Starts of the Week + Week 14 Breakdown, Bread Pudding! - Fantasy Football Podcast for 12/9

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B-O-M-B-A-S dot com slash footballers for 20% off. Bombas.com slash footballers. To the fantasy footballers podcast with your host, Andy Holloway, Jason Moore, and Mike Wright. Oh, welcome in. It's Delvin time. It might be. What is happening? You're going to get into it that quick.

This is what people want to hear about. And this is a fantasy football show. This is a serious show. We take things very seriously. And we talk about only the serious things. Well. But welcome into the podcast. Welcome in. Yeah. Andy Mike and Jason, the fantasy footballers back with you. And a lot of headlines being made this morning about Dalvin Cook. Not expected to have played. I mean, we said on yesterday's show he wasn't going to be in there.

He is marked as out on a number of platforms. He's made his way into IRs already. Now, the reason for that is because his shoulder came out a few days ago. Just to be clear, he dislocated his shoulder days ago. This is accurate. However, and I buy this, the Minnesota Vikings lost to the Detroit Lions. Sure. And if they hadn't, we wouldn't be talking about this today. That's what I believe.

Now, there are a lot of people out there, and let me give you the headline news if you hadn't heard yet, which is that there have been a number of reports that Dalvin Cook is trending to play tonight. In fact, since the initial report, it's looked even more positive, pointing towards him playing. They found that bath from wanted. I remember that bath. The milk bath. Somehow they made it for real because Dalvin Cook should not be able to play football?

Right now. It's not the normal timeline at all. But they're saying that he might be able to go with a device that he's wearing. That sounds really good. We're going to put him in the device. This should hold your shoulder in place. Don't worry about it. Just play. But you're right. Everything as of the time of recording right now has seemed like the expectation is he's playing tonight. Okay. So Thursday night football against.

the Pittsburgh Steelers who over the last four weeks are the single worst team against fantasy running backs. So how are you handling Dalvin Cook and Alexander Madison? Yes, for some this is a maybe good news, right? You're fighting for a playoff spot. You lost Delvin Cook. You almost conceded. You're laying down in the grave. You're pulling over some of the dirt. Don't worry. I'll take care of this. And then suddenly you sit up with this news and you say,

I mean, like, I have Delvin everywhere. I may not have enough time between right now and game time tonight to go into each league and put him in. That's how many places I have him. But for many people, this is a nightmare because they had Alexander Madison. They don't have Delvin Cook. It is a great matchup. I mean, the Steelers, they've given up 30 plus points to opposing running backs in three of the past four weeks. And the only week they didn't, it was 25 and it was to Devontha Freeman and company. So you're looking at a situation where they've just

utterly stopped being able to stop the run. And now, for some, you're in the playoffs and you wish Dalvin wasn't playing. Right. Because after tonight, you get 10 days off. And then the playoffs start next week. There's part of me that, which is that was the case. But the truth is, if he makes it through tonight without re-injury, he will get 10 days off to recover. He will be a solid, bona fide start going into the fantasy playoffs. Correct. And so how am I handling it?

I'm playing Delvin Cook if he's active. This team has shown that they're willing to go through all of this, get him back in the lineup when they already have a valid backup. Like Madison is a productive backup. And yet they still want Dalvin back out there. So there's no way I'm playing Madison over Delvin. There's no way I'm playing Madison over Delvin either. If Dalvin is back, he's their starter. That being said, I'm not necessarily starting Dalvin as if I would usually start Dalvin as a...

Top three running back currently, and obviously this is fresh breaking news. I have him as my running back 20. He's behind guys like Sequin and David Montgomery and some of these other players that right now I would feel more comfortable starting them ahead of Dalvin Cook. And I've got Alexander Madison at running back 35. I do think that there will be more of a timeshare than...

usual. And depending on the game script and how the game goes, it could have an effect. I don't think that this is going to be a situation where they say, we're giving Dalvin the ball 30 times tonight. Take a seat, Alexander. This is we need Dalvin for all the important drives, all the important plays, and we'll see how the game plays out. It is nice that Dalvin, for your roster, I mean, he's one of the league's leaders in 15 plus yard runs. So he doesn't need.

Look at what Damien Harris just did on 11 carries, right? You could have that kind of a game out of Delvin Cook. Mike, I'd love to know where you are with the whole situation. And I will say this before you comment. Please, please, please. Don't take today's show as the final word. Right. Follow the news. We'll post about it up to game time. We're reacting in real time on this podcast. I think I'm pretty in lockstep with you guys of.

