Week 8 Matchups + Spicy Starts, Wheel of Shame - Fantasy Football Podcast for 10/25

They're 500 against their implied team total. Three times they've hit it. Three times I haven't. It's a low overrunner in the game anyways at 41, regardless of whether they hit it or not. Herbert's not been an option for fantasy. None of the whiteouts. This is an easy game. I mean, Dobbins is the start of the week, and I'm playing him. The Saints defense has been the most abysmal at tackling and defending the run. Oliva is a maybe to me. Like, would you genuinely like? This is probably, okay, I'm not even going to ask it. It's Olave. I was going to say, like, James Winston's starting, and you've got past catchers for Cleveland, or do you go OLAVo with Spencer Rattler? I go OLAV. I think it's possible that Judy and Tillman both outperform Olave. Because of the passing volume. Ironically, I agree with you. I would go Olave over Judy, over Tillman. But if this was a flex option, I would put in a Joku ahead of Olave.

Buffalo's five and two, they take on the four and three Seattle Seahawks. We will talk about that game in just a moment. Going to take a quick break and then we'll talk Buffalo. All right, back to the five and two bills against the four and three Seahawks. The NFC West is four and three and four, three and four, three and four. So it's been, you know, we saw the Rams get a W right back in the mix. In this game, Buffalo's three point road favorites, the overrunners 46 and a half. It feels like Amari Cooper is going to be a stabilizer in terms of the way we view the Buffalo offense and it's week-to-week consistency. To me, I feel like now that you have a player like Amari Cooper, we no longer have to look at every week as Josh Allen has to piece it together with a bunch of inconsistent options. It looks like to me that Cooper is this foundational piece.

that's going to make Dalton Kincaid fit into the right slot. That's going to make Shakir fit into the right slot. Are you as optimistic about what he represents to the offense as I am? I am. The way that Josh Allen has played in his career, he's awesome, but he loves to throw to guys that are open. He finds a guy with separation and he laser beams the ball. That's not the rest of the core. Like Keon Coleman is like a 50-50 jump ball guy that's not getting separation. Same with the Mack truck. You know, this is... they finally have a player who not at the line of scrimmage like Shakir, but someone that can go 15 yards down the field, run a crisp route, and find space, and then that's where... Catcher with his body. Yeah. Why is Cooper developed into a body catcher? It's easier. It's much more difficult. No, no, no, it's easier. You don't have to lift your arms up. Oh, you're saying literally... The physical action is easier. Look at this. Look at this. You can barely... Oh, I see it. Now watch this.

So for the listening audience, raising your arms all the way above your head to catch a ball is more work than just halfway raising them up. But yeah, it's, I still like Cooper. His receiving line for this game is 54 and a half receiving yards. That's a fine line for a wide receiver one. I'm a little concerned. My big question, and this is personal, Gino Smith. Gino Smith has been on fire. He's been playing great. He's been playing some really nice looking ball. He's like a. just a tier below the way Baker Mayfield's been playing. Baker's been completely on fire. Baker's been throwing the touchdowns. Gino's been doing everything but the touchdowns. But they've looked very similar as far as pocket movement, quality, accuracy of passes, decision making. It's just the touchdowns have been there for Mayfield and not for Gino. But in this game, you do have a little bit of rain projected, 12 mile an hour wins. This isn't a worry, you know, bench receiving options, but it's not optimal conditions.

and you don't know the health of D.K. Metcalf. So can you, where does, where does someone like Gino Smith, you know, sort into your quarterback rankings right now? Because I've had a real difficult time with him this week. I think you brought up the fundamental decision-making piece, which is D.K. McCaf's availability. I don't want to start Gino leaning on just JISN and lock it against a. a passing defense that's 10th against quarterbacks, eighth against wide receivers so far this year. It gives me hesitation because Metcalf is the, you talked about him struggling with touchdowns and Metcalf is the touchdown maker. Yeah. So I would be trying to make my decision based off of Metcalfe. Jack Prescott on the road against San Francisco or Gino in this matchup. If I had to choose today, I don't feel great about Metcalf today. So I'll go. I'd go.

