Fantasy Football Today - Week 16 Tough Calls, Saints-Rams, Fantasy Cops (12/20 Fantasy Football Podcast)
Episode Date: December 20, 2023To display your continued support of the show, please vote for Fantasy Football Today in the Sports Podcast Awards in the "Best Fantasy Betting and Gaming Podcast" Category https://www.sportspodcastg...roup.com/sports_category/fantasy-betting-gaming-sports-podcast/ Fantasy Football Today is available for free on the Audacy app as well as Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts and wherever else you listen to podcasts We'll help you with your tough calls for Week 16! At quarterback (4:22), Tua Tagovailoa, Jared Goff and Baker Mayfield might be tough calls for you. Can Tua get it done against a good defense? At running back (13:35), how much do we trust James Conner and Derrick Henry? ... Looking at wide receiver tough calls (22:40), Chris Godwin, Tee Higgins and Calvin Ridley stand out. And then we look at the tight ends (34:30) in the Giants-Eagles game and do some Christmas-themed Fill in the Blank (37:40) ... Previewing Saints-Rams (40:00). Is Puka Nacua an automatic start? Is Matthew Stafford? And the Fantasy Cops are here to settle your league disputes (51:40) ... Your emails at fantasyfootball@cbsi.com SUBSCRIBE to FFT Dynasty on Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/fantasy-football-today-dynasty/id1696679179 SUBSCRIBE to FFT Dynasty on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/2aHlmMJw1m8FareKybdNfG?si=8487e2f9611b4438&nd=1 Follow our FFT team on Twitter: @FFToday, @AdamAizer, @JameyEisenberg, @daverichard, @heathcummingssr, @ctowerscbs Follow the brand new FFT TikTok account: https://www.tiktok.com/@fftoday Watch FFT on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/fantasyfootballtoday Get 20% off Fantasy Football Today merch: https://store.cbssports.com/collections/fantasy-football-today%20?utm_source=podcast-apple-com&utm_medium=web&utm_campaign=buy-our-merch&utm_content=fantasy-football-collection Join our Facebook group https://www.facebook.com/groups/FantasyFootballToday/ Sign up for the FFT newsletter https://www.cbssports.com/newsletter You can listen to Fantasy Football Today on your smart speakers! Simply say "Alexa, play the latest episode of the Fantasy Football Today podcast" or "Hey Google, play the latest episode of the Fantasy Football Today podcast." To hear more from the CBS Sports Podcast Network, visit https://www.cbssports.com/podcasts/ To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices
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This is Fantasy Football Today from CBS Sports.
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It's time to dominate your fantasy league.
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Now here's some combination of Adam, Dave, Jamie, and Heath.
We've got some tough calls to make in Fantasy Week 16.
You're sweating out your lineup decisions.
We are here to help.
We've got the Week 16 tough calls, including Tua Tungabailoa.
Derek Henry, is he going to get back on track after 16 carries for nine yards against the Texans?
Can James Conner get it done again?
And what about Chris Godwin?
I spent this morning watching some Chris Godwin tape.
Dave, did you watch it yet?
I haven't gotten to Godwin, but I watched that game
live. I thought that Dave Canales
was in his bag.
He took on the Packers.
Dave likes everyone named Dave.
You should know that. You should take that with a
grain of salt. We're also going to preview the
Thursday night game, New Orleans
and the Rams.
Hey, Jamie. Hey, Heath. What's going on? Heath, what you drinking?
Coffee.
Hot coffee. You don't strike me as a coffee
guy. I've never known you to drink coffee.
I drink two cups of coffee
almost every day.
And hey, Jamie, it's
Hat Wednesday for Jamie. Hat Wednesday.
All right. News and notes.
We'll do this real quick and then we'll get to the tough calls.
Aaron Rodgers said probably not going to play this year, almost certainly.
He says not 100%, so you can give up that dream.
But he also said that next season will not be his last season,
so you might get a couple of years, maybe more, of Aaron Rodgers.
That'd be great.
C.J. Stroud is likely out this week.
Geno Smith will play this week at Tennessee.
Chris Olave expected to play on Thursday.
And Keenan Allen has a Saturday game against Buffalo.
He missed practice.
What's going on?
What are you guys?
What's going on?
What's new?
Dave, what's new?
What are you feeling in fantasy football?
What have you been working on researching fantasy football-wise?
Why?
I don't know.
I'm just thinking of we're a minute into the show.
I have nothing to talk about.
So we could go right to the tough calls.
I thought maybe there'd be something interesting that you had to bring to the table.
It's week 16, but everything that I'm doing is the same as it is the week before.
I will tell you that I've got,
I think there are some encouraging signs
that the Falcons offense does throw more
and kick into high gear
and is a little more aggressive this week against Indy.
I think that James Cook is going to continue
to run wild over the Chargers.
I've got some real questions about Austin Eckler.
And I think that the Bengals are going to,
this might be a week where Joe Mixon and Chase Brown
both go off against the Steelers.
Kind of an obvious statement
based on how Pittsburgh's run defense has been.
I have the strangest thing ever going on this weekend.
I can't remember a semifinal weekend ever like this.
I have four teams with Patrick Mahomes
and five teams that I'm playing against Patrick Mahomes.
Oh, man. Do you guys have faith in Patrick Mahomes and five teams that I'm playing against Patrick Mahomes. Oh, man. Do you guys
have faith in Patrick Mahomes this week against
the Raiders? Yes.
He's going to go four and five.
I've got three teams
where Patrick Mahomes is not involved.
All right. Jamie, any interesting
tidbits? He's going to go four and eight.
Any interesting tidbits? I'm going to go four and eight. Any interesting tidbits?
I'm sure you're working on your start sit.
The Saints are great against bad quarterbacks.
They're terrible against good ones.
The rankings for Stafford are pretty different.
Heath's kind of low on Stafford, 17th.
Dave and Jamie have them just inside the top 12.
They've beat up very easily
on Bryce Young twice Desmond Ritter Mac Jones Brian Tannehill uh Jordan Love Jared Goff um
the great Josh Jobs when he was still good uh all over 20 fantasy points oh Tommy DeVito yeah
they beat him on him too yeah they were really really they were really mean to Tommy DeVito too
so what was more mean, the Saints doing this
or the U.S. women's soccer team doing the tea sipping that you hated so much?
The U.S. women's soccer team doing the tea sipping was beater than the Saints.
But the Saints were very mean.
I'm rooting against them forever.
All right, let's get into our tough calls.
To a tug of my loa.
Just so you know, I added Jared Goff to the discussion.
We had one quarterback in the tough call list.
I'm going to throw Jared Goff in there, too, coming off that huge game.
But on the road to face Minnesota.
It's going to be really cold in Minnesota.
No, I know.
It's inside.
I'm just kidding.
Anyway, Tua against the Cowboys.
Let's start with that.
Heath, this is what you gave the whole list, so thank you.
But you think this is a tough call, Tua?
And are you expecting Tyreek Hill at this point?
We are expecting Tyreek Hill,
and that is why it's a tough call.
If Tua was playing against the Cowboys
without Tyreek Hill,
I don't think it would be a tough call.
I think we'd just be sitting Tua.
It's a tough call for two reasons.
One, I think it's three of his last four games
at 15 fantasy points or fewer for Tua.
We know what this team has been against teams with a winning record.
Not very good at all.
This is only the fourth one of those they've played all season long.
And so, but it's a tough call because when they are right,
when things are going right, it could be QB1, wide receiver 1,
RB1 all in the same week.
