If you’re reading this, then you’re in your league’s championship game. Either that or you play in one of those weird leagues that end in Week 17, in which case I’ll still have rankings for you next week, but my thoughts here essentially still apply: Don’t get cute. You’re still playing because you have a dominant roster that has likely caught a few breaks here and there en route to a successful season. Remember who got you here, and don’t overthink things. That’s not to say that every lineup decision is going to be easy, but don’t let a good matchup for a guy like Justin Durant blur the fact that Bobby Wagner is still the correct play.
Here are a few things to watch for in Championship Week:
J.J. Watt – The ultimate overthinking it move would be to bench Watt this week. Since breaking his hand, he’s put up three terrible weeks in a row by his standards, and he hasn’t really shown much improvement over that time. But if you survived those games and are still alive, that means you have a solid team to begin with. And Watt is playing in a must-win game against the #1 matchup for DEs this year by a long shot. Even with the injury, Watt’s ceiling in this game is enormous. If you’re still not convinced, think about this: Would you rather lose while playing Watt against an ideal matchup, or lose with Watt putting up a huge game on your bench? It’s a long offseason to regret a decision like that.
Kelvin Sheppard – There aren’t a lot of relevant players on waivers at this point in the season, but things have broken right for Sheppard over the last few weeks. Jelani Jenkins missed last week’s game with an ankle injury, and shouldn’t be 100% this week if he plays at all. In his absence, Sheppard put up a whopping 12 tackles. Koa Misi also went down with an injury on Sunday, and has been put on IR since then. This Miami team is depressing to watch, but Sheppard’s only real competition for stats at this point is Reshad Jones. You could do a lot worse at LB this week.
Charles Woodson – This may be the most important fantasy advice you read all week: Treasure the last two games of Charles Woodson’s career. He’s somehow managed to fly relatively under the radar for an all-world talent in his absurdly long and absurdly productive career, but an IDP owner since 1999 can tell you how fun it is to watch him play for your team. In the preseason I wrote that it would be insane to predict that Woodson would repeat his 2014 production, and while he’s slightly fallen off stats-wise, he’s still a no-doubt every week starter. His last two games come against Philip Rivers and Alex Smith, and if you don’t think he’s getting an interception in one of those games, well you clearly haven’t been watching for the last 16 years.
Speaking of farewells, it’s with mixed emotions that I announce that I won’t be doing IDP stuff for Razzball next year. Real life sometimes gets in the way of fantasy (annoying, I know), and it wouldn’t be fair for me to do this half-assed. I’ll still possibly be around Razzball from time to time, especially during Thrones season, and I’m out there on the Twitters, but I’m taking at least a year off of the weekly grind. In the spirit of the holidays, I want to thank Sky for giving me my first chance four years ago, Jay for not missing a beat since taking over these last two years, Grey for running my undisputed favorite site on the Internet, the other Razzball writers for always making me smarter, and most importantly the readers who spend their valuable time reading my semi-coherent musings on individual defensive players. Hopefully this isn’t goodbye, just see you later, but for now I’m going back to being a full-time Razzball fan instead of a part-time Razzball writer. Happy holidays everyone, and good luck in those championship games!
