The Ringer NFL Show - Stash Guys, Sleepers, and the Dark Knights Return | The Dantasy Football Podcast (Ep. 299)

Episode Date: September 12, 2018

The Ringer's Danny Heifetz and Danny Kelly spotlight which fantasy sleepers to pick up this week (02:00), intriguing defensive matchups to exploit (19:30), and which wide receivers to stash for later in the season (31:15). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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That's right. If you live in any major metropolitan area, up and running will have a Sonos expert deliver and set up your system absolutely free. Just order from sonos.com and select up and running at checkout if you qualify. Welcome, welcome, welcome to the Danesie Football podcast. My name is Danny Heifitz, and I am here with my co-host and co-danny. Danny Kelly, how are you doing here, D.K.? I'm doing excellent. How are you doing, man?

I am doing great. We are brought to you by the Ringer Podcast Network, and we are still huffing the fumes of week one. I just felt high, watching like 12 hours of football again, just like back to back. I'm like, oh, my God. I had my whole system set up in my layer here. I had like seven games on it at one time.

It was amazing. It's good to be back. You call it a layer? Yeah, a little bit of layer. Well, it's an office, but layers sounds cooler. What's the difference, really, other than interior decorators? and stigma. Anyway, we can get right into it, D.K.

We're going to get into some revelations and question marks later, look at a couple of teams' performances in week one, do intrigued and deterred, and then thank me later after that. But first, we're going to get into a segment we're pivoting to for the regular season called Initial Advice. So we're going to couple of the legendary D.K.'s dark nights, which you hit on a crazy amount of last season.

And then now I'm going to add a counterpart to you, which will be D.H's designated hitters. Love it. Which is significantly less cool than DK's Dark Nights. Jim, what are the odds we could get a sound cue for DK's Dark Nights? Oh, my God. Oh, my God. And that's it?

Is that the right Batman song? Is that it? Oh, my God. What about this one? So in this segment, we're just going to break down players to go hunt on the waiver wires and add into your lineups this week. So these are the guys basically prime for major volume opportunity. etc, a matchup.

Whatever it is, it's favorable. We looked into it, so you didn't have to. So, D.K., without further ado, because there was a lot of adieu. It was your first dark night of the 2018 season for week two. The first dark night, for me, is Quincy and Newton, one of the Jets. And I think, you know, coming into this season, I think there was tons of question marks around. I mean, he'd missed all of 2017 with a back injury, and those are always really, you know, kind of worrisome long term.

And so he was coming into this game, he was only owned in 9.5% of ESPN leagues, 9% Yahoo. Obviously, there's question marks with the quarterback situation in New York. And so I think people are kind of overlooking him, but he kind of hit the ground running where he left off. And when he left off, he was sort of the number one guy in that Jets offense. He got team high 10 targets this week against the Lions, caught six passes for 63 yards and a touchdown. So that's a 48% target share in terms of their passing offense. That's probably going to go down next week. Well, don't bring math into this.

But the point is he's clearly one of the main focal points of this offense. He got three red zone targets, which was actually tied for third most of any player this week. And crucially, Darnold looked pretty good in terms of, you know, there's still stuff to be worked on clearly. But he looked pretty solid. Seemed to really trust Anunwa. I think he kind of looked for him when he was moving around out of the pocket too. Anunwa led all Jets players, all skill players with snaps, 40. He actually out snapped Robbie Anderson, so that's important and interesting.

He played mostly out of the slot. So overall, he just kind of like hit the ground running where he left off, which I think was really, really encouraging. I think he's going to be a fantasy factor this year. And home against the dolphins this week, I think you can probably pick him up. You know, if he's in your league, pick him up, and I think you can start him. Yeah, I mean, if you watch the Monday night game, obviously Darnold and like his pick six laugh fest until like actually winning was the story. but anyone who looked like the best receiver on the Jets.

And after Kenny Goliday, maybe the best one on the field. Like, he looked fantastic. I think, you know, he's always been such a big physical guy. He's really, really athletic. He's one of the, like, coming out of the draft from Nebraska,

he was one of the most athletic guys in the draft. So I really like him. I've kind of had him on my radar for a couple of years now, and it was really encouraging to see what he did in that game. And I think, again, like I said, he could be a big part of that passing offense. So, D.H., who's your first guy this year? Who's your first designated hitter of all time?

