XANDAMERE’S SHOWDOWN SLANT
Week 8 closes out with the Commanders visiting the Chiefs for a 47.5 total game with Kansas City favored by a huge 12.5 points. The Chiefs offense, after being stuck in neutral for most of the last two years, has finally started rolling, scoring 28+ points in four straight games (and yeah, that included Baltimore and Las Vegas, but it also included Jacksonville and Detroit). The Commanders, meanwhile, once again find themselves without Jayden Daniels and will turn to Marcus Mariota, who guided the team to scores of 41 (against Las Vegas) and 27 (against Atlanta) in his two starts this year. The Chiefs are extremely likely to put up points. The Commanders looked pretty solid under Mariota twice already. Can they do it again and keep up, or will they get stomped at Arrowhead?
KANSAS CITY
On the Chiefs side of things, the backfield remains a frustrating split. Isaiah Pacheco is the ostensible lead back, but after seeing a season-high 77% of the snaps in Week 6, he dipped down to 56% in Week 7. Now, some of that was due to blowout as Pacheco saw just 2 fourth quarter carries while Brashard Smith saw 11 of his 14 carries in the fourth, but that still means Pacheco saw “only” 13 carries in the first three quarters to go along with 2 targets. I say “only” because the game was an absolute blowout with the Chiefs dominating time of possession and play volume (the Raiders ran only 29 offensive plays), which makes Pacheco’s touch count look inflated. Still, he did see his most carries of the season and scored a touchdown. The downside is that it also bumped his Showdown price up from $4k on the last Chiefs island game to $7k this week. In a tough matchup against the Commanders, I’m mostly off here. Yes, the Chiefs could dominate the game, but $7k Pacheco is very different from $4k Pacheco, and he hasn’t put up a score all year that would make you feel good about playing him at his current price. Kareem Hunt was injured during the game last week, didn’t practice Thursday, then got in a limited practice on Friday, but also had an ankle injury added to his injury report. He’s also been ineffective all year. So…who knows here. I don’t get the Chiefs fascination with him. He’s no longer good on the ground and they aren’t even using him as a pass catcher with just 8 targets on the year. Smith, on the other hand, has seen his role grow lately. Yes, most of the carries came in garbage time last week, but he also has target counts of 4, 3, 4, and 5 in the last four games. At $4k, I’d rather play him than Hunt, personally, as it’s at least possible his role could be on the upswing and the passing game work has value in PPR formats. Overall, though, the Chiefs backfield remains what it has been all year: mostly a place to stay away from.
Showdown Ownership Projections!
Ownership updates automatically
In the passing game, Rashee Rice made his return, promptly scored 2 touchdowns, and then only played 41% of the snaps because the Raiders rolled over and died. So it’s hard to know how things are really going to shake out in this receiving corps, but one thing we can look at is the data around snaps and routes just through the first three quarters of the game:
What seems obvious is that Rice and Xavier Worthy are the two main guys, with Rice the 1 and Worthy the 2. The Chiefs clearly made an effort to get Rice involved early and often with a massive 10 targets (8 of which came in the first half). At $9,600, he’s expensive but not really priced like a true WR1, but he is one. He had a 24/288/2 receiving line last year in just three games. It’s odd to say a guy at $9,600 in Showdown is underpriced, but Rice should really be at least $10k in true alpha WR territory. Worthy still has upside, I believe, with Rice back. Rich hurts his target share (of course), but it also helps the overall efficiency of the offense and should free Worthy up to run more deep routes. Worthy is very, very fast, and he profiles as a deep threat receiver but hasn’t been able to be used as such because of Rice’s absence. I think we’ll see him move into that role, which gives him strong per-target upside in a positive matchup against a Washington secondary that has been burned by deep passing all season (remember Tre Tucker?). Worthy also played 71% of the snaps in the first three quarters of last week’s game (before the Chiefs started resting starters), while no other wide receiver even reached the 50% mark. I expect Rice will pass 50% this week, but Worthy should still be on top. All of this is to say that I think Worthy is still extremely playable even with Rice’s return. It looks like JuJu Smith-Schuster, Marquise Brown, and Tyquan Thornton will all have some kind of split roles. I think JuJu is probably at the highest risk of losing snaps as Rice’s playing time increases, but I could be wrong here. Thornton’s skillset fits the matchup and gives him the best per-target upside of the trio, while Brown is still fast and capable with the ball in his hands, while JuJu is more of a “catch and get tackled” kind of guy with a modest aDOT. That’s the order in which I’d rank this group.
At tight end, Travis Kelce led the Chiefs pass catchers in snaps and routes in the first three quarters last week, but it resulted in just 3 targets. Kelce’s usage is likely to remain very modest as they try to take it easy on him until the playoffs. As his price has dipped down to $8k, he’s still at least in the player pool, but personally, I’m not high on him for any games in which the Chiefs look likely to dominate as long as Rice and Worthy are both healthy. I just think they’re going to look to their younger pass catchers to carry the team throughout the regular season whenever possible. TE2 Noah Gray has been on the field a ton but isn’t seeing much usage when he’s there – he has games of 5 and 6 targets earlier in the season but otherwise has just 5 total targets in the year’s other five games.
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