Fantasy Football Today - Week 9 Recap: CEH, Zeke, Moore, Taylor and other Duds! (11/08 Fantasy Football Podcast)

Episode Date: November 9, 2020

We recap Week 9 and discuss how annoying RBBC is and then give you the big news (4:00) on David Montgomery, Justin Jackson and more plus who you should add off the waiver wire. Then we'll debate who the worst QB in the NFL is and get into our Believe it or Not segment (11:03)!. Is Mark Andrews benchable? Is Cole Beasley droppable (16:00)? Is D.J. Chark a Top 25 WR again (17:24) and what do we make of the Vikings WRs? ... Top 5 QBs (23:30), RBs (26:08), WRs (29:15) and TEs (30:48) of Week 9! Thoughts on Derek Carr, Kalen Ballage, Curtis Samuel, Irv Smith and many. more. Then we get to our Week 9 winners (34:30) and losers (35:40) ... Recapping every game with our Fantasy takes (47:10)! ... Email us at [e-mail] You can also download and subscribe to the full-length Fantasy Football Today podcast here: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/fantasy-football-today-podcast/id261735167 Follow the new FFT Twitch channel: https://www.twitch.tv/FFToday Follow our FFT team on Twitter: @FFToday, @AdamAizer, @JameyEisenberg, @daverichard, @heathcummingssr, @BenSchragg Watch FFT on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCviK78rIWXhZdFzJ1Woi7Fg/videos Join our Facebook group https://www.facebook.com/groups/FantasyFootballToday/ Sign up for the FFT newsletter https://www.cbssports.com/newsletter 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

This is Fantasy Football Today from CBS Sports. On his way to the end zone. I'll tell you what, that was a spectacular play. It's time to dominate your fantasy league. What a play! Off to the races! Touchdown! Oh, he's done it again!

Now here's some combination of Adam, Dave, Jamie, Heath, and Ben. Man, we had some good games to finish the Sunday slate. Dolphins, Cardinals. Cardinals should have gone for it, by the way. Cowboys, Steelers. Steelers should have kicked a field goal, by the way. They shouldn't have gone for it. And Chargers, Raiders.

My football take, they should not have thrown a fade to Donald Parham. But Chargers losing a close game, Parham for the course. Welcome to the show, everybody. Welcome to the show. Welcome to the Sunday night edition of Fantasy Football Today. Adam, Dave, and Heath here to break down everything from Sunday. Really looking forward to today's show. Good evening, guys. I'm going to give you my big takeaway from week nine, and I'll let you talk about it. Here we go. Ready? Yep. Put it on a license plate. I hate our BBC. It is hard enough to find good running backs that have all the touches. The RBBC is just not fair and it's very annoying. And what are we supposed

to do about it? Isn't it, though, actually the most fair? The idea that we're going to start off each game and whoever does the best gets the most. Like, it's the most American way to distribute touches, right? If they did it like that, but it's more like we're going to start off the game and DeAndre Swift's going to do the best, but we're still going to give Adrian Peterson all these touches and even Kerryon Johnson's going to get in the game.

Swift had quite a few today, didn't he? He did, but not enough. He had like 13 carries or something. Why did Adrian Peterson have... He totaled over 90 yards, which for a Lions running back is pretty rare. Hey, listen, man. He should get all the touches.

He should get 80% of the touches. Of course he should, but the coaches are trying to do what they think is the smart thing. Are they? That's keeping their running backs healthy. Well, I'm sorry. All these coaches. You can't handle more of a workload? They don't know, and I don't know if they want to

know, but most coaches, they don't want to have that feature back unless they are absolutely sure the person in question can handle it. Well, Dave, I would like to have more feature backs. That's all I'm saying. We all would, but the coaches are trying to ruin your fantasy

experience, but they're doing it to try and save their jobs. The Chiefs are just not running anymore. We're done. Just going to throw all the time. Patrick Mahomes. From their perspective, it makes some sense. They're averaging like two and a half

yards per carry the last two or three games. Why would they run? Their guard play really hasn't been that great. It's hard for them to move the ball that way. I don't know what strikes. It's not as bad as the Bears' situation currently is, but the Chiefs have had a lot of offensive line injuries and COVID

situations. Their offensive line play, it's amazing they score 30 points every week anyway, And their offensive line play, I mean, it's amazing. They score 30 points every week anyway. But their offensive line play hasn't been fantastic. Yeah. Mahomes covers up a lot of stuff. Sure does. And we'll talk about Clyde Edwards' E-layer and get your thoughts on that.

Talk about the best and the worst from today's games. DJ Moore was kind of a stinker. Curtis Samuel was great. Yeah. Christian McCaffrey was pretty good. That wasn't bad. But let's, by the way, I hope you're watching on YouTube.

YouTube.com slash fantasy football today. We have fun, you know, and we smile and wave. And I wave my arms around like a lunatic all the time. I roll my eyes at Adam regularly. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. But you can't really tell when he's wearing glasses like he is.

Oh, they're off. Never mind. Yeah, I don't you can't really tell when he's wearing glasses like he is. Oh, they're off. Never mind. Yeah, I don't wear the glasses during the show. Okay. What's wrong with wearing glasses during the show? Well, they're not real glasses, and they reflect the camera, and it looks really, really bad. It does.

I don't know how Dave has pulled it off so it doesn't do that because mine do the same thing. Okay. News and notes. News and notes. A couple things for next week. You might get a bunch of players back. You might get Raheem Mostert.

You might get Deebo Samuel. You probably are getting Nick Chubb and Miles Sanders as well. So that's good. As far as today went, running back injuries, Justin Jackson left after three snaps. They're at Miami.

He left after one snap and he played three snaps. After what? Okay. He tried to come back. Literally the first play of the game was an RPO and Herbert took off

and someone came along and nailed Jackson Lowe. Yeah, well, I was pretty PO'd by that. Yeah, a lot of people were. Yeah, so I didn't see it. I was doing the home team watch party presented by Lowe's. We were watching the Cowboys-Steelers game, which

was awesome. But yeah, Justin Jackson basically didn't play. And you've got to be pretty... If you're Josh Kelly and you just got passed by Kalen Balazs, that's no good. Yeah, Balazs is bad. What'd you say? I think maybe Joshua Kelly's bad. He

might be bad. Kalen Balazs did not look like Kalen Balazs. You guys remember when you were in school and there was maybe somebody in school who was maybe the geek of the school and you're coming back from summer vacation and the geek of the school looks a lot different. Something changed with them over the summer. This is what's happened to Kalen Balazs.

He was the geek of fantasy football. Nobody wanted him. He was two yards per carry, probably because he was coached by Adam Gase. Maybe a little bit more than that, but he goes to the Chargers. And honest to God, he looked like a physical tough between the tackles running back, which the Chargers haven't had since Melvin Gordon was there. He's all that. This is like, he's all that.

You know, it's a sequel. He's all that. Kalen Balazs was all that for one game at least. Yeah. Yeah. I'm not. It's going to be an interesting discussion on the waiver wire, I guess. Oh, he shouldn't be your top waiver claim.

We don't know what's going on with Justin Jackson and whether or not it's a serious injury, but I don't know. Anthony Lynn is another coach who clearly has a hard time making intelligent decisions because his team just can't win games and he's been using multiple running backs. He continued to give Joshua

Kelly work, even though Joshua Kelly wasn't very good. Again, I don't know. I think Kalen Balazs was okay. He's worth a waiver pickup. He's not the waiver pickup. So we have Duke Johnson might be worth more of a waiver pickup is David Johnson left with a concussion. David Montgomery also left with an injury.

Kyle Allen's going to be out for a while. And that could be, you know, sorry, from a fantasy standpoint, though, good news for JD McKissick because Alex Smith will not throw the ball more than five yards downfield. It could be good news for Antonio Gibson, too.

Not true. He threw it like 20 yards downfield to Terry McLaurin. Right. And then McLaurin somehow escaped three Giants defenders and raced for a touchdown. Yes. Nice defense you got there, Adam. Actually, Dave, it's really not that bad. I know, I know. But on that play, they were miserable. But let that was defense. You got there at him. Actually Dave, it's really not that

bad. I know I know but on that play they were miserable, but let's accept it. I mean, it's not a good matchup for running backs anymore. What is it now six or seven games in a row? No running back is a 15 yard carry both the running backs in this game score like 15 fantasy points. Well Gibson had 27 yards in a touchdown. No, it's a

great, you know, it's a great matchup in terms of receiving yards, but they have a good run defense. I think I've been proven right on that. Okay. Preston Williams left in the second quarter with a foot injury. Sounds like it's a foot sprain. Could be extensive.

