What’s up Karma Nation! Welcome back to another edition of my Monday Night Football Showdown Throwdown Article. I hope you had an amazing week 7. Let’s cap off week 7 with tons of green on this Monday Night Football slate! Make sure if you haven’t already, subscribe to our NFL Core Plays. Showdowns are fun but make sure you get in on all our prop plays for these showdown slates. I usually run a prop cash play then GPPs for showdowns.
Showdown slates are different from normal slates and vary from site to site.
On DraftKings you have a CPT spot with a 1.5x multiplier, this is similar to FanDuel, the difference is the salary for the CPT scales 1.5x as well. On FanDuel, the MVP spot it does not. This will lead to more unique lineups and less ties for DraftKings compared to FanDuel. Which is one of the reasons why I prefer DraftKings showdown slates to FanDuel. On DraftKings you select five flex spots and one CPT, while on FanDuel you select four flex and one MVP.
Vegas totals
The Rams are 6-point favorites tonight against the Bears. With a 44.5-point game total.
Historical Matchup
Jared Goff has faced the Bears twice in his career so far.
11/17/19: Bears: 7 Rams: 17 Rams Spread: -5.5 O/U: 40.0
12/09/18: Bears: 15 Rams: 6 Rams Spread: -3.0 O/U: 51.0
Quarterbacks
We all know the home/road splits for Jared Goff in his career. He is a SoCal kid, that doesn’t play well outside of warm weather. Born in SoCal, went to school at Berkley, and now plays for the Rams. It doesn’t get more Cali than that. There is snow coming down this morning in Chicago, with near freezing weather for tonight. Goff would have been the easiest fade in the world, IF this game was in Chicago, and I would have gone all in on his under for props. Luckily for Goff, the Rams are the home team tonight. There is nice 70-degree weather at kick off for Goff. So, he should have no issues outside the matchup tonight. Goff may be without one of his favorite red zone targets tonight, Tyler Higbee, which could potentially lower his ceiling, as well as, a potential limited Robert Woods. Surprisingly, he has been much better on the road than at home. He is averaging 237.5 passing yards, putting one touchdown and one interception in two games at home. He is averaging 273.8 passing yards, putting up 9 touchdowns and 3 interceptions in 4 games on the road. The matchups haven’t even been bad, going up against the Cowboys, who have the worst defense in the league, and a banged-up 49ers defense. This isn’t even a get right spot for him tonight, as the Bears have one of the best defenses in the league. The Bears have the best defense in the league at preventing touchdowns in the red zone and that’s where 50% of his touchdowns this year have come from. Combine that with potentially losing his favorite red zone target, Tyler Higbee, who has three red zone touchdowns this year. We could easily see Goff struggle in a low scoring game. I would lean under on his fantasy props, but I still want to play him tonight in DFS, outside of the CPT and MVP spot. Even with a potentially rough game he will still be relevant in DFS with only 14 fantasy points scored.
Nick Foles has been bad since taking over for Mitch. Foles ranks 31st in fantasy points per drop back and 19th in total fantasy points. I am expecting a low scoring, slow paced game tonight, so I will be fading Nick Foles. Even after seeing Jimmy G get a bounce back, with only 0.33 fantasy points per drop back and these teams playing in a slow paced game, I don’t expect much from Foles. Especially with how good these teams are in the red zone, I really only expect one TD for Foles tonight. The Rams are only allowing 35 pass attempts on average, with Foles 62% completion rate, this should lead to around 21 completions for him. Chicago ranks 29th in the league with only 9.2 yards per completion. This should put him just shy of 200 yards. 200 yards and one touchdown is just not going to do it for me tonight.
Running Backs
The running back situation in LA is tough to judge all the time. They have three names that are relevant in the offense; Darrell Henderson, Malcolm Brown, and Cam Akers. Akers seems like the odd man out of the rotation, but the Rams could just be waiting for him to get fully healthy to run him. They didn’t use a second-round pick on him for nothing. This is going to be the second straight week of not being on the injury report for Akers. He saw 14 carries and one target on 24 snaps week one against Dallas. In his first game fully healthy last week, he didn’t even record a touch, with only one snap played. After playing 13 snaps and getting 9 carries for 61 yards the previous week against Washington. McVay still states that he is committed to a rotation for the Rams running backs. He just didn’t find a good opportunity to fit Akers in. For now, we just have to assume Henderson will see a majority of the touches and snaps for the Rams, but Akers is worth a low owned pivot off Brown and Henderson. I am sure that is where the DFS community will lean based off of past usage and being burned by Akers last week.
