The Los Angeles Rams will face the Seattle Seahawks in Week 18. Here’s the latest fantasy football news and advice to help you with your lineups this week and moving forward, especially regarding QB Matthew Stafford.
Is Matthew Stafford Playing in Week 18?
Stafford is not injured but was listed as doubtful due to a coach’s decision. The Los Angeles Rams have locked up the NFC West, and Sean McVay appears to be punting on the opportunity to earn the No. 3 seed, staying at No. 4.
We’ll continue to monitor the Rams’ injury report. You can also visit and bookmark our NFL Injury Tracker and Fantasy News Tracker for the latest updates.
Matthew Stafford’s Fantasy Outlook
Stafford won’t play, but let’s look at this game as if he were playing.
The Rams hung 44 points on the Bills in a Week 14 upset victory and looked unstoppable in the process. Matthew Stafford averaged 10.7 yards per pass, Kyren Williams scored twice, and the healthy Rams were a force to be reckoned with.
The latter might still be true, but the fantasy numbers wouldn’t reflect it — this offense has scored just 44 points total in the three weeks since that masterpiece. Over that run, just one of Stafford’s 78 passes have resulted in a touchdown, a brutal stretch at the worst possible time for fantasy managers.
Would it have rebounded this week?
Stafford carved up the Patriots in New England in Week 11, but outside of that, his top four games have either come at home or against these Seahawks (Week 9: 298 passing yards with two scores). That performance against Seattle was even more impressive when you recall that he lost Puka Nacua to an early ejection, forcing him into distributing one-third of his targets to either Demarcus Robinson or Tyler Johnson that afternoon.
In theory, all of that sounds good, but I would have worried about this spot. Yes, he overcame this matchup two months ago, though that would have been just a snapshot as to what is most likely to happen. Throughout the 16-game sample of 2024, Stafford has told us that he doesn’t like pressure.
Whether it is that he’s been a tick slow on the fast read, he’s aborting plays a little early — whatever factor you want to blame it on, his rates when feeling the heat are a major concern against a top-five pressure unit in the league.
Matthew Stafford, pressure stats with Rams by season:
- 2021: 75.0 passer rating, 8.0 yards/attempt, and 5.8% TD rate
- 2022: 69.6 passer rating, 5.8 yards/attempt, and 2.7% TD rate
- 2023: 75.7 passer rating, 6.2 yards/attempt, and 5.8% TD rate
- 2024: 51.6 passer rating, 5.6 yards/attempt, and 1.4% TD rate
Stafford would have qualified as a viable play this weekend, but I would have been careful about blindly copy-pasting in his Week 9 numbers. This is a below-average team in pass rate over expectation and might be happy to play in the mud this weekend — it might work for them (I’ll be picking the Rams to win), but the risk would have been significant for those banking on Stafford.
Are you looking for start/sit advice for other players in your lineup? Read our Week 18 Fantasy Start-Sit Advice Cheat Sheet for every fantasy-relevant player in every game.
Matthew Stafford’s Fantasy Points Projection in Week 18
Stafford is projected to score 0 points in Week 18.
Check out the free PFN Fantasy Start-Sit Optimizer for the latest projections and advice for your lineups this week.
Matthew Stafford’s Fantasy Ranking
Our Weekly Consensus PPR Rankings are below — both positional and overall. They were last updated at 11:45 PM ET on Saturday, January 25.
Conference Championship QB PPR Rankings
1) Josh Allen | BUF (at KC)
2) Jalen Hurts | PHI (vs. WAS)
3) Jayden Daniels | WAS (at PHI)
4) Patrick Mahomes | KC (vs. BUF)