The Green Bay Packers prepare for their Week 15 Sunday Night Football matchup against the Denver Broncos following their impressive victory over the Chicago Bears. Josh Jacobs did not practice on Wednesday with a knee injury. Will fantasy football managers have their star running back available for this critical week?
Josh Jacobs Injury Update
Jacobs suffered a knee contusion during the Packers’ Week 11 matchup against the New York Giants. The injury occurred on the second play of the game when Jacobs banged his knee at the end of a run. He played 10 more snaps before he dropped out because the knee quickly swelled up and he couldn’t bend it.​
This current issue is not a new injury. It’s the same one that cost him Week 12 against the Vikings. Jacobs has played in two games since and looked no worse for wear.​
He returned for the Thanksgiving game against Detroit and rushed 17 times for 83 yards while catching his only target for eight yards. Last week against the Bears, Jacobs played 71% of the snaps and handled 22 touches.
Jacobs did not practice Wednesday. However, Matt Schneidman of The Athletic suggests Jacobs’ absence is likely just maintenance for the knee injury that he played through the past two games. Rob Demovsky of ESPN reports that Jacobs was riding a stationary bike and doing work off to the side while his teammates practiced Wednesday.​
This was not ideal, but not exactly a concern. Wednesday practice absences are largely meaningless for evaluating a player’s availability, especially for veterans dealing with minor ailments.
However, things took a turn on Thursday when Jacobs was once again absent from practice. Of course, Jacobs is a veteran who could easily go DNP-DNP-LP and play. But head coach Matt LaFleur’s comments don’t exactly inspire optimism.
Per Demovsky, LaFleur told reporters, “He’s been battling through it. We’ll see.”
Clearly, this issue has been ongoing since Jacobs first injured the knee. He’s been playing through it, but obviously it flared up last week. If Jacobs doesn’t return to practice on Friday, he is not going to play on Sunday. There’s a very real chance Emanuel Wilson makes a key start in the first round of the fantasy playoffs.
Jacobs’ Fantasy Outlook
Josh Jacobs has just three red zone touches over the past two weeks, 1.3 fewer than he was averaging PER GAME through his first 10 of this season and the scoring equity isn’t set to spike against an elite Broncos defense.
There’s nothing to do here.
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The gravity that Christian Watson is providing for this offense has a positive trickle down effect across the board and could be part of why Jacobs has a 15+ yard run in three straight.
We know the rushing volume is locked in (17+ carries in four of his past five games) and while his role in the passing game has been a bit sporadic, we at least have five examples of him catching 4+ passes this season.
This matchup has him sitting just outside of my top 10 at the position: a slight downgrade, but not enough to truly impact your decision making.
— PFSN Fantasy Analyst Kyle Soppe
