Starts of the Week + Week 3 Breakdown - Fantasy Football Podcast for 9/19

to the fantasy footballers podcast with your host, Andy Holloway, Jason Moore, and Mike Wright. Oh, welcome in. It's football time. Ooh! I got to give this game a little bit of juice here. It's going to need some help, boys. I appreciate that, Mike. We've often been surprised by a pleasant Thursday night football game. It's just some... Some, you know, it's a book, judge the book by its cover thing. Usually that book cover is very accurate. Yeah, Jets Patriots. Yeah. We get to see Drake May tonight. That's cool. Oh. Oh. What are you doing? I've just leave Jacobi alone. I said this before the show. My biggest hope is that Jacoby makes it through this game. Like that's, I want to be proud of him for just leaving this game uninjured. They have no offensive line. They're facing a good pass rush.

I fear for the man. But how are you going to feel if like, because you've been saying this all week, like you have basically been placing your bets on Jacoby Brissette, not surviving the game. I mean, if it happens, you're not celebrating. No, no, I really don't want it to happen. I just, it's literally me, you know, when I'm looking at it from a fantasy football perspective and a, and just an analysis perspective of the game, I don't know what they're going to do. Like I just feel like. You know, we saw that with the Rams and the Cardinals when they were down their offensive line. And Matthew Stafford, who is a much better quarterback than Jacoby Brissette, facing a much worse pass rush in the Arizona Cardinals still was just like, it felt like an unfair fight. And so the Jets are a bit deficient in the pass rush department due to injury at this point. So maybe it's a little bit of, you know, give and take there. Well, we'll.

Pray for Jacoby. Yeah, I mean, I'm being hyperbolic, and they're both NFL teams. It's not just going to be, you know, the bullfighting red flag offensive line. They're going to have some stuff in store. But, yeah, I hope it is more competitive than we think. Thank you for joining us today on the podcast. You can find us over on X at the FF Ballers. Jason's at Jason FFL. You can follow Mike at FF Hitman. I'm at Andy Holloway. We have a free Discord server. You can go join the community chat over there, ballers discord.com. And if you want to support the show, if you want a bunch of free perks, extra episodes, the ultimate dashboard, premium tools, resources, the streamfinder, all of that for the end season, for the end season tools, join the foot. The dashboard is hot.com. It's already become like a...

an indispensable tool for me like it just speeds up my process so much to just go and like look at oh yeah this is what my lineup should be and then just mirror it as opposed to mike who loads his lineup into the ultimate dashboard and it explodes it doesn't let him put christian mcalfrey in it doesn't let him put t higgins in it doesn't like change any of their injury outcomes which we can't do unfortunately the dashboard has asked me repeatedly are you sure this is this is your team You did? Are you sure? You did that? I don't take pleasure in saying this, Mike, but I looked at your team this morning. Uh-huh. Did you like it? I looked at it and I said, this is a bad team. Yeah. I bet the spot start tool, the spot start when you click there, it's just, it's just all the guys on the way for like, drop Christian McCaffrey and play to Kobe Myers. And I just looked at your bench and I'm like, oh yeah, T. Higgins, all right, but I mean.

Even without T. Higgins, this team's bad. And I'm like, oh, wait, it is. Oh, Christian McCaffrey. Oh, okay. Like, I mean, your team is. Look, we're leaning heavily on the Cleveland Browns DST this week. Have you, is this a good time, Jason, to bring up our routine like you need to hang in there if you're 0 and 2 messaging? It really is. I was actually thinking about it because we usually bring this up after a hard start to the season. And with Mike. Having, I mean, Mike is like the one case I've ever thought like, yeah, I don't know, man. I don't know. You know, we tell the footland, like, don't give up. 2025. Never surrender. You are always in it. We get so many messages every single year. Yeah, we have the data. Never give up.

Never surrender. We get those messages. I started 0 and 4. Oh, and 5. And I went on a run. I made the playoffs. I won the championship. We tell people like, don't give up, especially because some people in your league are going to give up. And they're going to be easier matchups down the line. But Mike, I don't know, man. We will figure something out. He's not even at the point in the season where like selling makes sense. No. I'm not selling. No, I mean, O and 3 is normally when we get the messages and the tilt. And we have the data. I mean, we have thousands and thousands of players every year. And we hear from all of you. And like people are coming back and winning because like you said, other players, they lose interest. They're not as active. The waiver wire, they're ignoring it. They get injuries. I mean, injuries happen every week. So the team that looks like a powerhouse suddenly disappears. So, yeah, I mean, good luck, Mike.

