Puka Nacua
Questionable
Groin soreness. No practice Friday or Saturday. Decide by 8:20 PM ET tonight.
No games were played yesterday. Week 2's main slate kicks off at 1:00 PM ET, so this report is about what you can still change - and there is one decision today that could decide your week.
LordHaveMRSA
-0.10
chaseelson30
17.20
One starter each has played. Six of your seven starting slots are still live.
DJ Moore
-0.10 pts
Zero catches, one carry for minus a yard, then a shoulder injury. Projected 13.1.
Michael Mayer
Trade chip
Third-most-added player in all of Sleeper. He is already on your bench.
Where the matchup stands
The scoreboard in one line
LordHaveMRSA -0.10, chaseelson30 17.20. Undecided, and you are the underdog by roughly two touchdowns' worth of projection.
You are 0-1 and you trail chaseelson30, who is also 0-1, by 17.2 to -0.1. Each of you had exactly one starter in Thursday night's Detroit Lions win over the Buffalo Bills. His hit. Yours produced the worst single outcome available from a starting slot.
Adding up consensus projections for everyone who has not yet played, this lands at roughly 94 for you against 110 for him. That is a deficit of about 16 points, which in a full-PPR league - where every reception is worth a full point - is one good afternoon from a single receiver. You are behind, not buried. But you are behind because you burned a receiver slot for nothing, and you cannot afford to do it twice.
The one decision before kickoff
| Option | Player | Locks at |
|---|---|---|
| Stay | Puka Nacua (Los Angeles Rams) | Mon 8:15 PM ET |
| Hedge - best | Xavier Worthy (Kansas City Chiefs) | Sun 8:20 PM ET |
| Hedge - earlier | Rashid Shaheed (Seattle Seahawks) | Sun 4:25 PM ET |
| Hedge - earliest | Wan'Dale Robinson (Tennessee Titans) | Sun 1:00 PM ET |
Hold Nacua through the afternoon
A healthy Puka Nacua (Los Angeles Rams) projects 20.1 points, the highest number on your roster and roughly double what Xavier Worthy (Kansas City Chiefs) projects at 9.9. If there is a credible Sunday report that Nacua is trending toward playing, he stays in and you take the upside.
If there is no upgrade by 7:30 PM ET, start Xavier Worthy
Two consecutive missed practices on a soft-tissue groin injury is not gamesmanship - it is a player who cannot run. A Nacua who does not play is worth zero, and you already have one zero at receiver this week from DJ Moore (Buffalo Bills). Nine projected points you can count on beats twenty you cannot.
Puka Nacua (Los Angeles Rams) came out of Thursday's practice with groin soreness. He did not practice Friday and he did not practice Saturday, and the Rams listed him Questionable for Monday Night Football against the New York Giants. Head coach Sean McVay said Nacua "felt good" in that Thursday session but could not hit full speed, and that "whether or not he plays is to be determined."
Here is the trap, and it is a real one. Nacua's game is Monday night. Every single receiver on your bench plays today. Wan'Dale Robinson (Tennessee Titans) locks at 1:00 PM ET, Rashid Shaheed (Seattle Seahawks) locks at 4:25 PM ET, and Xavier Worthy (Kansas City Chiefs) locks at 8:20 PM ET. Once Worthy kicks off tonight, you have no eligible receiver left to swap in. If the Rams rule Nacua out on Monday afternoon, that slot becomes a zero and the matchup is over.
So the deadline for this decision is not Monday. It is roughly 7:30 PM ET tonight.
Your lineup today
| Slot | Player | Status |
|---|---|---|
| QB | Drake Maye (New England Patriots) | Start - 1:00 PM ET vs Pittsburgh Steelers, projected 18.9, healthy |
| RB | Kyren Williams (Los Angeles Rams) | Start - Mon 8:15 PM ET vs New York Giants, projected 17.0, healthy |
| RB | Cam Skattebo (New York Giants) | Start - Mon 8:15 PM ET at Los Angeles Rams, projected 13.3, workhorse role |
| WR | Puka Nacua (Los Angeles Rams) | DECIDE BY 7:30 PM ET - Questionable, groin, two missed practices |
| WR | DJ Moore (Buffalo Bills) | Locked - already played Thursday for -0.10. Nothing you can do. |
| TE | Trey McBride (Arizona Cardinals) | Start - 4:25 PM ET vs Seattle Seahawks, projected 14.8, healthy |
| FLEX | Chris Godwin (Tampa Bay Buccaneers) | Start - 1:00 PM ET vs Cleveland Browns, projected 10.4, not on the injury report |
One structural warning worth saying out loud: Kyren Williams, Cam Skattebo and Puka Nacua are all in the same football game - New York Giants at Los Angeles Rams, Monday at 8:15 PM ET. Three of your seven starting slots, and possibly your entire week, come down to one broadcast. There is nothing to fix about that today, but go into Monday knowing your season-long variance is concentrated in a single stadium.
