Welcome to Week 15 of The Worksheet, a comprehensive fantasy football preview by Rich Hribar.
What is The Worksheet from Rich Hribar?
The Worksheet is a comprehensive weekly fantasy football preview for each NFL game. Rich Hribar analyzes the matchups for every notable fantasy player for every game every week of the NFL season.
Week 15 Fantasy Football Matchups
We are coming off a strong open to December and the start of the final push for the fantasy season.
There were NFL games with a playoff aura last week.
The gamers were not only enjoyable in terms of vibes, but also on the scoreboard.
11 of the 14 games went over the game total, the highest rate in a week this season.
The 49.9 combined points per game were the most in a week this season.
Not all of those offensive points, but after a string of offensive down weeks, NFL offenses averaged 23.9 points, the most in a week since Week 8.
Offenses averaged 2.19 points per drive, the first time we cleared 2.0 points per drive as a league since Week 9.
You needed a bigger score for a win in your fantasy league or to take down a DFS tournament (or even hit a cash line).
13 different quarterbacks scored 18 or more fantasy points, the most since Week 9.
Five players scored 30 or more PPR points in Week 14, with 11 players scoring 25 or more points.
As great as it was to see more points scored, we had a rough week with injuries that will impact the remainder of the season.
Daniel Jones was lost for the season (and maybe next) with an Achilles injury.
Jayden Daniels left his third game of the season early.
Tyrod Taylor was a popular streaming pick, but he only made it 6 plays into the game before leaving with a groin injury.
Zach Ertz and Brian Branch suffered season-ending injuries.
David Njoku, Nick Chubb, and Keaton Mitchell did not have a lot of standalone fantasy value, but all left last week with injuries that can elevate players at their position should they miss time moving forward.
CeeDee Lamb and Tee Higgins went into concussion protocol.
With the Bengals nearly eliminated from the postseason (they have 1% odds) and Higgins being in protocol for the second time in the past three weeks, we may not see him again this season.
And that is something to note.
In the final month of the season, we will see players shut down or teams eliminated from the postseason, and we will look at various topics as we approach the offseason.
There is a lot of instability week to week for starting lineups at this point in the season.
We did have four teams on bye last week, but that is no longer the case.
We have full slates of games from here on out.
This is a huge fantasy week for seasonal leagues.
If they have not started already, most fantasy playoffs will begin this week, while larger-field tournaments and dynasty formats continue to roll through their postseasons.
Ensure you are on top of inactive players for each kickoff and lineup lock this week for all games that start before Sunday.
If injuries or misfortune have worked against you this season, there is still plenty of DFS action to get into and make the most of the remainder of the season.
This article will be updated throughout the week to reflect major news or injury implications.
I encourage you to use the game-by-game tables and data points here in conjunction with the player rankings that will be available every Wednesday.
Enjoy the games!
Click the matchups below for the individual game previews.
