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 16. Let’s cap off the week with tons of green on this Monday Night Football slate! Make sure if you haven’t, to 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. If you haven’t signed up for the prop sites that we are partnered with, check them out! Monkeyknifefight and Prizepicks, Promo code: KARMA, have been around for a couple of years and are continuously growing in size and being available in more and more states. If you have further questions about the sites hop in our DISCORD and message me. Our NFL Core plays package includes access to all of the expert’s NFL Prop plays! What are you waiting for? Join KARMA NATION today!
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 fewer 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 Bills are 7-point favorites tonight against the Patriots. With a 46.5-point game total.
Historical Matchup
That Patriots have been the powerhouse of the AFC East for over 2 decades but that is slowly trending towards the Bills and Dolphins now. The Patriots have won 8 of the last 10 meetings and are 6-3-1 ATS with the under hitting six out of the last ten times they played.
11/01/20: Bills: 24 Patriots: 21 Bills Spread: -4.0 O/U: 41.0
12/21/19: Bills: 17 Patriots: 24 Bills Spread: +6.5 O/U: 39.0
09/29/19: Bills: 10 Patriots: 16 Bills Spread: +7.0 O/U: 41.5
12/23/18: Bills: 12 Patriots: 24 Bills Spread: +13.5 O/U: 45.0
10/29/18: Bills: 06 Patriots: 25 Bills Spread: +13.5 O/U: 44.0
12/24/17: Bills: 16 Patriots: 37 Bills Spread: +10.5 O/U: 47.5
12/03/17: Bills: 03 Patriots: 23 Bills Spread: +7.5 O/U: 49.0
10/30/16: Bills: 25 Patriots: 41 Bills Spread: +5.5 O/U: 48.0
10/02/16: Bills: 16 Patriots: 00 Bills Spread: +3.5 O/U: 41.0
11/23/15: Bills: 13 Patriots: 20 Bills Spread: +7.0 O/U: 47.5
Quarterbacks
Josh Allen has been one of the best fantasy football QBs in the league this season. The Bills are looking to make a push for the second-best record in the AFC. So, they will continue to play at the top of their game for the remainder of the season. The Patriots defense has been great at limiting QBs and Allen was no different. Allen put up only 154 passing yards and zero passing touchdowns. This could have been partially due to the weather. It was a cold and windy day that game. The Bills focused on the run that game, running the ball almost 40 times; one of their highest rates of the season. The Patriots have always been much better defending the pass than the run this season. So, we may need to look at the ground game for Buffalo tonight.
Although, the Bills have not had much faith in their running game. Since week 9, the Bills have passed at the 6th highest rate in the league, at 63%. Which is 5% higher than the league average over this stretch. With the highest pass success rate in the league over that time as well. Luckily for us, Allen gets it done both in the air and on the ground. So, if the Patriots are able to limit him through the air again, he should be able to rack up the fantasy points on the ground to make up for it.
Cam Newton has not seen much success through the air outside of three games this season. Newton has only thrown for over 200 yards four times this season, although, twice for over 300 yards as well. He makes up for this lack of passing upside with rushing upside. He is tied for the league lead for rushing touchdowns with 11 while playing one less game than everyone else. Newton serves as the goal-line back for the Patriots. So, in games where we are expecting them to move down the field well, you can chalk Newton up for at least one rushing TD. He leads all QBs with 40 RedZone rushes and 21 rushes inside the 5. He also ranks 6th in the league in RedZone carries and third in the league in inside the 5 carries. This has led to third in RedZone touchdowns and tied for first for i5 touchdowns as well including RBs.
My main thought whenever playing Cam Newton is, will the Patriots be able to get into the RedZone so Newton has the opportunity to score fantasy points. In this case, Buffalo allows 3.9 RedZone trips per game to the opposing offenses, which is one of the worst in the league. On top of that, they allow a touchdown on 64.81% of RedZone trips, which is also one of the worst in the league. This should set Newton up nicely with opportunities to score.
Running Backs
The running back situation for both teams is going to be annoying tonight.
The Bills feature two backs; Zack Moss and Devin Singletary. These guys are in years one and two respectively and are still looking to make a name for themselves in the league. While people will be looking to the passing game for the Bills, the running game provides extremely high value. The Patriots have bled points and yards to running backs all season and tonight should be no different if the Bills can get an early lead. While the Bills have been extremely pass-heavy as of late, the running game seems to be clicking for the Bills right now. Outside of the 49ers game where they had to bench Moss with an early fumble. They have three games since their bye week with 100 or more rushing yards. This is a rate of 75% compared to only a 40% rate before the bye. I’m sure if Moss didn’t fumble against the 49ers they would have gone over 100 yards in that game too. The main question is; who to start this week?
