Week 1 Matchups + GOAT Talk, Wheel of Shame - Fantasy Football Podcast for 9/9

On today's episode, we got to break down that Thursday night matchup. A lot of huge storylines took place last night. Break down the news and the injuries, the rest of the games. And a fantasy face off between the three of us, you do not want to miss this week's Wheel of Shame. Subscribe to this channel. Like this video and enjoy. The fantasy footballer studio is brought to you by Samsung Galaxy. Visit Samsung.com to learn more. Hey, this is Darren Waller, tied in for the Las Vegas Raiders. I am the Waller's, and you are listening to the Fantasy Footballers Podcast. Cuckoochoo! To the Fantasy Footballers Podcast with your host, Andy Holloway, Jason Moore, and Mike Wright. Oh, welcome in. Oh! Yes, sir. Yes. Jason Moore, Mike Wright, Andy Holloway, the Fantasy Footballers podcast. Back for Friday.

September 9th. Here we are, gentlemen. The season has begun. We've got more matchups on the show today. Oh, that was a lot of fun. That was a lot of fun watching football. Got a little sloppy there in the middle. A little bit. We have lots to talk about from last night's game because that's what we do. We talk about football. Yeah. I mean, the reactions are strong. As strong as they get. And I mean, you are right. There is a lot to take away from this game. But it is Friday. Put Clan Friday. In honor of the many who have supported this show over at Jointhefoot.com, every Friday we take a second to give something away. This year we're going to be giving away $100 gift cards to Fantasychamps.com. Ooh. Two people that support the show. And today's winner over on Patreon is Brittany.

That's the name. Just Brittany. Just Brittany. Hope you don't have a last name if you're listening and you're Brittany. Yeah. Now it is not spelled the Spears way. Okay. Thanks, Mike. I'm just letting people know. So it's not Britney Spears. No, it's not. Brittany won a $100 gift card to fantasy champs.com. Thank you for supporting the show. Get a trophy. Get a belt. Get a championship ring. Yeah, I mean, those are good choices. Yeah, those are intense. But let's jump right into that Thursday night. Recap the bills absolutely pummeled the Rams 31 to 10. So much for the Sean McVeigh 5-0 on opening games. So much for the 33 points a game was their average in openers. But there are storylines of plenty. Josh Allen is very good. Good. Excellent. I mean.

Goodness gracious. Pretty much a perfect game. And without Isaiah McKinsey's mistake, maybe would have been one of the better, like, completion records, like quantity of completions to start the game. 26 for 31, 297 and 3. Scored on the ground was the leading Russia for the team, 10 for 56 and a touchdown. And, you know, Stefan Diggs and Gabe Davis were both. huge for fantasy players, eight for 122 and a touchdown for Diggs, four for 88 and a touchdown for Gabe Davis. The other wide receivers in Buffalo, we'll talk about it briefly. Isaiah McKinsey and James and Crowder both had opportunities. One more target for Crowder. McKinsey had a touchdown, two for 19 and a touchdown, and then that drop that ended up as an interception.

Do you think this is the way that split will break down, or was this a product of McKinsey coming off the injury? So I'm glad you bring up the injury because we need to be aware that it could be kind of limiting his snaps. But I actually think this is how it's going to go moving forward. He was a full participant in practice. So. And it made sense for how the game win. Isaiah McKenzie is a smaller guy to have him out there on 100% of, you know, three wide receiver sets probably is a mistake. And they pay James Crowder, who's a good wide receiver. So I do think that they will probably split that role to some degree, making that role not valuable unless you get a touchdown. A couple of players you would have been disappointed in starting on the Buffalo side.

We'll start with Dawson Knox, who only had one reception in this game. I think he had to block a lot. Yeah, on two targets. And then Devin Singletary was great when giving the ball. What happened? I watched this game, and I was so excited because the beginning of the game was all Devin Singletar. He was 8 for 48. So he was, you know, great. Six a carry, two catches, but really just not. needed that much. They left him in the beginning of the game in on basically all situations through that first drive or two. And then all of a sudden you saw Zach Moss get involved. He was the second man up and had like a decent play of then eventually rookie sensation. James Cook comes in. Oh, man. Fumbles his first snap and his.

done he got wilson yeah so hopefully he gets an opportunity in the future but then yikes but then from then on out the rest of the game it was like all zach moss who was carrying his tuba around like he usually does six for 15 on the ground but you don't like that catches so um you know i don't know what that game plan was moss was definitely the second man up even before the cook uh fumble but singletary looked good just not a lot of work 10 total touches in the game that's been the story of His career. His career. I'm with Jason. They kept forcing Zach Moss onto the field, and I don't know why. Running back receptions, they don't always turn into a whole bunch of yardage, but six catches for 21 yards is absurd. Yeah, and six carries for 15, so not efficient. But they won the game. They only won the 10, so you can't really blame them or say that this won't happen again.

