Drake Maye
28.44 pts
24 of 31 for 321 yards, two passing touchdowns and a rushing touchdown. Beat his projection by nearly seven.
You lead 29.74 to 7.80 with five starters left to play, and the whole matchup now rests on one calf muscle in Los Angeles. Drake Maye carried you on Thursday night. Roschon Johnson handed back almost everything he was supposed to give. The only move left that you can still control is what you do with the wide receiver slot before 4:25 PM Eastern.
LordHaveMRSA
29.74
Gridiron Guru 23
7.80
Undecided. Five of your seven starters still to play; six of theirs. Projected final is roughly 107 to 100 your way - but strip out Puka Nacua and it flips to a 15-point deficit.
Roschon Johnson
1.30 pts
Two carries. Thirteen yards. No catches. A projected 9.9 turned into nothing.
Puka Nacua
Questionable
Calf. Game-time decision. The Rams must declare him active or inactive at 2:55 PM Eastern.
Where the matchup stands
One game has been played since the last report went out: the Thursday night opener on October 22, when the Chicago Bears beat the New England Patriots 30 to 24. That game touched three players on your roster and one on your opponent's, and on net it was a good night for you - your 29.74 against Gridiron Guru 23's 7.80 is the largest Friday-morning lead you have held all season.
Do not spend it yet. Your opponent still has six starters to play, including Brock Purdy (San Francisco 49ers), Ashton Jeanty (Las Vegas Raiders), Chase Brown (Cincinnati Bengals) and Christian Watson (Green Bay Packers), plus Dallas Goedert (Philadelphia Eagles) who does not play until Monday night. Consensus projections put his remaining starters at about 92 points. Yours, with a healthy Puka Nacua (Los Angeles Rams), come to about 77. That is a projected 107 to 100 win - a one-possession game, decided by whichever of you gets a surprise.
The one encouraging note underneath that: his A.J. Brown (New England Patriots) already underperformed on Thursday, catching three of six targets for 48 yards and no touchdown. 7.80 points against a 14.91 projection. He has already given back seven points he was supposed to have banked.
Your starters who have played
Drake Maye (New England Patriots) - 28.44 points
This was the best quarterback game anyone in the league got on Thursday and it was not close. 24 completions on 31 attempts for 321 yards, two passing touchdowns, one interception, plus four carries for 26 yards and a rushing touchdown. A 117.8 passer rating in a road loss. He was projected for 21.72, so he handed you nearly seven points of profit on the single most predictable slot on your roster. Nothing to fix here - this is what you drafted him for.
Roschon Johnson (Chicago Bears) - 1.30 points
Brutal, and worse than the number looks. Two carries for 13 yards. Zero targets, zero catches. D'Andre Swift (Chicago Bears) took 22 carries and four targets in the same game, which tells you exactly where Chicago's coaching staff has landed on this committee. Roschon Johnson was projected for 9.86 and delivered 1.30 - a loss of 8.6 points against expectation in a matchup your projections say will be decided by seven. That slot is locked and there is nothing to be done about it today, but there is plenty to be done about it before Week 8.
Bench versus starters
No bench player outscored a starter at the same position, because only one of your running backs and one of your wide receivers has played. But the comparison worth making anyway: DeMario Douglas (New England Patriots) put up 5.30 points on your bench - three catches on four targets for 23 yards - which is four times what your starting second running back managed. Different positions, so no swap was ever available. It is a scoreboard footnote, not a mistake.
The real lesson is forward-looking. Cam Skattebo (New York Giants) sits on your bench while Roschon Johnson (Chicago Bears) starts, and Chicago has now spent three straight weeks telling you that Roschon Johnson is the clear second back behind D'Andre Swift. Skattebo projects for only 4.91 at Houston today, so this is not an argument that you got today wrong - it is an argument that the second running back slot is a hole, not a choice, and that the fix is on the waiver wire rather than on your bench.