Hang in there. Hang in there. Let's talk about some news. News and notes from around the league. Presented by USAA Insurance. Cooper Cup has been officially diagnosed with a high ankle sprain. He will spend the next week or so in a cast. I'm guessing not playing in that, but the team is not putting them on IR right away. I wonder if this will be a... Still a chance for IR, but we want to see how the swelling goes. That's exactly what I think it is. Also, you know, you don't have infinite, I believe, you know, you can't put everyone you want on IR and have them eligible to return. And they already have a quite full hospital room there. So I wouldn't be surprised if he doesn't go on IR and misses like three weeks. Nico Collins didn't practice on Wednesday due to hip and foot injuries. Do you have any other information on his?

situation. Wednesday is not always a red alert day. Yeah, there was quite a few big names that they just, like, Nico didn't practice, C.D. Lamb did not practice. D.K. Metcalfe. McKaff did not practice. These are all situations where it's just, it's always, it's Wednesday, so don't freak out, but. Put your antennae into the air. Yeah, it's really helpful to know two things. One is Wednesday practices for veterans are often missed. That's normal. And two, all three of those players finished the game. You know, I saw D.K. pop up and I was a little worried. I went and watched his postgame press conference. That dude was not hurting. And so maybe there's something with the hand injury or whatever. But like he played the whole game, had no issue.

afterwards was, you know, jovial and normal and then has the Wednesday practice off. So I'm not worried yet. Jake Ferguson, not Jack, Jake Ferguson was limited on Wednesday, but he was back out there, which was awesome to see. I saw some film of that. Jordan Love returned to a limited practice on Wednesday. There is still a chance he plays. I'm still on the doubtful side. If you, not that you care about my opinion, but that's where I'm out. Yeah. I'm doubtful as well, and I'm doubtful of. If you had Love, I have to imagine you are already planning for someone else to be your quarterback for this week. And Jordan Love, should he miraculously recover in time to play, he's on the road against the Tennessee Titans with that bum leg. So I would probably stick with your other option, unless your other option was just garbage. Kenneth Walker still didn't practice on Wednesday. There was a slight.

Didn't play last week. A short little video clip of him running, not even at full speed. He's just kind of, you know, not a jog, but whatever. Like our kind of running. Yeah, like our kind of running. And then he just, and he grabs right to the side. Oh, really? I didn't see that. Oh, gosh, dude. This is an injury or an area of his body that he is, he's dealt with. Do some sit-ups, bro. Yeah. Do the turn on the top of the sit-up, man. Get those obliques tight. Rahim Moster returned to a limited practice could return this week. Devon A-chan is fifth in the NFL and total touches at the running back position. You're going to break him. Stop it. Do you almost, are you almost excited to see Rahim Moster back? Yeah. Because they lost Jeff Wilson, who also returned to a limited practice, same sit-up injury as Walker. But most of being back takes some load off of Devon A-chan. It's very good for.

The Dolphins, and I think for A-chan. A-chan's fantasy value is going to come mostly through the air. You saw a lot of checkdowns when Skyler got in the game. I noticed that there was no line for his receiving, for his receptions. I think you're going to see a ton of dump-offs there. So letting Rahim Moster run it up through the tackles, I think it's good. That was today's news and notes presented by USAA Insurance. Learn more at usaa.com slash insurance. Starts of the week. We'll kick off our matchup show with our starts of the week for week number three and a quarterback. I'm going Joe Burrow. Joe Burrow against Washington on Monday night football. He got back on track last week and he didn't even need Jamar Chase to throw 258 and 2. Higgins could return even if he doesn't. I love this matchup.

This is the team that Baker Mayfield carved up for four touchdowns in week one. Where Daniel Jones looked very competent last week, finishing is the QB7. And Washington has allowed every quarterback not named Trevor Simeon or Mac Jones to score 18 plus fantasy points in the last 18 games. So it should be a very easy 202 for Joe Burrow with tremendous upside against Washington. All right. And for my quarterback start of the weekend, to get that button ready, because I am going to do it. I'm going to. Send in the car. Send in the car. He's doubling up. Oh, no. Stream of the week, start of the week. He was your hungry for more. This is all bad news. Mike is starting him in League of Record. That might be the worst. That's the worst part of the news. I'm starting him in a couple leagues. I really do think it's, I'm buying into the change with Kubi X offense.