Well, it was 10 to 10. Zach Moss did fumble too in this game. Yeah. So on the other side, there was only one player you could have been happy with for the Rams. The offense was bad. Three picks for Matthew Stafford. This was the second. He had a QBR of 20. This was seven sacks he took with a defensive line from the bills that were rushing four and sacked him seven times rushing four and dropping seven. This was the second lowest fantasy performance in Matthew Stafford's Rams career. tons of stories to talk about here. The one player you would have been thrilled with, it was Cooper Cup yet again, 13 for 128 and 1. Yep, still good. Beyond that, we can start in the running back room. Okay. Cam Acres was non-existent. Woof. Oh, man. Like the Isaiah McKenzie, you can, the Acres truthers out there, which obviously are not sitting at this table. We've kind of been off Cam Acres through the offseason, but those who want to sport him will bring up.

that he was dealing with a hamstring issue. And so maybe he was limited in it, not just because of the Achilles injury, but, you know, that he was just going to be mixed in a little bit as they were coming back from the hamstring issue. Yeah, do I push the panic alarm button for people? Yeah. Now, so. For the lights? Oh, I'm not supposed to. I think, I think Al has to turn that off. I got a little scared. We got tighten that up. Oh, now we've got party lights going on. Yes. Why are we celebrating Cam Acres not being on the field? Was that my fault, Al? It was, but I'll, I was going to say I'll take the blame, but I just gave you the blame, so I can't take it. Well, I'm so used to turning it off, you know? Yeah. All right. I didn't know that.

that would make it party in here. So Darrell Henderson, if you didn't watch the game, Henderson started, it was looking like it was all Darrell Henderson. Cam Acres did get on the field. He received three carries for a grand total of zero yards, which not all three carries, I would say, were Acres fault. Like, you mean, he was getting crushed at the line of scrimmage. The burst didn't look like it was there for Cam Acres. On top of that, the rookie running back, Kyron Williams, who that wasn't a high draft capital pick, but we all liked him coming out of Notre Dame, he got injured on the opening kickoff. And now it's a high ankle sprain. So, I mean, he's basically toast, but I'm saying, I think we're lucky that Kaymakers got three carries. I bet the plan was going to be Henderson and Kyron and let Akers just take the whole game off. It could have been, but right now, Darrell Henderson, you know,

a must draft pick at the end of all of your drafts and might be the starter. So this was a game that was a offensive disaster for the Rams, and they're going to have much better days than this. I mean, Twitter would tell you they're going 0.17. Matthew Stafford's arm is broken. It's a disaster. And we would tell you they've got Sean McVeigh. They'll figure it out. So let me ask you this question on Henderson. You drafted him late. It cost you nothing. Are you rolling the dice saying, I did it. I found the late round guy or you or looking at the situation of Cam Acres was coming off of the training camp injury, going to be worked back in. He could be the primary guy. And do you try to go trade Henderson to the Acres manager right now? I don't. I don't. He was, you know, he didn't have a great fantasy game. Now he hit that 13 carry threshold that we're keeping our eyes on. Also had five catches. Yeah. I mean, he was very involved and I want.

to have the main running back on this offense. So you're going to gamble and keep him? I'm going to gamble at least another week because I think if they're bringing Camakers along slowly, he's going to have another good week. If he comes out next week, I think is the Falcons, if I'm not wrong. So, you know, look, this offensive line is the biggest story for me from the Rams. Like I'm worried about their entire offensive line being able to just, you know, they lost Andrew Whitworth. They're all world left tackle. And it looked like they. Didn't have a left tackle. But against the Falcons, they should have more time in the pocket. They should be able to run the ball better. So if you want to trade Darrell Henderson, I think you're better off doing it after next week. Yeah, I wouldn't trade him. I have zero confidence that Cam Acres gets back to a form that represents a team commitment to him. That's all I'll say. And we've been off of him. The concerns about the Achilles. The Achilles injuries have won every battle with running backs historically.