The one decision you can still make today
Hold Puka Nacua (Los Angeles Rams). Set an alarm for 2:55 PM Eastern.
He is questionable with a calf injury, he did not practice on Friday, and Ian Rapoport reported that Nacua himself said he could not get "power and full explosion" out of it. Head coach Sean McVay has called it a game-time decision. The Rams play at the Las Vegas Raiders at 4:25 PM Eastern, which means the inactive list posts at 2:55 PM. That is your deadline and your decision point.
If he is inactive, swap him to Cooper Kupp (Seattle Seahawks).
This is the whole reason to hold. Cooper Kupp's game - the Kansas City Chiefs at the Seattle Seahawks - does not kick off until 8:20 PM Eastern, more than five hours after the Rams declare. So holding Nacua does not risk a zero. It risks the difference between Nacua's upside and Kupp's 6.93 projection, and you get to make that call with the actual answer in hand.
Do not pre-empt with Chris Godwin Jr. (Tampa Bay Buccaneers) at 1:00 PM.
This is the tempting move and it is the wrong one. Yes, Emeka Egbuka (Tampa Bay Buccaneers) is out with a concussion and a foot injury, and yes, Baker Mayfield (Tampa Bay Buccaneers) is back under center. But look at what Godwin actually is this season: 23 catches on 29 targets, 216 receiving yards, zero touchdowns, a season-high of 46 receiving yards, and a scoring range of 5.5 to 9.1 points in every single game. He is a floor, not a ceiling. Starting him at 1:00 PM costs you Nacua entirely and buys you maybe two points over the Cooper Kupp fallback you would have anyway. That is a terrible trade for the chance at a 20-point receiver.
Your lineup and when it locks
| Slot | Player | Kickoff (Eastern) and status |
|---|---|---|
| QB | Drake Maye (New England Patriots) | Played Thursday - 28.44 points. Locked. |
| RB | Kyren Williams (Los Angeles Rams) | 4:25 PM at Las Vegas. Projected 19.81. The clear workhorse; start without thinking about it. |
| RB | Roschon Johnson (Chicago Bears) | Played Thursday - 1.30 points. Locked. |
| WR | Tre Tucker (Las Vegas Raiders) | 4:25 PM vs the Rams. Projected 9.06, and Dont'e Thornton Jr. (Las Vegas Raiders) is out with a hamstring, which helps. |
| WR | Puka Nacua (Los Angeles Rams) | 4:25 PM at Las Vegas. QUESTIONABLE - calf. Decide at 2:55 PM. |
| TE | Trey McBride (Arizona Cardinals) | 4:05 PM vs Denver. Projected 15.23, with one caveat below. |
| FLEX | Xavier Worthy (Kansas City Chiefs) | 8:20 PM at Seattle. Projected 11.05 and that is now light - see below. |
News that moves your starters
Rashee Rice (Kansas City Chiefs) is OUT - good for Xavier Worthy
Rice is out with a hamstring and knee issue, and Brashard Smith (Kansas City Chiefs) is out with a hamstring as well. That is a meaningful chunk of Kansas City's pass-catching rotation gone in a Sunday night game at Seattle. Xavier Worthy's 11.05 projection was set before that fully shook out; treat him as closer to a 14-point expectation. He is your best flex option and he is going nowhere.
Carson Beck (Arizona Cardinals) is questionable - the one risk to Trey McBride
Beck is dealing with back spasms and carries a questionable tag into the 4:05 PM game against Denver. Trey McBride is the kind of tight end you start through almost anything, and you have no real alternative on your bench anyway, so this is not a start-sit question - it is a warning that his 15.23 projection has a soft underside if Arizona has to go to a backup quarterback against a good Denver defense. Start him and hope Beck's back loosens up.