Dak as well. I'll go Dak. Line up adjusted. Well, and the, just schedule-wise, it's a much harder matchup for the quarterback and the wide receiver. Andy said that. And I mean, Seahawks are going to be getting in the zone all day, guys. In the bone zone. The bone zone. Obviously, you start Kenneth Walker. Get into the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, they have been terrible against running backs. This is a run funnel. So Kenneth Walker is limited with illness. I mean, this guy's what's going on here, Kenneth? Yeah, maybe. Take a multi-vitamin or something. Yeah, get on some IVs. There's a lot of illness going around the NFL this past couple of weeks. I mean, he popped up late at the end of last week with the illness, you know, was downgraded to questionable, played. He didn't play his normal amount. He still looked awesome.

And then he popped up again with the illness. It's weird. If Metcalf misses, there's been questions about Lockett, questions about JSN. Are those guys, like, is Lockett a must start at that point? Not a must start, but I find. Would you play either of those Seattle wide receivers over Khalil Shakir in the same game where I would. I would. If Metcalfe is gone, I would play both those guys over Shakir with the addition of. What about Dobbs? Would you play both of those guys over Dobbs against Jacksonville? No, I expect that the Green Bay passing offense is going to go out there and go hard in the paint. So you have a much higher odds of a touchdown to me for Dobbs. I would go Dobbs. What's the feeling on James Cook right now? I think with Ray Davis emerging with Cook's injury, we are not living off the high of the first couple of weeks. We know he's the main guy, but, you know, have you cooled it all on James Cook and where he's headed?

I have not. He still is, he's still coming through. I get it the, like this past week against Tennessee, that was the, like his worst performance. Also didn't get a target scoring. Yes, yeah. I mean, he's 12 for 32 on the ground. That's not very James Cook like. And getting no targets is also strange. But he was still, he was still close to his normal amount of snaps. So he's, he's in as regular for me. Kenneth Walker, by the way, in this game, he is currently the RB4 in points per game. just behind Seguan and Mixing. So if you don't understand how good he's been or you feel like maybe the manager of Kenneth Walker doesn't understand how good he's been. Oh, we know. Take advantage. What's his rushing line? 62 and a half. That is, that's a nice baseline to have. Dalton Kincaid, start of the week, that's an area where Seattle struggles. I really want to see this as a breakout game for Kincaid or he's going to start entering the streaming.

tight-in category for me personally. And then keep an eye on Keon Coleman as a compliment with Cooper because it was a big game last week for him. Yeah. Going back to Dalton Kincaid, I think Kincaid already is a streaming option where I would look. If there was another good option, you know, if I had picked up, you know, David Najoku, I would be willing to, you know, pivot. Oh, for sure. For streaming candidates, you know, you play the matchup. This is a great matchup. So this is a stream. Even if Dawton Kincaid is a streamer, he should start in this game. The Carolina Panthers at one in six travel to the. Oh boy. They travel to the altitude in Denver who. Oh boy. Denver is really playing good football four and three. Denver 10.5 point favorites. What's that face? That was the 10 and a half. That gives Carolina 15 points. The over under is 41 and a half. The Denver defense is delicious.