Matthew Stafford evaluated for a concussion, and Mike Williams left on the second-to-last play. He nearly caught a game-winning touchdown. He left on the second-to-last play of the game caught a game-winning touchdown. He left on the second-to-last play of the game. He's at Miami next week. Hopefully, he can get back. Noah Fant hurt his ankle early, but he returned. I don't know how hobbled he was.

He did not have a great game in the great matchup against Atlanta. About 10 players in the Giants-Washington game had a chance to recover a fumble until one finally did. That was cue the Benny Hill music, basically. Evan Ingram had two drops. One of them was almost an interception. Phillip Rivers fell down. It was sad. Oh, LaVista Chanel.

It was one of the highlights of the day. It was joyous. You watch it over and over and over, and it's just so much fun. Phillip Rivers falling down and trying to tackle someone it's just it's so much fun so i'm ever sad about it falling down and trying to tackle someone yeah it was no good yeah i mean it's not like he's 75 years old and he couldn't get back up he stumbled around and fell down and looked silly it was fun keith it's how i would picture adam trying to make a tackle of adam were put into an nfl game

okay so i'm just gonna we gotta move on but I just want to say this and get your thoughts. I think after watching a lot of that game, the Ravens-Colts, I think Phillip Rivers is the worst starting quarterback in football who is not an injury replacement for a different starting quarterback. So, you know, not a Jaguars. He began the year as the starter for their team.

Not Garrett Gilbert or whatever. He is the worst starting quarterback in football. So do you think you know more than NFL coaches collectively? Yeah, maybe. So I just like if Dave, if we did a poll of all NFL head coaches and said you for this year only, not for the future, but for this year only, you have to start

either Phillip Rivers or Daniel Jones, rest of year. Who do you think is winning that poll amongst NFL head coaches? I can tell you who will win it amongst NFL GMs. I truly, honest to God, believe that it's Daniel Jones. I don't think Phillip Rivers can make the passes that quarterbacks need to make. He was so bad today, it was hard to watch. But he was coming off two very good games.

Two statistically very good games, sure. He was facing the Ravens today. He's had as bad of a season as you know he's had. I think the entire Colts team was terrible today. It's not a defense of Daniel Jones. I don't know why you even had to bring him in this. Because he's the worst quarterback in the NFL. It's not an injury backup.

He might be. I think he's better than the Washington guys. That might be the worst. But Rivers is right up there. Okay, let's move on to Believe It or Not, brought to you by Heath Cummings. By the way, Heath, you have to separate your feelings about Daniel Jones

from your feelings about me because you want him to be that bad, but it clouds your judgment. So don't take it out on Daniel Jones. The your judgment. So don't take it out on Daniel Jones. The nice thing is my judgment of Daniel Jones is irrelevant because he's not

someone that people need to worry about for fantasy purposes. So I could be 100% wrong about him and it won't affect anyone. I guess that's true. Alright, believe it or not, Mark Andrews is no longer a must start tight end. Three catches for 22 yards on five targets. And that is, in his last three games,

21, 32, and 22 yards. Believe it or not, Mark Andrews is no longer a must-start tight end. I think you have to believe this. Like, Marquise Brown was the one that got upset after their most recent game, but Andrews just as easily could. He has not reached 60 yards receiving in a game yet this season. Six of his eight games, he has three or fewer catches.

Now, this does not mean you have to sit Mark Andrews. Of the tight end or bust tight ends, he's the top dog. But if someone emerges as a top 10 tight end that we're excited about, I'm not going to hesitate to say, like I've been basically in the projections, just Mark Andrews comes out as tight end 10 or tight end 12, and I bump him up to tight end six because he was good last year. I'm not going to do that anymore. So Irv Smith had

two touchdowns today. It was his only two catches of the game. Who do you like better? No, definitely Andrews. Irv Smith didn't just emerge. He had a two touchdown game when he only caught two passes. That was a flugie lucky game in my opinion. Sure, but

we'd kill for something like that from Mark Andrews. But I think I really think I'd probably rather have Hayden Hurst. In the NPR league, well, sure. In the NPR league, it makes sense. Well, the fans think fans are really not doing that much. That's the problem.

Well, he missed a good portion of this game today. Well, he did, but even coming into this week. Since the first two weeks of the year, he hasn't done that much. That's the problem. Well, he missed a good portion of this game. You know what Fant's doing? Well, he did, but even coming into this week. The year he hasn't done that much. He's barely been used downfield. I spent some time watching him, and then I wrote him up for the story that I write late in the week on SeabirdSports.com. He's a lot like how Evan Ingram was used earlier this year.

A lot of short area throws. And Drew Locke likes looking deep. Now, he'd have a couple of deep routes and occasionally would get a target. But I just... You saw Okunabunam getting more end zone targets than Fant.

I don't like this game. He was hurt, and so I wouldn't make too much of it. That's fine. But even coming into this game, he wasn't exactly doing great things. And now neither is Mark Andrews, and this is a problem. And so coming into this week, this was the Joe Boo week for Johnnie Smith, just bringing in another tight end

that fantasy managers were upset about. And he came through for a touchdown. And now fantasy managers aren't going to be upset about Johnnie for another week or two. I don't know about that. He had two targets. Fantasy managers are smarter than that. Johnnie Smith had two targets in this game.

They feel like they got lucky. Okay, fine. But they might not feel... The problem is that, okay, you don't want to call Mark Andrews a must-start anymore. I agree. I believe it. But what do you do about it? Who are you going to find off the waiver wire that's definitely going to be better than Mark Andrews? The answer is no one. Unless you find somebody and you start

him and you strike gold with him the same way that people who started John New Smith for the fourth week in a row when he didn't do anything for you in the first three weeks struck gold today because he had two catches and a touchdown. I'll tell you who you find. I got lucky and I started Irv Smith in the Kings Classic, one of the Kings Classic

leagues I'm in. 15 points for me today. Total lucky move. I didn't I needed one of my Kings Classic leagues I'm in, 15 points for me today. Total lucky move. I needed my third flex to be somebody, and Irv Smith was on my bench. So I said, okay, I'll start him. So are you saying Mark Andrews is a must-start tight end? I think he's a must-start tight end if you don't have anybody better and you drafted him to be good.

And I don't think it's anything that he's necessarily doing. It all comes back. We have problems with Brown. We have problems with everybody else in Baltimore. Lamar Jackson completed 19 of 23 passes. No one on the Ravens had even 50 yards. So he's spreading it around and he's not attacking downfield.

And Mark Andrews used to be the guy that would hog a lot of those targets and now he's not. Not a must start tight end. I don't know what you do to fix that. I thought you disagreed with us for five minutes there, and now I agree. I said all along that I believe that he wasn't a must-start tight end. Okay.

I'm going to tell you something here about the tight end. First of all, the guy I'd be looking to pick up is Austin Hooper. I'm not saying you drop Mark Andrews, but he's 40% rostered, and he's coming on, and now Beckham's out. So anyway, there were only two tight ends that were started in 90% of leagues or more. I think there were only two tight ends that were started in more than 80% of leagues. And they were Kelsey and Waller.