Tough call for you, Dave and Jamie. Tua?
Slightly.
I think, as he said, this hasn't exactly been Tua's best scenario against good defenses.
But I think also Dallas, similar to New Orleans,
their stats have been somewhat padded by what they've done
against a lot of bad
quarterbacks now you can say that in the last two weeks they've held jalen hertz and josh allen
to 25 fantasy points 26 fantasy points combined um which says something but i think a lot of that
though is josh allen really deferring to james cook and the run game the the cowboys when they
face good quarterbacks and it hasn't happened very much, when they face good quarterbacks,
and it hasn't happened very much,
especially when they face them on the road,
Brock Purdy lit them up, Jalen Hurts lit them up,
and I think Tua will have an opportunity to,
in what should be a high-scoring game,
be competitive with this Cowboys defense
to the point where he's above 20 fantasy points.
He's been mostly above 20 fantasy points at home this season,
five of seven games he's been above that threshold.
So the fact that it's in Miami,
I think this is an opportunity here for him to have a good statistical day.
Isn't this a game with two teams that have struggled to beat good teams?
Yeah.
But the Cowboys at least have that Eagles win.
They have that Eagles win.
It was at home.
It wasn't on the road.
They were close to beating them in Philadelphia.
I mean,
they are much better at home.
Their defense is much better at home.
Yeah,
of course.
That's how it usually is for defenses.
Um,
I,
he called out how Tua has been lately.
He's been struggling.
He hasn't had a blowout game since week 80 scored almost 28 fantasy points in
that game.
Um, I think if you, if you think that Dallas' offense is going to struggle,
it's going to limit Tua's pass attempts.
Now, he's had some games this year where he's had some monster numbers,
like the Denver game, barely through, had a monster game.
That was against Denver.
Their defense was total trash.
Dallas' defense is better than that.
But I think the Cowboys should be able to get after Tua.
I don't expect the offensive line to be in any better shape than it was last week.
I'm nervous about Tua getting one of those big ceiling games.
I think Jamie kind of said it right.
If you're expecting right around what his average has been this season,
he's averaging 20.2 fantasy points per game.
That's overall.
So maybe he's a little bit better than that at home.
I'd say somewhere between 20 and 22 fantasy points is where he's's overall. So maybe he's a little bit better than that at home. I'd say somewhere between
20 and 22 fantasy points
is where he's going to end up landing,
in part because I think
the pass rush will impact him,
in part because I think
the Dolphins are going to try
and run it at Dallas,
just like Buffalo did last week.
All right.
You guys have,
two of you have Baker Mayfield
ahead of Tua,
and Jamie does not, but is Tua just one spot ahead of Mayfield.
But everyone's got Tua in the top 12.
And I'll just say this.
I mean, he had a 119.4 passer rating last week.
So you might look at it and say, oh, he struggled.
He actually was terrific against one of the best defenses in football. 21 of 24.
224 yards and a touchdown.
If something derails Tua,
it's oftentimes
Raheem Mostert or Devon Achan or
both rushing for two
touchdowns. And
let's see if Jonathan Hankins plays
in this game. That could,
defensive tackle for the Cowboys, that could
have a big impact on Tua if the Dolphins could run all over the Cowboys that could have a big impact on tua if the dolphins
could run all over the cowboys like the bills did last week did you see uh the clip from mcdaniel
from hard knocks no uh on the jaylen waddle play no um he called it before it happened he said if
they give us i forget the coverage he said if they give us this coverage this is going to be a big
touchdown right here he saw the coverage he goes here it comes he said to tyreek he goes here it comes
and he hits wild on the play he goes yep it was pretty awesome that's so cool all right let's
talk about jared goff at minnesota here minnesota had been a really tough matchup for quarterbacks
browning last week he scored over 20 points he got the t higgins touchdown it was kind of a miracle
but good for him.
But what do you think about golf?
It's on the road.
I'm not wrong, right?
It's at Minnesota.
Is he inside?
It's inside, yes.
They're playing this game outdoors.
It's inside Sunday at 1 o'clock, Detroit at Minnesota.
But, yeah, I mean, I think we were caught a little bit by surprise by the five touchdowns last week.
How about Goff or Tua this week?
Goff.
I'm sorry, Goff.
Tua slightly for me, but I can change that.
You don't have to.
Don't let these guys bully you.
No, no, no.
I mean, between – I think there's four quarterbacks for me
that I've, like, shuffled around 75 times already.
It's only Wednesday.
But it's Baker, Tua, Goff, and Stafford in some order.
I don't think I get to debate Baker Mayfield with Heath.
But Heath's the low guy on Baker Mayfield this week.
I'm the low guy?
I think so.
I thought I had him ahead of Tua and Jamie didn't.
Yeah, but you still have –
Maybe there's somebody else.
No, that's true, but you're the low guy on Tua also.
So right now, Jamie has Mayfield nine,
Dave has him seven, and you have him ten.
Okay.
He should probably be in this discussion.
We'll call him a tough call.
You guys all have him in the top ten.
I'm just going to say the only thing is they are really...
The last three games,
they have something like ten more runs than passes.
They're 3-0 in these three
games. They're throwing less
than 30 times a game.
I think Jacksonville has given up 26 fantasy
points to four of the last six quarterbacks they've
faced. That's a fact. Their secondary
is beat up. Their pass rush isn't getting
home.
Baker's been playing well, and Godwin's been a huge
reason why the last couple of weeks.
Adam really takes exception with the few words. Baker's been playing well. And Godwin's been a huge reason why the last couple of weeks. Adam really takes exception with the,
the one,
the few words you Baker's been playing.
Well,
that's,
that's what really bothers Adam.
He played amazing last week.
No,
no,
no.
It's for the season for the season.
He's like the number 16 quarterback per game.
He's been fine.
No,
I know.
I'm just saying,
because Heath and I have been sort of talking about Baker.
Maybe I'm just saying before the last two games, he was on the waiver wire.
He still is in a lot of leagues, right?
Yeah, no.
Not a lot.
Well, I don't know.
It's probably about 78%.
It's hard to quantify at this point.
Yeah, exactly.
Sure, but in most leagues, he's rocked.
I just picked him up in a league last night.
I mean, the difference between Tua and Baker is 0.5 fantasy points per game.
They've basically been the same.
Yeah, that's an interesting point.
Tua's been slumping a little bit.
Do you still have Daniel Jones and Trevor Lawrence?
What'd you say?
They've basically been the same for their careers.
That's true.
Right, exactly.
That is factually accurate.
Are we talking about Jared Goff?
No, I think we've already established Jared Goff.
You guys are starting him.
But I don't think he's a super easy call, Goff.
He hasn't been – he's been pretty up and down.
Dave said his offensive line is healthy.
So Ragnarok came back last week, and that certainly helped.
He ended the Broncos' nine-game streak of not allowing a quarterback
to go over 20 fantasy points.
His last two on the road, both indoor games – two of the last three on the road uh of those indoor games against the
chargers and against the saints he's over 20 fantasy points in those games so i think that
matters too um the elements won't be a problem and so is it tough yeah the vikings are still
really good defense and jake browning i think you got to say got lucky with how he got to his 22
fantasy points with what he did in the fourth quarter in overtime.
But Goff, I know it's a different defense.
He's got a great history against the Vikings.
Three of his last five were 25 fantasy points.
So I'm not worried about Goff this week.
All right, we have a question here.
