XANDAMERE’S SHOWDOWN SLANT
Week 15 concludes with the Dolphins traveling to Pittsburgh for a 42.5 total game with the Steelers favored by a field goal. Miami has rebounded from an absolutely awful start with four straight victories, and one of those was even against a real NFL team as they beat the Bills in Week 10. The quality of opponents they’ve faced has been fairly mediocre in that time: the Bills, yes, but also the Commanders, the Saints, and the Jets. But, still, in that time, they’ve allowed no more than 17 points as their defense has really turned a corner and has been playing much better. The Steelers, on the other hand, are trending towards yet another 9-8 finish (especially if they lose this game) as it turns out 42-year-old Aaron Rodgers is not the answer they’ve been looking for at quarterback.
pittsburgh
On the Pittsburgh side, the backfield has been a real timeshare. Jaylen Warren is the ostensible lead back, but Kenneth Gainwell is right on his heels. In their last three games with no injury concerns, Warren has played a total of 86 offensive snaps while Gainwell has played 80. Warren has handled 36 carries and 7 targets to Gainwell’s 19 carries and 16 targets. Warren has a modest lead in total opportunities, but Gainwell leads in more valuable opportunities, with a huge lead in targets. On the season, Warren has 32 red zone opportunities to 31 for Gainwell (again, targets skewed Gainwell’s way while Warren leads in carries). These guys have very, very similar roles…Warren probably has a slight edge in touchdown equity, but Gainwell is also $2k cheaper. Assuming ownership is equal, I have a slight preference for Gainwell based on the significant salary discount, and I expect ownership to be pretty close. The Dolphins have been an awful run defense on the year, though the defensive improvements have been significant of late, holding Breece Hall, Devin Neal, and James Cook to modest performances. Still, part of their improvement has to do with winning games and thus game script working in their favor. If Pittsburgh wins, decent odds that one of the running backs is involved, and they deserve strong consideration in lineups that are built around a Steelers victory.
Showdown Ownership Projections!
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In the passing game, the Steelers are running out DK Metcalf and a smorgasbord of other random dudes at wide receiver. Calvin Austin was a full-time player earlier in the season, but his role has shrunk significantly of late, down to just 31% of the snaps last week. Roman Wilson looked like he might be showing some promise a few weeks ago, but was inactive last week so that the Steelers could instead play…wait for it…Adam Thielen and Marquez Valdes-Scantling. When your WR2 can’t hold off 35-year-old Adam Thielen, and however-old-he-is-but-he’s-bad-so-whatever MVS, yikes. Behind Metcalf, this is an extremely thin receiving corps. Metcalf, despite being the unquestioned WR1, is still only putting up a 23.3% target share (though a nicer 39.3% air yards share, even though is aDOT is a mediocre 10.4 yards. That tells us that this is a very, very short area passing offense). Metcalf is okay. He’s too expensive, frankly, for his role given the low passing volume of this offense and his meh target share, but he’s also the only real dependable pass catcher, so he’s definitely in play. I’m not excited to play him and will probably be underweight the field a bit, but he’ll be in my player pool.
All of the other wide receivers – literally all of them – are dart throws. Thielen and MVS each had 1 target (out of 34 dropbacks!) last week – surely they’ll see larger target shares at some point, but these are the two other main wide receivers, and there just isn’t any reasonable volume projection to be had here. Of the two, MVS carries more ceiling as he’s always been a deep threat guy and possesses a lot more per-target upside than Thielen, but both of these guys are thin. We’ll also see some WR4/WR5 snaps from whoever else is active. Last week, it was Ben Skowronek and Scotty Miller, but they played just 9 and 3 offensive snaps, respectively. I actually think Austin might go overlooked given his shrinking role, but he’s still on the field a decent bit, he still can catch a deep ball, and if people gravitate more towards MVS and Thielen as the new shiny things, he might get ignored. But, again, they’re all really thin options. Also worth noting is that the Dolphins have been better against wide receivers than tight ends, and while that sort of data point isn’t all that sticky given the nature of defense vs. position metrics, the extreme fragility of the Steelers wide receivers makes it enough for me to lean away from them.
At tight end, the Pats are running a rotation of Jonnu Smith, Pat Freiermuth, and Darnell Washington. Washington has been leading the position in snaps due to his blocking prowess and cleared the concussion protocol, so he’ll be playing in this one. Washington tends to play more against teams that blitz, and the Dolphins blitz at a high rate, so it’s reasonable to think he’ll be on the field a lot, but this spot is icky. Let’s do a quick side-by-side of the TEs in the passing game this season (note they’ve all played in every game):
- Freiermuth: 204 routes, 9.4% target share, 5.3 yard aDOT, 7 red zone targets
- Jonnu: 233 routes, 11.8% target share, 4.4 yard aDOT, 6 red zone targets
- Washington: 146 routes, 8.8% target share, 6.5 yard aDOT, 7 red zone targets
Sooo yeah. These guys are all super close to each other. They’re also all priced within $400. Looking around the industry, the consensus is that Jonnu has the lowest points projection, which is interesting given that he’s run the most routes and has the highest target share. Even if the projections were right, I’d still be interested in Jonnu, as given those projections, he’ll probably be the lowest owned of the trio, but I think there’s a decent chance the projections are wrong, given the target shares. I’ll take Jonnu as my favorite here, and I like him better than any of the cheap Steelers wide receivers, too, but to be clear, this is a slight lean. Everyone behind Metcalf is volatile, and I wouldn’t advocate smashing the lock button on any of them.
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