O-Line Rankings and Matchups to Exploit: Week 5

Evaluating offensive line play regarding its effect on fantasy football output has been a stone unturned throughout the course of our game within a game. Here at 4for4, we’re dedicated to looking at fantasy pieces from all angles, and that includes the positive and negative impact an offensive line has on that team’s fantasy assets.

Below I’m going to be digging into specific weekly matchups between offensive lines and the opposing defense's aFPA —one of the many useful tools available to us here at 4for4. Many sites publish raw fantasy points allowed by position, but 4for4 goes a step further and adjusts those numbers for a defense’s relative year-to-date schedule strength. Beginning this week and moving forward, aFPA will reflect the current season since we believe the three weeks of information begins to show reliable numbers and patterns.

Let’s begin by diving into the passing game to see what o-line/defense match-ups we can exploit.

Favorable Quarterback Matchups

By comparing a team’s offensive line ranking to the aFPA of their opponent for the week, we can look for beneficial discrepancies to attack for offensive and defensive players. The higher the “Difference” column, the better the matchup for a quarterback; the lower the difference, the better the matchup for the defense.

Colts @ Browns

The Indianapolis Colts o-line unit continues to solidify itself as a top-three group for the foreseeable future and as such, we should still consider some of the team’s offensive pieces despite injuries and age eating up a number of them. Thanks in part to the Cowboys’ propensity to score three-plus touchdowns in every fourth quarter, the Cleveland Browns are ranked 30th in aFPA to both the quarterback and wide receiver position. It’s not as if they’ve been flawless in the secondary outside of last week, as their 1,242 yards and 12 touchdowns allowed, both rank third-most in the NFL. Myles Garrett leads the league in pressures, yet the team as a whole only ranks 22nd in pressure percentage. If Indy can stifle Garrett with double teams, Philip Rivers will have plenty of time to get comfortable in the pocket.

Rivers himself isn’t very fantasy viable as he’s only averaging 30 pass attempts a game in an offense that would much prefer to keep the ball on the ground, but with target distribution being forcibly shrunk, we can feel (relatively) confident in T.Y. Hilton and Zach Pascal as WR3/FLEX options in leagues where we’re cursed to have them rostered.

Steelers vs. Eagles

Pittsburgh had an enticing matchup against the Tennessee Titans until they didn’t. Instead, they carry a week of rest into an equally beneficial game with the Philadelphia Eagles. Philly still has a defensive line that can get after the quarterback, but two of their four games have come against my 29th (Football Team) and 31st (Bengals) ranked offensive lines, so we’ll see how they fare against a top-three unit. The Steelers return right guard David DeCastro for a second consecutive game to accompany Roethlisberger’s front side with Chuks Okorafor, who shut down J.J. Watt the last time the team took the field.

As for the fantasy names we should be targeting, JuJu Smith-Schuster still leads the team in yards (160) and receptions (17), but things are becoming increasingly spread out to the tertiary pieces of the offense. Pair that with his unsustainable TD-rate and we may start needing to look elsewhere. That could come in the form of Diontae Johnson, who was coming out of the concussion protocol and still questionable ahead of the Tennessee game, but is now full-go thanks to the extra off time.

Panthers @ Falcons

Atlanta is simply an easy target at this point, allowing the overall QB2 (Russell Wilson), QB1 (Dak Prescott), QB5 (Nick Foles/Mitchell Trubisky), and QB3 performances through the first quarter of the season. The fantasy production allotted to the running back and wide receiver positions is positively skewed a little bit by Prescott’s three rushing touchdowns in Week 2, but the lesson learned there may be that you can do whatever you want to this defense, as evidenced by the 13 passing touchdowns allowed still leading the league. As reported yesterday, Falcons’ safety Damontae Kazee tore his Achilles this past Monday, further thinning the secondary to go along with a pass rush that has forced pressure on only 26.8% of passes (29th).

Pairing Teddy Bridgewater with Robby Anderson and/or D.J. Moore will be a worthwhile venture across all fantasy platforms, and disappointing tight end option Ian Thomas is worth consideration as well. Atlanta ranks last in TE aFPA, by a lot. The problem here is that Thomas has 30 yards across nine targets in four games this season and he hasn’t seen a snap percentage above 69% in 2020. If you were still holding out hope for him being your late-round tight end breakout candidate, this is the last chance.