Goff or Dak?
Things are more upside with Dak higher.
Dak.
Tua or Love?. Dak. Tua or Love?
Tua.
Jake Browning or Matt Stafford?
Stafford.
Stafford.
All right.
All right, let's go to our running back tough calls here.
And Derrick Henry is facing Seattle.
And James Conner at Chicago.
With Chicago having one of the best run defenses in football,
and Conner having a really, really good season.
All right, let's start with Derrick Henry, though.
So before the last two games, he was averaging 4.3 yards per carry.
Now he's averaging 3.8 yards per carry.
He has been miserable the last two games, although he did score two touchdowns at the Dolphins in week 14. And he had three straight games with 18 or more PPR fantasy points
before his dud last week against the Houston Texans,
who have one of the best run defenses in football.
Seattle doesn't.
And, you know, hopefully a competitive game, which is always good for him.
Heath starter, Eric Henry, when you nominated him as a tough call,
what was tough about it?
Well, as you can see here, we've, one of us is ranked him at 24,
one of us at 25, the other one at 26.
That's what I was kind of looking for with guys who were tough calls.
They were guys who were ranked right around that RB24 or wide receiver 24 range.
What makes him a tough call is how disastrously bad last week was,
how incredibly great his career and earlier this season was.
The fact that Seattle's not been that difficult of a matchup for running
backs.
Although what Deandre Swift scores nine points last week.
Yeah.
There's an asterisk with that.
There's an app because Jalen hurts steals all the touchdowns.
Yeah,
that's well,
it will love a stole one from the one yard line from Derek Henry last
week.
Well,
Levis might have a hard time stealing one this week because he's got a bad ankle.
He might.
I think it really, Henry, is less about him and more about,
do you have two guys who we like as top 20 running backs?
And if so, you're sitting him.
That I agree with.
I feel like we've nailed the game script for Derek Henry each of the last two weeks.
Two games ago was the Dolphins.
Figured the Dolphins would have a lead.
Derek Henry would be weaved out of the game plan.
Barely played in the fourth quarter.
Still had a great fantasy game because he scored two touchdowns.
Last week, much more competitive game.
It went into overtime.
He had a ton of carries.
Every single time he got the football, it looked like he ran into a brick wall.
I mean, it was really terrible. was painful yeah watching derrick henry do this but i think a lot
of it had to do with his offensive line more than him uh definitely doesn't have like quick burst
after the handoff he doesn't juke guys anymore he needs a lane to run and the offensive line
couldn't do that last week the question is can the offensive line do that this week? And on one hand, the numbers have been weird for Derek Henry, certainly touchdown dependent
because the rushing average has been so bad the last couple of weeks. On the other hand,
Seattle defense coming off an emotional win, short week on the road, and Seattle's allowed
a rushing touchdown to a running back in each of the prior four games going into last week.
And the only reason why Swift or Gainwell didn't have a touchdown
is because Jalen Hurts was tush-pushing him in from one yard out.
That's going to be Derrick Henry's job, theoretically, this week.
So if he scores, he's going to be okay as a low-end number two RB,
but I can't look at him and say, all right, he's going to get 80 yards.
He's going to have a shot at two touchdowns. He's going to have a shot at like two touchdowns.
He's going to have a classic Derrick Henry game.
You guys are starting Ty Chandler over him with or without Madison or just without Madison?
Just without Madison.
Just without Madison.
But I still might in PPR even with Madison.
And just so everyone knows, just looking at the game log, Derrick Henry was perfectly
fine with
ryan tannehill i mean kind of the same thing up and down i'm not sure if that has an effect i
think i'd rather have levis back there just have more faith in him but um i don't know if it's a
huge deal what about eckler uh what about eckler this week again uh against the patriots i'm sorry
no with broncos broncos buffalo Buffalo. What the hell? Sorry.
Eckler against Buffalo or Henry?
I have Eckler higher.
I have no faith in Eckler right now.
I have Eckler higher in PPR and Henry higher in non.
All right.
To me, that's a tough call.
What do you do with him?
The Eckler? Yeah, that's a tough call. Yeah.
He was rotating with the other two guys before the game was a blowout.
And you're talking about a Bills defense that looks fantastic right now
and what they just did to Tony Pollard in that Cowboys offense.
I don't know what to expect from Eckler, especially if it –
no Keenan Allen.
How much is this game going to be competitive?
Not competitive.
Right.
And so this feels like uh just a
complete sit no although teams do get the boost from the the firing the coach right like i i feel
but i feel like that boost will happen more on defense for the chargers and it'll probably fall
apart by the third quarter oh would you start james connor he was another guy on the tough call this james connor
or derrick henry this week connor for me connor doesn't seem like a tough call
based on well i guess i shouldn't say that what's tough about this one
chicago's defense is really good yeah arizona's offense is not that good
connor's involvement the passing game has been extremely hit or miss.
Conor's been the only good thing for this offense, though.
I'm sure McBride's been the only good thing.
I'm sure McBride, yeah.
Fair, sorry.
Yeah, look, Conor had a huge game last week.
So did Amari DiMarcato.
They both had a carry of over 40 yards.
They faced a 49ers defense that was missing two starters on the defensive line.
So I will say that.
I'm not trying to take away.
I'm not trying to take away from Connor.
Just you probably said, oh, he killed a tough matchup last week.
I don't think it was really a tough matchup given the personnel of the 49ers last week.
Right.
But the Bears are killing it against the run.
They are.
It's a matter of whether or not their interior defensive linemen are going to be able to
hold up against Arizona's line.
And I actually thought Arizona's line, like they look strong.
Maybe it was just because of the matchup, but it's,
it's two straight games now where they've looked good and they've gotten some
push. And now James Connor has some, some yardage,
maybe one or two yards just to get going on his runs.
And I thought he was excellent. And for the last two weeks,
we've her last two games, we've, or last two games,
we've told people, ah, tough matchup. James Conner doesn't catch the ball.
Totally inconsistent. You should sit him. And he's been amazing. So I'm kind of off of totally
telling people to sit James Conner. Of course there's risk. If he doesn't score, he's probably
going to get, you know, better than like 11 PPR points, but I think that there's
a chance that he scores. I think the
Bears have a way of not blowing teams
out. So even though I think Chicago
wins the game, I think Arizona can hang around
a little bit, and I think James Conner deserves
the benefit of the doubt. I like him as a number two
running back. This is incredible.
In his last four games, he has
nine catches for nine
yards.
That's one yard per catch in the last month.
He doesn't play on third down, really,
except for that one game where DiMarcato was out.
But this is, I mean, here's why Connor's a tough call.
Here is fantasy points in PPR in five games with Kyler Murray.
7.3, 8.3, 7.2, 22.5, 17.9.
Not much in between there.
All right.
Well, that's kind of what makes a tough call
is you've got to have a lot of upside
and a very low floor.
Yeah, yeah.
Let's take a break here,
and we'll talk about T. Higgins and Chris Godwin
and some tight ends
when we come back on Fantasy Football today.
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Data sourced from the ORCGA 2023 Dirt Report. All right, welcome back, everybody. Thanks for
joining us. We're going to have our episode on Sunday night, our recap episode at about 9.30
p.m. Eastern if you want to watch it live. So it'll be out a little bit later on Sunday night
than it typically is, or you'll still hear it at the same time on Monday morning. If that's what you
choose to do, that will be Christmas. So hopefully you'll wake up to some fantasy football today on
Christmas morning. Please check out the CBS Sports app. Going to be a lot of breaking news today.
