for questions pertaining to tonight's single game slate. This weekend as well I'm focusing primarily on the Thursday night slate and as always I will start there and then branch out and see where the questions take us. So get those questions in. I see a bunch rolling in but I'm going to start as always. Kind of get the base level stuff out of the way. Look at the game from a top-down perspective for tonight. We get the Chiefs the Chargers. It's a second time around Divisional Match if they played early in the year over under here 54. The spread is three in favor of the Chiefs on the road. It's going to be a high-scoring game. It should be a high-scoring game based on that total. It should be a close game based on that spread. Of course, crazy things happen but honestly it's shaping up to be both of those. I think high-scoring back and forth, tons of fantasy points and that's going to determine the way that we build our lineups for tonight. I'll jump over to my spreadsheet here. Look at some match-up stuff. The past defenses overall pretty middling so we don't have to avoid either past defense. We don't have to feel like we need to target either past defense with the quarterbacks. Of course the quarterbacks both Patrick Mahomes and Justin Herbert have really high salaries. You can roster them both together but it's really restrictive with what else you can do in your lineups. So talk about that if we have questions there. The rushing match-ups much better. Both teams just bottom tier in terms of rushing success rate allowed to running backs. The Chargers give up a ton of expected points on the ground. Tons of adjusted fantasy points per carry allowed on the ground. It's the way that they built their defense. The less you run on them with the attempt to limit the past which primarily comes against receivers. They're second in adjusted fandal points per target. So what this number does is it actually adjusts on a player level basis. So I go through and we know that targets again from Tyree Kill are different from targets thrown to Byron Pringle. Not trying to throw Byron Pringle on the bus but it adjusts on a player level basis and with that the Chargers have been really good against receivers but weak against tight ends and I think that's relevant for tonight with Travis Kelsey. And then the final thing I like to do from just that sort of game level preview is look at the pace and pass rate of each team. Both teams play pretty quickly. Both are top 12 in pace according to the data that I use which looks at each side's pre snap win probability whenever it's between 20 and 80 percent kind of weeds out that garbage time number. Both teams like to play pretty fast run a lot of plays and both pass heavy both ranking top eight in the NFL in pass rate. Now high total tight spread. What does that typically mean for a single game slate single game off those what do they look like. I pulled since 2019 games that fit you know this type of mold total of over 50 spread between one and five points so that tight spread there what happens what's most likely to happen. Quarterbacks still the most likely by far opposition to finish as the MVP makes sense. There's enough points to go around for quarterbacks to rack up multiple touchdowns passing which is what quarterbacks typically need for a really huge game from a fandal standpoint. Running backs drop by about nine percentage points here in terms of their odds of finishing as the optimal MVP. I think we can feel pretty good with this number here tonight simply because Austin Eckler is expected to play but have his workload limited. The chiefs employed a three man committee last week although I think there are reasons to like Clyde Edwards you layer not really any of those guys shaping up to be great MVP picks as primary plays. I'm not going to talk anybody out of playing Austin Eckler as the MVP but again reports are that he will be limited tight ends just always a low probability it's a little bit different with Travis Kelsey but even whenever he's in these single game slates doesn't really finish as the MVP very often and then for wide receiver we see about a five percentage point boost to receivers being the optimal MVP again makes sense enough points enough touchdowns to go around for receivers to overtake running backs and be you know better plays than the full sample of single game slates. One thing that's really interesting is that the favorite and the underdog have come up with I think it's a sample of 76 games yet the same amount of MVPs and optimal add-ups that's down from 59% usually for favorites it's half and half here and the one number that really jumps out to me is that underdog quarterbacks are the best sort of play in comparable games to what we have tonight that is really appealing for Justin Herbert I'm just going to leave that out there. Kickers I always like to talk kickers a little bit less likely than average to finish in in the optimal lineup still about you know over a 10 finish as or finish inside the optimal lineup let me turn off my wifi here I think I'm lagging a little bit and then