Monday Night Football Showdown Throwdown
Tonight I will be breaking down my top plays for this Monday Night Football Showdown slate. We’ve got what could be a blowout game, but you never know with these divisional games what could happen. The current Vegas line has the Patriots -14 spread with a 44 O/U.
Studs
James White: He is my favorite overall play on the bird for DK. His catch upside is insanely high and now they are without their future star Sony Michel. James White should see a bulk of the workload tonight but we have to watch out for Kenyon Barner tonight steal a bunch of carries.
Tom Brady: without Sony Michel I doubt they will look to rely heavily on their run game and James White is more of a receiving back then someone who is going to get 20 carries in a game. Expect Tom Brady to throw the ball a ton in the first 3 quarter until they get a huge lead and pound the ball with Barner.
Rob Gronkowski: He is questionable but still expected to take the field tonight against Buffalo. Which will come at no surprises because he loves playing against Buffalo. In 13 games he’s averaging 80 yards and almost 1 TD per game. He loves playing at Buffalo even more than just playing them, the Star TE is averaging 6.3 catches 104 yards and 1 touchdown a game. I don’t see the Buffalo D slow Gronk down at all tomorrow.
Julian Edelman: Brady got back his favorite target from suspension a couple weeks ago and they havent missed a step where their connection. He is see 8 targets a game since back and I would expect another high volume game from him tonight. I prefer Edelman over Gordon tonight because Gordon should be stuck on White a lot.
Middle Tier
Derek Anderson: He’s not one of my top plays that QBs normally are but he’s cheap enough that I think he’s playable. QBs are my favorite options on these single games because they provide the safest floor of all the players especially on Sunday and Monday games when the games are relatively high scoring compared to Thursday night.
Kenyon Barner: I wish his price was lower I was able to snag him on the prime time slate for almost min salary so I was expecting him to be lower than the kickers and the defense. I was going to lock him in at that price, but the sites were really smart and made you think about this pick more. I still like him at that price the Patriots should be in positive game script and these random running backs for the Patriots sometimes just fun for 100+ yards out of no where. We don’t want to miss out on the upside a player like that and I would assume that he would have low ownership with him being a no name and so expensive. When I say low ownership it is relative to a single game so I’m hoping for under 20%.
Chris Hogan: With a crowded WR core Hogan still continues to find his way to high target share. Last week he received 7 targets. He’s cheap enough where he’s able to see 5-6 catches and still pay off salary.
Defenses and Kickers
Defenses: I would not normally suggest a defense on a team that is such an underdog but they are just so cheap they are worth it. At 1.8k the Bills D are playable. You don’t need a ton of points from them to pay off and there is not much in value today. The Bill D is actually good and has been able to keep them in games just like they did last year. I don’t expect much out of them but if they give me 5 I’m fine with that if my studs do well and you never know many they can stop them or get a pick 6. Patriots D is of course in play tonight. I love targeting the Bills for defenses. The colts D who is averaging 26.6 points allowed per game just held the Bills offense to a field goal. Patriots should have have an easy time reaching value tonight.
Kickers: New England has allowed 25th most yards in the league, which means there will be plenty of opportunity for Steven Hauschka to get into field goal range and kick with volume.
Cheap Tier
Slot WR for the Bills: Johnathan Jones has been one of the worst slot corners in the league. So that is the area we want to target on the Patriots. The problem is the Bills run a bunch of different WRs in the slot. Their main WR is Zay Jones (25 snaps last game). Then they have 2 other guys who run the slot as well Ray-Ray McCloud (10 snaps) and Cam Phillips (15 snaps). So if you want a fun $200 punt Cam Phillips is the only viable option. Zay Jones should be the best WR to play in this offense tonight.