First, D.H. This one, you know, this is some real science I did in the lab. This is some real, you know, I crunched a lot of numbers, and I came to a, it's a risky conclusion, but I think T.J. Yeldon this week. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, he's only owned 16% of Yahoo, 8% of ESPN. Obviously, Leonard Furnett hurt his hamstring. This isn't rocket science. That was a joke before.

He rushed forth. So Yelden ran 14 times for 15.1. yards and then added a passing touchdown and 18 yards and three catches. This isn't hard. If Fournet is out for this week, Yeldon's worth playing. They're playing the Patriots. Obviously, it's a rematch, and I actually think that the Patriots tend to crush people in games after which they nearly lost, but it doesn't matter.

He's going to get a ton of volume, and he can catch passes. But hamstring injuries linger, and even if Fournet does play this week, he'll be limited and or he's very liable to miss games in the future. Sometimes this isn't hard. you know, you want to get upside after week one. Yeldin, I have a very tormented relationship with, but this offensive line is so much better than a couple years ago. I've hated Odingham in the past, but if it's out any week,

then Yelden can play in your flex. So it's not crazy. Yeah, again, this is a short-term kind of guy. And I think especially because there's a hamstring injury, those always kind of make me worried, you know, just because especially from a big guy like that who's really explosive, I could see the Jaguars maybe potentially holding him out next week just to be safe. And I think Yeldon is, you know, we talked about him, I think last week.

You hate having him on your team because he's kind of a frustrating guy to handcuff. But at the same time, I really think he's a good player. Yeah. And so if Fournette is out, I mean, he is startable in all formats. So he's going to get volume. He's good in the passing game. You know, he's going to get their red zone target or their goal line carries and things like that. he's a big guy still.

As interred Craig, who's one of the Winklopod twins, sent me a note. In the three games Yeldon played without Fournette last year, he carried the ball 27 times for 190 yards, which is more than seven yards per attempt. He added eight catches for 51 yards. And then, oh, Craig wrote in parentheses, dope. Actually, I wrote that.

Oh, you wrote that? Google talks about. He's dope. All right, there you go. So Yeldin. All right, D.K., who's your next dark night? George Kittle tied end for the 49ers. and if you were watching the Niners game against the Vikings,

I think it was pretty clear that he's going to be a major, major part of that passing offense. Now, obviously with Markey's Goodwin, he hurt his quad early in the game and kind of missed most of the game. And so that kind of might skew the numbers a little bit, but still, Kittle grabbed Team High 9 targets versus the Vikings. He caught five passes for 90 yards. And those numbers would have been a lot bigger if he had not dropped.

Well, I wouldn't even call it. drop it. He barely missed a deep bomb on a play action. I think it was just a little bit too far out in front of him by Garoppolo. And that he could have actually even scored on that play potentially. And then there was another play he missed later on that potential scoring play. So he could have had like 150 yards in a touchdown. I mean, it was that kind of thing where I think he's going to be a focal point in the offense, not just like, you know, not just like a secondary, you know, tight end option or whatever for Garapolo. Like he could be a downfield guy. Graham Barfield

his 13.1 yard average depth of target Week 1 was just behind Grong. So he's kind of, he's like a downfield guy. They're using him on play action to get behind the defense. I just really like his upside this year. He's only owned in 37% of ESPN leagues. Obviously in Yahoo, he's owned in 76%, which is a weird discrepancy kind of.

But like if you're in an ESPN league and he's out there, go get him because I think he's just, you know, he's got a lot of upside. I actually would say, even if he's owned already in your league, he might be a kind of, not necessarily by-low, because obviously he had a good game, but I think he's going to do,

I think he's going to do big things this year for that offense, and so he might be even like a trade target for you. I agree. Someone pointed out on Twitter, I apologize because I forget who, that Kittle was part of the 2017 draft, which was loaded at tight end. And among a group that, I mean, O.J. Howard and Joku, Evan Engram, a lot of really good guys.

I mean, Jake Butt at a Michigan, George Kittle was considered the most athletic guy in that draft. And he showed it. And to think he actually, I mean, he had actually a bad drop in the game, but he's going to be a stud. And as we've talked before, we're kind of banking on the Shanahanansance. Right. And Kyle Shannon uses and finds tight ends.