whenever the underdog does come or whenever the MVP does come from an underdog side it is very very heavily very often that quarterback so I think Justin Herbert makes for a really standout play tonight from an MVP standpoint I'll pull up the simulation results these are based in number fires projections I simulated out the slate 10,000 times to see how likely players are to finish inside the top five with the most fandal points pull up some touchdown props because really touchdowns drive a lot of scoring in all games but on a single game slate touchdown odds are something that we should really consider so love this game the pace the pass rate the over under should be a lot of points I think the best play at MVP is Justin Herbert I think I'm going to be a little bit light on Austin Eckler because of the reports that his workload will be limited and with that I will dig into questions all right starting at the top here grim fan on YouTube's asking who do we use for Lockett's replacement and we'll see them play Monday um okay so for Tyler Lockett's replacement I don't think there's going to be a one-to-one replacement for Lockett with him on the COVID list if we're looking for a big beneficiary honestly it's probably DK Matt Kaff because DK Matt Kaff's volume has really been down while the team is just focused on Tyler Lockett I think the secondary beneficiary is Gerald Everett who I talk about quite often on the NFL heat check podcast I do with Jim Sonos previewing the main slate the full slate of Fandall games I think he's in a good spot to be a safe volume bet for this week if we're looking for you know outside of those guys who gets a boost probably going to be DS Gridge he's been playing more and more snaps as a rookie came on slow I would say that he's the guy with the best chance of you know really overperforming because Tyler Lockett's out I do think that it's still good for DK Matt Kaff from a volume standpoint but one thing always to keep in mind is that efficiency bumps down whenever you take good players off the field that's something that we should be a little bit worried about um with the Seahawks offense especially with you know frankly Tyler Lockett being the driver for a lot of that efficiency and then as for Thielen they play Monday this would have been the first week or first day of the week that Minnesota had a practice report from what I'm seeing Thielen did not practice and it doesn't really sound like there's any indication that he's going to play Monday that's the best I can do reading again reading those tea leaves doing my best um doesn't sound like he'll play so probably another big role for KJ Osborne another question from Grimfan how does Matt uh Metcalfe's value um how is Metcalfe's value affected by Lockett being out again we should see better volume for DK Matt Kaff which really hasn't been there um but I would honestly anticipate decrease in offensive efficiency with Tyler Lockett off the field that leads to fewer red zone chances fewer touchdown chances for DK Matt Kaff so for him specifically it might honestly work out to a wash where he needs more volume anyway than he's been getting and he's good enough uh to generate touchdown chances himself so I would say it's not really a huge bump but for the other guys like even like a DS Gridge Rashad Penny I think it's I think it's a downgrade for this offense pretty easily uh Grim okay uh question for tonight Grimfan's asking value for Hardman would you play a kicker does Kelsey finally break out of his touchdown drought okay a lot of questions here um I will start from the first question here I made a note in my Thursday night helper on again Number Fire Miko Hardman's role has just been getting worse he's not really their number three that's now Byron Pringle um that's been the case in two post-buy games uh Pringle let me see here 72 percent route rate in two post-buy games to Marcus Robinson 56 uh 58 percent Josh Gordon was at 32 percent but he's on the COVID list I think he's technically not really out yet but he almost literally can't play kind of be a miracle but even he is over Miko Hardman who's run 28 percent of the route so I don't really like Miko this uh for tonight I would rather go with Byron Pringle um I'm kind of just down on Hardman running as like that'd be the fifth receiver behind even um just Pringle and Robinson as well as Tyra Kill and Travis Kelsey you play a kicker tonight again it's really not what we see it's not more likely it's not terrible these aren't terrible odds um if you want to go double quarterback uh if you do that I think you're like 8800 left for your yeah on average I mean it's doable um I would I'm not really into the kickers tonight that much just because there are enough producers I'm much more likely to go with a one quarterback play and assume that you know Tyree, Kelsey, Keenan, Mike Williams, Clyde Edwards, DeLair these guys have enough points where you can't really miss out on them just to get to both quarterbacks and then drop it down for like you know seven eight points from a kicker not really how I'm going to play