Each week of the 2025 NFL regular season, I’ll use this space to highlight teams facing various funnel defenses and fantasy options who could benefit.
What’s a Funnel Defense?
A funnel defense, in case you’re wondering, is a defense that faces an unusually high rate of pass attempts or rushes. I’ll take a close look at how opponents are playing these defenses in neutral game script — when the game is within a touchdown either way — and how good or bad these rush and pass defenses have been of late.
Identifying funnel defenses is hardly an exact science, and whacked-out game script can always foil our best-laid plans. It happens. I’ve found it useful in recent seasons to analyze matchups through this lens to see if there are any useful additions to the always-agonizing start-sit process we put ourselves through every week.
With more data, this analysis will improve. It happens every season. Through Week 6, we now have enough information to understand which teams are shaping up as funnel defenses.
▶ Pass Funnel Matchups
Broncos vs. Giants
This one, the spreadsheets say with once voice, is a nasty little matchup for Vibes King Jaxson Dart and his court jester Cam Skattebo. The Broncos excel at stopping all the cool stuff Dart and Skattebo have done over the past few weeks. We talked about it on Thursday’s Rotoworld Football Show if you’re into it.
But back to the point: Bo Nix and the Broncos are facing a pronounced pass funnel defense in the Giants. Only the Packers and Jaguars have faced a higher neutral pass rate than Big Blue this season, and New York opponents have been almost seven percent above their expected pass rate in neutral situations — the league’s second highest mark. Teams establish the pass against the Giants.
It’s a quietly excellent matchup for Nix and his pass catchers, The Giants’ pass rush is middling, per the metrics, and the Denver offensive line is an elite pass-blocking unit. Nix should operate from a pocket cleaner than my sand wedge after I hit a nice bunker shot and want to reward my dear Cleveland wedge with a good washing.
Inflated pass volume for the Broncos would obviously be a boon for Courtland Sutton, who leads the team with a 32 percent air yards share and 20 percent of the targets. Then there’s Troy Franklin. He’s running almost 80 percent of the routes in the Denver offense over the past month and being targeted on a reasonable 19 percent of his routes.
Then there’s Evan Engram in a Revenge Game (that’s analytics). He’s not running a lot of routes — he logged a route on just 45 percent of the team’s drop backs in Week 6 — but he’s being targeted at a high rate. Against the Jets in Week 6, Engram was targeted on a team-leading 40 percent of his routes. Only three teams allow more tight end targets per game than the Giants. What I’m saying is that Engram’s box score might not give you acid reflux in Week 7.
Rams vs. Jaguars
The trend, you’ll notice, is that the Jags have a seemingly permanent spot in the pass funnel section of this column. That usually happens this time of year: Defenses that have been attacked again and again via the pass or run become every-week mentions here. This becomes their home. I charge a reasonable rent. Ask anyone.
Here the Jaguars land again, facing the league’s highest neutral pass rate (66 percent) and the highest pass rate over expected in neutral game script. This checks out: Only the Panthers have allowed a lower rushing success rate in 2025.
Probably the Rams, with Puka Nacua sidelined, will try to establish the run — things of that nature — against the Jaguars this week. I don’t think they have much chance of success, and would bet on Matthew Stafford’s drop back volume to be unusually high. That wouldn’t be a new development for the Rams, whose 63 percent neutral pass rate ranks third, trailing only the Bengals and Chargers.
Lots of drop backs could mean absurd target volume for Davante Adams, who I wrote up in this week’s Regression Files as — you guessed it — a screaming (positive) regression candidate whether or not Nacua is in the lineup.
Tutu Atwell, who should function as a full-time player with Puka out, could also be a major beneficiary of this pass-funnel matchup. That doesn’t mean Atwell will be particularly reliable. Wideouts who see 19 air yards per target tend to be of the boom-bust variety. Maybe Atwell can smooth over that volatility with more routes and more targets against the Jaguars.
I suppose Jordan Whittington — who’s been targeted on a meager 13 percent of his targets — could also get a bump here in a pass-funnel matchup. The Rams, after all, target receivers at a league-leading 71 percent rate.
▶ Run Funnel Matchups
Browns vs. Dolphins
Against a gettable Steelers front seven, Quinshon Judkins last week was limited to 12 carries and a single target. It’s not the workload I thought Judkins would have. Check my Week 6 DFS lineups for proof.
This week Judkins gets a nice tidy matchup against one of the league’s most pronounced run funnel defenses, the Dolphins. Miami opponents this season have a 52 percent neutral pass rate; only five teams have seen a lower neutral pass rate over expected against them in 2025. When teams can establish it against the Dolphins, they do it.
You might look at Dillon Gabriel’s pass attempt totals and assume the Browns are the pass heaviest team of this or any other century. They’re not. In Gabriel’s starts, the Browns have a lowly 49 percent neutral pass rate. Add a little apocalyptic fall weather to the mix — Cleveland could see sustained winds of 50 miles per hour on Sunday — and the Browns appear primed to run it and run it and run some more.
The Dolphins aren’t great in rush yards before contact allowed (10th) but they’re truly miserable after contact. In fact, no team allows more rush yards after contact per attempt. The Dolphins, per the metrics, are bad at tackling, and Judkins, per the metrics, is pretty good at breaking tackles. It could be a nice combo in Week 7.
Cowboys vs. Commanders
The way you know Washington is the extreme sort of run funnel defense is that D’Andre Swift looked like Jamaal Charles against them in Week 6. The Bears, seeing how easy it is to gash the Commanders on the ground, posted a 55 percent neutral pass rate, considerably lower than their usual neutral game script approach.
The Commanders this season have seen a 52 percent neutral pass rate against them, the second lowest rate in the NFL. No team has seen a lower pass rate over expected in neutral situations in 2025. After a decent start to the season, the Washington defense over the past three weeks has given up the ninth highest rate of rush yards before contact.
It means — maybe — the Cowboys will be at least slightly more run heavy in Week 7. Dallas through Week 6 has been a good-enough rushing attack. They create rush yards before contact at the NFL’s 14th highest rate and have the seventh lowest rushing stuff rate. It could be a nice formula for Javonte Williams a week after he flamed out for fantasy purposes. Williams comes with plenty of touchdown equity against a Washington defense that has been attacked relentlessly on the ground inside the ten yard line.
This is the faintest warning to George Pickens drafters that their guy might not enjoy the kind of volume he’s seen of late against a run funnel defense and with CeeDee Lamb returning to action. Pickens, as I mentioned on the Rotoworld Football Show, was targeted on a mere 14 percent of his pass routes with Lamb on the field.
First Appeared on
Source link