What we've seen is not just that, you know, he had two good weeks. It's that there is a reason for it. The way that they're using their players much, much smarter. Alvin Camara looks great. And the Eagles matchup seems great. I mean, the Eagle secondary, it's still not fixed. They're tied with the Rams for the highest yards per completion allowed in the NFL. And they've allowed a top 12 performance nine of their last 12 games dating back to last year. I think this, and he's at home. I'm going to start him if I got him. And I'm trying to look, you know, of a different type of start, but if you didn't get Derek Carr, I'm going with Gino Smith against Miami. Jason, what is your face telling me? He just said this morning that he loves Gino. I had no idea. Hey, we ride, bro. I had no idea that he was hair of steel underpants. I had no idea he was your start of the week. I'm.

Completely in. If you saw the waivers that just ran a couple minutes ago, I picked them up. Did you pick them up? I did. I think I might be starting this week. The Smith only has one pair of steel underpants at a time. So we are one leg in. Oh, we're one leg in. Yeah, if you're if you're if you're going in with me. I don't know. We're not really protected. I'll go without steel underpants. You can have the steel underpants. All right. So here's the deal. Gino Smith is looking like a good quarterback again so far, QB7, QB5, completed 74% of his passes. The Ryan Grub offense is working. We saw it expand even more last week to get JSN properly used and the Charbonne zone, which I anticipate we will be in again. The dude, the only way that he is getting it done.

Talking about Zach Charbonnet. Volume is volume and a pass interference in the end zone. That's how we're rushing touchdown happens. Otherwise, the scores are going to go to Gino and that wide receiver crew. The Charbonne zone, huh? This is what you're left with? Charbonnet is a fine enough start, but that guy's, that guy sucks as a runner right now. I mean, if you've been a long time listener, like I loved Charbonnet. Like beyond measure coming out of college, I thought he was so exceptional. and he just looks so big and slow. He's still a good pass catcher. He's fine for fantasy. He's a workhorse back while, you know, while Kenneth Walker's out. I'm not saying sit in, but it's gross. Yeah. My running back start of the week is Tony Pollard against Green Bay. He has looked very good so far. Maybe the steadiest part of that tendency offense. RB 11 and RB 23 through two weeks.

and he's the only running back to see 15 plus carries and four targets in week one and two. Green Bay matchup, it's run funnel. They're giving up 5.1 a carry, and we're set up. Like this is, it's time. It's time for Tony Pollard to take the mantle. The identity of this team is going to be to remove the ball from Willis's hands. So, especially if you get Malik Willis out there, and this is a lower scoring game potentially, a run versus run. I think Tony Pollard is a great start. Yeah, I agree completely. My start of the week is going to go with your quarterback. We love playing against the Washington commanders. My guy, Zach Moss. He is the clear lead back. If you haven't paid attention, the whole, like, is it going to be Zach Moss? Is it going to be Chase Brown? Is it going to be a 50-50 timeshare? You know, the early season bets are in, and it's been Zach Moss. I mean, 65%, up to 80% of the snaps last week.

75% of the rushing attempts. Last week against Kansas City, he had five carries inside the 20. It did not amount too much, but Washington is not Kansas City. Their defense ranks dead last and points per drive allowed. I mean, you saw Devin Singletary carve them up last week for 5.9 a carry. I think Zach Moss will have the work in this game. They will be up and winning the game and the defense won't be able to stop. And I'm going with Zamir White, who gets to play against the Carolina Panthers. I saw this, Mike. Look, this is all about the process, man. Vegas is a five-point favorite in this matchup. The Panthers are allowing basically 200 rushing yards per game. And here is the quote from the head coach of the Raiders. Quote, I'm talking about Zemir. I'm going to keep pumping them up. Our goal.

is to get 20 plus touches with him. That was the goal last week, or this week. It didn't happen, but that's going to be the goal this week and every week while he's the starting running back, and I'm here. Game script-wise, this is a make-a-break week for them. They're dead last in the NFL and rushing yards per game, and they face Carolina. I think that this is a, I'm not going to call it the get-right game, because I don't know if it means he will. You don't know what Wright looks like for Zameer-Wy. I don't know if for the future he is now.