it but if it makes a perfect lineup work for you not against it and then for Kelsey I made another note in my primer on um Numberfire his red zone role has been really weird he's at a 15% red zone share and a 6% end zone target share Tyree Kill by contrast is at 26% and 35% respectively I don't know what it is I tweeted about this a few weeks ago um one of my few tweets in the season but they're not throwing the ball to Travis Kelsey in the end zone it's a you know straight up regression says the whole score soon the usage has been really worrisome so I don't want to just say like yeah you know look at Travis Kelsey in his game log he's going to score eventually like he's going to we know that he's good enough but the usage is really really strange so I'm not necessarily looking at like this is a must situation for Travis Kelsey that being said um again it's a much better tight end matchup against the Chargers than it is for receivers so I like Kelsey tonight I'm just not saying he's like a lock for a touchdown due to regression because the the usage of the red zone role has been really really really strange for a player of his caliber um Chris is saying Vikings bears minus three and a half what do you think um um that's not a game I've really dug into but for me I'm going to go to the Vikings there I don't really like what the bears have going on um Justin Fields still not quite where I want them to be um again that's a Monday night game so I'm not quite that far ahead um but yeah I would lean Vikings there um of the two uh DG's asking Miko Hardman or Jared Cook on Facebook yeah so that's again goes back to um just the role for Miko Hardman getting worse the role for Jared Cook with uh Keenan Allen coming back it's going to go down but his role has been like justifiable so for me it's going to be Jared Cook pretty easily uh between the two and I feel honestly pretty good about that um his red zone role has been fine uh with Keenan Allen back on the field it's going to help the offense move the ball better so I'm going to go Jared Cook there uh between those two Evan on YouTube is asking start three Echler CEH Mitchell Monti Jacobs thank you for the question that's a really good boy that's a really good one um um I'll pull up my start sit simulations here um I'll leave Echler there because he's already in this um that's a that's a so my assumption here is that these are these are all powered by number fires projections um I'm going to assume that Echler is in here despite the concerns of the limited workload I'm not looking at the the Sims I want to see what my my instincts say but my instincts are going to say Josh Jacobs I don't know I just don't know if Eli Mitchell is going to play um let me pull up that practice report this is such a good question I don't know if you have to risk it with Echler because the reports are just the of a limited workload and they probably don't need to run him into the ground so Eli Mitchell didn't practice Wednesday I don't I don't know um you're going to need to make a decision I'm going to say Jacobs Montgomery and then I'm going to put this one on you if you think Austin Echler is going to play a full workload play him if you think that he's really going to be limited I would go with Clyde Edwards E. Lair because Edwards E. Lair had eight of fourteen running back opportunities for the Chiefs in the first half before that game where they got out of hand last week um I don't want to say just wait and play Eli Mitchell because I don't think he's going to play um but Jacobs Montgomery I'm good with Echler it's just uh you know what the theme of the show has been stay tuned to the news keep keep tuned into the news see if we get any more clarity on just how good that workload's going to be um and if Echler is more than like 50% I would play him over Clyde Edwards E. Lair because his CEH's ceiling is probably about 50% of the snaps um so I don't want to overreact too much to Austin Echler um the projection's a little bit high for me from Number Fire but um I'll say Echler Jacobs Montgomery as of now unless we really find out that Echler will be severely limited tonight um sorry for the roundabout but you know sometimes you got to think think things through um you know for for an extra second um okay Evan's asking what about the CEH upside tonight um that's two group fans but uh I'm gonna I'm gonna stick I'm gonna stick with CEH here I'm gonna go to see what the Sims say for CEH so he's projected for 11 points um as a median not very likely to lead the Slade and Fandall points but again it's a dream matchup against the team that just invites you to run the ball against them and yes there was a three-man split between CEH Derek Gore and Dara Williams last week but again the the first half workload if you isolate that out really did favor Clyde Edwards E. Lair who did fumble on the goal line was out for a bit but came back in on the goal line or like on the sixth or whatever um which is where he found was like it was like deja vu uh you know kind of same play but he was back out there um at his his first half work again