It's National Signing Day. So check out the CBS Sports app. And it's really, it's amazing. You
get lightning fast scores. You get your breaking news alerts. You can watch live games on the CBS Sports app, and it's really amazing. You get lightning-fast scores. You get your
breaking news alerts. You can watch live games on the CBS Sports app. It's totally free on iPhone,
on Android. I'm on it all the time. Get the CBS Sports app. T. Higgins. Well, let's see.
Why is he a tough call? We are not expecting Jamar Chase this week. He's playing Saturday
at Pittsburgh, and he's got five games this year
with eight or more targets.
And in those five games,
he has 0, 89, 21, 110, and 61 yards.
He has three huge games
with 19 or more PPR fantasy points
and two games with four or fewer fantasy points.
So he's kind of like James Conner.
He was maybe a little bit lucky in that game last week.
But anyway, yeah, T. Higgins, Jamie, is he a tough call for you?
I mean, yes, in the sense of what he's done this season,
you know, comparatively to what he hopefully will do.
I know we've seen Pittsburgh's defense.
Now you mentioned about Joey Porter Jr.
and some of the matchups that he's had
and doing well against number one receivers, but he should be fed targets.
That's the promising thing for him this week is without Jamar Chase,
you saw a little bit of a breakthrough last week.
Again, it was some big, somewhat fluky plays with the touchdowns.
He bounced back after dropping a touchdown as well.
I'm just going to trust him this week as a number two receiver with the hope that this is a guy Jake Browning leans on.
Dave mentioned something earlier, which could be a problem, is that the Steelers offense is just not played very well.
And if Joe Mixon and potentially Chase Brown get going in this game, that we may not see Jake Browning have to throw very much.
So that could be a little bit of a problem here in terms of what the high volume is because they had to throw last week because of how the game was unfolding against Minnesota. I just think
that Higgins without Chase is somebody that I want to buy into. And so I will start him this week
as a mid-tier number two wide receiver. Yeah, that's the range. A couple of things about the
possible game script of this game that might actually help Pittsburgh. Bengals defense was already kind of a mess coming into last week's game.
They lost DJ Reeder at defensive tackle.
It is a huge problem figuratively and literally for them.
I know the Steelers haven't had success running the ball this year.
I think they might be able to have a little bit more success than normal for them.
So maybe like 3.8 yards per carry instead of 3.0 yards per carry
for Najee Harris, something like that against Cincinnati. And Mason Rudolph isn't a great
quarterback. Obviously he was third string for a reason for Pittsburgh, but he can throw a pretty
accurate deep ball. He can read defenses pretty simply. I think that he's, his biggest detriment
is that he's slow with his throwing motion.
And so if he's a little slow, that could turn into interceptions. That would obviously help Cincinnati.
But I think there's room there for the Steelers to keep this game relatively competitive.
You throw on top of that that the Steelers' defense is in just terrible shape right now.
Cam Hayward's in the concussion protocol.
Both starting safeties, one of them suspended for the year.
The other one, Minka Fitzpatrick, out for this game, if not longer, the inside linebackers have been a
massive problem for them. They say that they're going to change up some personnel there in
Pittsburgh. I don't know if it really matters. So there's going to be opportunities for the Bengals
to almost do whatever they want in this game. And Jake Browning does deserve the benefit of the
doubt for making good decisions with the football most of the time.
And I really felt like he started to spread his wings a little bit more last week.
Throw on top of that, there's no Jamar Chase.
And I think it's easy to see that T. Higgins will be the target leader for Cincinnati.
I think he's a middle to low end wide receiver too.
I do struggle with him versus the likes of Jalen Waddell, Drake London, Godwin, the way that Godwin's been rolling, especially in
full PPR, Amari Cooper. That's the range that he's in now. And I think it's possible that he could
end up being better than those guys. Yeah, I think I'm the low guy on him. And it's just,
it's not just the Jake Browning thing, but it is a lot the Jake Browning thing. I mean, we saw
a couple of games with Chase
where we thought he should be fed targets
and he wasn't really.
And Higgins has had a couple of games this season
where he was fed targets
and he scored four or fewer fantasy points.
He's had some real, real stinkers
based on his own level of play.
And I just have a hard time believing
that the Steelers at home,
cold, ugly game, are going to give up a bunch
and I think Porter will probably shut Higgins down
unless Higgins makes one big play.
Porter is a factor here.
They've given up one touchdown to a wide receiver
in their last five games, I believe, the Steelers.
That was last week to DJ Montgomery.
You should have had two in the game, by the way.
Pepe would have crushed them, though.
Yeah, well, he would have scored, but not Montgomery, probably.
Pittman had 78 yards on like 33% of the snaps.
I'm not saying their defense is good, but Porter is good.
So he's a factor here.
Would you start Puka Nakua against the Saints?
Yeah, Puka.
Okay, that was easy.
All right, so Dave mentioned Chris Godwin being in there.
Godwin's basically had two good games this year.
One of them was last week, 25.5 PPR fantasy points.
You know, interesting game.
He was terrific.
He really was.
I think you heard Jacob on Beyond the Box score
kind of throw a little cold water on it.
It was just his opinion.
It was kind of blamed it more on Green Bay than
giving Godwin credit. I would go the other way.
That's fair. No, I think
watching it this morning, the first half was like
Green Bay was just not covering him. He was wide open
underneath all the time. They made the
adjustment and he started making plays downfield
especially late in the second and the first
half. Chris Godwin had four catches
of more than 20 yards in this game. So he
looked like Chris Godwin. He ran a
route in the middle of the field that was just
disgusting, embarrassed one of the linebackers.
I thought he was great, but that doesn't mean anything
going forward. We've just seen
too much of bad Chris Godwin.
You have a
player that's finally getting involved.
He's got 23 targets in his last two games, which
has been a problem. There was a lot of talk in Tampa Bay of why are they not using him more and you
have a quarterback who's playing well you have a great match like you know there's three things
that all sort of fall in line here that makes it I don't want to say easy to start Chris Godwin but
you should feel comfortable doing it if he's been on your roster and you haven't been using him
so is he going to have a huge game again that's hard to say because Mike Evans has been a
disappointing part of this
for the last two weeks, too,
and I'm sure they want to keep him involved,
so there might be a little bit more balance here,
but if you tell me he's getting another game
with double-digit targets, I'm starting him.
No hesitation.
Oh, that's, yeah, but right,
but like I've been saying,
Baker Mayfield is throwing 28, 29, 30 passes
five of his last six games.
They're winning.
He's probably going to be better, we think.
They're running the ball a lot.
He's had his target
per outrun rate
the last two weeks,
Chris Godwin,
is 40%.
So it's an unsustaining,
like double-digit targets
on 30 targets
is probably not going to happen.
On 30 passes,
it's probably not going to happen.
I'm not saying Mayfield
has no chance
of throwing more than 30.
That's just how
they've been running
their offense lately.
Very run heavy,
better defense,
three wins in a row.
So,
you know,
what does Godwin do if he gets seven or eight targets?
That's been pretty bad this year.
That's.
And the,
and the touchdowns have escaped them.
So that's a problem.
Yeah.
He's now the end zone targets.
I haven't been there for,
for whatever reason they were earlier in the year.
I don't know.
Heath,
your thoughts on Godwin?