on the right path. But for this week, it's just a right game. You can play. Yeah, there you go. It's a white game. Yeah, it's a mirror white. All right. It's the right time to play white. And that'll do it for today's show. Where are we moving to? Wide receiver? Yes, sir. All right. I'm going to go with Chris Olave against Philadelphia. This is the get right game for Chris Oliva. Rashid has stolen the headlines, but the usage is there for Crystal Lave and the matchup is there for Crystal Lave. You know, this is a Philadelphia secondary that gave up the most fancy points to wide receivers last year. And is that the second most through two weeks this year? And so in week one, we saw Jaden Reed and Christian Watson score against him. Last week it was Mooney and Drake London. Maybe a sell high for Drake London, honestly. I don't know. We'll see. But this is Chris Oliva time. They're going to need him because, you know, I think you're going to have Philadelphia staying in this game.

You need to go to your go-to receiver, not just your downfield guy in Shaheed. So Chris Olavay versus Philadelphia as my start of the week. Nice. I'm going to go with your my guy as my start of the week. Calvin Ridley against Green Bay. Last week got into the end zone twice. He was awesome. Through two weeks, he has 24% target share and 74% of the team's wide receiver fantasy points. That is the highest in the NFL. There was a point last week when Will Levis was trying to bring them back at the end of that game. where an end zone target went to this one player and I was like, who is? And it was Hopkins. Like it was the corpse of DeAndre Hopkins in the corner of the end zone. And I was like, just look like a guy. You almost forget they have other receivers. Yeah, well, that's the point is he is the most important part of this offense. And he's a high upside type of player, the Packers secondary, allowing the fourth most receiving first, first downs in the NFL so far. Jameson Williams against the Arizona Cardinals.

About 90% of the snaps, a 25% target share, five receptions in each of the first two games. He is a part of the offense, and he's playing against the Arizona secondary. Plus, this is just, this is a matchup. The Lions in Arizona, you're going to want pieces in that one. And Jameson Williams is, he's getting into my lineup. Andy is very frustrated with himself for trading JMO for Amari Cooper. Right now, I'm very frustrated. I'm going to look into your orb. You will remain frustrated. Maybe. Maybe I will. I really, you know, I really tried to trust Jason last week. On Amari Cooper? Yeah. Oh, Jason's fault. Oh, that's my, the trade was my fault. Sort of. Okay. All right. Well, hey, I'll take place. Now you're even. Now, oh, no, we are not even. We will never be even for my Jalen Waddle CD Lamb trade. You guys made me do. You are even. We will never be even. You're even.

Yeah, if you, if that... You shouldn't have a championship last year because C.D. Liam shouldn't have been yours. It should have been mine. Everything is even. So yes, it's your fault. If you blame that one on us, then this one's your fault. But, um, no, my face... I never knew about your trade. You guys told me to make this trade. You don't know about how many trades are being made out there in the world. That are your fault. Um, all right. Did we get through all the wide receivers? We did. All right. I'm going to go. Brockum, sock them. Brock.

Bowers. Heck yeah, man. Against Carolina. Targeted on 30% of his routes. Brock them, sock them. Okay. And right now it's just ridiculous. Brock Bowers is, uh, this is the endorsement for every trade you can make to get Brock Bowers on your roster. Every flashy tight end name you can throw at the manager of Brock Bowers to make the change. Like this offense is going to function. The one variable. in the equation for Brock Bowers this year is a quarterback change. That would be the one thing I'd be worried about is if a quarterback change happens, you just never know what target distribution is going to look like. But I do know that tight-ins wide open all over the field are probably going to get targeted. It's just the contrast between what we're seeing this year from Kyle Pitts and what we've seen from Kyle Pitts for 46 games and what we've seen through two games of Brock Bowers.

You know, this is not an overreaction. Like this is, the evidence is already there that Brock Bowers is going to be an impact tight in for the remainder of his career. And we're 46 games in begging for the kind of utilization from Kyle Pitts that we got from Brock Bowers as a brand new rookie. It's just, the contrast is massive. I throw Dalton Kincaid's name in there as well. He was the promised one and Brock Bowers is the one doing it. I got a question on Twitter that was, would you trade Nico? My sweet precious Nico for Brock Bowers in a dynasty league. Oh, in a dynasty? Maybe. I said, I think I would probably do that. Like, that's my level of confidence in Brock Bowers after just two games. Wow. Yeah, crazy. And I don't blame you at all. If you have a tight end not named Trey McBride and you can swap them for Brock Bowers, I would do it. My start of the week this week is Mark Andrews, another one of those top end tight ends who has