uh seven carries one target so eight of 14 opportunities he's got red zone work he should be the primary back so I think there is upside with Clyde Edwards E. Lair despite the limited snap rate okay um question from Ralph on Facebook pitman or penny in flex that's a good one um I'll assume half PPR here there's a lot of buzz around Rashad Penny and I frankly love Rashad Penny coming out of college but I think I'm going to go with Michael Pittman here uh I know I know that it's not the best defensive matchup but Michael Pittman has a really strong role um and you would think that the Patriots will do what they can to limit Jonathan Taylor and I think that will come at the expense of letting Michael Pittman be a little bit more freed up Rashad Penny I know broke out with really great results last week but his workload wasn't that phenomenal I know Alex Collins is now on uh the covid list Adrian Peterson should play probably just take on that Alex Collins role it's never fair to do this but if you take off like the the huge touchdown run for him it was a good day um it wasn't like an 85 snap rate day uh so I think that the the individual rushing matchup for him a lower implied team total taking Tyler lock it off the field probably making the offense worse I'm going to go with Michael Pittman there uh between the two um okay another see another question about CEH I think I talked about him enough Austin on twitch is asking if James Conner doesn't play who should I start at RB 2 Michael Carter supposed to play that's what I've seen as well we're going to pick up Eno to replace Conner if Edmunds doesn't return from IR um okay the Jets are also really depleted but I think you should so this is a tough one because I don't know who you have to drop to get that um that you know like to get the insurance of having you know Benjamin on your team that's a little bit tricky but I don't think that Michael Carter is a bad enough play to go against just saying play Michael Carter because when he was healthy he was their guy um he got tons of targets um I know quarterback change probably doesn't help him get a bunch of targets but I would say pick up Michael Carter and just go with uh with Carter if we get word that Conner uh doesn't go grim fans asking thoughts on Donald Parm tonight so let me check what exactly what he did last week um the issue is they're getting Keenan Allen back and that doesn't help him it's going to hurt uh Jaylen Geithen Josh Palmer as well let's isolate this just a week 14 Donald Parm just eight routes two targets that's not enough for me as in the role should get worse with Keenan back so personally I'm not going to get there I assume you're probably asking because the salary's low and he might make a two quarterback lineup work I'm not against it because Donald Parm still can and does get red zone work and if he scores that might be enough but really uh and this is one thing I want to do address is like if you're if you're trying to jam in both quarterbacks you're really making you're betting against these guys here you're betting against big games from them because if they put up you know 15 to 20 points you know so let's say two of them you're not going to have enough salary you're not going to have enough fandal points from the guys like Donald Parm to overcome that gap you're going to need multiple guys in this range with more affordable salaries than both quarterbacks so it's going to depend on the way that you play things I would not play Donald Parm without playing both quarterbacks and there are going to be a lot of like those sort of tertiary quaternary options down here um you know you might play like a Joshua Kelly and think that Eckler's not going to play a full workload Kelly or Justin Jackson might get other Jackson salaries higher 10,000 I think yeah 10,000 um like that's kind of the trade-off you have to make Parm by himself I'm not interested in unless you're really playing the angle that Keenan and Mike Williams just get basically blanked tonight. Harrison Butcher, Nick Folk love that I typically always go with the favorites in this spot and Butcher is projected for an extra fandal point kickers again they're not bad plays on high scoring slates they're just a little bit worse than average but they're also not better than average and this just goes back to like it depends on the overall roster construction that you're going for if you're saying that it's it's Herbert and Mahomes going back and forth but they just spread the ball out nobody really has a big game you want both of those quarterbacks with the kicker who's just nailing extra points maybe you know two field goals that game script does exist especially with teams that do spread things out you know with Travis Kelsey talked about the red zone and end zone equity issues Tyree kill you know they he can get limited the chargers do their best to limit downfield passing not the best week for Tyree kill to have a big game definitely wouldn't bet against it but this is my favorite part about single game DFS is I can look at the Sims and see what's most likely to