While traditional fantasy football formats have dominated the landscape, managers can find numerous ways to play the game they love. Underdog Pick’em contests allow managers to put their player-projection skills to the test by predicting player stat lines.
Here are the top Underdog Pick’em plays for Sunday Night Football between the Pittsburgh Steelers and Baltimore Ravens.
Top Underdog Pick’ems for Sunday Night Football
Underdog Pick’ems allow fantasy managers to predict stat lines and fantasy-point totals for almost all fantasy-relevant players. Here, the more selections you add to your entry, the higher the payout.
The levels are two players for 3x, three for 6x, four for 10x, and finally, five for 20x, progressing with each additional pick ’em you add to your entry.
With Underdog Fantasy, it’s a brand new season every week, no matter how your other leagues are going at the moment. Sign up today and get a 100% deposit bonus of up to $100. As for my recommendations, below are my top Underdog Pick’ems for Sunday Night Football in Week 17.
George Pickens Higher Than 40.5 Receiving Yards
With Kenny Pickett under center, George Pickens is averaging just 13.9% of the targets and 24.5% of the air yards. However, when Pickett looks his way, it’s generally for a deeper target, as Pickens sits sixth in aDOT (12.6) and is eighth in deep targets.
Last week Pickens caught all five of his targets for 57 yards and had 53 yards or more in five of his last seven games, including 78 yards against Baltimore back in Week 13.
Baltimore has had a good defense against receivers, but because this number is so low, I’m fine banking on the fact that they have allowed the highest deep completion rate and the fourth-most deep passing yards this year. I’ll take Pickens to clear his 40.5-yard projection for Sunday Night Football Underdog Pick’ems.
J.K. Dobbins Higher Than 56.5 Rushing Yards
Last week we saw the floor for J.K. Dobbins. While his 4.9 yards per carry mark is a positive sign, he totaled just 59 yards. That already would’ve been enough to clear the projection.
MORE: RB Injury Report Week 17
Dobbins came in to last week with back-to-back 120-yard games, and since his return, he’s still averaging 13.3 carries in 101.3 rushing yards per game. Pittsburgh has improved their rushing defense this year and sits 10th in yards and 14th and success rate since Week 11. Yet volume alone allows Dobbins to surpass his 56.5 rushing yard projection on Underdog.
Diontae Johnson Higher Than 4.5 Receptions
I’m not going anywhere near an efficiency stat for Diontae Johnson. Those are just depressing. Instead, I’m going to bank on volume, which has been Johnson’s best attribute. With Pickett, he has a 23.1% target share, 30% air-yard share, and 37.5% end zone target share.
Volume is a non-issue for Johnson, who has seven more targets in five straight games and five or more receptions in nine of his last 11. Unless the Steelers blow out the Ravens, which is the least likely option on the list of outcomes, there should not be a game script where Johnson is phased out. I would have stayed off of this if it was at five or more, but at 4.5 receptions, I feel comfortable taking the higher on Johnson.
Tyler Huntley Lower Than 214.5 Total Yards
The concern when you make a total yard projection with a rushing quarterback is it only takes one or two of those 20-yard runs to drastically change the chances of it hitting. However, what have we seen of Tyler Huntley that gives us any hope for Sunday Night Football?
MORE: WR Injury Report Week 17
After accumulating 187 passing yards against Denver Broncos, Huntley has thrown for 88, 138, and 115 yards in his last three while rushing for 31 yards or fewer in those games. Week 13 against Denver (228 total yards) was a season-high, but he followed it with a 119 total-yard outing on eight of 12 passing and nine carries against the Steelers in Week 14.
We haven’t seen anything in his play so far to suggest a 200+ yard passing game is in store for Huntley, as he isn’t even utilizing Mark Andrews at this point. Unless Huntley has a Lamar Jackson-type performance on the ground, he should stay lower than 214.5 yards.