- The San Francisco 49ers vs. Tennessee Titans game will be underway at 8:20 p.m. ET on Thursday night.
- Who should be in the Captain slot for your DFS team?
- Matt LaMarca breaks down every relevant DFS option using the FantasyLabs Tools, Projections, and Player Models.
NFL Week 16 gets underway with a Thursday Night Football showdown between the San Francisco 49ers and the Tennessee Titans at 8:20 p.m. ET.
In this article, I’ll be using various FantasyLabs tools and other industry metrics to break down the slate.
And don’t forget to check out our Lineup Builder if you like to hand build your lineups or our Lineup Optimizer for those of you that like to enter multiple lineups into tournaments. This article is specific to the showdown slate but also relevant if you’re playing Tuesday’s two-game slate.
Studs
These two teams are headed in opposite directions. The Titans have lost three of their past four games, while the 49ers have won five of their past six. Unsurprisingly, Vegas has made the 49ers slight three-point road favorites in this matchup.
The 49ers offense is spearheaded by Deebo Samuel, who has evolved into a jack-of-all-trades. His role as a receiver has dwindled – he’s averaged just 3.4 targets over his past five games – but he’s made up for it with his work as a runner. He’s averaged 6.6 carries and 49.4 rushing yards over that time frame, and he’s scored a total of six rushing touchdowns.
That rushing workload gives Samuel a nice floor for a fantasy receiver, but you can argue that his current role caps his upside. Catches are supremely valuable in PPR formats, and Samuel just isn’t doing very much of that at the moment. He’s finished with just one catch in three of his past four games. He’s still posted a positive Plus/Minus in three of his past four games, but he’s scored 20.8 DraftKings points or fewer in four of them.