This game opened at minus seven and then like the Bryce Young News came out and now it's 10 and a half. And now Deontay is out. Deontay Johnson is out. Oh man. Good. Smart. But don't worry. Patrick Sertan full practice on Thursday. It's for the Panthers side, it is legitimately. He doesn't even know who he has to cover now. I don't think he has to. Surton's like, I'm back. Where's the, where's the whiteout? I want to bring up some history. No, he's out. In our first season playing flag football. Oh, my good. You know where I'm going, don't you? No, I, like, this is, I swear to you. Wait, what are you talking about? I swear to you, I had the exact same thought of, do I bring up this story? Yeah. So in the first season of us playing flag football, which was now like, I don't know, 15 years ago. Which is a rag tag group of guys approaching middle age who had.

very little to zero football experience. Yeah. And so we go out there in the first season. Well, here's how the first season went. Towards the end of the season, we scored a touchdown. We celebrated like we won the championship. Yeah, I think that was our only touchdown. Yes, it was. But we had a game where we were playing a good team. And that team had a word I don't want to say. He was, he was, he was emphatically. letting us know that his team is way better than ours. Because he was playing basically like the safety role. Yeah. And he was playing that from the crisscross applesauce. Yeah, he sat down. He sat down and he played in the secondary sitting down. He sat and we couldn't score on them. It was, we were playing seven on six. And so, and so that's certain doesn't need to cover anyone. It's so, because it popped into my head and I'm like, I don't.

Do people care about this? But I thought it immediately. Sir Dan should just try that on for size because it is a mind game. And I'll tell you what, it worked. That was some great defense. We really imploded. Now, for the record, would you get a, for the record about was a four or five years later as our rag tag group got it together, we did win the championship in that league. Would you get a penalty flag if you sat down? I don't think so. Would that be considered taunting? I don't think so. You're not, you're being very inactive. Did you point or did you put the thumb up? Because then that's, oh, yeah, that's a weapon. The question on the Panthers side, only question for me, do you play Chuba? Or, like, the matchup, the full strength Panthers against the Broncos, you're already like, ooh, I don't really want to play Chuba. Now, oh, man, can you play Chuba? I think so.

You play him the way you're playing Ramandre with the confidence. Which one of those two are you playing? Ramandre or Chuba? I would play Chuba. He's been a top 24 wide receiver, or I mean our running back in five straight games on a one and six team. So it's volume, it's passing game. I just think you just put him in there. I literally have that choice in Dynasty. Chuba's in my lineup. Okay. All right. I don't like the matchup, but I mean, it's just. over the course of the game. You had a parley partay on Chuba earlier this year with four receptions. I think three of the four came on the last drive of the game. I mean, you do get garbage time. What if I told you, though, Chuba in games where Bryce Young was the starting quarterback, Chuba was running back 66 and 26? I would go back to last season, the second half, where Chuba was on a heater and that was all Bryce. Yeah, it's too limited this year in those two matchups. I'm trying. And he wasn't getting the work as much. I am trying.

Okay, here's- Very hard to bench. I mean, would you actually play? I've got another name for you. Because I personally I would go Ramandre Stevenson over Chuba. How about Rahim Mostert? Yeah, I'd play him over Chuba. Against the Arizona Cardinals with two of their. He's going to get a ton of work. Okay. What about Madison against the Chiefs? I would play Madison. Man, I think I go Chuba there because both defenses. Like, Madison and Chuba have both been pretty good. surprisingly good, but Chuba is better than Madison as a player. Chuba has actually looked better. They're both terrible defenses or good defense. Bo Nix has been averaging 36 rushing yards per game. Bow Nix is in play this week against Carolina. You might need to just ignore the name and just play the player in the situation. Javante, Mike started the week, a rushing line at 64 and a half. We'll take it. Great opportunity there. I do think that the ball finds Cortland Sutton this week. I'm not trying to play him, but I think Cortland Sutton is going to

Get back to more than zero targets. Yes. And Troy Franklin could be a DFS dart throw or a break, you know, classic case of emergency player. He was going to be in my lineup if Puka was not playing. Are you going to play anybody else in Carolina, like take a shot on? No, no, no. So Thielin's out. Absolutely not. Deonti Johnson is out. Okay. Xavier Lugat's a rookie. And then we're talking about what, Jalen Koker? Absolutely not. I mean, Bryce Young is not set up for success in this game. This is not the one you want to get him back in on. No, but Jatavian Sanders, DFS dart throw. He's been limited, though. He's been limited with a very interesting injury, but the last two weeks, 13 total targets, five for 49, six for 61. I mean, I don't know. You're not having a great game. I'm just saying like DFS. Yep. And, yeah, play your Broncos and keep pounding. Yeah.