You could make an argument that those are the only two must-start tight ends in fantasy. And I think what you're seeing is a lot of fantasy managers have two tight ends and they try to play the matchups. You don't really worry about matchups with Mark Andrews. It's not like he can't beat a bad matchup, but maybe you try to guess the amount of pass attempts. I don't know. It seems like there are two must-start

tight ends and then we can be debating the rest of them for the rest of the season. All right, let's pick it up here. Cole Beasley is droppable, believe it or not. Yeah, and this kind of sucks in with one of Dave's winners because the full one for the article is John Brown is back and Cole Beasley is droppable, believe it or not. Yeah, and this kind of sucks in with what they want to Dave's winners because the full one for the article is John Brown is back and Cole Beasley is droppable and Brown

looked like himself today and Beasley got three targets and he is only top 60 yards once in the six games that John Brown has played. He's a desperation flex. You're hoping he scores a touchdown, but this is the Stefan Diggs and John Brown show. Yeah, usually when there's a game like this and hoping he scores a touchdown but this is the stefan digs and john brown show yeah usually when when there's a game like this and josh allen has a bunch of yards and it's a bunch of points cole beasley's involved so if you had told me that josh allen's going to

attempt 38 passes and have over 400 yards i would have been psyched to start cole beasley i had him ranked as a top 24 receiver in ppr and john John Brown, the only thing I disagree with you, Heath, is that there was that one big play that set up a touchdown for the Bills where it looked like John Brown was laboring a little bit when he was running. But you can't argue with 11 targets and 8 catches, and it's another game. We haven't seen this in like a month, but another

game where John Brown helped Josh Allen have just a monster stat line. Yep. And it was Seattle. Let's keep that in mind. All right. So you guys believe it? Cole Beasley's droppable? Yep. Easily a nine and a monster stat line. Yep. And it was Seattle. Let's keep that in mind. All right. So you guys believe it. Cole Beasley's droppable. Yep. Easily a nine and a half PPR, a little bit harder in full PPR,

but there's always receivers on the waiver wire. I just don't even know when digs and Brown are healthy. If he's better in full PPR, I think you're just hoping for a touchdown. I don't think I'll get enough targets to catch a lot of passes. Could be true. They got Arizona on the road next week. And then a bye.

DJ Chark is a top 25 wide receiver again, believe it or not. DJ Chark, top 25 again. I don't quite believe it, and I think most people will. So I guess what I'm saying is this could be a sell-high situation. It could also be that this was the beginning of something great with DJ Chark and Jake Luton. I just think if he's a boom or bust number three wide receiver, this type of game is not out of character at all.

And we've seen him have three or four of these types of games over the last season and a half. And then we also see him go through stretches where he has 40 yards for a couple weeks. What we need to see, and there was a problem with Gardner Minshew and DJ Chark. I don't know exactly what it was. Minshew's numbers were much better when throwing to Keelan Cole and Lubiska Chenault over the last

month, and Chark was very frustrated and openly critical of Gardner Minshew. So this in itself could be better. But I don't think this one game from Jake Luton or this one game from DJ Chark really tell us very much so far. Other than what we already knew, DJ Chark has big time upside and probably still doesn't have very much floor, but we'll see.

What I remember seeing with Jake Luton when he was playing at Oregon State was that he had a preference for taller receivers. Isaiah Hodgkins was his guy there. And it's funny, he wore number 17, just like Chark does. And he's just a tall, big dude. And Chark isn't necessarily buff, but he's tall. And he's fast. And Luton just came out popping with the 73-yard touchdown that accounted for half of Chark's yards.

He had 12 targets. I don't think it's too far off to say that he could be a top 25 receiver rest of season. Okay. Yeah. That's why it wasn't a hard sell from Heath. I have to break in with some breaking news, Adam. The Tampa Bay

Buccaneers recorded a first down. Oh, good. All right. Justin Jefferson is a problem for Adam Thielen. Justin Jefferson is a problem for Adam Thielen, believe it or not. The truth is that Mike Zimmer is a problem for Adam Thielen, but we knew that coming into the year. We thought that Thielen would overcome it

because he'd get a 30% target share because Stephon Diggs wasn't there. Stephon Diggs is kind of there. And this was the fourth straight game for Thielen with five targets or fewer since Jefferson emerged in week three. Thielen is averaging seven targets per game. Jefferson's right behind him at 6.3. I think there will probably be a couple more games where he gets double digit targets. But despite the fact that the Vikings defense is not as good as they had hoped it would be or as good as it has been they are still doing everything they can to throw the ball

as little as possible and that means that theelin's probably getting seven or eight targets that makes him a 50 to 60 yard per game guy which makes him a number two wide receiver. I am taking a call back here to before the season when I compared how Thielen did when the Minnesota run game was on fire versus when they weren't doing well. And there were only five games where he had 15 or more points out of 20 where a Minnesota running back also had 15 plus in PPR.

But when the Minnesota running back, and remember it was Dalvin Cook and before that it was Latavius Murray, whenever a Minnesota running back did not have 15 PPR points, he had 15 PPR points himself in 8 of 12 games. So I'm just thinking that if Minnesota is able to just crush opponents by running it with Dalvin Cook, it's not going to leave a lot for the receivers. It's just not a prolific enough offense where Thielen gets his, Jefferson gets his, and Dalvin Cook goes bananas.

Okay, so that's believing it. You guys believe it? Justin Jefferson is a problem for Adam Thielen? No, Dalvin Cook is the problem. There's an Adam Thielen problem. So let's do some rest of seasons then. First of all, Adam Thielen or Justin Jefferson? I'm going to still say Thielen.

I am too, but I think it's very, very close. Adam Thielen or Juju Smith-Schuster? Let's do it, Juju. Yep. Really? Boy, wow. What a reversal from two weeks ago, huh? Adam Thielen or Chase Claypool?

Thielen. Yeah, I'm going to say Thielen too. Okay. You know what I was thinking about when you said that was Jefferson or Claypool. But Claypool just had a game with a ton of targets again. He doesn't get that every time. I think we need to do a segment on Wednesday ranking the rookies at running back

and wide receiver rest of season. We could do a rookie draft. It's fascinating and difficult. Who's the top rookie running back? Probably James Robinson. Clyde. Jeez, what's with you, Clyde? Get the ball. Clyde. Jeez, what's with you, Clyde? Get the ball, Clyde.

He must have... Kent Schrager, can you get the snap counts for the Chiefs, guys? We've got it. Clyde Edwards-Ziller was on the field at the goal line. He was... I bet he out-snapped Bell by a big signal. I think 25 snaps for CEH.

That's it? CEH had 25 snaps. Le'Veon had 19. Darryl had 18. And I believe there were several plays where two or more of them were on the field at the same time. 25? That's it? Daryl Williams had 18 snaps. It was a competitive game.

Williams played 13 out of 14 third downs. That's so gross. Well, they didn't have the ball much in that game, but still, that is not good, and that is disappointing. Let's look at the top five in each position. Believe it or not, is Le'Veon Bell droppable? Yes.

I would like to hold him. I'd rather hold him than Cole Beasley. You absolutely positively cannot start him. The only way you would start him is if something happens to Edwards-Elair. Yeah, he's a handcuff. He's a black hole on your bench. To the top five, to the leaderboard here,

at each position, Kyler Murray is number one. How do you not go for it on fourth and one instead of kicking a 49-yard field goal, I think? What a terrible decision by Cliff Kingsbury. Yeah, I don't know if Cliff is such a great coach when you consider some things, including that. Josh Allen, number two at 41 fantasy points,

my homes 38. This is six point per passing touchdown leagues, Aaron Rogers, 36. And then how about these two drew lock and Teddy Bridgewater just in front of Ben Roethlisberger. If you take out Aaron Rogers, you're looking at Murray, Allen, Mahomes,

and then a big gap. How many did Drew Locke have? 32 fantasy points. 48 passes. Three total touchdowns. He ran for 47 yards. If Breeze passes them by halftime or by the time we finish this podcast.

I guess something's going on in that game. Okay. So, yeah. Well, anyway, let's talk about Josh Allen. Was it because he played the Seahawks? What are we supposed to make of this? He's coming off four games in a row with less than 20 fantasy points, and he goes for 41 fantasy points against the Seahawks.

If you're asking me, I think he finally figured out how to beat deep cover defenses because he'd seen a lot of defenses playing not just cover two but cover three cover six kind of daring them to run the football and last week that's what they did and this week pd p carol even said it we were surprised at how much they threw and it was a lot of throws to the sideline and in the middle of the field there weren't a lot of deep shots per se, but at the same time, they did have a cover three beater on the first touchdown to Isaiah McKenzie,

which was pretty sweet. And Alan just, he was under pressure a little bit too in the game. There was a lot of everything, but the one thing that he wasn't was inaccurate. So what do you think? I mean, are you buying in? I just got to, let's get that.

Are you buying in or was it just the Seahawks? I think we could say it was just the Seahawks? I think we could say it was just the Seahawks. But it was still encouraging. He's a top six quarterback. What do you guys think about Drew Locke and Teddy Bridgewater? That I would say that Drew Locke was mostly, I think Teddy Bridgewater is a low-end starter. And having McCaffrey back and the emergence of Curtis Samuel

only makes things better for him. I think Locke was mostly just the Falcons. Yeah, and Bridgewater did end up... He played terrible for the first... It was almost a repeat of last week with Locke, where he was terrible for the first half. And then once he finally started to get going late, almost when it was too late, he was on fire.