If Dalva plays, I'm going to play him because he apparently passed whatever tests he needed to pass. The team thinks he's healthy enough to go. The matchup is great. So Dalvin would be in. But I also think that Madison isn't relegated to the bench. He's still a flex type of a play, which it's Thursday. So.

I'm not saying put him in your flex. I'm saying you put him in the running back position, but you're playing him as that tier of a fantasy option for this week. But this is high risk. This is very high risk where, yes, they're saying Dalvin is fine, but with this type of an injury, he can go out, first play takes a good shot on that shoulder, and then he's out. All right.

Like, he's just, he's so good that I'm willing to inherit and take that risk on. But I'm watching that, I'm watching tonight's game. If I start down when I'm,

Covering my eyes and just peeking through the cracks. Yeah, every single tackle is going to be scary. Oh, it's going to be. Oh, man. Our own Matthew Betts, this is his quote. He's our injury expert says research crossed the board is conclusive. The early return to play following shoulder dislocation significantly increases re-injury risk. So you're taking a gamble, but I don't think most managers do not have a roster that's like.

Okay, I've got three better options than a risky Dalvin Cook. No, most of them are saying, Hallelujah, I don't have to play Adrian Peterson this week. Yeah, or it's like Chuba Hubbard. Maybe you were able to grab him a week ago after Chris McCaffrey went down and you're like, well, I'm going to play Chuba against the Atlanta Falcons, which is not a bad play. But I would still put Dalvin Cook in over Chuba. I don't think Dalvin Cook.

I don't think any other running back plays tonight except for Dalvin Cook. And the reason being is this is something his body does. He's got experience with this. Like he actually has a problem with dislocating shoulders, which you're like, okay, that's not a good thing. But it also means he knows what it is to recover from them and what the re-injury risks are. And I think that gives him more leeway to prove to the team that he can play. We have...

news other news to talk about we have the fantasy forecast matchups today starts the week boom boom kicker oh boy there is a lot going on and we even have never not working never not working presented by head and shoulders scalp shield technology available at walmart oh the folkland we work a little harder than everyone else um well

The nice thing about the foot clan. Yes. And us. Yes, and us. Well, the nice thing is, y'all don't have to. You just sit back and enjoy the ride. We'll do the deep dives and the research. And this week, what we deep dived, deep doved? No, it's not deep doved. Deep. Definitely can't be deep doved. Well, you say it can't. I can say anything I want. But we took a deep look at a bunch of different depth charts and wide receiver cores. Because.

We've talked a lot about how defense have changed. You've got Washington and the Giants who just are terrible, the chief's defense won to target. And then as the season has come along, you're like, oh, no, these defenses have got it going. Well, the same thing happens within a wide receiver core. Good examples. Mike Williams, historically has always been a downfield guy. That's all he is, a deep threat. Through the first five weeks, all of a sudden he was leading the league in intermediate.

targets. Or Deontay Johnson's the opposite. He's just a slot guy, a PPR machine. It's Chase Claypool, who's the deep threat guy. Well, no, Deontay is leading Chase Claypool and deep targets. So we wanted to take a look, and we came up with two wide receiver cores that I think are important to look at to recognize where it's at now, which might not be what our expectation is, and what we think is going to happen going forward. So the first is the Cincinnati Bengals.

Oh, Jamar Chase. Yeah, what is going on? On fire. Unbelievable. He is the future. He is the brightest star, and T. Higgins is dead. You don't need to start him. You could drop them. You could whatever move on. But that was in the beginning of the year. Early on, Higgins was hurt. He missed weeks three and four, sputtered in weeks five and six. And it was obvious.

you know, what this wide receiver core looked like. It's start Jamar Chase under all conditions and Bench T. Higgins. But since week seven, it's been very, very different. The Bengals are scheming for Higgins. He is a focus. He's not an afterthought. And opposing defenses are obviously trying to combat Jamar Chase. Rich Rebar had this tweet to just illustrate the example of what's happening on deep shots. Through the first seven weeks.

you had Jamar Chase 10 of 17, 384 yards, four touchdowns. Since week seven, on those deep shots, he's one of nine for 16 yards. Defenses have changed. T. Higgins, meanwhile, on those same deep targets, the first seven weeks, he was 0 for 5, and since then he's nine for 14, 239 yards of two touchdowns. So what are the takeaways? Like what can we assume?