Thursday Night Preview – Giants @ Eagles

Well folks, at least we have Thursday Night Football back, right? If you’re anything like us over here at TopShelf, we look forward to Thursdays as the beginning of our football consumption for the week, and when we get blessed with a great game (like last week should have been, before it was postponed and played in the rain… KC vs BUF) there’s really nothing quite like TNF to get you through the final day of your work week and into the weekend full of freedom, excitement, and of course… more football!

But this week is nothing like that. We have the devastatingly injured Philadelphia Eagles facing off against the New York Giants, who have injuries of their own, but have been hapless even prior to losing star RB Saquon Barkley.

The Eagles offensive line is composed entirely of backups and guys who did not expect to see the field at the beginning of the season. Fortunately, there are rumblings that Lane Johnson is about to make his return this week on Thursday Night, so that could finally be a small step in the right direction for this OL unit who has failed to protect Carson Wentz at all this year, and is giving up more pressure than you could ever imagine. They are closing in on allowing pressure on HALF of the passing snaps. HALF!!!! If they hit that it would be unprecedented.

The Eagles have also lost Miles Sanders for this game and will look to Boston Scott to fill his shoes. He was effective at the end of last season when he was asked to relieve Sanders, so Philly will surely be hoping for more of that in Week 7, but again, with almost no OL to speak of, the prognosis is grim.

Their final position groups, WR and TE, are…you guessed it…also extremely hurt! Alshon Jeffery, Jalen Reagor, and Dallas Goedert have all been out for a while, and last week Zach Ertz joined them as yet another casualty. However, DeSean Jackson is poised to make his return to the lineup in this game and could look to have a big day. There hasn’t been much noise about his anticipated role in this one, so whether the Eagles will ease him back in, have him on a snap count, or let him run free still remains to be seen. But for a guy who has struggled to remain on the field since he returned to Philly a couple seasons back… it would be great to see him out there making an impact while he still can. And this week, against a Giants defense that is middle of the pack, could be a great time to have one of those classic 25 point DJax explosions.

The shock of the season might also be Travis Fulgham coming out of absolutely nowhere to be a stud WR for this team. It will be interesting to see what happens with him when the Eagles start to return some more talent, but for this game on Thursday Night, I think he is an absolute must play based on what we have seen from him thus far.

Then on the Giants side of the ball, you have Daniel Jones facing many of the same issues that Wentz is, but minus all the injuries that help excuse some of it. The Giants OL is largely intact, they did have Nate Solder opt out due to COVID prior to the season, but they have, for the most part, been healthy. They just can’t block. Can’t pass block, can’t run block, and even when Saquon was on the field he was struggling to get any space to maneuver. Now you have Devonta Freeman back there, who we at TSF said could be a flex play going forward, and he is barely getting a second to decide where to go before he is plastered by a defender in the backfield.

Then you have the Giants receivers, Tate, Slayton, Shepherd (who was just activated off IR and may look to play Thursday Night), and Engram who hasn’t done a single thing all year. Slayton has had a couple monster games and then been largely irrelevant, and Tate has yet to do anything that would force you to keep him on your roster through this point of the season. So, what is it I am saying here? I’m saying sit all your Giants. I don’t want any part of any of them until they show me they can actually play some football. And this is coming off a week where the Eagles actually did an okay job preventing any breakout days from the Ravens receivers, and I think we would all agree Hollywood and Andrews are a bigger threat than any WR on the Giants and Engram.

So as far as fantasy relevant players in this game, I think we are looking at the following:

Carson Wentz (as a risky play with high upside)

Boston Scott

DeSean Jackson (as a boom or bust)

Travis Fulgham

Devonta Freeman (if you are really really hurting at RB)

And there you have it, not the most spectacular Thursday Night game you will ever see, not a ton of fantasy implications, so let’s just enjoy a nice game and hope they can both escape with no new injuries.