Thursday Night Showdown Slate Article- Rams @ Seahawks

The Rams and Seahawks meet in a division clash on Thursday night with a game total of 49 and the home Seahawks favored by 1.5.  Last year these teams combined for two shootouts, 33-31 and 36-31 with the Rams victorious in both.

The player who has feasted off this match-up the most the last two years is easily Todd Gurley who has a staggering 759 rushing yards, 8 touchdowns and 10 catches for 104 yards in his last three games against the Seahawks.  In his first three games this year he had 14, 16, and 14 carries, but last week game script took that away and he ended up with 5.  Fortunately, he fit right into the passing game and exchanged his rushes for catches, 7 for 54 on 11 targets.  He did have 2 touchdowns rushing of his 5 carries.  Sean McVay has not been piling up the touches like he had prior to his knee issues, but he did play 75% of the snaps last week.  He is my favorite play on the Rams side of the ball.

Jared Goff has stayed true to his production being being better at home than on the road this season (27 and 20 DK points at home vs. 17 and 10 points on the road).  I will likely own him on some teams stacked with receivers, but I will have less exposure to him than most of my other core players.

The receiver position on the Rams is always difficult to prognosticate although Cooper Kupp has taken the lead dog role early in the season with a whopping 32 catches on 46 targets.  He is Goff’s top choice, and will be a part of many of my rosters.  I also am going to own Brandin Cooks as he is $1,800 less than Kupp, $200 less than Woods and looks to have the best match-up with Seahawks corners.  The best corner Seatlle has is Shaquill Griffin and he lines up on the left side nearly 100% of the time.  Woods lines up the most on that side for the Rams receivers (nearly 50%).

The tight end position for the Rams is a crapshoot.  Everett runs more routes than Higbee, but production was nearly equal last week with the exception of Everett scoring a touchdown.  Its tough to imagine both of them combining for 15 targets like last week when Goff had 68 pass attempts.  Depending on how much cap space you have on your rosters Higbee might be all that fits at $1,200 less.

My favorite option on the Seahawks side of the ball is Tyler Lockett who when the passing game is needed is a monster.  Last week they ran all over the Cardinals so Lockett only had 4 targets of which he caught them all for 51 yards.  The two weeks prior however he had 21 catches for 233 yards.  Chris Godwin lit up the Rams from the slot last week for 12 catches for 172 yards and 2 touchdowns.  The week before although not a huge week, slot receiver Jarvis Landry was the Browns leading receiver against the Rams. I will feature Locket in the Captain spot on about 35-40% of my teams.

Of course if you are going to roster Lockett, you probably want to pair him with Russell Wilson on a good share of those teams hoping the connect for a score or two.  Wilson is also capable of racking up DK points via his legs as he has 88 rushing yards and 2 tds on the ground.  The only thing that can derail Wilson is if their running game dominates the Rams, which hasn’t really happened this year giving up rushing totals of 88, 95, 57, and 127 despite facing monsters like Kamara, McCaffrey, and Chubb.  The Seahawks do put an emphasis on the run, which is why I am going to own Carson on this slate, but I don’t think he will go crazy.

Unlike many Showdown slates this year, the low dollar options are not popping out like Samuels did Monday night or D’Ernest Johnson did for the Browns two weeks ago.  C.J Prosise is a change of pace back who will likely see a few touches, but Penny is expected to return, which will diminish his role even more than it is.  One low dollar option that has a chance to do something is Jaron Brown, who has received 9 targets the last two weeks and caught six of them for 80 yards.  He lines up in the slot all the rest of the time that Lockett doesn’t, which I have already talked about is the weakest of the Rams secondary.  Brown is only $1,400, so if we can get three catches for 50 yards and he happens to pop one for a td, it would be a huge.

Here are a few rosters I like initially:

Captain: Lockett, Wilson, Gurley, Cooks, Metcalf, J Brown

Captain: Gurley, Wilson, Lockett, Cooks, Penny, Higbee

Captain: Cooks, Goff, Lockett, Wilson, Everett, Prosise

Captain: Gurley, Lockett, Cooks, Carson, Dissly, Everett

QB:

Wilson $10,600

Goff $10,200

 

RB:

Gurley $8,800

Carson $8,200

 

WR:

Kupp $9,600

Lockett $9,400

Cooks $7,800

J Brown $1,400

 

TE:

Dissly $7,600

Everett $3,200

Higbee $2,000

 

K:

Myers $3,600

Zuerlein $3,400