So he's great against prevent defense, which is super. Bridgewater ended up throwing 49 times, which certainly helps. All right, let's look at the top running backs here as I get this list up. Let me see if I can think before it populates. Oh, that's pretty quick. Dalvin Cook is probably going to be on the list. I was going to say 206

rushing yards, 46 receiving yards and two touchdowns on the day. McCaffrey is two. James Robinson, we should talk about him. 25 carries, 99 yards, and a touchdown. Kalen Balazs is RB4. It really was not a great day for running backs. How about Dalvin Cook scored 10 fewer fantasy points this week than last week?

Holy cow. But how about in a non-PPR league, there are two running backs currently going into Sunday Night Football that scored more than 15 fantasy points and that it would probably extend to PPR more than 15 or 16 fantasy points. I mean, that's weird. And it's Cook and McCaffrey,

Robinson, Kalen Balazs, Devante Booker, Jarek McKinnon, Wayne Gallman, Josh Jacobs, Todd Gurley. I mean, these guys are all around 50, 60, 50 to 70 yards or so in a touchdown. Not a ton in the passing game. It's something I was thinking about. This highlights something I was thinking about the other day.

As far as the running backs go, it was a great year for zero RB. It's just too bad all the elite wide receivers got hurt and not all of them did and some of them are like now i think if you have davante adams and tyree kill you're feeling pretty good about it but it just seems like this at most weeks we've got a couple of the elite running backs that are just absolutely incredible and then we've got two or three guys that either weren't drafted or weren't even being started two weeks ago that have a gigantic game.

Weren't even being started two weeks ago. People forgot about Kalen Balazs and Devante Booker. I guarantee you there were people who see Kalen Balazs' stat line and they go, he's still in the league? No. He's on the Chargers? In fairness to Kalen Balazs, he has been memed all season

long because Adam Gase tried to trade for him. Yeah. Well, let me ask you about James Robinson because, yeah, it was a really encouraging day. 25 carries, 99 yards, and a touchdown. On the other hand, he was very involved in the passing game with Gardner

Minshew. He had two targets. He did not catch either of them, and Chris Thompson actually kind of got back in the mix. So does that make you a little concerned at all? A little bit. Let's see if that continues. How do you take him off the field if you're trailing big in Jacksonville? If Jake Luton starts the rest of the games,

then I think you'll see fewer targets go to the running backs in the short area targets than you did when Gardner Minshew was the quarterback. So yeah, that'd be a slight downgrade for him. Who's the running back. Who's the waiver wire running back that has the audacity to outperform Clyde Edwards, Z layer.

That would be... Goal, man! Okay, wide receivers. Wide receivers. Oh, my God. Yeah, we have people come up with some funny lines for the superhero goal, man. Who's the guy that asks your if... asks your wife if she's

pregnant? Oh, gall man! Okay. Anyway, wide receivers. I swear to God the podcast is going to be better. Please don't turn it off. Thank you. Richie James is number one right now. Devontae Adams is number two. So that was Thursday night. And Tyreek

Hill, DJ Chark, Christian Kirk. He's a winner, big time. Jerry Judy and Curtis Samuel. Look at those three. All right. So Tyreek Hill, DJ Chark. We already talked about Chark. Great to see the targets for Tyreek Hill, by the way.

He had 18 of them. But Christian Kirk, 123 yards and a touchdown. Jerry Judy, 125 yards and a touchdown. Curtis Samuel, 105 yards and a touchdown. How would you rank those three rest of season? Kirk, Judy, 125 yards and a touchdown. Curtis Samuel, 105 yards and a touchdown. How would you rank those three rest of season, Kirk, Judy, and Samuel? You just did. Yeah, I think so.

I've been skeptical of Kirk because the targets really hadn't been there before this week, but he was one of my winners. I think there's more upside for Judy rest of season than Kirk. I'd probably go Judy, Kirk, very, very close to each other, and then Samuel a little bit behind them. Okay. That'll kind of cut it for wide receiver.

I guess we're going to have some waiver wiring there between Judy and Samuel in particular. Terry McLaurin was next up on the list, by the way. And DK Metcalf with another game with at least 90 yards. It's all but one game this year. Tight ends, your top tight ends this week. Travis Kelsey was ridiculous this week. 10 catches, 159 yards on 12 targets. Irv Smith, two catches, 10 yards and two touchdowns on four targets. But keep in mind, again, very low pass volume in this game. Jimmy Graham, six catches for 55 yards and a touchdown against Tennessee.

Evan Ingram, I think he has nine or 10 targets in three straight games. And this time he had five catches, 48 yards and a touchdown. And then you had Hawkinson behind him and Jonu Smith and Darren Waller. Eric Ebron made a great play too. Heath, what stands out?

Kelsey, Irv Smith, Graham, Ingram, Hawkinson, Johnnie? Yeah. We talked about the Johnnie thing. It was he and Irv Smith. If you started them, that's fantastic, and you should be celebrating and feel good about it because that's what it's all about when you're streaming the touchdown or bus tied in

when they hit the touchdown. But I don't think they're going to be must-start guys. It's getting harder and harder to do anything but start Jimmy Graham. Nine out of the top 10 tight ends as of this recording scored a touchdown. Two of the 10 had over 50 yards

receiving. Wow. And it's kind of hard to not start Evan Ingram. Sure, but it's different in PPR because at least with Ingram, there's volume. With Hayden Hurst, there's volume. Those guys, we've seen it enough where they're getting four plus catches a game.

And so they get those catches and they get some decent yardage and you can feel confident starting them. I think you can throw Hawkinson on that list so long as Gallaudet is out. You guys have some winners and losers. I want to go back and just give because he wasn't on the top five, but

you didn't say his name, but you had said there were two must start tight end. I guess. Okay, go ahead. Are you talking about Hawkinson's must start Hawkinson? Yeah. Yeah, you're right. He was not started in more than 80% of leagues, but I don't see how anyone sits TJ Hawkinson at Yeah. Yeah, you're right. He was not started in more than 80% of leagues, but I don't see how anyone sits

TJ Hawkinson at this point. The targets are up without Kenny Galladay there. Is this an opportunity to sell TJ Hawkinson? I think so. I just think Marvin Jones may be done. I'm not sure that TJ Hawkinson just think Marvin Jones may be done. And so

I'm not sure that TJ Hawkinson is the one that's going to lose when Gallaudet comes back. Let's take a quick break here. When we come back, winners and losers. We've talked about a lot of the winners. John Brown, DJ Chark, Christian Kirk. But the losers, well, Marvin Jones, Corey Davis was a dud.

Jonathan Taylor fumbled. He had five carries when he fumbled. He had one carry the rest of the game. Hunter Henry, 33 yards on seven targets. We will talk about winners and losers when we come back on Fantasy Football today. Kick off an exciting football season with BetMGM, an official sportsbook partner of the National Football League. Yard after yard, down after down,

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Time for winners and losers from Dave and Heath. Dave's, we can pretty much skip the winners. Dave's winners are John Brown and DJ Chark. But I'll ask you this, Dave. John Brown, 65% rostered. How would you compare him to Christian Kirk, Curtis Samuel, Jerry Judy? I would put him behind Kirk and Judy in PPR. Non-PPR, I'd probably rather have Judy just to speculate on him.

Kirk's ahead of them all. Okay. And then, Heath, your winners, Christian Kirk and Chase Claypool. Anything to add there? Just that Claypool, it went through a couple of weeks there where it looked like he needed Deontay Johnson to be out. He actually led the Steelers with 13 targets in this game. I'm not as concerned about

Chase Claypool. Johnson made a nice play after the catch in this game, but it still looks like Claypool is going to be the more efficient option. He catches for 69 yards. Are you worried about that? He also had two bad drops in this game. They didn't connect on the downfield

targets, but he also saw more downfield targets. So I still think he's going to be used in that role more than the other guys are. That was a strange game. The fact that it came down to that. I was unaware of this whole Steelers are bad

every year when they're huge road favorites against a crappy team. But I guess this is like a big Mike Tomlin thing. Just have these letdown games. The losers. Marvin Jones and Corey Davis for Heath. So Marvin Jones, 86% roster. The thing is, he's scoring.