Kansas City, the Chiefs, six and oh, taking on the two and five Las Vegas Raiders. The Draft King Sportsbook line, Kansas City minus nine and a half on the road. The over under is 41 and a half. Start up your cream hunts. I think Patrick Mahomes is a streamable quarterback. Mike, if you were Bonix or Patrick Mahomes. Oh, my gosh. I think I go Bo Nix. That's okay. Yeah, I'm not going to fight for Mahomes. I just think he's an option. I'd play him personally over Richardson. Yeah, my rank, I do have, I have Bo Nix on my top 12. Mahomes is currently at 15. I love Andy Reid's comment on DeAndre Hopkins arrival, saying, you know, when they asked him whether he's going to play, he said, quote, why wait, right? I mean, have you seen my wide receiver room? Andy Reid is a national treasure. He's delightful. But Hopkins will help.

Hopkins will help move the sticks. Are you playing Hopkins immediately? Like Andy Reid? I mean, his line is 37 and a half. I don't want to. I think it'll be limited snaps. I think it'll be, you know, we had two of these situations last week with Devante Adams and with Amari Cooper. Cooper got in the end zone. Hopkins could score. I can see Andy Reid 100% like creating some specific plays inside the 15. That are Hopkins. That makes sense to me. So I do think he's got a shot to score. Hopkins or Cortland Sutton? I play Hopkins. At that point, I would play Hopkins as well. I expect the running game to take over for Denver at some point. Yeah, you're going to need a touchdown to be happy with Hopkins. I agree with you. Andy Reid could design up a player too, but that's just such a limited, you know, it's not like Mahomes have been throwing a lot of touchdowns. And so if you're trying to say, the reason Cooper had a good game last week was he had a touchdown.

You know, he didn't run that many snaps, wasn't in that many packages. He was four for 66. With a touchdown, it was great. Without that touchdown, you'd be like, oh, no. Mahomes, yeah, I mean, he has not thrown a touchdown in two consecutive games against Norlands and San Francisco. There's a chicken and egg factor of losing Rashi Rice and losing talent at wide receiver. But they also know that they can hand the ball to Cream Hunt 52 times and win this game. Their defense outstanding against the run. That's why Madison is terrifying, although his rushing receiving combo line is 61 yards. He is scary and just the matchup. If Alexander Madison were completely alone, and now, I'm not saying Zemir White is a good player at all, but Samir White is actually healthy again. He was only in on 14% of the snaps. It's been kind of up and down between.

who's getting the snaps and the opportunities between him and Madison. Madison keeps scoring touchdowns, which was an impossibility last year. He can't stop now. But so Zameer White's return plus the defense here. Madison is a, he's a pretty desperate running back start. Jason, you said that Dalton Hinkades is streaming tight in. Is Travis Kelsey is streaming tight in? He's had two good games and the rest have been disappointing. No, I think Travis Kelsey is more than a streaming tight end. You're going to start him every week. I'm not looking at the matchups. But if you are looking at the matchups, the worst team at guarding the tight end position is the Kansas City chiefs themselves. And Brock Bowers obviously is by most people's rankings. He's the tight end one right now going forward. He's the one that you are most assured of around 10 targets.

a week. He's going to catch a lot of them. Get yards. He can yak. You know, we did see week one is ironic because week one is part of why the Kansas City Chiefs are number 32 against tight end because Isaiah likely went nuts against them. However, they completely schemed Mark Andrews the, you know, at that point the presumed major offensive weapon at tight end. They took him completely out of the game. So maybe they roll some of that to Bowers, but either way, you're starting them. All right, let's move on to a very important Sunday night football game, right? We have Jaden Daniels and the commanders. Jaden Daniels? That's a better way to play. We did get an update. They pushed him today in practice. Like over? And they said they will assess how he responds to the work that they did. He will be a game time decision.