I think everybody's pretty much said it. He
fits in very well with
the guys who have shown us extremely
low lows, but in Godwin's case, and I'm
a little bit higher than this now. I think I've got him 27,
so I'm a little lower on the
group. He's shown us extremely low lows, but he's
given us reason to hope. I would
like him a lot more if Trevor Lawrence could get
out of the concussion protocol.
I think that would make him an easier start and probably enough to push him ahead of T Higgins for me
how about in the same game Calvin Ridley who we were going to talk about but we're
running a little long so Calvin Ridley or Chris Godwin I've got one higher yeah same
I've got you've got just ahead of him you've got to worry about Ridley if he's catching passes from C.J. Beathard.
This is another guy where if Lawrence plays,
I think you make the move to Ridley.
The matchup is so delicious for them.
But if it's Beathard, I would be nervous to start Ridley.
I think I would love Ridley if Lawrence were playing.
I think I would, too.
He'll have three end zone opportunities
and he won't score a touchdown
put on the line on one of them
follow the ball on the next one
he'll catch it but there will be a holding penalty
on the third one that brings it back
imagine if that
touchdown had counted
and Lawrence scores like 23
points against the Ravens
and that would have been
four straight good games for Lawrence,
or maybe five, I think four,
including two against the Browns and the Ravens.
And then going into this matchup at Tampa Bay,
imagine how excited you would be about Trevor Lawrence.
I would say there would not be a graphic on Twitter
comparing him to Daniel Jones had that happened.
Right.
Did you do that?
I didn't even see this.
I mean, I know you always...
I did not do it.
Oh, okay.
It sounds very much like something I would do.
Oh, yeah, 100%.
It wasn't me.
We've got two tight ends to talk about here,
but what do you think about Brandon Ayuk
against the Ravens who are, you know,
their 11th best against wide receivers,
but I think we all consider them
to be a pretty tough matchup
and they were great against Jacksonville last week. Ayuk has been good, but I think we all consider them to be a pretty tough matchup, and they were great against Jacksonville last week. Iyuk has
been good, but rarely great
lately. He has one game
in his last seven with more than
16.6. 16.6
is good. He just hasn't had a lot of blow-up
weeks lately, which wasn't the case early in the
year. He was incredible.
Now he's just been sort of merely good.
And I have another stat I can throw out there,
but I'll let you guys talk.
Jamie, what do you think about Ayuk this week?
Is he a tough call?
I put this one, I sort of editorialized on this one.
Does anyone think he's a tough call?
No.
I mean, you have arguably the MVP of the NFL the way Brock Purdy is playing right now.
And you want pieces of this offense.
And it really doesn't matter, I think think who they're playing at this point so you know he's he's found the end zone I don't say frequently
but enough that you say okay he's got that potential uh I don't think this Ravens defense
like you said is something that you run away from and no I didn't say that
just well I mean that's fine if you feel that way. I didn't say that. I'm sorry.
I don't think this is a defense that you worry about.
I think about that Rams offense against the Ravens in the rain two weeks ago
and how the receivers had big games there
and how I know that John St. James offense.
It's the game of the week, yeah.
The Ravens and the Diners.
It's a Christmas game of the week.
He's not a tough call.
Hey.
It was just a setup, folks, for the Christmas game of the week.
Now, I mean, here's what I was wondering what that was about.
That makes more sense now.
Yeah, yeah.
On Wednesday?
Well, I got to mix it up.
Like, obviously, this is going to be the game of the week.
So I had to mix it up and surprise Dave a little bit.
You're saving the bit.
It's good.
Yeah.
It was a very good job.
Hey, how about this?
What if we put it in context?
What do you do if you've got one spot and you've got Rashi, Rice, and Brandon Ayuk?
Rice.
Is it still an easy call?
Cooking up rice.
I'm cooking up rice.
Yeah.
Jamie, did you say something?
Yeah, rice.
Oh, rice.
Okay.
Yeah.
No, the stat I was going to give was that every wide receiver that's had a big game,
like more than 15 and a half points, I think, against the Ravens, has had double-digit targets.
That has happened one time this year for Ayuk, one time this year for Debo Samuel.
So I think you pretty much throw all that stuff out with the Niners.
They're just more efficient by far than any other team.
But typically, if you're going to have a weak winning game against the Ravens, you need
double-digit targets.
All right, tight ends real quick here, guys.
Darren Waller and Dallas Goddard facing each other.
How much do you trust them, Heath Cummings?
They are both low-end starters.
I prefer Waller.
His target per route run and yards per route run numbers last week
were both very good.
He just only played 42% of the snaps.
I would assume that he's going to be more involved this week, we're both very good. He just only played 42% of the snaps. I would assume that he's going to be more involved this week.
And whether it's a good matchup for tight ends,
it's a pretty good matchup for pass catchers against the Eagles.
Man, Goddard's the one that's harder to trust for me
just because of his lack of involvement
and really lack of production this year.
What does he have, two good games?
Yep.
Yeah.
Yeah, it's easy to be out on Goddard.
Especially since this is another matchup where I think the Eagles can run
and so maybe take a little bit more pressure off of Jalen Hurts.
I definitely like Waller better.
I think there will be more opportunities, more volume.
He was second on the team in targets with six.
He only ran 22 routes.
That makes for a nice target per route run rate.
That makes for a very fun thing to say on the show.
I wish he had looked better, but it was his first game back.
Maybe he can be a little bit more explosive in his running this week.
So I'm happy to take a chance on him as a low-end tight end one.
A little worried about Kevin
Bayard covering him. This is what they did with
Kelsey when they played the Chiefs. They put
Bayard on him.
They could really put anyone on Waller. They could put
Darius Slay on Waller if Darius Slay plays in this
game.
All right. Those are tough calls.
How about this? I'm not sure if I feel
this way, but just going into the
week, in my gut,
I like DeAndre Swift more than Saquon Barkley.
Anyone else?
No.
It's not a bad call, but no.
You can't do it because he never scores.
That's the problem.
That's what holds him back.
It doesn't really catch up.
My sounds don't count.
Sure.
I can start Swift over Saquon.
It doesn't catch up.
It's also a Boston Scott week.
It is a Boston Scott Week, yes.
All right.
Let's take one more break.
When we come back, I've got Christmas-themed fill-in-the-blank,
New Orleans at the Rams, the fantasy cops,
and your email is at fantasyfootballatcbsi.com.
We'll be right back.
Christmas-themed fill-in-the-blank.
A lot of you are going to be traveling this week.
Maybe you won't have time to listen to the episodes.
We'll give you a little taste of Christmas right now.
Blank has been naughty this season.
Dave.
Oh, I'm sorry. Wrong game.
Javante Williams has been naughty this season.
Patrick Mahomes.
Patrick Mahomes has been naughty this season.
Heath, who's been naughty?
Najee Harris.
Naughty Harris.
Agreed.
Naughty Harris.
Blank has been nice this season.
Raheem Mostert.
Yep.
Yeah.
Sean McVay
Trey McBride
who shared early in the season
let Zach Ertz
do his thing and then when Ertz got hurt
he became the best tight end in football
that was nice of him yeah
blank will be a week 16 lump of coal
Austin Eckler
Kyler Murray
this is where I have to say something
this segment
this segment
that's me
Ravens
like all of them
Ravens
oh wow that's pretty bold
okay blank will be your week 16 Santa Claus delivering you a fantasy gift.
Kenneth Walker III.
Drake London.
Travis Kelsey.
Oh, okay.
And blank is what you should eat on Christmas.
Ham, ham, ham, ham, ham, ham, ham.
