Quick Slant: Christmas, pt. 3 - And to All, a Good Night
Mat Irby’s Quick Slant
'Twas the night before Christmas, and all through the town, The Broncos were dreaming of wearing the crown. Their jerseys were folded, packed up with great care, in hopes that a West title soon would be theirs. The players were nestled all snug in their chairs, while visions of Super Bowls danced in their prayers; Sean in his visor and Nix in a cap, they’d just settled in for a pre-travel nap.
Wheels started spinning, and jet engines clattered, as they’d boarded the plane to settle the matter. Away to the clouds the big Boeing flew, carr’ing their dreams in orange and blue. But east o'er the border, Chiefs Kingdom was waking, To the smell of the hick’ry and meat they were making. Pat’s torn ACL, their playoff streak ended, yet among the tailgaters, not one was offended.
Their bellies were full, and surrounded by friends, they laughed as they feasted on piles of burnt ends. They toasted to glory they'd already carried, how soon Trav and Tay-Tay would fin’lly be married. Though the temperature dropped, they were toasty and tranquil. They remembered what reasons they had to be thankful. Their hearts were a-glow and were bursting with glee, for no one could take back those titles—all three!
They stepped on the tarmac, that Mile High crew, and boarded the buses—they needed a few. Through the tunnel they rumbled, as red became dominant. The gates of the Kingdom stood heavy and prominent. When, what to the Broncos’ tired eyes should appear, but a sea of red jerseys and thousands to cheer. Dressed all in red, a coach merry and thick, they knew in a moment it wasn’t St. Nick.
More rapid than cheetahs his playmakers came, And he whistled, and shouted, and called them by name: "On, Xavier! On, JuJu! On, Hunt and Pacheco! Let’s make the whole stadium rattle and echo!" His eyes—how they twinkled! His play-sheet, how bright! It shone like a beacon in Arrowhead’s light!
His droll little mouth was drawn up like a bow, as he paced on the grass in the stadium’s glow. The stump of a pencil he bit on the end, as he drew up a play that no team could defend. A light-brown mustache, with a smatt'ring of gray, bounced on his lip as he called out the play. He carried a warmth and a spirit profound, and he shook when he laughed—a magnificent sound!
But Payton was ready, his eyes on the sheet; He’d checked the film twice, so his plan was complete. With a flick of his wrist and a sharp, sudden glare, He sent out the signals and filled up the air. With a shout of the play-call, he broke from the huddle and did his pre-snaps to untangle the puzzle. He barked out the signal; the cadence rang clear. Sixty years of fierce pretext loomed loud in their ears.
The mountains look east as the prairie lands wait for two-storied empires to settle their fate. Though one holds the glory and one holds the spark, they both seek the light as they dance in the dark. With pride on the line and a legend to write, Merry football to all, and to all a good night!
Broncos
Implied Team Total: 25
In a third Christmas-day game featuring a team starting their third-string QB, we have the most uninspiring of them all. The Chiefs were probably better than their record indicated. But now, without QBs Patrick Mahomes and Gardner Minshew, both lost with season-ending leg injuries, the Chiefs will turn to 2022 seventh-round pick (Steelers) QB Chris Oladokun. Meanwhile, the Broncos are in the conversation for the best team in the league.
The Broncos, 13.5-point favorites, are in that conversation, but by Pythagorean expected wins, they are more like fourth and are outperforming their expectations by nearly four wins.
The Broncos are above average in offensive EPA and defensive EPA allowed.
Offensively, they are above average in dropback EPA and average in rush EPA.
Denver is 12th in offensive EPA per play and 21st in offensive success rate. They rank 13th in offensive EPA per dropback and 23rd in offensive success rate on dropbacks.
The Broncos average 26.1 seconds to snap (T-5th). Their pass rate is 60% (T-7th). They have a 5.64% pass rate over expected (PROE), so their default setting is to pass. They average 66 offensive plays per 60 minutes (T-6th). This is a pretty good environment for fantasy production.
Bo Nix has dropped back 602 times (2nd), converting them into 551 attempts (2nd). This is probably a pretty surprising conversion rate, considering how he played a year ago. He doesn’t take many sacks, owning a 9.0% pressure-to-sack rate (2nd).
What’s more surprising is that Nix hasn’t scrambled nearly as much as we might have anticipated, only taking off 23 times (T-17th). His rushing yardage (265, 14th) is way down, but he has salvaged some of the rushing production we had hoped for by scoring four rushing TDs, already matching last year’s total.
Nix has been a top 12 QB five times, including a massive spike in Week 7, and two additional games at or around 30 fantasy points. He has only one single-digit output all year. He’s a back-end QB1 for fantasy.
Much of his fantasy production comes from being a plus rusher, even if it wasn’t quite what we had hoped, and being in a highly effective and dropback-heavy offense that scores a lot of points. As a thrower of the football, it still isn’t perfect; Nix has been above average in dropback EPA, but below average in CPOE, highlighting accuracy concerns he had coming out of college (despite a high completion % in a low-aDOT Oregon offense, he had previously had a 59% completion % at Auburn in a more traditional offense.
The Chiefs have allowed the 18th-most fantasy points to QBs in their last five games. They’ve suffered a lot of significant absences. They’ve also truly given up on the season, and many players who were content to patch themselves up with baling wire and gum have finally let go. CBs Trent McDuffie and Jaylon Watson went on IR on Wednesday, ending their season.