Injuries on your roster
DJ Moore (Buffalo Bills) - out, shoulder and stinger
He was hurt late in the second quarter Thursday night, diving for a catch in the end zone against the Detroit Lions. He walked off under his own power, had X-rays in the locker room, and did not return. Head coach Joe Brady had no update afterward and no timeline has been given. His Week 3 availability is a genuine open question, which makes the waiver note below more than housekeeping.
Puka Nacua (Los Angeles Rams) - questionable, groin
Covered above. This is the only injury on your roster you can actually act on before tonight.
Everyone else is clean
Drake Maye (New England Patriots), Kyren Williams (Los Angeles Rams), Cam Skattebo (New York Giants), Trey McBride (Arizona Cardinals) and Chris Godwin (Tampa Bay Buccaneers) carry no designation. Godwin in particular is not on Tampa Bay's Week 2 injury report at any level, which is the cleanest he has looked in a while - start him without a second thought.
Bench check
Do not drop Michael Mayer (Las Vegas Raiders) - trade him
Brock Bowers had a meniscus trim on his left knee, typically a four-to-six week recovery, and Mayer is now the Raiders' starting tight end. That has made him the third-most-added player in all of Sleeper over the last 48 hours, with roughly 260,000 adds. You already own him and you already have Trey McBride (Arizona Cardinals) starting ahead of him. That is a bench player at peak market value sitting in front of a league where somebody is desperate at tight end. Shop him now, while the add count is doing your negotiating for you.
No bench player clearly outprojects a healthy starter at the same position. Michael Mayer (Las Vegas Raiders) projects 8.3 at tight end against Trey McBride's 14.8 - not close. Braelon Allen (New York Jets) at 5.6 and Brian Robinson (Atlanta Falcons) at 6.0 are nowhere near Cam Skattebo's 13.3 at running back. Xavier Worthy (Kansas City Chiefs) at 9.9 is a hair under Chris Godwin's 10.4, close enough that it is not worth the swap on its own - but it is exactly why Worthy is the right insurance for the Nacua slot rather than the Godwin slot.
Waivers and the roster spot to clear
| Player | Why | Bid |
|---|---|---|
| Keon Coleman (Buffalo Bills) | Six catches on six targets for 63 yards Thursday, and DJ Moore is now out with no timeline in an offense that just scored 31 points. The direct replacement for your own injured receiver, in a Josh Allen passing game. He already played this week so he cannot help your Week 2, but he is the best Wednesday claim on the board. | $14 |
| Xavier Hutchinson (Houston Texans) | The most-added player in all of Sleeper right now, roughly 642,000 adds, because Nico Collins was ruled out with a hamstring injury. Houston hosts Cincinnati at 1:00 PM ET today, so if he is sitting in free agency you can have him this morning. Be honest about what he is: a 7.8-point projection and a one-week rental unless Collins misses more time. | $6 |
| Rashod Bateman (Baltimore Ravens) | Quietly the best projection among unowned receivers at 9.1. Not exciting, but a real NFL starter available for nothing while you are down a receiver. | $3 |
Cut candidate: Najee Harris (New York Giants)
He projects 1.1 points. The Giants have handed the backfield to Cam Skattebo - your own starter - and Devin Singletary is the change-of-pace back ahead of him. Harris is a dead roster spot that exists only to be blocked by a player you already start. He is the clean cut for any of the claims above.
You have $94 of your $100 FAAB left - FAAB being the season-long budget you bid from to claim waiver players - and you sit twelfth of twelve in waiver priority, so bidding is the only lever you have. You have made zero roster moves all season. That is a resource you are not using.
What has happened since the last report
Nothing was played Friday or Saturday - the NFL had no games on either date. The last football in the books is Thursday night, September 17: the Detroit Lions beat the Buffalo Bills 41-31.
Two things from that game matter to you, and one of them the last report could not have known. The obvious one is DJ Moore's injury. The less obvious one: your opponent's 17.2 points came from Sam LaPorta (Detroit Lions), who caught six of seven targets for 52 yards and a touchdown against a Buffalo defense that surrendered 41. Jared Goff threw for 327 yards and four touchdowns and Amon-Ra St. Brown went for nine catches, 142 yards and two touchdowns. Detroit's passing offense looks like a problem for the rest of the league, which is worth filing away for matchup purposes later in the year.
Today's kickoff times, US Eastern
1:00 PM - Carolina Panthers at Atlanta Falcons, Minnesota Vikings at Chicago Bears, Philadelphia Eagles at Tennessee Titans, Pittsburgh Steelers at New England Patriots, Green Bay Packers at New York Jets, Cleveland Browns at Tampa Bay Buccaneers, New Orleans Saints at Baltimore Ravens, Cincinnati Bengals at Houston Texans.
4:05 PM - Jacksonville Jaguars at Denver Broncos, Las Vegas Raiders at Los Angeles Chargers.
4:25 PM - Washington Commanders at Dallas Cowboys, Seattle Seahawks at Arizona Cardinals, Miami Dolphins at San Francisco 49ers.
8:20 PM - Indianapolis Colts at Kansas City Chiefs.
Monday 8:15 PM - New York Giants at Los Angeles Rams.