Yeah. And Kittal's going to be a stud. It already is. I just think that Garoppolo, he had a down game. The whole 49ers offense had sort of a down game. I think there's still so much upside for this. And so, yeah, I'm kind of just thinking Kittle might have a huge year. You've mentioned in the past how the league is trending toward more receivers on the field and spreading it out.

But one of the things that Shanan likes to do is actually put two tight ends on the field. And then force teams to put heavier packages out there, run play action. And then this is really what the Patriots pioneered with Gronk and Hernandez, which was having super athletic tight ends just burn the wrong packages. Yeah, I mean, you're lining them up against linebackers who suck in coverage because they're bringing in linebackers to defend the run. Kittle's going to crush this. It's the same reason you see Kyle Juschik or however the hell you say his name. The fullback getting, yeah.

Oh, yeah, excuse me. You know what? My name's Haifitz. I don't feel bad when I get people's names wrong. I have no, if I'm Kyle, I don't expect people to get that right ever, so I'm sure he's not offended. But the point is if your fullback's catching those 50-year passes, your well-designed offense, kiddles going to be great. Anyway. Absolutely.

Who's your second DH? So, yeah, so, I mean, those guys are a little more safer. You know, they're not owned nearly as much as they should. But they're probably safer options. Now this is kind of the opposite. This is somewhat riskier. This is riskier DH options. Yeah, go a little bit deeper.

These are for like deep league guys. If you're kind of not desperate necessarily, but if you really need someone to start this week, these could be options for you. Yeah, this is good plug and plays if you're deep. So, I mean, Delaney Walker got hurt out for the season. Greg Olson hurt his foot, I mean, second year in a row. And then everyone's, at least two or three people are upset with their tight ends

after week one anyway. So if you don't manage to get George Kittle or even Jared Cook, a plug and play for this week that I like is Ben Watson. He's owned a third of ESPN leagues a little more than a third in Yahoo. And he's playing against the Browns last year

if you just started the titan who played against the Browns every week, that would have been the number one tight end in fantasy football. Really? That's interesting. And so look, a lot of the... The Greg Williams special? The Greg, exactly. No, actually. So... Play the safety 35 yards off the line of scrimmage and see what

having? So you're so ahead of me. So like a lot of the Browns team turned over and sometimes it's unfair to compare them. But the guys in the middle of that defense, so Joe Sherbert and Christian Kirksey at linebacker, you got Derek Kindred at Strong Safety. Gibral Pepper's is still playing like 75 yards behind the line of scrimmage. Not really, but it's kind of crazy to watch. They're tight-end stuff. We didn't see it in week one.

It was a monsoon. But Watson's still a great bet against Cleveland. Last year he played him twice with the Ravens, 12 targets, 12 catches, 165 yards in a touchdown. Obviously, the Saints are going to spread the ball. around more. But they also, the running game sucks. So even if they get up big, I'm not convinced they'll start pounding it with Kamara and Gillisley look terrible.

And I just think that Watson has a really great chance to score. I just pick up some yardage and the Browns suck. I like him. He's another guy that we talked about in the preseason, you know, super athletic, even though he's like 37 years old or something like that. Again, one of his teammates was saying he's like the most ripped guy on the team. So

I like him. He looked pretty good. He looks solid. I watched him specifically this week and he didn't do anything, you know, super amazing, but he looks, I mean, he looks fast enough to make an impact. So, yeah, I like that. I like that call. All right, D.K. Who is your next dude?

Next DK. Yeah, this is another deep one. And I was really torn about it, actually. But I'm going with Brandon Marshall, Seahawks. They're playing at the Bears Monday Night Football. Right now he's owned in 9% of Yahoo League, 6%. So, again, this is a deep cut. But here's the thing.

Doug Baldwin. hurt his other knee in this game. He had a strained MCL, I want to say. He's going to keep him out a couple weeks. He was already dealing with a knee injury on the other knee. So now both of his knees are messed up. I think it's looking bad for Baldwin this year

in terms of just like his ability to get on the field. And so really Marshall is the Seahawks number one receiver. Now you can talk about Tyler Locker, which I think is, you know, he's another option here. And if you like him more, I wouldn't necessarily, you know, try and talk you about it. But the reason I like Marshall, I'd lean him here is just the style of play.

He's that big-bodied guy. It looks like Russell Wilson really trusts him. You know, in the first game, he had team high six targets. He got three passes for 46 yards in a touchdown. But, I mean, there was some hidden, you know, there was some hidden production there that got taken off the scoreboard. So he had another touchdown earlier in the game. He was called for a pretty egregious offensive pass interference.