The Broncos have only two players with a target-share-per-game rate of 15%: WRs Courtland Sutton (19.7%) and Troy Franklin (16.4%). WR Pat Bryant, who is usually their third WR, will miss the game with a concussion.
Sutton has been a WR1 four times this season, including in each of his last two games. He has not had a massive spike week, and he’s had three single-digit PPR outputs. He is on a streak of four straight weeks in the top 24.
Franklin has been a WR1 three times. He is a very volatile entity, with eight single-digit games. He is not a sacraficial field stretcher type as we ought to expect from this type of boom-bustness (he and Sutton are first and second on the team, but they have 13.5 and 13.6 aDOTs).
With Bryant out, the natural reaction in 11-personnel might be to slide Franklin into the slot, where he already plays 47% of the time, and bring one of the WRs, Lil’Jordan Humphrey or Marvin Mims, in to man the outside. This is speculative, though. The Chiefs allow a target rate of 33.9% to opposing slots (3rd), so there may be some significance in this.
The Chiefs have allowed the 11th-most fantasy points to WRs in their last five games, but again, this is subject to change with the Chiefs folding up shop for 2025.
TE Evan Engram could also pick up some of the slack for Bryant; to be clear, this isn’t some massive share in the Broncos slot that we’re mopping up, so we shouldn’t get too buried in the weeds about this when you hear me harp on it. It’s more of a curiosity, really, and it’s matchup-driven.
Engram has two TE1 weeks, but he’s been a pretty unreliable TE2 with limited upside and enormous downside. Hopefully, he’s not your best option this week, but if he is, hey—at least he’s got a realistic pathway to the TE top 12.
The Chiefs' defense has surrendered the 17th-most fantasy points to TEs in their last five games. In addition to their lost CBs, they apparently had a nasty virus run through the locker room this week, affecting three front-seven players, including LB Nick Bolton. I’m not sure if I’m ready to go all-in on Engram just because Bolton is absent, though.
The Chiefs’ defense is pretty close to the middle in both dropback EPA and rush EPA allowed. They are slightly more efficient against the run.
The Chiefs rank 15th in EPA per play allowed and 17th in defensive success rate. They rank 18th in EPA per dropback allowed and 20th in defensive success rate on dropbacks.
They use man at a rate of 29.4% (9th). They play two-high at a rate of 56.9% (6th). They prefer Cover 3 (26.1%), but DC Steve Spagnuolo runs a versatile defense that is highly multiple. They also blitz at a rate of 33% (3rd).
Fantasy Points’ coverage matchup tool assigns a zero-based matchup grade to each pass-catcher based on their opponent’s use of specific types and rates of coverage and how that pass-catcher performs against them. Positive numbers indicate a favorable matchup and negative numbers indicate an unfavorable one.
Based on this model, Sutton (+10.1%), Franklin (+2.3%), and Mims (+19.2%) all have favorable matchups, while Engram (-6.7%) has an unfavorable one.
PFF’s matchup tool is player-based, pitting the PFF ratings of individual players against each other for an expected number of plays based on historical tendencies and rating on a scale from great to poor.
Based on this model, Sutton’s matchup grades out as good, along with Engram’s, while Franklin’s and Mims’ matchups grade out as fair.
The Broncos’ offense has allowed a pass rate over expected (PrROE) of 1.17% (6th). The Chiefs’ defense has generated a PrROE of 9.85% (6th). Strength-on-strength, the matchup comes out neutral. That said, two of the Chiefs’ players suffering with this virus are DE George Karlaftis and DT Derrick Nnadi; their absences could change the math a little, but likely not. The Chiefs get a ton of pressure because they blitz a ton.
The Broncos’ offense generates 2.52 adjusted yards before contact per attempts (adj. YBC/Att, 5th), while the Chiefs allow 2.15 adj. YBC/Att defensively. The composite gives the Broncos a relatively significant run-blocking advantage on offense.
The Broncos rank 16th in offensive EPA per rush and 12th in offensive success rate on rushes.
Since RB J.K. Dobbins was lost for the season, rookie R.J. Harvey has served as the lead back with a highly meaningful role. Harvey has a 61% snap share, a 10% target share, and has earned 54% of the team's rush attempts in his last five games.
Harvey has been an RB1 six times, including three times in the four games since the bye. He has had eight single-digit PPR outputs, but they all happened before the bye in Week 12.
Despite only a limited time as the Broncos’ undisputed lead back, Harvey ranks in the top 20 in high-value touches (HVTs, 17th).
That said, Harvey is also a significant negative TD regression candidate based on my TDs/Yds touchdowns-over-expected (TDOE) model. We don’t have meaningful data on prior TD rates since he is a rookie. A 6% rushing TD rate seems a little high, but not bananas. It does seem unlikely that he could carry an 8.3% receiving TD rate, though.
The Chiefs rank 16th in EPA per rush allowed and 10th in defensive success rate on rushes.
They have held opposing RBs to 23rd in fantasy scoring in their last five games. The real consideration here, however, is that 13.5-point spread. It is hard to conceive of a world where the Chiefs, led by a third-string QB, on a team ravaged by injuries everywhere else, could actually keep the game competitive. You have to find yourself bullish on Harvey this week.