When Kenny Galladay is not there, he scores a lot. So, you know, can we really drop him? What do you do? 86% roster. Yeah, I mean, you can hold on to him if you want to. But I don't think he's the same guy that he was. And you've kind of been bailed out whenever you have used him with the touchdowns. I don't know that we're going to get a big yardage

game. What would you do? Would you drop him for Duke Johnson? I would drop him for Jerry Judy. You were talking about him on the waiver wire. What about for Tim Patrick, who had nine targets and caught a touchdown? I would rather have Tim Patrick than Marvin Jones.

Okay. Corey Davis, three targets, no catches. His previous two games, he had 10 targets in each of them. Was this just a matchup thing against the Bears

or what for Corey Davis? I don't know for sure, but it was discouraging and it's going to make you have to trust him next week. Would it have been a Tannehill thing thing because Tannehill was really not good. This was an old school. He was 10 of 21 passing.

Yeah, this was an old school Titans. Tannehill Titans gave it. This is a throwback to last year, right? I mean, 21 passes. Now, the touchdown to A.J. Brown was unbelievable. And I'm thrilled that John, who got involved on OneDrive, thanks for that. But getting three targets,

not what we were expecting from Corey Davis. But that's also kind of a reminder of what Corey Davis was in 2019. Yeah, I guess so. We would say, okay, let's give him a shot. He had a couple of good games, and then... It was terrible. I see the time of possession in that game. Yeah, Tennessee had the ball for 26 minutes and 6 seconds.

Chicago, almost 34 minutes. Nick Foles... 34 excruciating minutes. I'll bet. Nick Foles threw 52 passes. He throws... Look at... These are his pass attempts in six starts.

42, 42, 39, 40, 41, 52. And he came through with 25 fantasy points today. So that's Nick Foles. Congratulations if you started Nick Foles. Pete did in a DFS tournament. I started him in 2QB League. I want to tell you guys, by the way, we had an episode of Fantasy Football Today in 5

with Jacob Gibbs. You heard his stats last week. If you didn't hear what he said, one of his stats was Kirk Cousins against man defense. Heins against man defense. He shreds man defense. And the Lions play, I believe it was the second most man

coverage in the NFL behind the Patriots, Matt Patricia. And Cousins, did he have a massive game? He barely threw the ball. I think he had like 25 points on 20 pass attempts. So it was a really cool nugget. Would have really helped you in DFS. And we're going to have a bonus.

It's a Saturday episode every week. We're going to have with Jacob Gibbs, where he's going to give you some stats. One of them didn't really pan out. Chase Edmonds, he expected a huge game from Edmonds. You didn't really get that. The other one was about Derek Carr, who just didn't really throw enough.

But I thought it was really interesting and something to keep an eye on for Kirk Cousins going forward. What type of coverage does he face? Sorry for the detour there. The other losers were for Dave, Jonathan Taylor, and Hunter Henry. Oh boy, Dave. Jonathan Taylor. Let's start with him.

He looked great on his first run. And he got gifted a goal line carry. And otherwise, he was really, really, really a lot like he was last week. You just talked about a third of his touches. He fumbled and he got benched. The fumble is really what did him in, obviously.

What do you think going forward? Is Jordan Wilkins the starting running back there? My guess is that the Colts will come around and they'll give Jonathan Taylor half of the rushing workload and Wilkins will get the other half until Taylor can prove that he can hold on to the football. And that was an issue

with him coming out of Wisconsin. And he can be effective. He's still... The first carry of the game was an edge run. Okay, it looked like he was wired in, knew where to run, knew how the play was supposed to go. It might have been the only play other than the goal line dive that uh he he seemed to know where he was going and what he

was doing and holding onto the football or not it was frustrating he's he's not what we thought he was okay would you rather have deandre swift or jonathan taylor. I don't know why I sounded like Scooby-Doo saying that. Or Shaggy. Any character. I did a little Shaggy for you there. Thanks. It wasn't me. So, yeah. I was a different Shaggy. That was another joke.

Sometimes there are three people who get my jokes each week. I got that one. That was a good one. Thank you. Hunter Henry. He's 93%. That was a good one. Thank you. Hunter Henry. Now he's 93% rostered, 71% started. His yards in

his last five games, 39, 23, 23, 33, 33 for Hunter Henry. He's going to get you six or seven PPR points. Great. Do we drop him for Austin Hooper or Dallas Goddard

or do we want to see what's going on with Mike Williams? Would that have a big impact? What do you think, Dave? Well, in the one game that Mike Williams didn't play this season,

he had four targets, two catches, and 39 yards without a touchdown. And, I mean, Justin Herbert's been starting the majority of these games and Hunter Henry has not been doing a lot with it. And, I mean, Justin Herbert's been starting the majority of these games, and Hunter Henry has not been doing a lot

with it. Remember, there are two big appeals with Justin Herbert. Number one, he is throwing to Keenan Allen like crazy. And number two, he will take about four or five deep shots a game. Yeah, it's fun. It's fun because he's connecting on them.

And they're not going to Hunter Henry. They're going to other guys who you're not starting on your fans. So what do you think? You dropping him for Hooper or Goddard? Yes, I'm dropping him for Hooper or Goddard. And I'd rather drop him than Mark Andrews. Can I give you a fun fact that I just discovered? Yeah.

Each of the past three weeks. Well, let's see. There was a bye week in there. so it's not exactly three weeks. Each of their past three games, Hunter Henry has more catches, more yards, and more fantasy points than Mark Andrews. And in those three games, he has 23, 33, and 33 yards. Wow. And yet, Heath, if you had to pick one,

are you going to stand by Henry because he's been better pick one are you going to stand by henry because he's been better or are you going to still say andrews um i don't like i'm not saying for sure that i'm going to rank andrews higher next week if i had andrews and henry it's it it's going to be they're going to be ranked in a very similar position um it's like i don't disagree with the fact that it's been really discouraging for hunter henry but like i could pretty easily spin it that hunter henry has at least seven targets in six of eight games and mark andrews has seven targets in two games henry at miami next week and uh the Ravens are taking on the Patriots at Foxborough.

I'm probably going to have Henry projected higher than Mark Andrews next week. The Patriots don't scare me. I mean, like I said, they are giving up the most passing yards per attempt in the NFL. That's that is an unbelievable number. I want to talk before we attempt in the NFL. That is an unbelievable number. I want to talk, before we get into the games,

I just want to make sure we don't miss anyone. How about the mega duds? Well, look, I don't want to go another 20 minutes before we talk about Clyde Edwards-Ziller, for example. Okay? Clyde Edwards-Ziller was terrible. DJ Moore was terrible. I think it's time to drop Darius Slayton.

He's going to get Darius Slay next week and then he's going to buy. I just... He's invisible. But are there any players that really stunk up the joint that are concerning to you? DJ Moore is super, super concerning. And I don't know...

The thing was, it was really weird two weeks ago and it was a bad weather game and Teddy didn't have a good game. He just basically didn't throw to DJ Moore until the last drive. And then DJ Moore looked like a superstar on two or three plays. And then the game was over. And I kind of thought, well, that was weird, but that won't happen again. And it was even worse this week. They didn't even get the superstar time at the end of the game. Curtis Samuel looked legitimately good.

And Robbie Anderson remains the number one wide receiver. And now McCaffrey is going to probably get more targets than Mike Davis did. And they're still throwing to Mike Davis five times. So, yeah, I'm a little worried about DJ Moore. They're making use of everybody they have, which is a staple of what Joe Brady does. But in fairness,

they're not because they're not making use of DJ Moore. Well, they did before this week. What about Clyde Ebertsy there? There were several weeks to begin the year where they didn't do boo with Curtis Samuel. What about Clyde Ebertsy there, guys? Where are you on him?

I mean, we got bailed out by the touchdown catch today. It was nice to see him at the goal line. I think you look at him as a number two running back, but eight touches isn't going to cut it. No, and it's eight or nine touches. Has he even had...

Has he had 12 touches since Le'Veon's coming down? No, I just said eight or nine touches, three straight games. I didn't hear that. I'm sorry. Yeah, no, eight or nine. It's crazy. Three straight games. I want to say it's going to turn around eventually, but

Chiefs have Mahomes. Reid loves letting him throw. They needed him today. They've got to bring back some balance to their offense. I mean, it was pretty ridiculous. They had nine handoffs to their running backs, one to Tyreek Hill, and then Mahomes took off twice. Those might have been kneel downs, or one of them might have been a kneel down.

