Lions vs. Packers Fantasy Football Worksheet, Week 13

The Worksheet, a comprehensive fantasy football preview by Rich Hribar, breaks down everything you need to know about the Week 13 matchup between the Lions and Packers on Thanksgiving.

Find a breakdown of every Week 13 NFL game in our Worksheet Hub.

Trust = spike production for that player

Quarterback

Jared Goff: Goff only managed 6.6 yards per pass attempt on Sunday, his lowest rate in a game since Week 4.

But forced into a trailing script and a low-scoring week across the league, Goff still managed to produce a QB9 (17.2 points) scoring week.

Goff threw the ball a season-high 42 times against the Giants for 279 yards, 2 touchdowns, and an interception.

Goff has once again been a better quarterback at home this season, which is not a surprise to anyone.

He has finished as QB13 or higher five times this season, with four of those games coming at home.

His 109.6 rating at home is QB5 on the season, with 12 touchdowns to 3 interceptions.

The home-road splits for the Green Bay pass defense are also noticeable, but they are more pronounced in their rush defense than in their pass defense.

On the road, the Packers have only allowed 6.6 yards per pass attempt (5th), 9.7 yards per completion (3rd), and a 4% touchdown rate (12th).

Goff has thrown for fewer than 7.0 yards per pass attempt in all three games against Jeff Hafley’s defense.

He has six other games in total over the past two years in which he averaged fewer than 7.0 Y/A.

When these teams met all the way back in the season opener, the Packers had a game plan that boxed in the Detroit passing game.

The Lions averaged 3.8 yards per play in Week 1, their fewest in a game since Week 16, 2020 (3.7 yards).

Goff was QB23 (10.9 points) that week.

He completed 31 of 39 passes, but for a season-low 5.8 yards per pass attempt.

Goff averaged a league-low 4.2 air yards per attempt in Week 1.

Only 23.1% of his throws were 10 or more yards downfield (29th), while a league-low 2.6% went 20 or more yards downfield.

Green Bay stymied Goff by forcing him to hold the ball and taking him off his first read.

Per Fantasy Points data, Goff threw the ball to his first read 53.8% of the time in Week 1, his lowest rate of the season.

When throwing to his first read, Goff was 15 of 18 for 151 yards (8.4 Y/A).

When not throwing to his first read, he was 16 of 19 for 74 yards (3.9 Y/A).

That is the story if you want to have success against the Lions.

Goff has a 122.5 rating (5th) when throwing to his first read, completing a league-high 74% of his passes for 9.4 Y/A (4th) with 17 touchdowns and 4 interceptions.

When taken off his first read, Goff has completed 69.4% of his passes (28th) for 6.9 Y/A (22nd) with 6 touchdowns and 1 interception.

Dan Campbell is now calling plays for Detroit, but the cat-and-mouse game of the success of the play call is vital to Detroit’s success in the passing game.

Goff threw 3 touchdowns when these teams played in Detroit last year.

That game was also much higher-scoring than the first matchup in Green Bay.

After they combined for 38 total points in a rainy Green Bay in Week 9, these teams combined for 65 points in a Detroit 34-31 win in Week 14.

There is volatility with Goff, where I prefer to use him as a floor-based QB2 (on the higher end), but also enough upside here with this offense at home to provide a spike week should this game be pushed into a shootout like the rematch a year ago.

Jordan Love: Love was not tasked with doing much on Sunday, completing 14 of 21 passes for 139 yards without a touchdown or interception.

Closing last week as the QB26 (7.1 points), Love has now finished higher than QB16 in two of his past seven games.

Without Tucker Kraft on the field, the Packers are averaging 4.8 yards per play (27th) with a 40.8% success rate (21st).

Love has now thrown for fewer than 200 yards in all three games since the loss of Kraft.

On 129 dropbacks with Kraft off the field this season, Love has completed 63.6% of his passes for 6.7 yards per pass attempt with a 4.2% touchdown rate.

On the 236 dropbacks with Kraft on the field, he has completed 70% of his passes for 8.3 Y/A and a 4.7% touchdown rate.

Green Bay will be ultra conservative unless pushed.

The Packers have a 55.6% neutral dropback rate, 30th in the league.

As a road underdog, the Packers should be pushed here to throw more.

I am handling Love as a boom-or-bust QB2.

I believe his floor is lower than Goff’s, but this game still has the potential to be high-scoring, given that it's in Detroit.

Detroit has been a boom-or-bust pass defense due to its aggressive nature.

They have only allowed a 60.9% completion rate (5th), but when they do give up completions, they have been chunk gains.

The Lions are allowing 7.2 yards per pass attempt (22nd) and 11.8 yards per completion (30th) to go along with a 6% touchdown rate.

The Lions play man coverage 35% of the time, second in the league.

Against man coverage, Love is 14th in completion rate (58.6%), but for 7.8 Y/A (7th) and a 12.6% touchdown rate (5th).

Even if Love is inefficient, he could find his way to yardage and touchdowns.

Detroit was still without Terrion Arnold and Kerby Joseph last week, both of whom are questionable to open the week.