This is big. Sunday night making your GTD. Yeah. Sunday night. So your pivot. Wait, we have two Monday night game? Oh, no. Wait. What are the, what was the order? Do we have? We have Dallas and San Francisco Sunday. That's not Sunday night. They flexed the. That's where I got really good. Yeah. We've got our dock backwards here. Okay. Yeah. Or did they flex it back? What? What is going on? I thought we were told that the Bears commander's game had gotten flexed into prime time. That was a couple weeks ago. Did it get unflex? Can you un flex? Deflex. I don't think you can deflex. Can you deflects? Can you deflects? I don't think you can de flex by like not working out for a while. But I don't know.

All right. Well, let's talk about the Bears. I mean, the Bears and commanders are in their afternoon. Okay. All right. I swear I did. We all Mandela affected that. Yeah. I'm going to find the report. There's a parallel universe somewhere where that is the Sunday night football game. But anyways, it's not. So then you've got more flex. Yeah. Which that's, that's great news. If, uh, if you're waiting on Jane Daniels, if you're. So it was it was flex to the late afternoon. It was early. It was previously an earlier game. Gotcha. So we were right on the flex, wrong on the spot. You got it. All right. The are you playing Jaden? If Jaden is active, are you playing him or are you trying to find a streaming option? If Jaden is active, I am playing him. Because when I look at this week's options, I think that a lot of the streaming players are mediocre to bad. The, the players that you would have.

in consideration that have been playing well like Gino Smith and Baker Mayfield, who you might be like, oh, yes, I'll be fine to wait. You've got major red flags there. Like, I would have played Darnold if that was my decision because it projected to be good. He was my quarterback eight. Outside of that, I don't think most people are going to have, like, I'm not going to Kirk Cousins and Bo Nix and those types. I also want to really quickly just correct something I said on the show yesterday that was wrong. Oh. about Jaden Daniels. I compared him in Kyler and said they were only a point apart in points per game. That was because off the cuff, I was looking at our stats. And I didn't take out the injury game for Jaden. They're about five points apart. Yeah, that's four and a half points apart. That's much better. But since they are the afternoon game, Bo Nix is in the afternoon game as well. If you're, if you're going to ride with Jaden, that would be my suggestion. Yeah, that one, that one is workable. Go go pick up Bo right now and. I mean, Jason,

You literally took the risk on Apuka knowing the upside and the upside of Jaden Daniels is tremendous. And I also, I don't believe that this team at 5 and 2 is willing to jeopardize him. So I think if they put him out there, they think he can play the game. Yeah, it's just the ribs, man. You won one sack and he. It could limit his running game. Yeah. It's dangerous, but he's been so good. Caleb's been good as well. Caleb Williams, his passing line is 27 and a half. That's really nice. That's what I was wowing. The 227 and a half has a passing line for the rookie coming in. That's great. You have Swift, Moore, Allen, Adunze, and Commet, all weapons available to him now. You have a defense that struggled against wide receivers this year. Washington giving up almost 30 points to them. This is not like you want Jaden to play because you want this game to be in exciting back and forth.

I still think it's possible with the way Mario da played last week that you do get an exciting performance. It's not Jacksonville, right? Chicago's not playing Jacksonville again. But the last, like his evasiveness opening up plays down the field. The fact Cole Kometta's completely got the strangle hold on the tight end position again, which he should have from the jump. That was a mistake. The fact that this office is, hey, the office is coming together. I'm going to give Walden credit for what, look. Swift has been valuable for three straight weeks. Caleb's been good. Kenan scored touchdown. DJ Moore has had good games. This is what you wanted to see. So the number one start-sick question right now is one that you literally have your league of record team. You have Kyler Murray and you have Caleb Williams. This is a very interesting question. I know where I lean in this? They're both on the road. They're both on the road.