I'm not sure. But Mahomes threw it 45 times. I don't blame Andy Reid for it at all but someone's got to tap him on the shoulder and say, hey, big guy, we got to try and run the ball a little bit more. I have this theory, this joking theory. I won't tell anyone except for all of you.

Andy Reid is sick of all this Russell Wilson hype and he's like, hey, my guy's going to win MVP, like it or not. And he's just letting it fly I think it could also be um like this goes back to when my youngest son started to learn football through Madden and he just couldn't understand why people run the ball and you look at the Chiefs and they get eight yards per play when they pass the ball and four yards per play

when they run the ball. So why would we run the ball? It's a good question. I just saw that score, the halftime score of the Bucs Saints game. Wow. 31 to nothing. Just like we all predicted.

Maybe not even that close. All right, so let's get into the games then. Houston 27 and Jacksonville 25. All right, so we already used the DJ Chark, believe it or not. So let's talk about Duke Johnson. 16 carries, 41 yards and a touchdown. Four catches, 32 yards. David Johnson only had two touches in this game

and he left with a concussion. They are at Cleveland, then New England, then at Detroit. If we know, we won't know, but if we did know on Tuesday that David Johnson was going to miss Week 10, is Duke Johnson a break-the-bank kind of guy?

I think he'll be viewed as such. I don't only like the matchup against Detroit as a, well, Duke Johnson could be really good here, but it's any running back. That's going to get you 15 touches that you can get off the waiver.

Wire is going to be appealing. Would I break the bank form? If I needed a running back, I think I would, I'd rather break it for him than Kalen. Go ahead, Heath. If you told me David Johnson was out, Duke Johnson would be a top 15 running back

next week. Okay. Is there any doubt you just start Willer and Brooks? Willer and Brooks. Willer and Brooks. There you go. We start them every week, right?

Okay. For the Jacksonville Jaguars, Chris Conley. Seven catches, 52 yards on eight targets. Quick thoughts. Another big receiver that Jake Lewton's trying to. I think LaVisca got hurt early in this game. Yes. But Keelan Cole didn't, and he had one catch.

Disappeared. Keelan Cole had one catch on two targets. And another big guy, Tyler Eifert. Four catches, 48 yards. And another one, Colin Johnson had a couple of targets. Okay, Atlanta 34 and Denver 27. A little bit of a lopsided time of possession here. Atlanta had the ball for 33 minutes, 27 seconds.

Denver for 26 and a 33 minutes, 27 seconds. Denver for 26 and a half minutes, basically. Big games from Drew Locke and Matt Ryan. You got to believe it or not for this one, Heath? Believe it or not, Drew Locke is a borderline startable fantasy quarterback. At Las Vegas, that's

not a bad matchup next week. Nope. No, it's not. He's finding a way to put up those numbers. That's not a bad matchup next week. No, it's not. And he's finding a way to put up those numbers. It's ugly early, but he gets it done by the end of the game. Yeah, it's too scary for me, but I'm not going to believe it, I guess. But here's the encouraging thing. Pass attempts last three games, 40, 41, 48. Passing yards last three games, 254, 248, which is solid. And 313 today.

But I don't know, Heath. I'm going to say no. What about you? Yeah, I don't. I believe it when he's playing the Falcons. Yeah. What about the Raiders? I think the Raiders are considerably better defensively than the Falcons.

Oh, by the way, remember my little rant about RBBC? Forget it with these two. With Lindsey and Gordon. How can you trust them? Dude, Atlanta's run defense has gotten better over now it's four games. Oh, it is. We've been saying that. That's true. But still, I mean,

they're not going to get... They don't catch the ball that much. Sometimes, Gordon. Almost never, Lindsey. They're not going to get... They don't catch the ball that much. Sometimes, Gordon. Almost never, Lindsey. They're not going to get more than 12 carries, it seems. The thing is, Adam, you're not going to have that luxury. Oh, no. I had to start over. Yeah.

We're going to have to start running backs every single week that might get six carries. I hope not. No, not the winning team. And one of them is named Clyde Abert-Jolair. You know who my favorite one is? We're going to start him over these guys every week. And Jonathan Taylor, who I think had six today.

You know, the running back who might get six carries that I like is JD McKissick, dude. This is what? Four out of five games with at least 40 receiving yards? Yeah. He kept that roll through the bye week. That's good. And he crushed it in snaps.

McKissick played 45 snaps. Barber only had, or Gibson rather, had 25. Peyton Barber played one snap. What was that? Wrestling fans will know. Okay. Minnesota 34, Detroit 20. What do we got? I already did a Believe It or Not for this game.

Oh, which one was it? Damn! It was the one with the Vikings players. Oh, sure, Sure. Okay. Believe it or not for the Lions. Okay. Believe it or not. DeAndre Swift is going to be

a league winner next the last eight weeks of the year. Oh, too strong. Don't believe it. I don't think startable wants to have a league runner. But at least here's a running back that got 16 touches. And it's a Lions running back at that.

Like, I almost want to send a pack of pencils and maybe some moving boxes to Matt Patricia to celebrate this. A pack of pencils. That's good. All right, I think that's it. He's going to need the moving boxes. Heath, what do you think? You want to revisit Dalvin Cook

versus Derrick Henry? In non-PPR? Yeah, sure. In any form. I'd still take Derrick Henry. Yeah, for sure. I'll take Dalvin Cook. Wait.

Let me ask. Do I get credit for the last two weeks points with Dalvin Cook or just what he does moving forward? Just going forward. Okay. Yeah, I'll still take Derrick Henry. I thought you were taking Henry over

Cook in any format last week. Am I wrong? I think I took him over in half PPR for sure. Henry? Then this should really be a half PPR discussion. For sure, yeah. Delvin Cook is... Chicago, Dallas, Carolina, Jacksonville.

Next four games. I know. Well, yeah, Chicago's not great, but... No, but those next three after. Who cares? And then Tampa Bay, Chicago, and the Saints in week 16. He's insane. All right, moving on. Giants 23, Washington 20.

Yeah. I know. It was that riveting of a game. Well, yeah. Believe it or not, no one cares it was 20 to 3 giants at one point and wft got back into it you know what just with alex congratulations alex smith on throwing a touchdown pass that was awesome he threw for 300 yards that's great i don't think he was particularly good. Wow. I didn't even realize that. 325 yards.

No, I mean, he didn't throw the ball downfield. The Giants gave him everything underneath. He took advantage of it. I don't love it for Terry McLaurin. I'm not saying... It's definitely not... It's not necessarily bad for Terry McLaurin, but I really don't see how it's good for Terry McLaurin

because he's just... He's so conservative. And, I mean because he's just so conservative. All the big plays happen. Kyle Allen had 62 yards passing. Yeah, but you saw the McLaurin big play, right? I did. Cam Sims had a couple though, right? Cam Sims did, yeah.

Yeah, I don't know. What do you think? Buy or sell? Alex Smith is bad news for Terry McLaurin. I would sell that. I don't know. Well, what do you think? I mean, buy or sell, Alex Smith is bad news for Terry McLaurin. I would sell that. I don't think Kyle Allen's good. And so maybe the targets are a little closer to the line of scrimmage, but we saw Alex Smith throw down field plenty when he was comfortable in Kansas City.

In the last two years, he was there. It won't be like that because he doesn't have those types of weapons. But I don't think it's bad for Terry. I don't think it's necessarily good for him, but I think it's just Terry McLaurin's a starting wide receiver who you start. Smith hit a deep throw of 32 yards to Sims. Another one, 45 yards. That was the longest one for Sims on the day.

The 33-yarder that Sims had from Smith was actually a short pass that Sims took in as was actually a short pass that Sims took in because they catch and run. And then they, they they're calling it a deep left throw to McLaurin. I guess that's because the ball traveled 15 plus yards in the air, which it did. And McLaurin made a great play.

Do I think he can do that every week? It is Terry McLaurin. I think it's possible. I would love to try and sell high on him still. No, really? But I'm not, I'm not going to give him up for nothing.

I don't even want you, what you could get. Like if there is a team, let's say I've got Terry McLaurin. And after this week, I'm four and five and I can't afford to lose anymore. And I need some starters. And there might be a team in the league.