He probably didn't have to do that. I think he could have had that touchdown, even if he hadn't done it. And so he had a potential two touchdown game. He also dropped a really what was actually a great catch. When he hit the ground, it kind of squirted it out of his hands. And that was over Chris Harris. So he had a couple other big plays that kind of, you know,

you don't really see on the stat sheet. I think he's going to be still a pretty big target in that offense. Obviously, health is a major issue because he's old and he's had some history of injuries. But it just looks like... History of injuries? Like Wilson really trusted. History of entries on the Seahawks?

There's no way. You're the Seahawks expert, so I trust you there. And now you told me that I was, I think you said it was interesting display of Stockholm syndrome when I talked about Marshall earlier. And then lo and behold, he scored a touchdown week one. I don't necessarily think he's going to go off. But again, it's kind of a deeper, in a deeper league. I think he's a kind of guy you could put in your flex and he's got some touchdown upside. I think he's going to get, he's probably going to be close to the team lead and targets.

And so, yeah, I think he's definitely kind of turning into a fantasy option, which is a little bit crazy because no one talked about him in the preseason. Well, fine, you talked about him. There, there you go. My last guy real quick is Paul Richardson and the Redskins. He's owned like 10% of Yahoo, but half of ESPN, which, again, that's kind of wild. Six targets, four receptions, 22 yards last week. Didn't really do anything, but he broke one long route that would have been a touchdown, but he just got held up and the defender just grabbed them, pulled him to the ground. So, like, that would have been a touchdown.

but he led Washington targets, Redskins snap counts, Josh Dockson at 70, Richardson at 61, Jameson Crowder had 49. I think Paul Richards is going to be like the possession receiver we kind of think of with Crowder. He's going to like this possession deep threat combo. And I think the Redskins are going to be really freaking good this season. And they stop passing as much and being as aggressive because they were destroying the Cardinals. But against the Colts this week, I think that Richardson's going to be just a fantastic streaming option

and might be better to grab him a week earlier than a week later. and you can plug and play. They're also hosting the Colts, which is a really meaty matchup. I mean, when you're talking about these kind of guys too, every week,

you're talking about, you really look at matchups, and the Colts, I think, have yet to show that they have, you know, quality secondary. I think, you know,

um, it's one of the better fantasy football matches. I think you can have, especially since they're playing at home. I mean, Alex Smith looked really comfortable in that offense. He kind of hit the ground running. You know,

he didn't throw deep much. He had a pretty low, you know, average depth of target type thing, but at the same time, he looked pretty comfortable, and I think there's some, you know, there's some real potential in that offense. Again, Alex Smith was the fourth quarterback in fantasy last year.

Kirk Cousins was sixth, and now Alex Smith is in that offense. I mean, it's fair to expect of top eight season from him and it's got to go somewhere. Absolutely. All right, before we move on, let's take a quick break. We want to stream NFL Sunday ticket live every Sunday.

Right, Danny? Right. Even if we can't get a lot of, Get DirecTV where we live. Because we want every play, even if we don't live in a house with a satellite. Because a lot of us live in apartments. I live in an apartment. We're on a college campus, but we still want to stream NFL Sunday ticket.

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Minimum $5 deposit required, eligibility restrictions apply. See draftkings.com for details. Okay, DK, we have to win $2 million this week and then we'll get our boat and we'll figure out if we want to keep doing this podcast. But until then, we're going to talk. Yeah. We're going to talk more big picture stuff and intrigued or deterred going forward. We're going to talk a more team-focused things.

And I'm really excited about this. Break down some things you saw on week one, caught our eyes. You know what caught my eyes? Was the Buccaneers destroying the Saints? 48 to 40. I think that was maybe the most shocking, like, development in the entire NFL. It was like, where the hell did that come from? Burn your eyes looking at the box score.