Chinese food.
Pizza.
Blueberry muffins.
Blueberry muffins. Blueberry muffins.
Interesting.
We have blueberry muffins
on Christmas morning every year.
Nice.
I think we have Eggs Benedict,
as I recall.
My wife will make.
Yeah. Okay. That's fancy. Yeah, yeah. She loves recall. My wife will make. Yeah.
Okay.
That's fancy.
Yeah, yeah.
She loves it.
Yeah, it's great stuff.
Are you big?
She homemade hollandaise sauce on those?
I think so.
Yeah, I think she does everything, yeah, from scratch.
I'm looking forward to it.
Can't wait.
New Orleans is at the Rams on Thursday night.
Na, na, na, na, na, na.
Na!
Here's a trend to watch.
In the last three games, the Saints very run heavy, like the Bucs.
29, 26, and 28 pass attempts in their last three games for the New Orleans Saints.
They're 2-1 in those games.
The Rams have seen 36 or more pass attempts in five straight games.
We get some pass volume, please, Derek Carr?
All right, here's your updated stat of the game.
Remember, I gave this one out last week, and I was like,
is this right, is this right?
And it was right, and it turned out to be very right
because Barkley was terrible.
Only three running backs have scored.
Nope, only two.
Two running backs have scored more than 14.4 PPR fantasy points
against the New Orleans Saints.
Is Kyron Williams going to be the third?
Do we have any concerns about Kyron?
Nope.
Zero.
All right.
Kyron, I mean, one of the most amazing things about him
is he's had tough matchups so much this year,
and it's come through.
So good for him.
I think the only concern would be,
are they going to punish him for the fumbles?
Oh, yeah.
When's that going to happen?
Two fumbles last week. Kept playing.
First two of the season. Sean McVay gave him the
vote of confidence this week.
He's not going anywhere.
He might have to fumble three
times. Unless he fumbles again.
Chris Olave is expected to
play, so how would you rank
the three main wide
receivers in this game?
Cooper.
Puka.
I've got Cooper Cup, Puka Nakua, Chris Olave.
Yeah.
Okay.
Cup, Nakua, Olave.
Cup, Olave, Nakua, you said, right?
Cup, Nakua, Olave.
I'm the only one that has Olave.
Oh.
Look, I'm open to the idea of Olave over Nakua,
and I agree with you about the whole pass attempts thing.
No one has seen more pass attempts against over the last six weeks in the Rams.
It's actually 41.6 pass attempts a game.
The only team, this is amazing,
the only team that hasn't thrown 40-plus times in the last six weeks
against L.A. is Washington.
And they're the team that we always expect to just throw like crazy.
Second week in a row or second game in a row for Washington,
rather where they didn't do that.
It's because the Rams run defense is really good and their past defense is
not.
So if a lot of is right,
then I could imagine he could end up having a pretty big game.
Do we have any Puka concerns?
It's a little bit of a bad taste in your mouth, right?
Five for 50 against the Commanders.
He has seven to nine targets in seven straight games.
There have been 10 wide receivers
with seven to nine targets against the Saints.
Only four of them scored more than 11 PPR fantasy points.
Only one of them scored more than 14.2 PPR fantasy points.
The Saints, by the way,
they give up the third fewest fantasy points to wide receivers.
I think I may have mentioned that earlier.
So, Jamie, you did say there are some concerns with Puka?
Yeah, I mean, not to sit him, but I think when you, you know, you mentioned Rashi Rice.
I would start a lave over him.
You can certainly make a case that if Zach Wilson plays, Garrett Wilson's better than him.
They're basically similar type of players.
Touchdowns tend to be a little
bit of a problem. They're more PPR reliant than
they are non-PPR. So since
Cooper Cupps revival,
we haven't really seen huge gains from Puka.
It's true, yeah. You have him
21st and Dave and Heath have him 12th.
So it's a pretty big difference there.
I think Olave's got to go ahead of him just based
on upside.
Easier in non and half PPR than full PPR.
But the more I think about it, I really believe that volume is going to be huge here.
And that Derek Carr is going to have to throw a lot. And we've seen it so many times this year.
When he throws a lot, Carr's over 300 yards.
And so if he's over 300 yards, you've got to figure Olave is going to have plenty of catches, plenty of yards.
Maybe he scores on top of it.
I think that Olave is a better bet than Nakua.
Would you start Puka Nakua or Devante Smith against the Giants?
Smith.
Smith.
I think I have Nakua higher there, too.
Not sure if I'm going to stick with it.
All right.
I'm trying to find some questions in the chat because there's
a lot of starts in this game. You're starting Kyron.
You're starting Kamara.
It'll be interesting to see because the Rams are tough.
They give up the fewest receiving yards per game
to running backs, but you're starting Kamara.
I have where I was the
two seed coming off a bye.
Kamara, Kyron,
Puka,
Olave.
Wow.
And I may be in trouble or really happy.
Oh, my God.
I hate that.
I do, too.
I hate that for you.
I'm so sorry.
You're good at fantasy.
I haven't changed it.
I have Groupie as my kicker.
That's definitely not changed.
Oh, wow.
I might pivot to Haversack because I like him a lot.
Another one. Yeah. So it's interesting. I I like him a lot. Another one, yeah.
So it's interesting.
I mean, it's interesting, these teams.
Thursday night, we don't love Thursday night necessarily,
but there are too many must-starts in this game.
So that brings up Stafford.
Carr is a sit even coming off that game.
I don't even think he's in the top 18.
I don't think he's a sit necessarily,
but you're not going to trust him.
But again, you're looking at a very good matchup
and as Dave said, volume
should be there. He's got five touchdowns in his last
two games. He's coming off his best statistical
game from a fantasy perspective.
When you don't have potentially Trevor
Lawrence or CJ Stroud, and you
can't get your hands on, let's say, Baker Mayfield
or Joe
Flacco,
I don't see tremendous difference.
I like Mullins better, but like Nick Mullins, Jake Browning,
this week without Chase, Carr, I think they're all very similar.
Minshew, you know, especially Pittman plays,
I think they're all very similar.
And so it's not a bad matchup to say I'm shying away from Carr.
Sure, but on the flip side, we've seen a lot of games this year
where Carr does throw a lot, gets a lot of yards, doesn't
get the second touchdown, does have some
turnovers. And I also don't like
that it's a short week, on
the road, late in the season,
and do we know about Ryan
Ramchak? Is he playing their right tackle?
I didn't see if he
practiced. I don't think the
Rams' pass rush is dominant, and obviously
their pass defense hasn't been good. But if the offensive line is an issue for Derek Carr,
I, uh, I, I would worry about his upside. They're not a top 12 quarterback. I don't think
but someone that like, I think you can feel encouraged in a super flex to start him. And
if you're really desperate and he's out there, you don't want to take your chances on Browning or Minshew or Gino.
Yes, Carr isn't that far off from those guys.
Yeah, I can't help but notice Carr with the five touchdowns in his last two games.
It's coincided with Taysom Hill being inactive for one of them and being completely uninvolved in another of them.
And I think he had two short yardage touchdown passes in those games.
He did. Good point.
Flip a coin. I don't know. I mean, Taysom Hill, we were going to talk about him in tough calls, Dave. two short yardage touchdown passes in those games. He did. Good point.
Flip a coin.
I don't know.
I mean, Taysom Hill, we were going to talk about him in tough calls, Dave,
but I said we'll just save it for when we preview the game.
Yeah, I mean, we know.