in terms of taking them off the field. So lots of concern. If you have Cam Acres, if you were one of those people that maybe you weren't even in that end to him, but you ended up drafting him, you have no choice but to hold him and hope it gets better. Now the elephant in the room? Yep, this was the Alan Robinson fantasy line, one for 12 on two targets. This game was brutal for Alan Robinson. Like I said, Cooper Cup was the one player that did anything, 15 targets. We talked about it on Never Not Working yesterday, that five target threshold. You want to see it. If you don't get it, it's a bad omen for you for your season result as a fantasy player. So I want to turn to you guys because you guys were, you know, with me on the Alan Robinson train. And are you concerned or are you taking this in stride with, you know, if you want to say things on the defense of Alan Robinson side, you would say,

played every offensive snap except for two along with Cooper Cup. First actual game action with Matthew Stafford. They didn't play in the preseason together. So acclamation, game planning. You know, Sean McVeigh came out and said afterwards he wants to get Alan Robinson more involved in the offense. Which a reminder that Robert Woods had a little bit of a lull to start last year. And McVeigh came out and said, we got to get Robert Woods involved. And then boom, Robert Woods was heavily involved. where I will say is this situation is impossible because everything that's going on right now. What was his stat line in week one last year? It was like five for 43 or something from it was Andy Dalton. Okay. It was like five for 26, five for 43. Six for 35 on 11 target. Okay. So he actually, okay, he had the targets, but I'm saying almost every argument of like that's going to happen right now.

is exactly what happened last year. So it's, it is, and I had Robinson on my team. So like, I am having deja vu in a really negative way of like, holy crap, here we're already starting right there. So it's almost impossible to emotionally, to not have an emotional reaction to this of what happened to me and what happened to my teams last year. Because that, I mean, one, he had two targets technically. The second one was the, a target into the end zone at the very, very end of the game, just to end it. The fact that he wasn't even targeted when Cooper Cup got 15, which is fine. Okay, Cooper Cup's great. Tyler Higby got 11 targets. And I don't, so it's, I don't know what happened where he wasn't even looking at Alan Robinson, but I am, there honestly should be better days ahead. This offense will get it figured out. But I am super freaked out.

You have to make a pretty clear decision very quickly on Robinson's future. Yeah, I mean, I think brighter days. Which is hard. I think brighter days are ahead for him. I think next week against Atlanta, we're going to find out everything because they're going to try to get him more involved. They're going to be able to get him more involved. If he has a bad game next week, though, is going to have been too late to sell him. That's what I'm saying is you've got to make your decision right now. And like, and that's not. That's not what you want to be backed into in fantasy football. You want to be able to ride it out. But if you have two games in a row, no one's trading for him. I agree next week is huge for the Alan Robinson storyline. We don't want to take week one victory laps or concession speeches on players you have conviction about. The Rams are not going to score 10 points every week. And Matthew Stafford, I think a big part of it was, he's on his back the whole game.

You know, these plays couldn't develop down the field. That was definitely a product of it. I'll say this. In that stat we brought up on Never Not Working last year. Last week. Last, uh, no. Yesterday. Yesterday. Sorry. Thank you, Mike, for correcting me with a slightly closer time frame, uh, answer. In the grand scheme of time, I was way closer. You were way closer. I apologize. I'll say this. So one of the caveats that I don't remember if it was brought up was. veterans getting a slower start to the year were an outlier of that group like Mike Evans has many years started with the bad week one Michael Pittman last year had fewer than five targets in week one with a new quarterback so Carson Wentz was brand new to the Colts offense same situation for Robinson I think you have every you should be concerned yeah with the usage but you should be patient and I don't think you're going to be I mean all the reasons that you brought up Mike about almost a post traumatic stress

reaction to Robinson last year are going to dissuade people from paying you any type of premium on Robinson. To me, if you want to bench him and wait and see, that's fine. If you want to take the 65 snaps and say, well, you know, it's going to be better next week against Atlanta. That's an option for you. I certainly am not going to abandon my belief that he's going to be involved in because if you do, you're also abandoning your belief that the Rams and Sean McVeigh knew what they were doing, right? They went out. paid a ton of money for Alan Robinson, put him on the field. It was the first week together. So you get to make your conclusion out there. I will say this. It was the lowest target, the fewest targets in his career for any game. So long as you take out the game, he only played five snaps in. Sure. That's a great debut. What a great debut. Oh, man. I guess what it says is that the range of outcomes, like I didn't see like, you know, in.

