The Lions travel to Jacksonville after blowing a big lead to New Orleans in week 5, while Minshew mania has hit a bit of snag in recent weeks. Which squad gets their season back on the right foot? For the 2020 NFL season, Matt Savoca will be providing his weekly NFL Daily Fantasy Football Matchups Breakdown column, going through every single game and offensive and defensive matchup, every week of the season. For your viewing convenience, we have broken up the matchups breakdown into several single columns, each one covering a single game. You can find links to every game right here. We have 11 games on tap for Week 6 NFL DFS and NFL Fantasy Football, so let’s dive in. The entire matchups article will be available in podcast form, every Friday afternoon on the Awesemo Podcast Network. Let’s get into Lions – Jaguars NFL DFS picks for your daily fantasy football lineups.
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Daily Fantasy Football Matchups Column for Week 6
Detroit Lions (28.5) at Jacksonville Jaguars (26) – 1:00 p.m. ET
Detroit Passing Game
The Lions continue to be a slow-paced squad, running the fifth-fewest plays per game and ranking right at league average in neutral early-down pass rate, but Matthew Stafford has begun to defy the conservative scheme and started to air the ball out, particularly since star receiver Kenny Golladay returned to the lineup in week 3. During week 4, the last time the Lions played, we saw Stafford finish with his highest average depth of target this season, cresting nine for the first time. Stafford’s 325 total air yards in week 4 were the second most in four tries this season as well. But much of that had to do with the fact that the Saints could not be stopped by the Lions defense in the second half, blowing a two-score lead that Stafford and the offense had built in the first half.
Stafford’s efficiency this season has been a disappointment, especially compared to the high hopes many in the fantasy football industry had for him coming into the 2020 campaign. Stafford ranks 23rd in passing expected points added per play, 19th in success rate and 28th in completion percentage vs expectation. Even against the Jaguars’ banged-up secondary, who are once again expected to be without standout rookie corner C.J. Henderson and are already operating without D.J. Hayden for the rest of the season, it’s still extremely difficult to consider Stafford or any of his weapons, even Golladay, close to a sure thing.
It’s not a question of if the Detroit offense is better with Golladay, it’s how much, and through two weeks of play, Golladay absolutely has proved his worth on the field, even if it hasn’t necessarily led to wins for the Lions. Golladay has had at least 55 yards and a touchdown in each of his first two outings and is unquestionably the team’s leader in true weighted opportunity share. But Stafford continues to spread the ball around, even with Golladay on the field. No other full-time player besides Golladay averages even 5.5 targets per game, meaning that all the other weapons in this pass game, even Marvin Jones and tight end T.J. Hockenson, neither are consistent weekly plays in daily fantasy lineups at this point. However, if there was a week to take a chance on one of them, this would be an excellent one. Jones has a scintillating matchup as the No. 2 receiver against the Jaguars, who just allowed a monster game to Brandin Cooks, but Hockenson’s also intriguing bet Sunday. Hockenson ranks ninth among tight ends in true weighted opportunity share and hasn’t had fewer than four targets in a single game this season.
Though it’s always a possibility that Danny Amendola will command 10 targets out of nowhere (essentially as an extension of the Detroit run game), forcing targets underneath to Amendola appears to be less of a focal point in recent weeks — a positive for the Detroit offense but a negative for Amendola’s production. After averaging seven targets in the first two games (the games Golladay missed), Amendola has seen seven total targets, just one ahead of backup tight end Jesse James and running back D’Andre Swift.
Detroit Rushing Game
The Lions seem like they’d be perfectly content handing the ball off to Adrian Peterson 20 to 25 times a game. Though it’s only happened once in the first four games, Peterson is the unquestioned focal point of the Lions’ rushing attack, and by most measures his performance has been lackluster. Peterson is well below the historical trendline of evaded tackles based on his touches, frustrating for fantasy gamers who wish they’d see more of Swift, who’s been adequate if not spectacular, while being used mostly as a weapon in the passing game. Swift leads the Lions’ running backs in quality opportunities (targets and/or goal-line rushes) by a significant margin and ranks 30th at the position, while Peterson ranks 55th. With by far the highest ceiling of the three Lions running backs (which includes Kerryon Johnson), Swift presents even more of a value than Peterson this weekend, priced just $500 off the minimum running back pricing on DraftKings.