Favorable Defensive Matchups

Rams @ Football Team

The Rams may not dominate both sides of the trenches quite as they did in 2018, but they still have Aaron Donald and a rotation of disrupters up the middle of the field, and to a lesser extent, on the edges. Washington’s offensive line strength comes from center Chase Roullier, but Donald hardly ever lines up as a pure nose tackle. Los Angeles instead prefers to spread the wealth of his dominance across the line and focuses on the weaknesses of the opposition. This likely means we’ll be seeing a whole lot of him lining up across the left side of the o-line against guard Wes Martin and tackle Geron Christian Sr., who have combined for 25 pressures and four sacks allowed on the year.

Newly appointed starter Kyle Allen’s propensity to turn the ball over will be something to watch for with his blindside the weakest part of the line. Allen threw 16 interceptions and fumbled the ball 13 times in his 13 games under Ron Rivera last season.

Jets vs. Cardinals

Yes, oddly enough, the Jets are good at something in 2020, and that something could equate to some sneaky fantasy goodness against Arizona on Sunday. Gang Green and their 46.3% pressure rate (third-highest) will welcome the Cardinals’ offensive line and their 50 pressures allowed to the Meadowlands in hopes that those two ends of the spectrum will equate to sacks and turnovers. With both teams clocking in as top-ten situation neutral paced teams (Cardinals - second, Jets - tenth), there should be plenty of plays to exploit the offensive line enough to overcome the raw points on the board that New York is sure to give up.

Favorable Running Back Matchups

The RB table will work just the same as the above QB table; high “Difference” numbers mean an offense has a favorable matchup, the lower the number, the least favorable.

Chiefs vs. Raiders

Clyde Edwards-Helaire may take some breathers from time to time, but a 66-75% snap share is pretty much a bellcow in the 2020 NFL. He’ll get to take his 15-20 touch floor against the Las Vegas Raiders who are currently sporting a 5.01 defensive adjusted line yards, good for 28th in the league. Unless something changes with this backfield dynamic, CEH will be dominating touches across all game scripts, and those touches should even increase if his team is ever not leading by multiple scores. Especially when his above-average but not upper-echelon offensive line has a chance to push around its’ opponents in the trenches, you have to prioritize Edwards-Helaire in all formats.

Buccaneers @ Bears

The boxscore only accredits Ronald Jones with two drops during Week 3, but I feel like a saw a multitude of Tom Brady passes bounce off his chest or out-stretched hands. Nonetheless, with loaf-of-bread runner LeSean McCoy and perpetually injured Leonard Fournette out of Thursday night’s contest, the backfield remains Jones’ and easily-forgotten rookie Ke’Shawn Vaughn who unfairly missed the most important weeks of the offseason due to COVID-19. With Chris Godwin and O.J. Howard out and Mike Evans fighting through an ankle injury, we can presume that the Bucs offense will be running through the Jones/Vaughn tandem even more than it would with a full wide receiver corps.

I’m excited about Ke’Shawn Vaughn in the longer term —as early as the back half of the season— but he has still only seen 24 total snaps in 2020, with 18 of them coming on offense. The play here is Ronald Jones, who we could fairly easily pencil in the 20-25 touch range.

Jaguars @ Texans

The Jacksonville/Houston game presents the widest berth between offensive adjusted line Yards (Jags - seventh) and defensive ALY (Texans - 30th) of Week 5. This bodes well for James Robinson against a defense that has allowed 27-130-2 to Dalvin Cook, 18-109-1 to James Conner, 10-73 to Gus Edwards, and 25-138-1 to Clyde Edwards-Helaire en route to allowing the most yardage on the ground for the season. Robinson has taken full control of this backfield, seeing a season-high 76% of the offensive touches against the Bengals in Week 4, relegating Dare Ogunbowale to a special teams role and Chris Thompson to a pass-blocking zero-target role.

Running Backs with Bad Matchups

As opposed to breaking down every bad match-up through the rest of the slate, here are some running backs I’m looking to avoid because of their poor offensive line and the strong defensive fronts they will be facing:

• Myles Gaskin, Dolphins
• Melvin Gordon, Broncos
• Frank Gore, Jets
• Justin Jackson, Chargers

*All “pressure” info comes from Sports Info Solutions, pace and ASR/ALY come from Football Outsiders