Thorman’s Snaps and Pace: Week 17

Welcome to the Week 17 edition of Snaps & Pace, where we examine trends in play volume and game pace. It is meant to be a 30,000-foot view of upcoming contests, with the goal of identifying which matchups will – and which will not – be played on fertile fantasy soil. For a primer on why this is important, click here.

We typically see reduced offensive output when divisional rivals meet for the second time in a season, but since every Week 17 game is a rematch, we don’t have a choice but to dive into some of them. With an extra playoff team in each conference for the first time, only a small handful of Sunday’s games are meaningless. For more on who will be playing all-out, check out Adam Levitan’s write-up on Week 17 Motivation.

 

Up In Pace

Atlanta Falcons at Tampa Bay Buccaneers

Especially after the Falcons just gave the Chiefs everything they could handle during a disappointingly low-scoring game in Arrowhead, going all-in on this matchup feels risky. Although the game has plenty going for it from a scoring and play-volume perspective, there’s no guarantee this Week 15 rematch reproduces 131 snaps and 58 points. Atlanta is still playing voluminous games, but their situation-neutral pace has slowed (25th fastest over the last month) and they’ve tightened up on defense. Of course, that didn’t stop the Bucs from piling up 320 passing yards and 31 points after halftime two weeks ago.