Week 15 and here we are… hoping for some Big Philly Rivers in our life!
Pace of play gives the prospective DFS player an opportunity to consider not just Vegas totals but how the game will be played out in a given week. Game flow is a tricky rabbit hole to jump down when you consider the endless scenarios that can play out in a game. Stacking up-tempo offenses who can keep the ball moving is crucial to gaining an edge in DFS. Even slight differentiations of team trends matter in a world where volume is king.
Each week I’ll highlight my favorite game environments factoring in their pace metrics and stacks to consider for tournaments.
Game Pace Score
A reminder of a simple metric I introduced a couple of years ago: Game Pace Score(GPS). I liked the acronym to also give you a “compass” of how the game total and neutral pace statistics come together. These scores are ranked 1-5 with five indicating the pace of the play is everything you want for a DFS bonanza.
- 5– A back-and-forth shootout is looming. Both teams are pace-up and both sport team implied totals of 25+.
- 4– An up-tempo spot worth game stacking in DFS in multiple ways. Consider multiple game scripts in play.
- 3– This game could go either way. Often, these are onslaught spots for teams with healthy implied totals or games that hit the under because two middling offenses collide.
- 2– Strong indications of a game you want to stay away from. Usually, the pace is dragged down by one team with an absurdly slow neutral pace or a team with a team implied total so low it drags the entire game environment through the mud.
- 1– This has all the makings of a plodder. These games have totals UNDER 40 which gives you zero confidence in DFS.
For Week 15, I’ve sorted by all 32 team implied totals while focusing on seconds per play and pass rate over expectation (PROE), and Expected Points Added per play (EPA) ranks.
For those that would like a CSV version of the above chart, you can download the Week 15 Pace of Play CSV.
Detroit Lions @ Los Angeles Rams
With the highest over/under of the 2025 season, it begs the question: how often do we see a 55+? This is only the second 55+ over/under game since the beginning of the 2022 season.
NFL Games with a 55+ O/U at kickoff over the last decade
2016- 1
2017- 4
2018- 15 (that Rams/Chiefs game changed us all)
2019- 1
2020- 20 (what a year)
2021- 7
2022- 0
2023- 0
2024- 1
2025- 1* (this week's DET/LAR)— Kyle Borgognoni (@kyle_borg) December 10, 2025
Beyond the Jared Goff/Matthew Stafford narrative that has been beaten like a dead horse, the 4.5/5 GPS score for this game isn’t just a product of the game total. Both offenses are top-5 in points per game, yards per play, and yards per game. The Rams are #1 in play success rate, 3rd in EPA per pass, and Lions games are averaging the 3rd most combined points per game (53.7). This NextGenStat puts in perspective the amount of motion we will expect to see on our TV screens: The Rams and Lions offenses utilized motion on 116 of their 135 combined snaps when they met in Week 1, 2024, resulting in the highest motion rate by two teams in the same game since at least 2018. Whether you are a Sean McVay truther or you bleed with Dan Campbell, it will be tough ignoring this game in the DFS streets as it is being billed “the Game of the Year”.
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