yet to really explode and look great. He would have last week if he wasn't overthrown on a really nice wide open spot. In fact, he's number one in fantasy points separation score. He is getting open. And the nice thing is this last week, we saw that Andrews was running way ahead of Isaiah likely. 41 to 32 snaps, 27 to 18 routes run, 15% to 10% target share against Dallas. I think this is going to be. one of those games where they're going to need to throw the ball. This is like a playoff game. Dallas is one and one, and the Ravens are 0 and 2. Right. So they're going to rely. That's a fun game. It is. I'm very excited for that. I think they're going to need Mark Andrews in this. He hasn't looked bad to me. So he's my start of the week. And I wish I could jump into the dumpster and find something this week. But I just, I, there's nothing. There's no amount of metal in the world that can get me onto one of these nasty tight ends right now. But it's George Kittle versus the Rams.

Debo is out. 12 games without Debo. George Kittles average seven targets and 80 receiving yards per game. This one is very easy of the Brock Kittle, Trey McBride, the only three tight ends I have true faith in at this moment. He's going to crush. All right, let's take a break and we'll jump into the forecast. All right, another big week of games. No bye weeks. Lots to get through. Let's jump in. It's time for fantasy forecast presented by Draft King Sportsbook. The New York Giants at O and two take on the Cleveland Browns. They're one and one. The Draft King Sportsbook line here, Cleveland minus six and a half at home. The over under is 38 and a half. I think when you look at this game on the surface, you just ask yourself, can New York score any points? I mean, an implied point total of 16, Cleveland at home, a solid defense. They're going to make Daniel Jones.

look really, really bad in this game. That's the likelihood. And now, Jason, you were, you were sitting back and asking the question, is Deshaun Watson going to have a good fantasy week? Because you're laboring over the Purdy and Gino and, you know, Watson, maybe Watson. Yeah, I've got a real conundrum at quarterback this week for me. And certainly in the mix is Deshaun Watson, who I think could be a top 12 quarterback this week against the Giants. The Giants defense is not a terrible defense, a terrible defense, but it is a really, really bad overall team, and that puts you in situations for the other offense to score. Being on the road against a great Cleveland Brown's defense that I think will not allow Malik neighbors to do what he was able to do last week in a much easier matchup.

The Giants just aren't going to do much. They're going to turn the ball over a couple times. They're going to punt a lot. And so, you know, the implied point total for the Browns is 22 and a half points. Deshaun Watson should have an okay game. Last week, Devon Singletary had, he looked very good, but it was Washington. 16 for 95, six a carry, one touchdown, did have a fumble, only one catch. Somehow that was only good enough for running back 19 on the week, but it was a nice week for Devin Singletary. It doesn't feel like this is going to be a nice week for Devin Singletary. No, no. Devin Singletary is a very, very good matchup based option. If they're playing a bad run D, they're going to rely on him. He's going to do well. He's a solid running back. But in a game like this where you're a six and a half point dog on the road against a good defense, I'm not playing Devin Singletary.

Yeah, so you'd go Charbonnet easily over Devon's Singletary? Easily, yeah. Singletary is a workhorse. I mean, 71% of the running back attempts in week 1, 94 this past week. And while it was only the one target, that was all the targets to the running back position. We could see more of those this week. Looking over at the Brown's running back situation, I think that's the biggest question to me of this particular matchup. Jerome Ford, week one starter workhorse for the Cleveland Browns. His line right now for rushing yards sitting at 49 and a half. But Deonto Foreman was the one who came in and got the bulk of the carries. Well, Jerome Ford had the higher yards per carry because he had the big run. But it's between these two guys, where are the two of you? Where are you looking? Because one of them should be good in this matchup. I think it's Foreman.

Personally, in the way that this breaks down, he had 48% of the rushing back attempts compared to 24% for Jerome Ford last week. And this is the type of game where I think you have that big body back to ice the clock. I think it's Ford, man. You think he's the foreman versus Ford, man. Oh, I see what you did there. Are you on the Jerome Ford side? I'm on the Ford side. I mean, I'm not, that's why I asked the question. I think if you get the question right, you're going to have fantasy points. One of these guys are scoring a touchdown and one of these guys getting 15 carries. Your guess is as good as mine. I'm going based on the utilization of last week and the literal pounds they weigh. That's, that is my hypothesis. What's crazy about Ford is that he was awesome.