The matchups are Kyler's against Miami, and obviously this one is Caleb playing against the commanders. I can tell you who's in my lineup right now. Who do you think it is? I think it would be Caleb. It's Caleb. I would play Caleb. I would as well. You know, and again, contextual to your league. I also have James Connor. I don't want double exposure to the Cardinals on the road, East Coast, Miami, good defense. What do you do, though, with the past catchers? I think DJ Moore is just, he's in your lineup. It hasn't been great. You know, you have one really strong game. Every other game is just kind of eh. For me, it's more in combat and that's it. It's so weird of the passing line is 227, which I think that's fine. That's fair. But where does it go? Like these are like Houdini yards just disappearing into the ether because DJ Moore has not been. Romo Dunzee has been catastrophic for fantasy football.

And Keenan has not been good either. He just caught two touchdowns last week. If you are wanting success. Like where are these yards going? I can tell you where they're going. DJ Moore and Cole Commit each have a 24% over the last two weeks of the market. So half of the teams yards are the targets. The yards. Okay. So the yardage is going to DJ Moore and Cole Commet. And so. That's over the last two weeks, but that's the trend that we're hoping to see more of Caleb. You throw out the beginning of the year where he was struggling, throwing for 80 yards or whatever. If that's what he does, then the answer is nobody. If you're looking for the answer in a positive game, it's those two players. I agree with Andy. It's DJ Moore and Cole Komet. I'm not going to do the Alan Adunze stuff right now. I agree. Terry McLaurin, what do you do if Jaden is missing in this game? Are you...

Are you trying not to start him? Yes, I am trying not to start him if he misses. Olave or Terry McLaurin? That's a great question. They're in very, very similar situations. I lean towards Olave personally. I'm a little on the TMC side. Yeah, I mean, I get it. But the difference maker for me is that the Chicago Bears passing defense is really, really good. And so I believe that will be harder for the backup quarterback to do. work against. However, the quality of the backup quarterback is much better. Mariotta, greater sign, Spencer Rattail. Brian Robinson, top 24 in every game he's played, you play him. Zachards always, Zachards is always a break glass tight end. I mean, he's been a top 10 tight in three times this year. He's been not bad three other times. So, yeah, we did get a Senator touchdown last week.

Oh, yes, we did. I am the Senate. 2025, everybody. We have Sunday night football, Monday night football to talk about. We'll take a break. Come back with those exciting games. All right, Dallas, three and three, San Francisco three and four. Last place, San Francisco four years. I mean, yes, yes. Let's go to the Falcon and get his thoughts on it. Oh, is that why he's not here? Is this depression for his niners? I get that. I get that. The last place being behind the cardinals. Yeah. That's embarrassing. You must be so embarrassed. No retort, oddly. Look, Dallas needs to win this ball game, but the 49ers are four and a half point home favorites. The overrunner is 47. This is a very consequential game at this stage of the season for both teams. Dallas can slip to three and four or they can be back above 500 and on the right track. San Francisco could slip to three and five with hopes that McCaffrey comes back, already lost IUC. I would say that Brock Purdy had, he had his struggles last week.

And we know the struggles of Dallas defense has had. So, you know, Vegas has it as San Francisco minus four and a half. We're waiting on news on Debo. We don't think we'll have Joanne Jennings. You've got rookies and Ricky Pearsall and Jacob Cowing trying to fill in the gap. You know, they're going to lean on the running game. Yeah, this is the Jordan Mason game. His rushing is at 80 and a half yards. That's the line that D.K. is setting for him. I mean, all the. Like Andy said, the passing weapons are gone and the matchup. The Cowboys, one of the worst teams against the run. If you're adjusting for schedule, they're 26th. And Mason was right back in last week. It was up in the air. Is it going to be there with the shoulder? How much work? The answer was all of it. So Mason is in with full confidence. Dallas is running defense. I doubt they fixed it over the break.