Whatever his game log will be throughout the season, I wouldn't have seen something. One catch. Yeah, this bad. No, I get it. I am curious. Comes down with that throw on the last play of the game. You sell him. Do we have a conversation about Allen Robinson today? Yeah, for sure. Yeah. Okay. Into the news we go. News and notes from around the league. Presented by USAA Insurance. Man, we have so much to talk about today. uh ken walker another do not practice or did not practice do not do not what you do uh you shall not practice thank you gandolph unlikely to play monday night correct yeah uh we have chris godwin expected to be a game time decision for fantasy purposes he's on your bench i can't imagine starting him yeah if he if he is active he's on my bench al azar didn't practice

Does not look like he's going to play either. Michael Thomas. Limited in practice on Thursday. Nick Underhill, trusted beat reporter out of Norlands. The way he's moving at practice, I'd be shocked if he didn't play. Okay. You play him? I am, yeah. Greg Roman said that Baltimore would go with the hot hand at running back. JK Dobbins is likely to miss. Hot hand has to be between Mike Davis and Kenyon Drake. I don't think so. I think the only hand that can get hot there is Lamar Jackson. I mean, what's Justice Hill status? He is also recovering from that ACL. So I don't know if he'll be active. I doubt he'll be involved. I don't think anyone's going to get a hot hand. No, not unless they like put it on a stove. I mean, this is not the backfield for hot hands. Ron Dale Moore, forced to miss Thursday's practice, hamstring injury, undergoing an MRI. And then Zachers didn't practice. I have more confidence in Hertz playing.

just based on the way the team is talking about him. I think Rondale's out. I think this is a major injury. I was going to say Rondale's gone for a while. He was missing with, I presume, a hamstring injury. Then he came back and had a reaggravation that sent him to an MRI. Not good for Rondale's outlook. AJ Green, anybody? Sure. I think week one, AJ Green, you're going to be down a lot to shootout to the chiefs and you're going to be throwing the ball. I don't think it's going to be efficient. If AJ Green has 10 targets, he's going to be fine for fantasy. What about Andy Isabella? Oh, come on. I would go with the Dorch before I would go Isabella. George Kittle didn't practice again, unlikely to play. What a disappointment. What a bummer if you finally were like, okay, we're going to start the season fresh. Yep. If you need a tight end, you can look at Injoku on the waivers, Irv Smith, Gerald Everett.

Some other options out there. It's just crazy that all of these injuries we're talking about. These players that are all going to miss week one happened after all of the football was done. The preseason was over. And then it's like everyone's getting stepped on and pulling groins and hamstrings. It's just sad. I thought we made it through unscathed. Well, Chase Edmonds was upgraded to a full practice on Thursday. Okay. We got one. Jason's face did not say he's certain he's going to play. Well, I do think he's going to play. I am terrified of how he plays and whether he can reaggravate the groin issue because we're reading about George Kittle. My groin again. Reading about George Kittle is basically saying like no matter what level of strain the groin injury is, it takes more than a week to recover from. And I don't know that they've given that to Chase Edmonds. He wants to prove himself. He wants that new contract after this one.

I just worry. I'm terrified because he's my guy. All right. A reminder, the Injury Blitz podcast back today. Matthew Betts, our injury expert, he brings that little bonus podcast to you on JoinThefoot.com. Check that out. That was today's news and notes brought to you by USAA Insurance. Learn more at USAA.com slash insurance. Back with the fantasy forecast in a minute. All right, yesterday on the show, we covered the Saints, Falcons, 49ers, Bears, Steelers, Bengals, Eagles, Lions, Patriots, Dolphins, Ravens, Jets, and the Jaguars Commanders game. We're back into the fantasy forecast. Fantasy forecast. We got eight games left to cover. We've got fantasy face off. Supposedly the wield of shame is, did we skip that today?

