Each week of the NFL season, the PFN NFL staff makes their selections for all 16 games. Using those selections, we can highlight the ones where we reach a consensus and analyze them as potential NFL survivor options for the upcoming week.
This week, we have three unanimous selections in the Kansas City Chiefs, the San Francisco 49ers, and the Houston Texans, as well as one overwhelming majority selection in the Dallas Cowboys. Let’s break down each of those games to see which are the top Week 4 NFL survivor picks.
Which Teams Could Be Survivor Picks for Week 4 of the NFL Season?
Kansas City Chiefs (at Los Angeles Chargers)
The 3-0 Chiefs head West for their first divisional matchup of the 2024 NFL season, and things are looking fairly rosy. The Los Angeles Chargers look set to potentially be without Justin Herbert leaving Taylor Heinicke as their starting quarterback in Week 4.
Even if Herbert plays, he will likely be extremely limited.
From The Insiders on @NFLNetwork: #Chargers QB Justin Herbert sounds like a player adamant about playing, despite a high-ankle sprain. pic.twitter.com/YrqKnbTj9H
— Ian Rapoport (@RapSheet) September 25, 2024
In all likelihood, the Chiefs would be the favorite for this game, regardless of whether Herbert played or not. The Chargers have had a good start to the season, going 2-1, but failed their biggest test of the year on the road against the Pittsburgh Steelers.
Still, they will point to the fact Herbert was heavily compromised, and that they played more than a quarter of the game without him as part of the reason for losing.
Kansas City has been far from convincing, winning all three of their games by seven points or less. They won by a matter of millimeters in Week 1, needed a last-second kick in Week 2, and then barely held off the Atlanta Falcons in Week 3.
It’s hard to look beyond the Chiefs winning, especially if Herbert is out, so they are a solid survivor pool option this week if you haven’t already used them.
Dallas Cowboys (at New York Giants)
History tells you that taking the Cowboys over the New York Giants is as safe as it gets in survivor pools. The Cowboys have won the last six matchups between the two, 13 of the last 14, and 18 of the last 22. Brian Daboll is 0-4 against Mike McCarthy and the Cowboys in his two seasons, and the aggregate is 140-53 in favor of Dallas.
The closest game between these two in the last two years was their first matchup of the 2022 season, which ended 23-16 to a Cowboys team that had Cooper Rush at quarterback.
Now, the difference this year is that the Giants profile as the superior team in terms of net EPA (expected points added) per game by just over five points (-3.77 vs. -9.19). That difference is not huge in relative terms, with New York ranked 22nd and Dallas ranked 27th.
In their game against a common opponent, the Cleveland Browns, both won on the road in Cleveland.
Ultimately, the Cowboys are an option in survivor leagues that you should be hesitant about. They’re also the only non-majority pick in this article, even if the person picking against them is the Eagles’ beat writer. This is probably a matchup to avoid this week.
San Francisco 49ers (vs. New England Patriots)
The 49ers were viewed as a nailed-on certainty by many to beat the injury-hit Los Angeles Rams last week. And for the best part of three quarters, that’s exactly how it looked.
That is until the Rams staged a furious comeback to win the game. That, combined with the 49ers’ own injury problems, makes them a hard team to trust this week.
San Francisco is expected to be without Deebo Samuel Sr., Christian McCaffrey is on injured reserve, and George Kittle is, at best, going to be playing through injury. That is a major blow to the offense and offers a glimmer of hope to the New England Patriots. We already saw the Patriots beat a banged-up Cincinnati Bengals team on the road in Week 1.
New England is also coming off a 10-day rest and is licking its wounds after being humiliated on Thursday Night Football in Week 3. The EPA difference in this one is a little bigger than the Cowboys-Giants game, with the 49ers at an EPA average of 3.32 and the Patriots posting an EPA of -9.05.
If you’ve already used the Chiefs this year, then the 49ers might be the next best option, but I would go for Kansas City before San Francisco if both options are still available.
Houston Texans (vs. Jacksonville Jaguars)
Coming off Monday Night Football, the Jacksonville Jaguars are likely to be a team that many people are targeting in their survivor pools as a team to go against. Jacksonville looked horrific against Buffalo, giving up five touchdowns in the first half and ultimately losing 47-10 in one of the more embarrassing results of recent years.
The problem is that the Texans have hardly been convincing this year. They barely beat the Indianapolis Colts and Chicago Bears in the first two weeks and then embarrassed themselves against the Minnesota Vikings in Week 3.
Some of the Texans’ offensive struggles in the last two weeks is that they’ve played two of the better defenses in the league, according to PFN’s Defensive+ metric.
Through three games, both the Texans and Jaguars have posted negative EPA per-game numbers. The Texans are 23rd with an EPA per game of -4.26, thanks in large part to their offense’s -6.13 number. Meanwhile, Jacksonville is last in the NFL, with an EPA per game of -14.42, with failings on both offense and defense.
This has the makings of a trap game. People always tend to overreact to prime-time games, so you will likely see the Texans taken a lot this week. However, this is one I am steering clear of, ranking them third behind the Chiefs and 49ers among the consensus picks from PFN’s analysts.