It's just like you see the score crawling out. Is that mistake? There's like 900-something yards. So this is, this is interesting me for a lot of reasons, but in particular because I don't think it's necessarily an aberration. Them beating the Saints is probably an aberration. But in essence, we just saw them destroy, but my first reaction was what the fuck. And my second one was, this is exactly what people thought might happen last year. You had Deshaun Jackson and Mike Evans like, oh, Deshaun could take the top off the defense and Mike Evans is great. And you have all

these weapons and everyone loves to talk about weapons and O.J. Howard. But this is what people envisioned, but Dirk Cutters, the head coach, also was the coordinator. You know, I hate that. It's two full-time jobs to be head coach and offensive coordinator. He gave up the play calling to offensive quarter to Todd Monkin. Monkin? Munkin? Well, we're going with Munkin. So he gave up the play calling and he was still waffling on it like a week ago, which is crazy to me. You have all off-season to figure that out. And look what happened. Unbelievable. It's like... Pretty good first, yeah, pretty good first impression. There's four or five coaches in the league who can call plays and head coach, and the rest of them just can't. And, and,

it's amazing what happens when you have amazing personnel and you let someone just think about it all day. And by the way, you called this, I think in a couple, like, it was either last week or the week before we talked about how Ryan Fitzpatrick might be a sneaky fantasy option. I did say that Ryan Fitzpatrick would be the number one quarterback in week one. It's definitely on record. With four touchdowns and 417 yards. No, you said that, right? Yeah, it's verbatim. No, but I did think that he was intriguing this weekend, just in the beginning of the season, because I just, I, now.

it seems stronger than ever that he might actually be able to take James's job. And while I don't know if they'll be able to play like this every week, their defense still sucks, and they'll still be losing in the second half. So maybe they won't have a first half like this again. And the secret's kind of out there that, oh, wow, like, you know, they still have to take care of Deshaun Jackson. But this team could still be in shootouts all the time, and it doesn't mean they won't be aggressive going forward or change their game plan. Although my one thought, fantasy-wise for this is that Deshawn Jackson obviously had the big line, because he had, like, you know, five targets caught all five of them.

And then he had, like, two touchdowns, 146 yards. But, I mean, he suffered a concussion. But I think that it's not an aberration, but, like, kind of an aberration. Chris Godwin's the guy going forward for me that I want. He had four targets, three catches, 41 yards in a touchdown. Not the same, but Todd Munkin loves Chris Godwin. He's been talking of all offseason, and it showed. Godwin had, so the snap counts for the receivers.

Mike Evans had 50. Godwin at 46, Adam Humphreys at 44, Deshaun Jackson at 20. And that 20 is not because he had a concussion. He basically caught that big gain and got concussed, but that was like the last pass they threw. They were bleeding out the clock at that point. So that was pretty representative of what was happened. Deshaun got less than half.

And then it's extremely unlikely to be getting that kind of targets and that kind of production. Banking on it going forward is fools gold. So not only is he injured, but I would take that that is more a sign of the potential of the offense then this means Deshawn, I think Godwin's the guy who's going to be a better play going forward.

Yeah, I mean, because Jackson is what he's always been, which is a really dangerous field-stretching threat, and he had those two huge touchdowns down the field. But, yeah, I mean, Godwin could end up seeing more of the volume. We talked about post-type players. They're like the ultimate post-type team in a way, or at least the post-type offense. So it's interesting.

But the next team we were kind of looking at, the Raiders. First of all, were you just your initial, reaction and, you know, maybe like forget about the last 10 minutes of the game or whatever when they got completely blown out. But what was your initial sort of reaction from the Raiders' offense? John Gruden was much better than I ever could have anticipated. And he turned into a meme this offseason, but they look good. And the final score has no indication to how the game actually went. Yeah, exactly. It was way, way closer than it should have been. Or not should

That's mean. It was way closer than I ever would have thought. Right. They look, they look, Raiders looked good. And that was, like,

my impression, too. Like, it wasn't necessarily that they looked, you know, like super great or anything, but they were just way better than I thought they were going to be.

I mean, we saw Marshawn Lynch, you know, kind of carry that offense, literally. The thing that interested me, I have not been able to wait to talk about this since I,

like, since I saw this stuff this morning. Derek Carr, you put in this, the Derek Carr, through 40 times, yeah, Nine balls went to wide receivers.

Oakland tight ends had 15 targets. Oakland's running backs had 15 targets. 15. So nine of those went to wide receivers. I was curious what you thought about what that meant. Because my thinking there was that's kind of what made it brilliant. The Rams have the best cornerback group, not in the league, but maybe in recent memory. I think you'd have to go back to Peak Legion of Boom to even, like, compare them to anyone right now.