happen that's always going to point me to quarterbacks at MVP almost always aside from like last week whenever it was very evenly split between you know Daven Cook, Dodgy Harris, other guys along with those low upside quarterbacks but you have to think things through with each lineup and just say what's the path for this lineup actually to lead this late and be the optimal lineup if you can't sell yourself on that try to make changes but the kickers I think do fit with a double quarterback lineup and you assume that you don't need to get back up to Tyree or Kelsey or Echler in that lineup okay um with your question from DJ asking with your question from Grimfan would you still recommend starting Kelsey so in a in season long absolutely um tonight yeah I still would I would still like Travis Kelsey I don't want to make it sound like I'm down on Travis Kelsey I usually am more up to date with my regression numbers um but Travis Kelsey has so this is about two four six eight like it's got one touchdown in his is past like 12 games or two touchdowns sorry it's past 12 games with the yardage even being down that's still not really enough touchdowns for the yardage in this sample um Travis Kelsey though his story does overperform in the touchdown column so you could say if you just look at his like his whole career he's just sort of averaging out but I don't think that's the case that the only drawback is like he's not getting red zone work to the degree that he usually is but again this is a much better matchup uh for him than it is for for Tyree Kill so I think that Travis Kelsey absolutely is in play I would not play him at MVP very often just because even someone as good as Travis Kelsey doesn't typically end up as the MVP in optimal lineups tight ends don't have generally as much yardage upside the way that you sell yourself on Kelsey as MVP as you say it's a lower scoring game um and a hundred yards in a touchdown is enough for him to lead this late if you think it's a full on shootout Kelsey probably doesn't have it have enough to outscore the quarterbacks in that type in that type of game so that's kind of where I'm with Kelsey I I'm I'm down on him but not to the point where I'm going to recommend you know not playing him in single game or especially not benching him in season long Shane's asking can I play Mike Williams Austin Echler Keenan Allen in the same lineup in season long ppr yeah absolutely you can do that um you want to play the best plays you can in season long those are all great plays um especially if you don't have any better options with Echler potentially being limited it's still a really good matchup for Echler on the ground and I wouldn't I wouldn't bump off of any of those guys just because they're all in the same lineup um Mike Mono's asking Mike Davis Craig Reynolds Durance Johnson Gainwell or Ty Johnson I know I know but here I am um okay yeah so I'm gonna say Mike I'm gonna say Mike Davis he's playing a lot of snaps he still has some red zone work there's a lot to Cordero Patterson but of those the best bet for snaps and some points gonna be Mike Davis um Barrett's asking what are your thoughts on Michael Carter and his upcoming weeks again Michael Carter was really featured in this Jets backfield when healthy I think that'll be the case again I don't know why why they would just go away from him um you know the Jets don't have a whole lot really to play for but it seems like they want to get him involved and see what he can do and I think that he'll be featured again it's just the issue with someone like Michael Carter is the offensive expectations will always be low but I do think that he's worth picking up if he's you know available on your waiver wire um and I think that he'll be a good sort of high-end flex I won't even call him a low end RB2 because he gets passing work and that matters even in standard scoring leagues um okay I see CEH here this will be the final question for tonight um James Connor CEH Echler Eli Mitchell AJ Dillon Aaron Jones start one flex to running backs in PPR so that's a little bit difficult with the uncertainty around Echler and Mitchell and Connor Aaron Jones did not practice today so I gotta pick three here I'll say I will say the first three um and if Connor doesn't play then we pivot to uh potentially AJ Dillon because Aaron Jones might not play so that'll do it for me um great questions uh for tonight got to talk a lot about game theory for the single game slate which I don't typically get to do a lot it's a my favorite part of doing these Q&As um but best of luck in your season long leagues I know it's tough I know there's a lot of injury news to try to keep up with just stay tuned uh check out the player news section on Number Fire and if you stay up to date you will have an edge in season long and in DFS so best of luck for tonight big thank you to Joy Affleck for producing the video side of this show uh let's hit a big stack you can follow me on Twitter at Kodola13 check out everything I do on Numberfire.com but um let's have a great game tonight and a better weekend in week 15