We could see some early Week 15 fireworks because the total for Thursday Night Football is 52.5 points.
The Las Vegas Raiders are 3.5-point home favorites over their AFC West rivals, the Los Angeles Chargers. That puts the implied score at 28.0-24.5 in favor of the home team.
A few things to note: the Chargers may be thin at receiver. Keenan Allen is questionable due to a hamstring injury, and Mike Williams is likely out. The Raiders will be without speedy receiver Henry Ruggs, who is on the reserve/COVID-19 list and will not play.
Before we dig in more, don't forget to brush up on some single-game perfect lineup trends and leverage our Sharpstack single-game optimizer for correlated lineup plays.
High-Level Simulation Results
I simulated this game a thousand times -- using numberFire's projections -- to see some high-level takeaways. Here's what I found. Keep in mind that Allen is projected for half of his usual workload.
| Player | Salary | Top-5 Score Odds | Player | Salary | Top-5 Score Odds |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Justin Herbert | $16,000 | 75.8% | Jalen Guyton | $7,000 | 16.6% |
| Derek Carr | $15,000 | 75.3% | Keenan Allen | $14,000 | 16.6% |
| Austin Ekeler | $13,500 | 66.5% | Michael Badgley | $9,000 | 7.5% |
| Josh Jacobs | $13,000 | 57.3% | Devontae Booker | $8,500 | 6.6% |
| Darren Waller | $12,000 | 49.7% | Justin Jackson | $7,500 | 3.6% |
| Nelson Agholor | $10,500 | 33.1% | Zay Jones | $5,500 | 2.3% |
| Tyron Johnson | $6,500 | 25.7% | Kalen Ballage | $7,000 | 1.2% |
| Hunter Renfrow | $7,500 | 23.5% | Jalen Richard | $6,000 | 0.1% |
| Daniel Carlson | $9,500 | 20.1% | Foster Moreau | $6,500 | 0.0% |
| Hunter Henry | $10,000 | 18.5% | Donald Parham Jr. | $5,500 | 0.0% |
Here's a snapshot of how these two teams stack up, based on numberFire's opponent-adjusted Net Expected Points (NEP) metric.
| Team | Total Offense | Passing Offense | Rushing Offense | Total Defense | Passing Defense | Rushing Defense |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| LA Chargers | 20 | 18 | 27 | 17 | 19 | 15 |
| Las Vegas | 13 | 15 | 15 | 32 | 27 | 32 |
Slate Breakdown
Using numberFire's projections as the base, we see that both quarterbacks -- Justin Herbert and Derek Carr -- are the likeliest candidates to finish top-five in fantasy points with both being about 25.0% likely to finish as the top scorer (and thus be the MVP of choice). That's usually what we see with quarterbacks. However, both will be without relevant pass-catchers.
Herbert, last week against the Atlanta Falcons, averaged just 5.5 yards per attempt but put up 0.25 Passing NEP per drop back, good for nearly twice the current NFL average (0.14). He kept things in check with only a 4.2-yard average depth of target and a 4.5% downfield attempt rate (downfield passes being those traveling at least 16 yards from the line of scrimmage). It's just a luscious matchup for Herbert, even without Williams and possibly Allen.
Carr has had an abundance of fantasy points the past two games on 45 and 47 pass attempts, but the per-drop back efficiency was roughly NFL average. In two early-season games without Ruggs, we saw Carr average just 0.11 Passing NEP per drop back with a lowly 7.9% downfield attempt rate. He may not be in line for another eruption against a mid-level pass defense.
So, instead, we could look to Austin Ekeler at MVP. Ekeler is due for touchdown regression and, as a running back, will likely be less popular at MVP than he should be. He leads the Chargers in target share since returning, as well. Josh Jacobs gets a spot against an average rush defense. Last week, after trolling the fantasy community by implying he wouldn't play, Jacobs saw a meager 42.7% snap rate and handled 13 carries and 5 targets. He's also very much in consideration for a non-quarterback MVP despite the low snap rate.
Then we're on to the pass-catchers (and kickers, who are flex plays but not MVPs). The simulations like Darren Waller the most, no surprise, to finish as a top-five play in this game. Waller, in two games without Ruggs, has had 21.1% of the team's targets. He's up to a 24.6% target share over the past five games.
Nelson Agholor has a 20.9% target share in this five-game span, making him the only other Raider above Hunter Renfrow's 13.9% target share. Agholor has had dud games but is averaging a robust 3.0 downfield targets per game with 1.8 in the red zone. That brings his target total from 7.8 per game to 11.1 per game when weighted for the leverage on those targets. (Waller is at 9.2 targets per game and 11.5 weighted targets per game, for comparison.) Agholor is a really enticing, DGAF-y differentiation play at MVP, and we historically see receivers as the forgotten position at MVP.
Since Week 12 with Ekeler back in the lineup, the targets have flowed through Allen, who has a 21.5% target share (11.3 per game) in that span. Removing him opens up volume but also makes the team less efficient. Next in line behind Allen (and Ekeler [22.8%]) in this sample is Hunter Henry at 13.4% of the targets and Mike Williams at 13.3%. A lot of volume could be up for grabs for some typically quaternary options.
Last week, with Mike Williams playing just two snaps, it was Tyron Johnson who benefitted most. Johnson played 74.0% of the snaps and ran 80.0% of the routes en route to 7 targets, 2 of them traveling downfield and 1 of them coming in the red zone. Jalen Guyton had more snaps (83.6%) and routes (88.9%) but drew only 3 targets, 1 of which was downfield. Guyton is a better bet for snaps, but Johnson is probably the better bet for volume and is both my preference and the algorithm's preference between the two.