And I think it was kind of brilliant to just say, look at them. They're like, okay, we're going to do tight ends and running. If Bill Belichick had thrown those numbers out and you just looked at a box score blind, you'd be like, wow, that Bill Belichick, he's brilliant. But Grudy did it. I mean, I think you're right. Absolutely. We'd be talking about what an amazing game plan that was.

I think it's a little bit disappointing that Mari Cooper didn't get more action. You know, he's running out of the slot for the most part that game. And, you know, obviously fantasy football-wise, it was a big letdown because I think he's been one of the more hyped up players during the off season. So my two fantasy takes on it are this. If you believe in Amari Cooper, you might as well keep waiting one week. Do not sell them or anything like that. You have to just, look, the broader point here is that the Rams defense is so good and their cornerbacks are so good.

They might be like a you sit your receivers against them no matter what, since like Derell Revis used to just sit Calvin Johnson. It didn't matter who you had. You sit him if he was going against Derell Revis. That might be what we're looking at with some of your top caliber receivers, maybe not like Antonio Brown and O'Dell, but it'll be interesting to see how everyone does against the cornerbacks

and that also might indicate a lot of passing volume of running backs and tight ends against the Rams going forward. Yeah, I mean, he, so I think, you know, man, Cooper was one of the most frustrating players in fantasy football last year because he had that huge, huge game where he had like 200 yards receiving

and then for the most part he was basically unstartable. I think this game is going to make him a pretty interesting buy-low target if you're looking to trade for him because number one, like you said, the Raiders essentially just completely avoided the Rams corners and that I think that made a lot of sense.

And it worked, though. The final score doesn't indicate it, but like that worked, and I do think there's a case for that to be a blueprint going forward. Yeah, I mean, I think the game was tied well into the fourth quarter. I can't remember exactly when the Rams

started running away with it, but, I mean, it was one of those things where they played them pretty tough. And so, yeah, I think he's a kind of guy, who you could, you know, I wouldn't give up a ton for him, but he's a, he's a by-low candidate because, obviously, he faced the Rams this week. Next week he's going to face the Broncos,

which I think is kind of a similar story. They're probably going to avoid the cornerbacks for that team a little bit. And so you could have his value be really, really depressed, and then I think strike and kind of get him for later in the season. But, I mean, overall, yeah, like, I thought their offense was pretty interesting. The running back rotation was certainly kind of, I don't know how to, you know, I don't know what you take from that, because Lynch kind of, they switched off,

Doug Martin and Lynch switched off roles in series. And then obviously Jalen Richard had a piece, you know, he was a big part of it on third downs and things like that. He was nine receptions for 55 yards. So he was like kind of the passing game guy. And so it's tough to really have huge takeaways from this. But other than that, like overall overarching type thing, I think I was a little bit more impressed with their offense than I thought it would be.

That being said, Derek Carr, rough game. I think his few. his future, I think, starts to come into out. People are actually talking about whether the Raiders can move on from him after this year. And it's actually not that bad. I think right, I'm looking at, right now, I'm looking at his contract structure. They could cut or trade him. And it would basically just be like $7.5 million in dead cap after this year.

I am sympathetic to the idea that both Stafford and Carr, who were both recently the highest paid player in football, were just trash Monday night. Having said that, I'd go to the odds. opposite way. I don't think the Rams can be representative and I actually think that I wouldn't be shocked if car bounces back. I just, I can't judge the guy after just going against that front. Even that one time he threw the ball, went third down with like no pressure. Like, look, I think it's a special defense and we'll, I don't, I don't think it's fair to dock him if the clock in his head had

gone down to the point that he was just throwing balls away early. I think that the Gruden showed enough creativity that we should give him credit. Yeah. So, I mean, overall, that was a really fascinating game to me fantasy-wise, just in general, schematic-wise, the way that they attacked the Rams defense. And I think, obviously, Jared Cook, going to be a huge waiver-wire edition.

