Thursday Night Observations

Could've been worse

That game went okay. I had the Cowboys +3.5 in my home picking pool, even though I knew the Lions were the sharp play. The Cowboys were a surging public team with a high-flying offense, the Lions were limping to the end of the season with key injuries and a diminished spirit from last year. The sharp play is to fade recency bias, but I didn’t so I’m 0-1 in that low-stakes pool.

Otherwise, it was pretty good. I have one team that could get into the NFFC postseason with a huge week, and it had Brandon Aubrey, ARSB and Jared Goff going. ARSB had a solid game, and I wasn’t even sure he would play. Goff was a little disappointing with 21 points, but not terrible, and Aubrey crushed it with 25. I’ll need big games from the rest of my team, but it’s still drawing live.

The other big concern was the Chiefs-stack team which is over the line for now, but the Chiefs draw the best defense in the league this week, so I needed something from Javonte Williams. He scored a TD and did okay with 14.7 points. I don’t need a monster week, just about 130, I imagine, to stay in.

In my Stacker_Sports league I have a playoff spot locked up, but I’m playing for a bye. I had CeeDee Lamb who would have gone bananas had he not got concussed, Jake Ferguson and Jahmyr Gibbs who lit it up.

Overall, I’d give it a B+. Ideally, I’d have liked Williams and Goff to do more, but I’ll take it.

• Dak Prescott had only one TD and two picks, but 376 passing and 14 rushing yards makes up for that. He might have had a bigger game, but for George Pickens bizarrely deciding to mail it in on a few plays.

• Williams didn’t have much running room and caught two passes for zero yards. The TD really salvaged his day.

• Lamb was going crazy in the first half before he got concussed. Might have had 200 yards. That it’s a Thursday game gives him a chance to play next week, but players have been taking an extra week off these days when they have brain damage.

• Ryan Flournoy stepped up big in Lamb’s absence, the second big game he’s had this year. He looks like a player, and between his emergence and Pickens’ poor game, I could see the Cowboys opting to let Pickens walk and let Flournoy be the No. 2. That would be ideal for me since I have Flournoy and Lamb in the RotoWire Dynasty league.

• Pickens has been the team’s best receiver all year, showing insane athleticism and playmaking skills. I don’t know what happened on the routes he half-assed, but now people are saying that’s why the Steelers traded him. So odd because there was zero sign of that until last night. If he rights the ship next week, which is still my base case, maybe people will forget it, but if not, it cost him a lot of money in free agency. The problem for Pickens is also that this game probably knocked the Cowboys out of realistic playoff contention, so there’s a chance it gets held against him.

• Aubrey is the greatest kicker of all time, and it’s not really close. He drilled a 63-yarder like it was from 45.

• Goff played okay, but still seemed under more pressure than last year. His fantasy day got capped by all those rushing TDs.

• Gibbs will be the league’s 1.1 next year. He caught seven more passes for 77 yards and scored three times. He also shook a DB out of his shoes to pick up a first down.

• Oddly David Montgomery was more effective running the ball with 6-60-1, and he caught a 13 yard pass. I think teams just don’t worry about the run that much when Gibbs leaves the game. Montgomery’s getting a backup’s workload now.

• Jameson Williams had a nice game, making a couple deep intermediate catches, but nothing in the end zone.

• Amon Ra St. Brown fought through an ankle sprain — you could see him laboring a bit when he ran — but still went 9-6-92-0. A TD would have been nice, but under the circumstances a strong game, and he gets 10 days off before he plays again, in time for the fantasy playoffs.

• Isaac TeSlaa caught his fourth TD on his seventh catch. He looks like a player and probably would have gone off in this game had ARSB not been able to play.

• The Lions still don’t look quite like last year’s team, but this game was a step in the right direction.