Thursday Night Action!
Green Bay Packers 5-2 (2.5) @ San Francisco 49ers 4-4
I wish I could tell you which Green Bay team is going to show up on Thursday. In all of their wins, you see Rodgers looking like an MVP and the defense looks serviceable but the line holds up. A key fumble caused by a 3 man rush on the last play of the game was a stinger. This team’s inability to stop the run is concerning. In their two losses, their opponents averaged 165.5 yards. Even when you look at their wins that were actually competitive throughout, they still let up 128 on average. Now you face arguably the best run scheme team in the game. Should I even have faith? Even in their losses, San Fran is still able to average over a hundred yards a game. This team is really only going to go as far as Aaron will take them. He is 7th in yards per game among active QBs. 3rd in touchdowns and quarterback rating. Teams will always give him the respect and play a little off the line. That’s where it’s huge for Aaron Jones to be active. Johnathan Williams has filled in really well and there is a reason he led the league in rushing touchdowns. He is 6th this year with just five games played. The dude just has a knack of finding the end zone. He isn’t even top 10 in opportunities inside the red zone. The Packers have treated this regular season as a true warm up. Their minds are set on the playoffs. They know that they can win the NFC North. Getting their guys healthy for when that time comes is crucial. After two weeks out he may even be held out of this short week, but best believe that when he does come back, he will roll over defenses. Another question worth asking is, who is going to cover the best receiver in the league – Devantae Adams? DK just ate them up for 12-161-2. As amazing as that is, Adams’ ceiling this year is probably higher. No matter what trouble Aaron is in, he can always chuck it in Devantae’s direction and he will come down with it more times than not. He is tied for the league lead in touchdowns even though he has played 2-3 less games then everyone else.
This game opened up at -1 for Green Bay and now you can find it for -3 at some places. It seems to me that the public doesn’t care about the rush defense in Green Bay. Yeah, Hasty is good but he isn’t half as good as Cook. A backup quarterback who has a turnover-prone history leaves me a little worried. But I’m siding with the public on this. Green Bay is going to come out hungry to prove everyone that they didn’t forget the beat down they took in the NFC championship game last year. And sadly, it won’t be as even as it was back then. I’m looking to see where Adams’ yards O/U starts out because I think he goes the hell off. The defense comes up clutch early on and gives the offense some nice field position to take advantage. Green Bay with the Points is a smash for me.
San Francisco should come in with some confidence that they can win this game. Even with no Kittle, no Jimmy G, and banged up defense, Kyle Shanahan has his guys playing hard. The total next man up mindset has paid off still. Mullins came in and led a touchdown drive every time he touched the ball. Kendrick Bourne and Brandon Aiyuk stepped up when Kittle limped off the field. And even though it looks bleak for Deebo, Aiyuk is showing that he is ready for number one duties. Tevin Coleman comes in and looks great with his three carries, and then injures the same knee that he was held out with. Hasty has looked solid and whenever they want to include McKinnon I’m ready and waiting on a lot of fantasy teams. They might be forced to give him more looks as he can be a comfortable piece for Mullins. He knows the offense and has looked good at times, but maybe with all these injuries, they are destined for an 8-8 season. Not good and not bad…just ok. The two games leading up to this one, you’d of thought that maybe this team is just a well-oiled machine that will always chug along and get wins. They embarrassed New England and made a decent Rams offense look suspect, but you can’t forget that ass whooping from Miami, the way they looked early on against Seattle, and how they allowed a bad Eagles team steal one late.