Do you think he can keep it up overall throughout the whole year? I think you have to add them if you need a tight end because, I mean, that was like what we've always expected from Jared Cook. Everyone's always been like,

oh, if Jared Cook's ever good, and that was the game. Having said that, I do think that there's a chance that tight ends are just going to get a ton of volume against the Rams. this year and that that might just be a weird side effect of amazing

cornerbacks. Having said that if John Gruden actually looks at Jared Cook is their number one passing option, that's a different thing and it's probably worth picking him up to figure that out. He looked pretty beastly. He ran that guy over. Looked like a beast. The other note that you kind of just touched on is the Rams are going to be a

tight end funnel team. If you're playing the Rams and you've got a tight end in that offense, I think that's something to really look at matchup-wise. And so going forward, you know, that could be indicative of a really good matchup for the tight-end position. So, RAM opponent, tight ends. Intrigued. Absolutely. Beautiful. All right. Before we move on, let's take a quick break. People always ask me for advice. Well, they always ask us for advice. Yeah. Usually it's what team to bet on this week. And the truth is, we don't know who's going to win, or else we'd be very rich. But if you think you know, you've got to check out My Bookie. I always tell people to bet with My Bookie. They are your best bet this season. They've been a

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That's my bookie, M-Y-B-O-O-K-K-I-E, and don't forget to use the promo code, Ringer NFL, when creating your account to claim the bonus. You play, you win, you get paid. All right, D-K, this is now, thank me later. These are the guys to stash or starred, watchlust, whatever it is, whether you use ESPN or Yahoo,

the guys to keep it track of. Intern, Winklopod, Craig, didn't even know you could actually add watchlist guys on ESPN or Yahoo, but you can. There's a little button next to their names, actually. I didn't know that for a few years either. He was just manually. He just had a manual watch list.

He's just like, well, he's got it all in his head, you know? It's like Facebook. You don't write it out anywhere, but, you know, just keeping your... Beautiful mind. Exactly. Exactly. So you guys know your league's better than we do, so we can't tell you specifically.

But whether it's Adam to the end of your bench, keep in my mind. Adam's Sunday morning, if you have an extra spot, these are guys we like in future weeks going forward that you can get a jump on. Absolutely. All right, who's your first one, D. Based on Delaney Walker's injury,

oh man, Delaney Walker dislocated his ankle, so he's out for the year. So take a look at Johnny Smith, his backup. And I think again, you know, we talked about Shanahan using two tight ends in his offense. I think that in Tennessee, that's going to be a big two tight end set type of offense.

And I think Smith is going to get a lot of play. And so, I mean, the Titans just didn't look good in week one. They didn't look good in the playoffs or in the preseason. you know, there's definitely some doubts around that offense going forward. And Mariotta now, Marioita, sorry, I keep saying Mariotta. Marioita, his status is sort of up in the air because of a hyper-extended elbow, I believe. And so there's a lot of kind of big question marks about this, which makes him more of a stash than a start type of guy. But I think Smith is a player that could end up getting pretty big volume, lots of snaps.

And, you know, it could be kind of the type of guy that comes in and replaces Walker's production. There's a video somewhere of like Marcus Mariotta's first day of him correcting a reporter pronouncing his name. Marioata? The next guy for me, Mike Williams on the Chargers. He's owned 60% on Yahoo, but 35% ESPN. He is unbelievable. He's a huge. He's an amazing athlete, but always be wary of guys who are athletes who haven't translated yet.

But snap counts in week one for the Chargers. Keenan Allen, 72, Tyrell Williams, 62, Travis Benjamin 47, Mike Williams 44. Now, that's not great, but if he starts trending up, the numbers and fantasy production could follow very shortly. He could be an amazing red zone option. They talked about him replacing Hunter Henry, and they're playing the bills this week. If anyone's going to break out or get some garbage time, and then not to mention Tyler Williams and Travis Benjamin both dropped, which should have been long touchdowns. And if Mike Williams' targets, or sorry, snap counts start going up, I would want him on my bench rather than him to go off for the first time on waivers.

Yeah, I mean, he's a first round pick. I think they have big plans for him. I think he has the talent of a first round pick. He's definitely like a big jump ball catcher kind of guy, like a big target. Philip Rivers has always liked those guys that he can just kind of toss it in their general direction and they can come down with it. That's like Philip Rivers, M.O. I think he's a great stash candidate. He could even be a start guy in really deep leagues.