I think I would like to do it today. I would love to. Okay. Yeah. Well, I guess two-thirds vote we're going to do it. Yeah, I guess we're doing it. Cleveland, the Browns, taking on the Carolina Panthers in Carolina, the Draft King Sportsbook line. It's a pickle. The overrunners 42. So this is going to be a pretty quick discussion on this matchup. Yes, it is. You're not playing the quarterbacks. Correct. You're playing the starting running backs. Nick Chubb, Christian McCaffrey. DJ Moore is in there. So let's talk about some decisions you have to make. Let's go Cream Hunt, Amari Cooper, David and Joku, thoughts on those three players. If you drafted David and Joku, I think this is a fine enough matchup. The Panthers, their one weakness last year on defense was the tight end. And so you're fine to start him. Cream Hunt, good flex play, but the Panthers, you know, front seven, their defense is pretty good.

or Melvin Gordon against the Seattle Seahawks. I'll play the match up there and go Melvin Gordon. Are you going to be holding your breath watching Christian McCaffrey in this matchup? Yes, all season long. I feel like if it's week eight and he hasn't missed one snap, I'm still going to be going, don't get hurt. If you were on Twitter yesterday. Oh, yeah. I don't know. There's clown show reporting just because it's, this was, this was intentionally trying to rile people up. We had, boom, Christian McCaffrey came through, uh, on the injury report with a shin and you're going, are you freaking kidding me? Are you kidding me? And it was he got cleaned. What's wrong with your body? He got a cut on the shin, so he's fine. But like, it just, it comes out. Shin, injury is like,

With Christian McCaffrey, we don't need that in our lives right now, Twitter. It's a dangerous place right now. Please. All right. So Omari Cooper, are you willing to flex him? No. David and Joke, are you willing to give it a go in week one? Yeah, yeah, yeah. All right. The Colts taking on the Houston Texans, the Draft King Sportsbook line, Indianapolis, seven point road favorites. The overrunners, 45 and a half points. and we're going to get to see the Damien Pierce experience with superstar Jonathan Taylor on the other side. People are hyped, but should we temper those expectations? The Colts defense, fourth against the run last year, giving up 17.9 fantasy points per game. People have decisions to make with Damien Pierce based on where they got them in their drafts.

Yeah, I would prefer to wait and see. I mean, if you drafted very, very late, you know, last couple of days last week, you might have drafted him where you need to start him. But I think a lot of people that drafted Damian Pierce have other options. Damian Harris. Damian Harris. Chase Edmunds. Clyde Edwards Allaire. Clyde Edwards Allaire. Oh, okay. That was easy. Yeah, I mean, that's kind of how I'm viewing Damian Pierce because this matchup. He's the no piercer. I do think he is the starter. He gets the first carry. He gets the majority of carry. He gets the lion's share of the carries here. But Andy, you've brought this up before. When you're down two scores early in the game, it doesn't matter how much you want to run the ball. You can't. And this is a tough defense to run on if you're up.

and they're not going to be up. The last two times these teams played, it was like 31 to 3 and 30,000 to nothing. It was just, they've been slacked. It's a big lead. Yeah, it was hugely biggest all time. But you're playing Brandon Cooks. Yeah, they're going to throw the ball. Nico Collins, flyer, emergency? He's fine to sit on your bench. The answer's no. I'm saying he's fine to sit on your bench and see how involved he actually is. I'm sure there are some people that wish they hadn't start. Started Matthew Stafford last night and that they could maybe pivot to a streaming Matt Ryan against Houston. I'm sorry. Your league's not going to let you do that. But you can ask. This could be a strong start for Matt Ryan. Like you could have a very interesting waiver situation. The whole narrative of do you buy into Matt Ryan succeeding on the Colts after this week. Michael Pittman? Yes, sir. You got to start Michael Pittman. Wait. Oh, look. Go ahead, Mike.

Oh, wait, is still Andy? Oh, no. Good work, team. I actually feel sad about that, as great as that was. Triggering weird lights. Oh, thank you. What? It's Mike. Come on. Where's mine? Oh, boy. Oh, boy. All the listeners really enjoying that. Naim Hines. Would you play him? I don't. So I do think Niam Hines is going to have a good season and he'll be very involved. He projects to be a best friend of Matt Ryan in the play style of this offense. So, you know, I- Damian Pierce or Niam Hines? I would go Pierce. Okay. I just making sure. And part of the problem here is that, you know, the passing game, I like Matt Ryan. I love Michael Pittman. And I think Niam Hines has a good season. I'm excited to see what Alec Pierce does. And, of course, Awful Tower.

You know, how involved is Paris Campbell. Paris Campbell, but this just doesn't project to be the game where you're going to get to see them in a situation where they need to throw it for four quarters. Mike's Petty City shirt, by the way, is up on shopballers. It absolutely is. Is there a tank up there too? Yes, I got the tank version. I mean, when you see the shirt, you'll realize you got to get the tank top version. I got the tank top. So I got my eyes on that. And then from this matchup, guns out in the city. Yeah, of course. The sun's out, man. You got to get.