I mean, Heath is another, right?
Heath, Taysom Hill, you say tough calls are guys with high ceilings
and high floors or low floors.
It doesn't get much lower than that for Taysom Hill.
So you talked about Goddard and Waller, for example,
as tough calls at tight end.
What about Taysom Hill?
I would start Taysom
over those guys in non-PPR.
I would start those guys
over Taysom in full PPR.
But this is like
one of those situations
on Sunday night
where Dave said that he'd like
to get a hold of the Bears
and just get their game plan
beforehand because
their Taysom Hill usage
is about as predictable
as the Bears' running back usage. Who knows when it's going to be on the bears running back usage
you've got a beat on it yeah they gave you the game plan no i watched the game i figured it out
but what about the game before that it was the exact same thing was it i mean it was foreman
was scott was just foreman it's for, I know we're supposed to be talking about Taysom Hill,
but Foreman and Herbert rotate series,
and then on third down, it's Roshon Johnson.
The only difference last week was they used Roshon more in the fourth quarter.
All right. Seriously, Heath, what about half PPR?
Goddard, Waller, Taysom?
I would probably just go Waller and Goddard.
Let's talk about Matthew Stafford.
I'm actually going to give Heath the first word
because he is the low guy on Stafford.
He's like 13 for me.
Oh, you're moving him up?
Okay, okay.
Yeah.
All right, good.
So that means we can have confidence starting Matthew Stafford,
but not ahead of two.
Oh, no, that's not true.
Jamie has Stafford ahead of Tua.
Jamie, what do you like about Stafford this week?
You have him ninth.
I mean, four straight games of standout production.
He's playing very well.
Cooper Cup is back to being Cooper Cup.
And so when he has two receivers like this,
you go back to Cup and Woods and even Cup and Beckham
when Beckham was playing well and Brandon Cooks was part of that.
Maybe Cooks was with Goff. But in any event,
I just think Stafford's clicking right now. Sean McVay, Dave mentioned it in terms of who's been
nice. He's arguably coach of the year
with what he's done with this team and how they're in playoff contention.
I said it earlier in the show that they've been, the saints have been really good
against crappy quarterbacks and somewhat bad against good quarterbacks and Stafford's playing
as well as anybody in the league right now. So, uh, I don't have any hesitation with him. You
know, 10th might be a little too low. It's so funny because early in the year,
he was averaging like 320 passing the first four games of the year, he was averaging like 320 passing.
The first four games of the season, he was averaging like 320 passing yards per game.
Yards per attempt, over eight yards per attempt in three out of four games.
And he had three touchdowns in those first four games.
Fantasy production was just awful.
But the yardage and the yards per attempt were awesome.
He was at 310 passing yards per
game the last four weeks he doesn't have a game over 300 yards he's averaging like 260 yards per
game the yards per attempt is mostly like seven and a half yards or worse but he throws three or
four touchdowns every week so the fantasy production is awesome yeah well here's been the formula two two questions
one is cooper cup playing check is matthew stafford going to throw even 33 passes if that's
a yes he has a big game if he's right under 30 he does not he had they had a stretch where they
were just running the ball like crazy and he was not throwing enough and Cup was probably playing through something.
But lately, throw the ball
and if Cooper Cup's playing, he has been a stud
and he's done it against Baltimore
and he's done it against Cleveland.
So, all right, let's go Matthew Stafford.
Finish strong.
Let me see if I have any questions here from the chat.
Puka, Godwin, or Keenan Allen?
And you're going to have to make that decision on Thursday.
Puka. Puka. Puka, Godwin, or Keenan Allen? And you're going to have to make that decision on Thursday. Puka.
Puka.
Puka Nakua.
Puka, Ridley, Addison, Gus.
Well, I guess you're going to go with Puka there.
Yep.
Do you know what Puka means?
Puka is a nickname.
Oh, yeah.
What does it mean?
It means fat and chubby.
Fat and chubby.
That was according to the broadcast.
Camara, Mostert, Kyron Williams, Gibbs, and Pollard.
Pick three.
The first three.
Yep.
Yeah.
I might look at Gibbs over Kamara, just based on the matchup.
Ooh.
Okay.
Okay.
That's it.
Dave, that's it for Thursday Night Football na na na na na
na na na na na
na na na na
na na na na na
na na na na
you're singing the wrong music
what you should be singing is
hold on, you should be singing
the Fantasy Cops music
let's settle some league disputes.
All right.
This first one comes from Jeff.
In our league, we allow depth charts.
Here's the exact wording in the rules.
Each manager has the option to submit a depth chart each week.
You can indicate which backup player you would like to start in case your starter is a last-minute inactive.
This only covers players who do not play at all.
Example, if your player gets injured on the first play
but was active for the game, it does not qualify.
This week, one manager named Mike listed Aiden O'Connell
as his backup quarterback on the depth chart
in the league chat with Geno Smith as the starter.
Flash forward to Monday night,
he would win his matchup
if he gets Aiden O'Connell's points,
but lose it if he gets the zero from Geno.
What would you do in this situation?
And again, I'm going to read the wording.
Each manager has the option
to submit a depth chart each week.
You can indicate which backup player
you would like to start
in case your starter is a last-minute inactive.
Then it goes on, though.
This only covers players who do not play at all.
Example, if your player gets injured on the first play
but was active for the game, it does not qualify.
So Geno was active, but he did not play at all.
What say you, fantasy cops?
Should he get the Aiden O'Connell points
or the Geno points? Aiden O'Connell points or the Geno points?
Aiden O'Connell points.
Agreed.
Yep.
I think it's debatable.
I would be really mad if I was facing him and lost because of this.
And I'd be really mad if I was him and I didn't get the Aiden O'Connell points.
And you probably need to add a little one more sentence in your rule here but i
would also agree to aid in o'connell points i can't believe that it says inactive in the rules
it also says does not play a snap but it only covers players who do not play at all right but
that he was very inactive on monday night he that i disagree. Schaefer, I'd love to know what you think.
Does he get the O'Connell points or the Geno points?
O'Connell points.
Oh, fine.
I disagree with you guys wholeheartedly.
Geno was active.
Like, what about the Bichon?
Oh, no, I mean Bichon played.
All right, fine.
Fine, fine, fine.
Well, is there another scenario you can think of where this applies,
where somebody did not play? All right, fine. Fine, fine, fine. Well, is there another scenario you can think of where this applies where somebody did not play
but was active?
I mean, not this season,
but remember when
Marshawn Lynch was active
and then his back acted up?
He was at Cleveland
and then he didn't play
a snap against the Browns?
I mean, I think you run that risk
with injured players, right?
You run that risk
of I'm starting this guy.
I don't know if he's going to play.
Oh, he was active, but they never actually intended to play him.
Yeah, but I mean, that's just, look, it's obviously the wording.
You know, if you're going to put this in a court,
the wording would not favor the Aiden O'Connell side.
I know.
Well, that's what this is.
But I mean, come on.
He did not play.
It was clearly that he was an inactive active player.
Who's to say that he would not have played if Drew Locke had struggled?
But he didn't.
But he was active.
So he could have.
I don't know.
I think you guys are wrong.
He did not play a snap.
I'm having Internal Affairs investigate you, but it's fine.
All right.
Let's go to...
The rules lay it out.
Yeah, you're right.
They say if the guy's inactive,
then you can substitute for him.
So the rule is,
Geno Smith was active
and you can't.
You guys are breaking the rules.
Read the next sentence, please.
