In today's Fantasy Life Newsletter, presented by Bud Light:
The dust is finally settling after the NFL schedule dropped on Wednesday night.
Kendall recapped the standout matchups, strength of schedule, and international angles, as well as the takeaways from the bye weeks.
Matt LaMarca highlighted his favorite schedule release videos from the teams.
And Ian gave us a full set of winners and losers from the 2025 NFL Schedule release (sorry, Cam Ward).
But as the resident best ball bro around here, I’d be remiss if I didn’t highlight my favorite Week 17 games …
The Best Week 17 Games
For those who haven’t taken the plunge into the world of best ball, the majority of the prize money is paid out in Week 17.
This necessitates an emphasis on stacking up players from the same game in hopes that a shootout could launch your roster to the top of the leaderboard.
You can see my rankings for all 16 games here—along with my favorite correlation angles—but I’ll share my top three games below …
🥉 RAMS @ FALCONS: The McVay Tree Bowl
> Environment: Dome, high total
This game could get nutty. The premium pieces are expensive, but there are lots of cheap late options that make this the perfect game to target a single piece early and then build out the back stack starting around pick 150 with one of the QBs, the back-up RBs, and tight ends.
🥈 BEARS @ NINERS: 1.01 & Mr. Irrelevant
> Environment: Outdoors, warm, high total
This game has the potential to be extremely fun. The new-look Bears should be hitting their stride at this point and the Niners remain an offensive juggernaut who has no problem facilitating shootouts (i.e. 40-34 Week 17 matchup vs. the Lions last year). These stacks won't be cheap, but there's basically a viable selection in every round from Round 4 to Round 10.
🥇 LIONS @ VIKINGS: The Ultimate Dome Boner
> Environment: Dome, high total
Lions. Vikings. Dome. What else needs to be said? These stacks are fairly expensive, but I can't imagine sitting this one out with how many explosive players will be getting opportunities on the fast track.
13 MORE WEEK 17 GAMES … RANKED!
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Justin Fields: Man on Fire?
Man on Fire is one of (if not the) best revenge movies of the last 20 years. The flick features Denzel Washington in his (second) prime and yet another unforgettable monologue by Christopher Walken. Anyway, it espouses the elements of vengeance worth finding in NFL games now that we’ve got the schedule …
… and one player stands out with Denzel Washington-esque revenge upside—Justin Fields.
A Week 1 date with his former employer should get his season off to a roaring start, if he still holds what he said this offseason close to his heart:
“It was, of course, different for me and a space where I wasn't necessarily comfortable."
Fields had a winning record through Week 6 for the first time in his career. Plus, he hit career highs in every efficiency metric while simultaneously falling to an all-time-low sack rate (9.1%).
His reward? A clipboard.
And what did his new role as sideline clipboard keeper lead to? A new job with the New York Jets and the opportunity to exact revenge in a highly motivated game against his former employer … in his debut with his current employer. Drama, baby.
What other players are circling dates on the calendar this season? ⬇️
WHICH WR GETS TWO SHOTS AT EXACTING REVENGE?
TE SUPER MODEL REFRESH
When Colston Loveland landed with the Bears at pick No. 10 and Tyler Warren went 14th to the Colts in the recent NFL Draft, they comfirmed what we had already known: that they’re good at football. We knew because Dwain McFarland’s Rookie TE Super Model had deemed them the top prospects in the class by far.
Dwain did a refresh to the model with landing spots included to get an even clearer picture of how these and other members of this tight end rookie class can perform. Will opportunity come knocking for any other TEs from this class?⬇️
IS MASON TAYLOR THE ANSWER FOR THE JETS
Around the Watercooler
The latest fantasy nuggets, silliness, and NFL gossip from our merry band of football nerds.
👀 Which defenses got the best schedule draws? Early-season streamers to target.
📕 Every bye week for 2025. You may want to bookmark this.
📺 ICYMI: Dwain & Ian ranked every QB of the last 3 draft classes.
🤢 Behind the scenes of Caleb Williams’ rookie year. Yikes.
🎯 These players are early targets in dynasty rookie drafts.
🍎 New signal-callers in the Big Apple. What does it mean for Malik Nabers?
🧁 2025’s easiest NFL schedules. The Niners stay winning.
✈️ When players find out their schedules … this is what they look for first.