Running Back

Jahmyr Gibbs (TRUST): Gibbs turned in the best fantasy game of the season on Sunday, posting 264 total yards and 3 touchdowns.

Gibbs rushed 15 times for 219 yards (14.6 YPC) with 2 touchdowns, adding 11 receptions for 45 yards and a touchdown.

You have probably seen this make the rounds, but the 200-yard rushing game paired with 10 receptions is so rare that it was the second time it has happened in league history.

LaDainian Tomlinson in 2002 was the only other back to do it.

There have been 167 games in which a player has rushed for 200 yards.

Gibbs became only the fifth player to do it on 15 or fewer rushes.

After a slow start to the year in terms of explosive plays, Gibbs has made up for it of late.

Over his past five games, Gibbs has touchdowns of 78, 5, 14, 13, 43, 3, 49, and 69 yards.

The coaching staff has repeatedly said they want to get David Montgomery more involved this season.

Still, whenever this offense is against the wall, Gibbs is on the field because he is simply the better, more explosive playmaker.

Gibbs has set new season highs in snap rate in each of the past two weeks.

After playing 72.9% of the snaps in Week 11, he played 73.5% last week.

When Detroit has been tied or trailing, Gibbs has played 71.1% of the offensive snaps and has handled 67.5% of the backfield touches.

The Lions are favored here, but the spread is tight, and as we just saw last week, nothing is locked in with them as favorites.

Campbell has had mixed results since taking over as a play caller, but Gibbs has been more involved as a pass catcher.

After averaging 6.8 receiving points per game over the first eight games of the season, Gibbs has 12.0, 15.7, and 21.5 PPR receiving points over the past three weeks.

He has target shares of 12.5%, 22.2%, and 31.6% over that span, with targets on 25%, 29.6%, and 42.9% of his routes.

The lower-end target share came in with a positive game script, so there is some fragility here, but over the opening eight weeks, Gibbs cleared 3 targets in a game twice.

He has 4, 8, and 12 targets over the past three weeks.

That receiving spike has opened the door for Gibbs to produce massive ceiling weeks.

He has 172, 146, and 264 total yards in those games.

That combination of usage will serve him well here.

The Packers have had a weaker rush defense on the road this season.

They allow 3.7 yards per carry (6th) and 0.98 yards before contact on running back runs (10th) at home compared to 4.2 YPC (16th) and 1.36 yards before contact on those runs (23rd) on the road.

Regardless of location, the Packers have allowed over 100 total yards to a running back in three of their past four games.

Josh Jacobs: Jacobs sat out last week’s game with a knee contusion.

The move was presumed to be precautionary, to have him ready to play on a short week, but we will follow his status heading into Thursday to ensure he is active.

The Packers are a notoriously cautious team when it comes to player injuries, so we will keep tabs on the situation.

Should Jacobs be ready to go, there is still some risk of re-injury, but gamers will take that on in managed leagues as an option on the RB1/RB2 line.

How you handle Jacobs in DFS is where the unpredictability has a larger impact.

If you do buy that Jacobs will be limited in some capacity here, we saw Jacobs semi-limited in Weeks 7 through 9 while dealing with a calf injury.

In those three games, he played 55.4%, 53.1%, and 58.5% of the offensive snaps, his three lowest rates of the season (excluding Week 11 when he left early).

In those games, he handled 66.7%, 53.3%, and 70% of the backfield touches for 58, 45, and 100 total yards.

The Packers limited his work as a pass catcher in those games.

He ran a route on 45.5%, 37.8%, and 39.5% of the dropbacks those weeks, his three lowest rates of the year.

Jacobs is only averaging 3.8 YPC, which ranks 27th out of 34 running backs with 100-plus runs on the year.

His 0.75 yards before contact per rush ranks 31st on that list.

He does not even have a 100-yard rushing game this season.

That efficiency and workload reduction make him more of an RB2, but he still held onto his touchdown equity in all of those games.

Jacobs scored in all three games.

Going back to last season, Jacobs has now scored at least 1 touchdown in 19 of his past 21 complete games, totaling 27 touchdowns over that span.

Jacobs only rushed for 66 yards on 19 attempts (3.5 YPC) when these teams played in Week 1, but he did find the end zone.

David Montgomery: Montgomery only managed 8 touches for 37 yards on Sunday.

Gamers never got the game script they were hoping for as a home favorite against the league’s worst rushing defense, which propelled Gibbs to a massive outing.

In trailing game scripts the past two weeks, Montgomery has played 39% and 33.8% of the offensive snaps.

It is not a surprise, given his archetype, that Montgomery’s four highest snap rates have come in the four Detroit wins by double-digit points.

Montgomery has only played 34.4% of the offensive snaps with Detroit tied or trailing with 32.4% of the backfield touches.

Ahead by 7 or more points, Montgomery has played 48.8% of the snaps with 49.2% of the backfield touches.

Montgomery is a touchdown-dependent FLEX. How aggressively you handle him in DFS is based on how you anticipate the game script to flow.

Wide Receiver

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