Davante Adams (Los Angeles Rams) is on injured reserve
This cuts both ways for you. Adams is expected to miss at least six weeks with a hamstring injury, which means that if Puka Nacua does suit up, he walks into an enormous target share against a Las Vegas secondary - the single best reason to hold him through the 2:55 PM decision. It also means that if Nacua sits, the Rams' passing game runs through Konata Mumpfield and Tyler Higbee, neither of whom is yours, and Kyren Williams (Los Angeles Rams) sees even more work on the ground. Your running back wins either way.
Injuries and dead weight on your roster
Beyond Puka Nacua, your injury sheet is quiet but your bench is not healthy in a different sense: two of your seven bench spots are producing nothing at all this week. The Buffalo Bills are on their bye, which parks both Keon Coleman (Buffalo Bills) and DJ Moore (Buffalo Bills). DJ Moore is also carrying an out designation independent of the bye. The other teams on bye this week are the Jacksonville Jaguars, the Los Angeles Chargers and the Washington Commanders - none of which touches your roster.
You are carrying seven wide receivers and three running backs on a roster that starts two running backs. That is backwards for a 2-4 team that just watched its second running back post 1.30 points. DJ Moore (Buffalo Bills) - injured, on bye, and behind Keon Coleman in your own depth chart - is the obvious cut.
Waiver wire
| Player | Why | Bid |
|---|---|---|
| Justice Hill (Baltimore Ravens) | The top add available to you and the right fit. He is Derrick Henry's handcuff - the backup running back who would inherit the job if the starter went down - and Baltimore's other option, Adam Randall (Baltimore Ravens), is on injured reserve. Henry is 32 and carrying one of the heaviest workloads in the league. Hill has standalone passing-down value now and league-winning value if Henry misses time. Drop DJ Moore (Buffalo Bills). | $7 |
| Eli Raridon (New England Patriots) | The one genuine breakout from Thursday night who is still unowned: three catches for 56 yards and a touchdown on four targets from Drake Maye. A rookie tight end carving out a red-zone role in a good passing offense. You do not need a tight end behind Trey McBride, so this is a speculative stash only - worth it if you would rather hold the lottery ticket than Keon Coleman's bye week. | $3 |
| Ted Hurst III (Tampa Bay Buccaneers) | The direct beneficiary of Emeka Egbuka's absence, expected at roughly 80 percent of Tampa Bay's offensive snaps today. The catch is that it is a one-week window - Egbuka is targeting a Week 8 return. Only worth a dollar, and only if you are streaming. | $1 |
| Michael Mayer (Las Vegas Raiders) | Trending hard this week as Las Vegas thins out at the position with Carter Runyon (Las Vegas Raiders) out. Listed here for completeness; you have Trey McBride and no reason to care. | Pass |
You have $39 of your $100 FAAB budget left - FAAB being the season-long fake-money budget each manager uses to bid on waiver pickups. That is below the league median, so spend it on need rather than on upside, and your need is unambiguous. Note that this is a deep league: 176 of the roughly 200 relevant players are already owned, so most of the names on national waiver lists this week - Germie Bernard, Kendre Miller, Kyler Murray, Tyler Higbee - are long gone here.
What is coming
The Monday night game is the Dallas Cowboys at the Philadelphia Eagles, 8:15 PM Eastern. You have nobody in it. Your opponent has Dallas Goedert (Philadelphia Eagles) at tight end, projected for 11.55 - so if this matchup is within 12 points when Sunday night ends, it goes to Monday and Goedert decides it.
Longer view: you are 2-4 and ninth of twelve, four games behind UndisputedGiant at 5-1. Your 597.02 points scored is tenth in the league, but your points against - 661.16 - is the second-highest total anyone has faced. You have been unlucky as much as you have been bad. The more useful number is your potential points: 699.02, meaning you have left 102 points on your bench across six weeks. That is roughly 17 points a week of lineup error, and it is the single biggest thing standing between this team and a playoff push. The trade deadline is Week 13 and the playoffs start Week 15 with six teams. You have time, but not a lot of it, and it starts with winning today.