Happy Week 16!
Fifteen weeks of football are in the books. Madness. Championship Sunday is here, but injuries have unfortunately continued to take a toll on offenses around the league. The longterm game is over in season-long lands; it’s time to win this mini one-game season and take home some hardware.
What follows are my Week 16 QB rankings. Note that these are not season-long lists or projections; I’m purely ranking based on who I believe will score more fantasy points this week with a focus on 1) What the QB has achieved in recent weeks, 2) Injuries or workload changes that could impact their production, and 3) This week’s matchup.
I’ve slightly abbreviated the back half of this ranking’s usual full 32-QB listing under the assumption that the majority of remaining teams that have made their league’s championship are working with an above-average fantasy option under center.
1. KANSAS CITY CHIEFS QB PATRICK MAHOMES VS. ATLANTA FALCONS (KC -12.5, 54)
The 2020 fantasy QB MVP race is going down to the wire. Through 15 weeks of action, Mahomes and Kyler Murray have functioned as two of just seven signal-callers in NFL history to average at least 25 fantasy points per game (min. 6 games):
- 2019 Lamar Jackson (27.7 fantasy points per game)
- 2011 Aaron Rodgers (26.5)
- 2018 Mahomes (26.1)
- 2010 Michael Vick (25.9)
- 2014 Peyton Manning (25.8)
- 2020 Kyler Murray (25.7)
- 2020 Mahomes (25.4)
Of course, Mahomes and Murray have gone about racking up their production quite differently. Nobody has racked up more fantasy points from purely passing production than Mahomes, and he’s continued to do so in style.
Best of Patrick Mahomes against the Saints is pretty, pretty, pretty good pic.twitter.com/IJolicHW3J
— Ian Hartitz (@Ihartitz) December 21, 2020
Nobody has allowed more fantasy points per game to opposing QBs than the Falcons this season. The fantasy football gods have a sick sense of humor sometimes. Continue to fire up Mahomes as the real life and fantasy overall QB1.
2. GREEN BAY PACKERS QB AARON RODGERS VS. TENNESSEE TITANS (GB -4.5, 56)
Rodgers has thrown multiple TDs in all but two games this season. He’s been particularly dynamic when throwing downfield (20-plus yards):
- PFF passing grade: 99.7 (No. 2 among 41 qualified QBs)
- Big-time throws: 29 (No. 1)
- Passing yards: 1,117 (No. 1)
- Pass TDs: 10 (No. 4)
- Yards per attempt: 15.7 (tied for No. 9)
- Adjusted completion rate: 45.1% (No. 18)
- Drops: 3 (tied for No. 6)
The 2020 version of Rodgers has been his most-productive self since 2011. Fire up Rodgers as the second-best option among all QBs; he’s been a matchup-proof QB1 virtually all season. The Panthers managed to cause problems last week by sacking Rodgers five times; don’t expect the Titans’ 28th-ranked defense in pressure rate to cause the same sort of issues.
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