For fantasy purposes, it’s better to have players in games that feature teams that play fast and run a lot of plays. Why? Faster paced offenses drain less clock in between plays which gives the game more volume. And more volume = more opportunities to score fantasy points.
Note: All pace/play stats are from RotoViz and cover the last eight weeks (Week 10-17). And all of the rankings within this column are playoff teams only. Eliminated teams were not included.
Let’s preview both Championship games:
Tampa Bay at Green Bay
Buccaneers: 1st-of-4 playoff teams in pace (seconds between snaps); 3rd in plays per game
Packers: last in pace; last in plays per game
Much has been made of the Packers struggles on offense when these two teams met back in Week 6, but let’s be honest. This is a totally different spot. The Packers were coming out of their bye and traveling to Tampa back when these two teams met in mid-October. This game is in Lambeau. Also, Green Bay did not have Allen Lazard in Week 6 while Aaron Jones injured his calf during the middle of the game, causing him to miss a few weeks. David Bakhtiari’s loss is huge, but Aaron Rodgers finally has all of his weapons fully healthy and this offense has rolled since they got embarrassed against the Buccaneers. Green Bay has scored 30 or more points in nine of their last 12 games since Week 6. What’s going to be really interesting to see in this matchup is if the Packers continue their slow-paced, balanced, ball control offense or if they try to open it up a bit and abandon the run game against the Bucs’ sterling front-seven. Because their run defense is so dominant — they are No. 1 in YPC allowed, success rate, and yards per game — opponents against the Bucs’ have gone 65% pass-heavy, which is easily the highest rate in the league. And, if Vegas is right about this game (the Packers are favored by 3.5 points), Tom Brady is going to throw a ton. When Tampa Bay has found themselves behind on the scoreboard, they’ve gone 74% pass-heavy which, for reference, is tied with the Bills for the second-highest rate in the league. All of this sets up for the game to be a little more high-scoring than the total implies (51.5 points). Each of the Bucs’ last five games have combined to score 50 or more points between both teams and with the Packers offense humming along, I think all of the signs point toward the over here.
Buffalo at Kansas City
- Bills: 2nd-of-4 playoff teams in pace (seconds between snaps); 2nd in plays per game
- Chiefs: 3rd in pace; 1st in plays per game
Bills-Chiefs has the makings of being the game of the year if Patrick Mahomes clears the league’s concussion protocol. (Spoiler alert: He will.) Both of these teams were mainstays in this column all year long as two of the fastest-paced attacks with both ranked top-10 in pace and top-6 in pass rate when the game was within a score (7 points). If it stays tight throughout, this game will definitely trend towards a shootout with both teams throwing the ball up and down the field. In fact, the Bills have relied even more heavily on Josh Allen in recent weeks and ramped up their pass-heavy ways. Over their last six games, OC Brian Daboll has called a pass on 64% of their first-down plays which trails only the Steelers (76%) in this span. The Chiefs have only lost four games over the last two seasons with Mahomes under center and their opponents needed 40, 35, 31, and 19 points to win. Note that Tyreek Hill was out in the game that the Chiefs lost 19-13 to the Colts last season. I’m fully expecting the Bills to come out and throw to win all game long, resulting in a potential shootout.