That's eight and one. And they're trying to collect a bunch of superstars for their squad. Maybe they don't want to make lineup decisions late in the year, so they'll trade their depth for studs, and they'll look at McLaurin as one of those studs. So if I can get a good running back and a good wide receiver for Terry McLaurin to boost my lineup and give me a chance to sneak into the playoffs in my league, I'm doing it.

I think I offered Terry McLaurin for Ezekiel Elliott earlier this week and it got turned down. And I'm not sure I'd offer it now. Yeah, right. Oh, yeah, Ezekiel we should probably talk about. Okay, we'll get there. Real quick to wrap up this game. Do you agree with me that Darius Slayton is droppable? I'd rather not, but you can.

What would be the circumstance where you would feel good starting Darius Slayton? Well, my main reasoning is that you're probably not starting him against the Eagles because Slay did a good job against him two weeks ago or three weeks ago, and then he's got to buy. After that, Cincinnati, Seattle, Arizona. That's why you would hang on to him. The matchups are really good after the Giants buy,

but Sterling Shepard has had six catches every healthy game he's had. Exactly six. When he comes back from the bye, there will be one week where there's other teams on a bye and you can call Slayton a bye week replacement.

I think you've got to look at him as, okay, is he someone that is in the mix for a flex spot or a wide receiver two spot or wide receiver three spot on my fantasy team? And if my receiving core is just not that great and he's on my squad, I don't think I want to let him go, especially for those matchups after the bye.

Okay, next game, Buffalo 44, Seattle 34. We had a, believe it or not on dropping Cole Beasley. So I will go with a Seahawks believe it or not. Oh gosh, believe it or not, Tyler Lockett is I mean, there's really nothing I can say here, but I'll just you can say no

believe it or not. Tyler Lockett is not a must start wide receiver. He has less than 50 yards in four of his last five games. I do not believe it. Too much upside to, to put on your bench. It is pretty frustrating though, isn't it?

Yes. When you look at his, when you look at his PPR stats for the year, he's averaging 20.9 per game, but in weeks one through three was a a monster and then he had an even bigger smash game in week 7 and everything since then or in between

week 4 through week 9 save for the big game has been single digit points in PPR DJ Dallas and Travis Homer have the same amount of touches 9 touches if you started DJ Dallas you got a little lucky with the touchdown there. For the second week in a row.

Yeah, seven carries. He did look better, though. I must admit, I thought he looked better this week than last week. That's pretty much it. Gabriel Davis, I think he's going to end up being a pretty good player. I agree. Yeah, I think I'd be happy if I had him in a Dynasty League. I am. Tennessee think I'd be happy if I had him in a Dynasty League. I am.

Tennessee 24 and Chicago 7. Did we have anything from this game, Heath? Not yet, right? Yeah, the David Montgomery one. He plays for the Bears. Oh, I didn't read that one. You didn't do that. Believe it or not, David Montgomery is a flex or best rest of season. Flex at best.

Assuming he plays, obviously, next week. We don't know the extent of the injury. I said rest of season. I don't think he's out for the year. He shouldn't be. Dave, what do you think? David Montgomery is a flex at best, believe it or not. I don't know if I can come up with 24 running backs

week in and week out that are definitively better than David Montgomery. But I think I can probably name you 20 or 21 so i don't believe it but i think we're getting really close there where just because he's getting a lot of touches doesn't mean he's a very good fantasy running back i do think um like and i've been the guy not as worried about his inefficiency, so take this with a grain of salt. He'd shown a pretty good PPR floor before this week,

11 or 12 points without touchdowns, and when he scored, he was better. And the offensive line this week, they're going to have a bad offensive line all year. It won't be as bad as it was this week. They believe, I believe they had their third string center who had never played center and two of their starters were active for this game. So they get the Vikings next week and maybe David Montgomery is not okay. Maybe the offensive line is still a mess.

Then they have a buy. Then it's Packers, Lions, Texans, Vikings, Jacksonville. Yeah, I know, but I just feel like we've been saying that about him for a while. Well, but he's not been, like, this was a very bad game. He's been a number two running back for most of the year in PPR. In PPR. Yeah, look, there's something to be said for 11, 12 PPR fantasy points, and that's typically where he's been at.

I think it's important when guys have not scored any touchdowns to say if you're scoring 11 or 12 fantasy points without touchdowns, that's pretty good because he's probably going to score a couple touchdowns in the second half. I'll tell you what worries me. Let's say he misses week 10. Bears are going to have Ryan Nall and Artavis Pierce and Cordero Patterson, and maybe even Lamar Miller, who's not the same

Lamar Miller that he once was, but they've got four guys auditioning for playing time whenever Montgomery does come back. And Patterson, I don't know if he had a lot of playing time, but every time I clicked in to watch this game, Patterson was on the field doing something. He only played 17 snaps, I think. Okay. Then I want to say that that's a lot for him, but I can't. I'm not on top of Cordero Patterson's snap rate. I'm

very sorry. No, sometimes that happens. I thought Clyde Edwards-Elair played a ton of snaps because every time the game came on, he was in there. The point is the Bears need something on offense and something from the run game.

I don't think Montgomery's really given him much of anything this year. A lot of it's the offensive line. I really believe that. Facts are facts. His numbers are terrible. Bears are desperate for a win. They'll do anything to get that run game going. Well, except for go back to Mitchell Trubisky.

Well, he's hurt. He's hurt now anyway. That's true. I do think coming into this, it depends on what numbers you look at with Montgomery as well. If you're YPC for life, then he might be the worst running back in the NFL. I also think he led the league in broken tackles coming into this week.

When some people think that's representative of being good? Yeah, I mean, I think this is one of those teams that was allowing a lot of backfield congestion. I'll see if I can find that stat. So it might have just been like broken tackles, you know, behind the line of scrimmage, and he doesn't have much of a chance. Maybe we just don't really know how good Dave Montgomery is,

but I don't know. I'm trying to find ways to evaluate running backs. Yards per carry is useful for fantasy because you're not sitting here trying to make a judgment about how good a guy is all the time. It's just you're trying to make a judgment about how efficient he is. So yards per carry really matters for fantasy. But one thing I look at a lot is big plays.

The best of the best can make a lot of big plays. And he can't. Rarely. He did last week against the Saints. And you know who else can't? Ever? Ezekiel Elliott. The guy never makes big plays anymore.

I don't know what that means. I'm just giving numbers. You all can make your decisions. Kansas City 33, Carolina 31. We had one here, right? No. Well, we talked about DJ Moore. Yeah, we talked about Bridgewater.

We talked about a lot of players in this game. We talked about Clyde. I'm happy moving on, I guess. Any interest in Demarcus Robinson? 69 yards or a touchdown in three of his last four games. Not really. No. But I am interested in Curtis Samuel if he's going to keep getting a lot of targets.

How about Sammy Watkins? Today was the season high. Nine targets for him. But he had 11 combined in the two games prior. And he gets a little bit of work in the ground game as well. Okay. Then I think we can go to our next game, which is... He's scored in three

straight. Which is what? Which is what? Which is Baltimore 24 and Indianapolis 10. Alright, Lamar Jackson has now through... Have they played nine games or eight games? They've played eight games. Eight games.

He has three games with 28 to 33 fantasy points and six points for passing touchdown leagues. That's really good. Five games with 15 to 19 fantasy points. What is it? It's just the touchdown rate? I know he's not rushing quite as much, but he's still on pace for like 950 rushing yards.

So is it just the passing touchdown rate? Heath, is that what's keeping Lamar Jackson down? No, it doesn't look like his passing touchdown rate is actually that bad. So passing yards? Really? I think he was on pace for like 3,000 passing yards. So I know that was an issue.

Well, like his touchdown rate for this year, I believe coming into this was there. Yeah, I don't coming into the today. It was six point three percent, which would if that was his career rate would be an all time high. Last year it was nine percent. And we knew that wasn't sustainable. Yeah, I think the yards are down. And I think maybe the rushing touchdown

rate is down from where it was last year. I just don't get it. I mean, how does this guy, how does Lamar Jackson have three games with more than 20 fantasy points while he's on pace for

950-ish rushing yards? That is wild. Are you still just starting him, pretty much? I think you still start him because of the rushing upside. But this was his first game in his last four where he completed more than 60% of his passes. And there were a lot of short passes. And he didn't throw a lot of them.

23, that's it. That's his lowest in four games. But he's also only thrown more than 28 ones all year. I feel like he's regressed a little bit as a passer, but the offense has regressed a lot in terms of creating these explosive plays. And the one thing that I think would make a hell of a lot of sense would be start creating ways for Mark Andrews to get back involved. Start finding plays and ways to take out other players in the offense.