Jacksonville Passing Game
It was another tough loss for Gardner Minshew and the Jaguars on Sunday, only putting up 14 points against a Texans team that had previously been winless. Due to game script, the Jaguars were forced to drop back to pass 55 times in week 5, the most they’ve dropped back all season. Minshew crested the 300 yards passing mark for the third time in five tries this season and posted a pass or air conversion ratio (PACR) of 1.02, which was the 10th-highest mark for a quarterback in week 5. He also threw no interceptions and ended with the 13th-highest quarterback expected points added on the weekend. On the season, he is 15th in rbdsm.com’s EPA/CPOE composite rating. That is not bad for the quarterback of a squad that’s supposedly tanking for a high draft pick this season.
The touchdowns haven’t come, and neither have the victories in recent weeks — I t’s been three weeks since the Jaguars topped 25 points — but that absolutely has a chance to change this week against a Detroit defense that ranks sixth worst in the league in points per play over the last three weeks. The lions don’t have a full-time cornerback graded inside the top 50 (via PFF’s coverage grade) and are fourth worst in team defensive grade. In fact, there is no phase of the game, at least defensively, that the Lions rank outside the bottom 10. In short, this is a highly exploitable defense devoid of play makers, and Minshew and the Jaguars have no excuse not to cure their offensive woes this weekend.
That could be made considerably more difficult if star wide receiver D.J. Chark is forced to miss Sunday’s game; he left week 5 in the fourth quarter with a lower leg injury. Chark has now recorded three games with under five targets (in four tries),m and has been out-targeted by teammates Keelan Cole and Laviska Shenault, but prior to week 5 it was Chark who had been enjoying most of the big yardage totals and the touchdowns, though those were few and far between in this offense. Shenault emerged as both the target leader and yardage leader in week 5, which was particularly encouraging, as he had come into the game with a hamstring injury that had threatened his availability for the week. When factoring in air yards, Cole is actually the team leader in true waited opportunity share, but all three of Chark, Shenault and Chris Conley are just mere percentage points behind. No receiver on this team is ranked within the top 60 in true waiting opportunity share this season.
Tyler Eifert, who has been the de facto fifth receiver for the Jaguars, also suffered a stinger that the team is concerned may affect his availability for this weekend. Even after commanding more than 15% of Minshew’s targets in back-to-back weeks, Eifert has yet to record more than 36 passing yards in a game this season. If he’s forced to miss, it would mean additional looks for the receivers, and possibly for back up James O’Shaughnessy, who has not been targeted more than 10% of the time so far this year. The Lions have been particularly effective against tight ends this year, however, allowing the fifth-fewest fantasy points versus expectation to the position this season.
Jacksonville Rushing Game
He may have been disappointing relative to expectation in week 5, but James Robinson continues to be a valuable workhorse for fantasy gamers week in and week out. Only 13 active running backs have had a higher average snap share than Robinson, and only 12 have had a higher share of team opportunities. His 70 total yards in week 5 was his lowest output of the season, while in all other 2020 contests, he’s hit at least 90. We happened to witness his floor in week 5, with the Jaguars forced to pass relentlessly, down big to the Texans, but no one should be afraid to go right back to the well with Robinson. Even as the ninth-highest-salary running back on the slate, he’s a value play in Awesemo’s projections this weekend. Though Chris Thompson plays on 40% of team snaps, it’s mostly as an extra receiver, and he isn’t taking away from Robinson’s workload. Thompson hasn’t posted a game with over 42 yards this season. Don’t overthink this one: Play the bell cow back who’s facing one of the softest defenses he’s seen in weeks.
Prediction: Lions 31, Jaguars 24.
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