Moss is not used in the passing game so if you think the Bills get an early lead and need him to milk the clock and score in the RedZone. Moss is the one you should be playing at $7,400 on DK and is, therefore, more valuable on FD at $11,500. On the flip side, if you think the Patriots are going to get an early lead or will be leading in the second half, prioritize Singletary over Moss or don’t play either. Singletary is slightly more expensive on both sites; $12,000 on FD and $7,600 on DK.
Unless either Damien Harris is inactive or you believe the Patriots will be winning, I will not be playing Sony Michel or Harris in my DK lineups tonight. Michel is cheap enough on FD where you can squeeze him in playing the Patriots positive game script narrative, but as 7 point underdogs that are highly unlikely. With Newton being the main RedZone back too, there is not much touchdown upside for either, especially if both are active. James White is the main running back I am looking to fit in my lines, mainly for his pass-catching abilities, but other than that, I want to avoid this annoying backfield, and if it comes back to bite me so be it.
Bills Pass Catchers
Josh Allen has been producing enough to supplement a ton of fantasy WRs in the absence of John Brown, but as we saw last time the Bills faced the Jets, Allen was held under 200 passing yards. Which was fine for Allen’s fantasy numbers with his rushing upside, but that really capped the receiving options fantasy points. Since the Patriots will be without Stephon Gilmore tonight Allen shouldn’t have any issues passing on this defense tonight.
Since Week 11:
| Player | Tar | Rec | Yards | Air Yards | AY Share | Tar Share | TDs | RZ Tar | RZ TDs |
| Stefon Diggs | 46 | 38 | 408 | 479 | 38% | 32% | 1 | 11 | 1 |
| Cole Beasley | 35 | 24 | 308 | 307 | 24% | 24% | 1 | 6 | 1 |
| Gabriel Davis | 22 | 11 | 184 | 311 | 25% | 15% | 3 | 11 | 3 |
| Dawson Knox | 16 | 11 | 99 | 124 | 10% | 11% | 3 | 7 | 3 |
There is an interesting comparison between Cole Beasley and Gabriel Davis. Even though these two have the same air yards, Beasley is $10,000 vs Davis at $5000. Davis sees more RedZone work as well. The only difference is Beasley has a little bit of a higher target share, but Davis has more valuable targets and a higher touchdown upside. There is no reason for me to play Beasley tonight with Diggs only $1000 more and Davis $5000 fewer. I will be prioritizing those two over Beasley.
Patriots Pass Catchers
The Patriots pass at one of the lowest rates in the league, so there isn’t a ton you need to stack with Cam Newton if you are playing him. You don’t even need to play a receiver with Cam like we normally do with QBs in showdowns. Newton has thrown for less than 20 pass attempts in four of the last six games, so even a 30% target share is only 6 targets if he has another game under 20 pass attempts. Since the Bills are pretty heavy favorites, we should expect more than 20 pass attempts unless the Patriots can keep it close all game where they can run with no issues.
The Patriots pass at such a low rate, even DraftKings Sportsbook only offers one receptions prop for Patriots players. It’s not worth it to them to try to project those guys, but since we are a bunch of degens we still have to figure it out.
The loss of Julian Edelman in Week 7 changed the complex of the WR situation in New England. Newton went from averaging 193 passing yards per game to only 176 passing yards per game. They also only pass 48% of the time which only is in front of Baltimore. We can’t expect a ton out of Cam and their receivers but there is still value to be had.
Since Week 10:
| Player | Tar | Rec | Yards | Air Yards | AY Share | Tar Share | TDs | RZ Tar | RZ TDs |
| Jakobi Meyers | 38 | 26 | 322 | 337 | 34% | 26% | 0 | 8 | 0 |
| Damiere Byrd | 30 | 19 | 253 | 308 | 31% | 21% | 1 | 3 | 1 |
| N’Keal Harry | 18 | 11 | 117 | 158 | 16% | 16% | 1 | 5 | 1 |
| James White | 22 | 17 | 126 | -12 | -1% | 15% | 0 | 2 | 0 |
| Tight Ends | 11 | 5 | 87 | 122 | 23% | 16% | 0 | 3 | 0 |
I will be avoiding Damiere Byrd and N’Keal Harry, who will be lined up on the outside against Tre’Davious White and Levi Wallace. Both guys have been playing at the top of their games this season. The player with the best matchup tonight is Jakobi Meyers. He is also Newton’s favorite target so that correlates perfectly. The Bills have struggled this season in the slot and with TEs. With Ryan Izzo missing we have two options to choose from to replace him; Dalton Keene and Devin Asiasi. I would play Keene over Asiasi because Keene has run twice as many routes as Asiasi in the last two weeks. Which is the amount of time Ryan Izzo has missed.