I think he's a great guy to kind of just stash the back of your roster for now, see how it goes. And if he turns into the legit number two in that offense, that's potentially huge volume right there. Yeah, he could just be an absolute monster in real and fantasy football if he gets going. Who's your next guy, D.K.? All right, so this is, you know, we talked about Devante Booker all preseason. I know. God damn. And then we didn't even mention Philip Lindsay,

who ended up playing a much bigger role to, you know, back up Royce Freeman in the Broncos first game. So he's a, you know, very exciting rookie. He's only owned in 6% of leagues in Yahoo 2.4 in ESPN. And so he's, you know, very, very still under the radar. But in the first game of the year, he rushed for 15, he rushed 15 times for 71 yards, kind of a couple of passes for a touchdown. You know, he looked really, really good in their, you know, elusive, kind of explosive.

And he kind of looks like they're change of pace back to Royce Freeman, so he could end up being kind of like a legit fantasy option going on, going forward. But the big question is, like, how they're going to kind of split up reps. Vance Joseph, the Broncos coach after the game, said he was just riding the hot hand. The hot hand is like the worst thing you want to hear in fantasy because it just kind of changes, like obviously it changes their usage every week.

I think Lindsay, he's not a big back, he's only 190 pounds, so, you know, he's not ever going to be a bell cow probably, but the way that they used him in the passing game, I think is intriguing. I saw this on pro football focus. He touched the ball on almost 70% of the snaps that he played. So he's getting a lot of touches when he's in there.

And so that kind of efficiency in terms of snaps to touch is really encouraging. And so, yeah, he's a speculative ad at this point. I wouldn't necessarily put him in your starting lineup. But he's the kind of guy who could end up taking Booker's spot going forward and have a legitimate fantasy kind of role. Yeah, as a Roy's Freeman owner, this was just lovely. Love to see this. This is great stuff.

Same exact amount of rushes, same exact amount of yards. Wonderful. All right, D.H., who you got? Next guy, Dante Pettus, Niners. We talked about the Niners' offense and Marquis Goodwin getting hurt earlier, so I need to elaborate. But Pettis is owned 2% of Yahoo, ESPN, 1%. It's like a rounding error. He looked really good.

Two catches, 61 yards and a touchdown, and it looked like he might be used in the offense. So if Goodwin is hurt or even if he isn't, he could be really good ad. Yeah, he's a great stash. I really like that one. My next guy, this one's real speculative, but Ryan Grant of the Colts, he's only owned in 3% of Yahoo Leagues right now, 9.6% ESPN. He's kind of the number two opposite, T.Y. Hilton. He had eight targets last week, and so he's kind of, you know, with the way that the Colts offense runs, and like we said, Andrew Luck still likes to pass it short. He could be kind of a big guy to get some volume.

Who you got next? I hate that. First of all, the Red teams loved Ryan Grant when he was there. But my next guy, Cole Beasley, Cowboys, seven catches for 83 yards. It's just they have no one else to catch balls. He led the team in targets. He's fantastic. He's only 8% owned in Yahoo.

He's 12% in ESPN, and they're playing Monday at football, and the Giants suck. So, you know, why not? You're already there. Who's your next guy? I think Echler, Austin Echler, the Chargers, is a good, not only just a handcuff to Melvin Gordon, but I think he could be in PPR league's an interesting ad. He rushed five times for 39 yards, and he was a big piece of their passing game. Five catches, 87 yards, one touchdown.

Super explosive guy. We talked about him in the preseason. I think he's just one of those guys to have on your bench. I'm actually going to push back on this one. I think that that performance was part Echler's good, but also part the Chiefs, I think, are going to end up being the worst team defending past catching running backs. I think they're going to turn a lot of past catching backs into Chris Thompson every week,

kind of like the Browns and their tight ends. And it's also game script. They're going to put up a lot of points on opposing defenses, and the Chief's defense sucks. So it's kind of this perfect recipe for offensive, or running backs that you kind of look at at waivers, so that might be a fun-streaving options going forward. It's just running backs going against the Chiefs.

Yeah, he's going to be one of those guys that's probably kind of hit and miss, I think. But again, we talked about it earlier. He's super, super efficient with the amount of touches that he gets. And so I think he's a guy that in PPR leagues, deep PBR leagues, it's worth having him on your bench. Yeah. All right, D.K, I will let you return to your lair office, whatever you call it.

It's your house. You can do whatever you want. But that's all we got. Thank you for listening to the Dandestee Football Podcast on the Ringer Podcast Network. We'll see you guys on Friday. Thanks again to Sonos. Meet Sonos Bean, the smart compact soundbar for your TV. Bean lets you play everything you love from music and radio to movies, TV, podcasts, and more.

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