I wonder if what's happening is defenses are focusing on taking Andrews away from Lamar Jackson and then seeing what happens. It's something I can look into. I wonder if that's part of the problem. Where's our concern level for Hollywood Brown? Cause I was, I was pretty excited. You talked me into Brown this week.

Yeah. I was pretty excited. The Colts had been really struggling against wide receivers. And maybe if Lamar Jackson had thrown more than 23 passes, we would have had a good game, but Brown gets three catches. Like, getting five targets on 23 pass attempts is actually not that bad.

Three catches for 38 yards is disappointing, but I'm sorry. I think I might just have to stop with the whole Marquise Brown is going to have a big second half. Marquise Brown is a buy low. I just can't do it. I don't have faith in the Ravens passing game. And we knew when he came out, do it. I don't have faith. I don't have faith in the Ravens passing game. And

like he had to we knew when he came out, he had to kind of be a mold breaker. Yeah. Number one wide receivers are not as small as him weight wise. And he he's had some games, but he kind of looks like that

gadget fluke big game guy and not a true number one alpha wide receiver. Let's talk about the Chargers and the Raiders. Las Vegas 31, Chargers 26. Chargers had the ball for 34 minutes and 44 seconds. Vegas for 25 minutes and 16 seconds. Is there anything to say about Josh Jacobs?

You just start him. He's just not having a great season. He's splitting more than we would like for him to, and I don't think he was 100% healthy, and Devontae Booker had a little pep in his step early in this game. He did, and that helped set

the tone because the Raiders realized, especially on that Booker touchdown run that he had, that they can start to work the outer edges against the Chargers. And they ran a ton of power run plays where their guards were pulling to the edges. And both Jacobs and Booker were having success there. And Jalen Rashard was playing a lot on passing downs. So not exactly the type of scenario that we feel good about with Josh Jacobs,

but 14 carries is nice. You get that catch on top of it for 15 touches. I feel like that's the minimum we should expect from Jacobs from game to game. I wish it were more, but I think the Raiders are kind of realizing we don't have to lean so heavily on this kid, especially if he's not at 100%. And I think they like what they've got in Devante Booker, which makes me kind of want to puke, but that's how they feel about it. And

Nelson Aguilar caught a touchdown, but he only had three targets, and Derek Carr only threw 23 passes. It was an awesome throw. The Carr's throw to Aguilar was awesome. It's time to drop Henry Ruggs, right? I don't know when you'll start him and feel good about it. Just say yes.

I mean, come on. If I'm starting a bi-week replacement at wide receiver, it's not going to be him. It's going to be Aguilar. He's 65% rostered. I just don't understand. He never gets any targets. Aguilar.

He's a first-round rookie that people are hoping in the second half is going to make a big impact. So would you hang on to him? I think I'd rather hold him than Slayton. I'd definitely rather hold him than Beasley. I'm 1,000% holding both those guys ahead of Ruggs. Oh, okay. Would you pick up Nelson Aguilar or Curtis Samuel? Sammy.

Samuel. Another. Samuel. Another big game for Justin Herbert. It's 27 or more fantasy points in five straight games and six points for passing touchdown leagues. Justin Jackson got hurt. We'll check on that. Kalen Balazs got the touches.

And yeah, that's... And look good. You know what, though? Yeah. But let's... Like Mike Williams, this is now two good games in a row. I hope he's healthy,

but it just makes sense if Justin Herbert's going to throw for 300 yards every week and he's going to throw the ball downfield, it just makes sense that Mike Williams is going to start playing better. So 73% started, 93% rostered. Miami 34, Arizona 31.

Tua with a decent game. He was 20 of 28, 248 and 2. 24 fantasy points and 7 carries for 35 yards. Really nothing from the run game, although Jordan Howard scored a touchdown. And Salvin Ahmed led the team in rushing with 7 carries for 38 yards. Any takeaways here for the Dolphins, Heath?

Man, it kind of stinks because Preston Williams looked really good in the first half and then got hurt again. Yep. I don't know that the connection between Tua and Devontae Parker is quite there. Well, he caught six of seven targets. They just weren't big-time down-the-field throws. I think the connection has a chance,

especially if Preston's going to miss a few games. Was Patrick Peterson on him? Patrick Peterson was on Preston Williams when he made one of his big plays, but he was probably on him for most of the game because Preston Williams left. Yeah. And I, they seem to cover Deandre Hopkins pretty well in this game. I saw Xavier Howard on him quite a bit.

Throw to him. Well, second half, I think Howard on him quite a bit. They didn't throw to him until the second half. I think Howard had four penalties on Hopkins. Just grabbing him. I'm just not going to let you catch any passes today. I'm going to commit a penalty every time. Yeah, just a weird game for Hopkins, who had three catches for 30 yards.

And Christian Kirk has now 20 or more PPR fantasy points in three straight games. Kyler Murray is unstoppable. Absolutely unbelievable. And another shootout to the next two games are Buffalo and Seattle. Oh my gosh, it's going to be glorious. Pittsburgh 24, Dallas 19. Just a, just kind of a weird day for the Steelers. James Conner, nine carries for 22 yards. I mean, you brush it off. But Dave, what do you think about the... I'll give you the Steelers wide receivers,

and then Heath, you give me the Cowboys wide receivers. I came into this week feeling best about Juju, and he had the fewest targets in the game, but he had the nice 31-yard touchdown catch from Roethlisberger. I thought it was weird that the Steelers didn't run it more. Roethlisberger was a little beat up, went into the locker room early in the first half with the knee injury, and came through in the second half and played through it.

I'm just wondering if the targets were a byproduct of who was open and Roethlisberger looking for him. Heath told you about the Deontay Johnson big catch. It was a catch and run for like 40 yards. Outside of that, it wasn't a particularly great day for him. So even though Juju was third in targets among the three receivers, I still like him the best. And I like Claypool second best.

Okay. And Heath? That's encouraging for the Cowboys wide receivers that they won't have a quarterback as bad as Ben DiNucci. Hopefully Andy Dalton comes back, but it made me feel a little better about Lamb, a little better about Cooper. They're probably number three wide receivers.

And I did go find Cameron Wolfe covers the Dolphins for ESPN. Davian Howard's four PI penalties today were the most by a player in a single game in 20 years? Wow, that's awesome. So don't fret too much about DeAndre Hopkins. And Zeke, we're ending the show with Zeke. Rest of season, would you rather have Ezekiel Elliott or Clyde Edwards? Zeke. Oh,

I don't know. It might take, it might take Clyde three games to get 20 touches. It might, but I don't get points for the touches. Yeah. Yeah. He's not scoring.

The catches haven't been there. Tony Pollard's been more effective running the football. I'm not feeling good about Ezekiel Elliott. And he's going into a bye. And you know what? I want to say that I want to give the Chiefs credit that they'll see that Le'Veon Bell isn't who they thought he was. I think maybe they realized that

when they started giving Darryl Williams more third down work. I'll take Edward Zillair rest of season over Zeke. Okay. Zeke. I kind of Edwards-Alaire rest of season over Zeke. Okay. Zeke. I kind of can't believe I'm saying that. 18 carries for 51 yards for Zeke.

This was the Steelers. Yeah, yeah. The Steelers were gashed by the Ravens last week on the road for the second week in a row. And Zeke was hurt, but Pollard had more yards.

So we don't think the Steelers defense is good anymore? No, I'm saying that on the road for the second week in a row. And Zeke was hurt, but Pollard had more yards. So we don't think the Steelers' defense is good anymore? No, I'm saying that this was an exploitable spot for the Cowboys' run game. And it worked out for one of the Cowboys' running backs, and it wasn't Ezekiel. Gilbert at quarterback against the Steelers. And he was halfway decent.

I'm not questioning the Steelers' pass rush. And he was halfway decent. I'm not questioning the Steelers' pass rush. The problem that I'm seeing is that Zeke is much, much, much less involved in the passing game than he used to be. He had two catches on three targets today. And that was a huge part of his success. So can't really bank on it. Guys, thank you so much. Good show.

We will talk to you all tomorrow with a special episode with Ben Schrager and Chris Towers. And Fantasy Football Today in 5. Make sure you're listening to that one. For Dave and Heath, I'm Adam. Have a good one, everybody.