Players who do not play at all.
The next sentence
is superseded
by the inactive sentence.
All right.
That's not how it works.
Sentence structure
would determine...
I think so.
I think that's the rule.
The rule is inactive.
They should really remove that second sentence.
It made things more complicated.
Anyway.
Yeah, I agree with you.
The second one is from Dave.
Hi.
I'm in a 12-team league with fishing guys in Vail.
And last week, or he actually says fishing guides in Vail.
And last week, I, the sixth place team, smoked the third place team.
My team looks stellar, and I'm slated to play the two seed this week.
The two seed said that because I'm the lowest seed, I should be playing the one seed.
And I agree.
I think that's how it's supposed to work.
However, Yahoo arranged the playoffs this way, and I didn't change anything.
I looked into, he's the commissioner.
I looked into the commissioner tools, and there is a statement on playoff reseeding that reads,
if your league uses a three-week playoff setting,
playoff reseeding will adjust the second round matchups
so the highest seeded team will play the lowest ranked team.
Playoff reseeding will occur when there is an upset
in the first round of the playoffs.
I thought this was my answer,
but I have that option turned to off.
Ooh.
The player in the second place
doesn't want to play me
because I'm on a freaking roll
and is accusing me
of switching up the playoffs
and cheating,
and I'm super pissed.
I discussed this
with the person in first place
who said,
I don't care who I play.
I'm going to win.
So I can switch to Final Four,
but I guess my question is,
should I change how Yahoo
seeded our playoff bracket
to appease a pissy
player who thinks he has a better shot of making
the finals by playing someone else,
even if the other three people don't care who they
play, or should I trust the system that
Yahoo seeded a specific way for a reason
and let him and no one else
think I'm a cheater?
What do you guys think he should do here?
So he could still reseed the playoffs himself
manually? Yeah, he's the commissioner, so he could do it.
And that's what he intended
to do all along? Yeah, in case you missed it in that
whole spiel. It seemed like
he intended to do that, but
he didn't do it. He didn't turn that setting on,
but now he doesn't want to give in to this
whiny two-seed, basically.
I'd kick the two-seed out of the league, take a bye,
and go to the championship game.
One person actually wrote back and said, please don't let Heath kick these guys out of the league, take a bye, and go to the championship game.
One person actually wrote back and said,
please don't let Heath kick these guys out of the league.
But I'm not sure if it was to this email.
Oh, man.
So what would you guys do if you were here? It would be great if you read this on Friday,
because Dan would have some scenario where this happened to him.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Here's what we did in my league, and this works really great.
Okay.
All right, sorry. So's what we did in my league. This works really great. Okay. All right.
Sorry.
So Jamie says reseed.
Heath, you said kick someone out of the league and reseed?
Yes.
Dave?
I think reseeding is the option.
I think you guys are so wrong about the first one.
But he also, Dave also says, the emailer Dave says,
come fish with me this summer.
Bring the fam.
I don't know.
I don't know that there are.
I don't like maybe I do fly fishing before skydiving,
but I just can't imagine myself ever fly fishing.
That is.
You would definitely be Ben Stiller and something about Mary.
If somebody's fishing around.
Yeah.
Yeah.
100%.
I will wear a face mask.
Let's finish with some emails.
A fantasy football.
A football gets stuck in your hair.
And then Dan would say,
I'm such a better fisher than you.
Oh, 100%.
Yeah.
I can do fly fishing.
I can put the worm on the hook.
I can do any type of bait.
All right.
From Matthew here.
Which, by the way, do you guys fish?
I eat fish.
We used to take a fishing trip
to Minnesota every year
when I was a kid.
I fished a lot as a kid,
a little as an adult,
but twice in the last eight years.
My oldest son still does.
Does he catch things and eat them?
Or does he throw them back?
I don't believe he eats them.
No, I think he just throws them back.
All right.
From Matthew, which three running backs do you like best in a dynasty league?
PPR, ETN, James Cook, Brian Robinson, Ramondre Stevenson.
Well, we got two.
Two are easy. I would take Ramondre over Brian Robinson. Iondre Stevenson. Well, we got two. Two are easy.
I would take Ramondre over Bryan Robinson.
I think I would too.
Yeah, two of those guys are in my top eight, nine
in my updated Dynasty rankings.
Ramondre is just ahead of Bryan Robinson at 27 and 29.
Adam would ask his kids to bait the hook for him
because it's too icky.
I would never, ever, ever use live bait, ever.
This is way too icky.
You're absolutely right.
There's no chance.
I would put cheese on there.
I think I used to fish with cheese or something as the bait.
Who do you like better, ETN or Cook and Dynasty, by the way?
ETN.
Yeah, I think that's the answer.
Yep.
This one is from Maxwell Booth.
I think that's a great name.
Great name.
That should be a team name.
Wondering if I should start Joe Flacco or Geno Smith.
Four point per passing touchdown.
Flacco.
Did we rank Geno?
Yes.
Okay.
Well, I don't know if you did.
I didn't.
I need to do that.
Throw him in there.
Yeah, I'd probably go Geno.
Josh is between Mahomes
and Baker Mayfield and the Chiefs.
That's crazy.
In the fantasy semis.
The Chiefs, the Bears,
and the Seahawks DST.
Bears. Bears and the Seahawks DST? Bears.
Bears and Mahomes.
Bears and Mahomes.
All right, from Tanner B.
Do you think every year the NFL will be cursed
to have more bad offensive lines than good offensive lines?
Been that way for like a decade, B.
I wonder if it's been that way longer than we even realize.
No, forever.
Yeah.
Especially now, just the way the college game is,
they don't develop linemen at the same rate that they do.
Well, they don't get to practice as much either.
They don't get as much contact practice.
We'll make a rule that
defensive players
have to crawl on all fours to the quarterback
and then offensive line play will get better.
Go back to allowing holding.
From JT,
start two in PPR. Swift,
Ridley, JT,
Jonathan Taylor, and Njoku.
Swift, Ridley, Jonathan Taylor and Njoku Swift Ridley
Jonathan Taylor
Njoku
start two
all in on the last two
assuming Taylor plays
I'll go Taylor and Ridley
wow
Njoku
I think I'm gonna
I'm hanging with Dave
I think I'm going with
so basically it's Ridley
or Njoku for you guys,
and Jamie said Ridley and Dave...
I'll amend that.
I have Trevor Lawrence with me.
Okay.
That makes it closer,
but like I told you on Sunday,
I'm done second-guessing Njoku.
He's locked in.
Sid from Milwaukee says,
Dear Marino, Schneier, Bil Bill Zarian and DeVito.
Dan,
who's Dan Bilzerian?
Look him up.
I am.
He is someone on Instagram.
I was a poker player.
Oh,
he's more than just a poker player.
He's a jungle man.
Is he?
Okay.
Just like me. Start two
in PPR. Puka,
Aaron Jones, Devante
Smith.
Two receivers.
Yeah, for sure.
Although I think Jones has a big game this week.
Jones at Carolina. That's
really tempting to sit him
if Dylan doesn't play.
I mean, even Bijan was good against Carolina.
Oh, no, he wasn't.
He was terrible.
All right.
That was a great show.
Thank you, guys.
We'll talk to you tomorrow.
Start or sit for the AFC home games.
All right.
Have a great day.
Enjoy signing day.
If your cousin's wife thinks that the Vikings made the Super Bowl,
you can play.
Oh, that's fun. All something that's a bit of a dream
later everybody