On the other side of the field, the Bears have a much easy backfield to decipher. Since Tarik Cohen went down with an injury in week 3, David Montgomery has dominated the backfield usage, seeing 5+ targets in each of the three games Cohen has missed so far this season. One of the issues with Montgomery has always been his lack of pass catching upside, but now that has changed with the absence of Cohen. Plus, the Bears are 6-point underdogs. Meaning there will be plenty more dump off opportunities for Montgomery tonight. So, those 5 targets could sneak up to 6 or 7. The Bears have yet to use another running back in this offense, instead they have used Cordarrelle Patterson as the backup. Which, who we all know his big play potential. He is always worth a flier in these showdown formats, with his big play upside. He is only $1,400 and if the Bears are struggling to get their offense going tonight, I could see them trying to manufacture touches for him.
Bears Pass Catchers
We all know how important Allen Robinson is to the Bears offense. He continues to amaze the football community with his production even with bad QBs. He has yet to play with an elite QB and still is able to put up top 10 WR numbers. Robinson is obviously Nick Foles favorite target. Since Foles took over as the true starter on this team week 4, Robinson has a massive 30% target share. He also accounts for 37% of the team’s air yards. Robinson also has a pretty easy matchup against Troy Hill, who is allowing the 15th highest catch% in the league at 75%. Robinson also has 4 inches and 30 pounds on him, which will help in the red zone. Robinson leads the team with 13 red zone targets, but has only hauled in 4 of those targets for one touchdown. He is due for some touchdown regression based on those numbers. Although, the Rams have been much better in the red zone at home than on the road. They are allowing a league best touchdown% of 25% at home, but unfortunately a league worst 90% red zone touchdown% on the road.
Let’s take a look at the secondary WRs on this team. Since Nick Foles has taken over, there are two guys that have very differing involvements in the offense before and after Nick Foles took over as the starter. Darnell Mooney vs Anthony Miller; who is the right play tonight? Since Foles has taken over; Mooney has 19 targets, which is a 16% target share, 273 air yards, which is 31% if the air yards, converting that into 103 yards and no touchdowns. While, Miller has 12 targets, which is a 10% target share, 48 air yards, which is 5% of the air yards, converting that into 52 yards and no touchdowns. Miller also has the tougher matchup tonight. He will be going up against on of the best corners in the league; Jalen Ramsey. Ramsey continues to shut down players in the slot. I am sure Foles will try to avoid him as much as possible.
At TE, the Bears will be featuring Jimmy Graham, who looks to be restoring his career here in Chicago. At least fantasy wise. Since Foles has taken over, Graham has yet to eclipse 35 yards, but continues to dominate in the red zone. Which is a spot we love to see for our TEs. Graham has led the team in Red zone targets two out of the last three weeks. He gets a six-inch advantage tonight in his TE matchup against Kenny Young. Rams aren’t giving up many yards to TEs, but give up the 7th most touchdowns to TEs this year. This lines up perfectly with how Graham plays.
Rams Pass Catchers
Robert Woods popped up on the injury report on Friday and did not practice that day, but was limited on practice on Saturday. He is now off the injury report for tonight’s game. This makes me believe that Woods is not 100% healthy. He is going to be my fade of the day. I always take a stand on one stud to fade in my lineups and Woods is number one of that list. Not only does he not appear 100%, but he will be going up against Kyle Fuller a majority of the game, making Cooper Kupp the focal point of the offense tonight. This isn’t a play to overthink. Kupp will see an increase in target share tonight and he is the main slot guy in this offense. My only worry is that Kupp and Woods split time in the slot 60/40 in favor of Kupp. Buster Skrine is the slot corner for the Bears. Skrine is one of the worst slot corners in the league. He has been able to hide behind this amazing Bears defense the past two years, but I fully expect him to get exposed tonight.
With Woods potentially limited, this could bring Van Jefferson, the Rams second round pick this year, into fantasy relevance tonight. McVay is also on record saying that he wants to get Van Jefferson more involved in the passing game anyway. So, if Woods is limited tonight, this will be the perfect opportunity to get Van Jefferson involved more in the offense. Last year the Rams ran 11 personnel on passing plays at the highest rate in the league; 83%. This year they are running 11 personnel on passing plays 84% of passing plays. Again, we should see plenty of opportunities for Josh Reynolds and Van Jefferson to get work in the passing game tonight. I wouldn’t be surprised if they used Woods as a decoy on Fuller’s side to draw coverage towards This way the Rams can focus on the other side of the field, away from Fuller.
Tyler Higbee is questionable for tonight’s game. He did not practice all week, but was limited on Saturday. If this game was on Sunday, he most likely would not have played. So, if he plays tonight, like woods, he could be limited. This would elevate Garrett Everett to a top play for me tonight. Everett has shown in the past his receiving skills from the TE position in the past. Up until this year Everett was always Goff’s favorite tight end target, now Higbee has taken over. At only $4800 he is definitely worth a shot tonight, if Higbee is ruled out.
