Starts of the Week + Week 14 Breakdown, Almost Upset(s)! - Fantasy Football Podcast for 12/7

We've got starts of the week on today's episode. We're dealing with half of the week 14 matchups, and there's a lot of weather issues coming up this week. So make sure you subscribe right now. Click the subscribe before you watch the show so you can be alerted for Sunday live so we can help you out this week. Stay tuned. To the Fantasy Footballers podcast with your host, Andy Holloway, Jason Moore, and Mike Wright. Oh, welcome in. It's defense time. It's man football. Real men. Real men score zero points. You said man football? Yeah. Okay. Okay. I mean. Real men win three to zero. We do have a football game tonight. Unfortunately, no rain. Oh, man. I know. That would have really taken this game down a notch. We could have got like some sleet. Actually, hey, Fookland, this is important that you know. This is, this is.

crazy. Don't tell these people. I'm telling the people. Don't tell people what we've done. I'm telling the people what we've done. So they can't root with us and we can enjoy Thursday night football tonight. In the most important league, champ champ champ league that Mike and I co-manage a team and are the defending back to back to back champions. We're playing for the buy. This is an important week for us. And we have four quarterbacks on our roster. Kyler. He's on by. Yeah. Derek Carr, probably not going to play. Joe Burrow. He's done. And who else? Someone else. But then we had to pick up the only guy left. It was Mac Jones. Yeah. The only guy left on waivers. Mitchell Trebisky, baby. Would you, hey, disadmit, you spent 95 fowb on them. We had to have a quarterback. And we were correct because the entire league conspired against us to add all the quarterbacks. People not involved.

And we're adding quarterbacks, which I commend you for the move. I always enjoy most important league season for you guys. Yeah. Because that just means that you are not fighting me in my important leagues. Yeah. Because you've moved past them. Yeah, yeah, yeah. We have elevated beyond. Yeah, you've moved beyond. You've moved to kind of like. We've ascended. We have reached nirvana. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. So anyways, fuckland. Go Mitchell Trabisky. Route with us. It will be. There will be a football game tonight. Pay no mind to the fact the overrunners the lowest in decades. You said it's defense time. I mean, the defense is going to have a lot of help from their offenses. We just need the Steelers defense to get an interception and take the ball down to like the seven. Yeah. Not too close. No, no, no, not too close. Would you call a 16 to 15 game like exciting? Is that two toddies from Trubisky?

I'm just asking. 1615, is that what you would normally classify as an exciting football game? No. That would hit the over. It could. You can have an exciting low-scoring game. At the end of the game, sure. Yeah. Like the, you know, I'm saying, like, as long as there's big plays and fun things happening, you know. I would not expect either of you to appreciate a defensive battle in any capacity. Thank you. Because you also don't appreciate outdoor football. Thank you. Which, I mean, the real argument for outdoor football, to be fair, it's the fans in the stands that make it fun. Right. That's an experience. I will definitely admit that, like, for fantasy, it's awful. Right. You know what they should do? What? They should build a roof that has, like, an open ring around the stand. So, like, protect the players. Wait, so you're over, no rain straight down. No rain on the heel, but the bands get just.

just snowed on. Yeah. You know, and what's great when you have a multi-billion dollar product, cater it to like 0.001% of the people who are watching the game? Yeah. That's good business. Have you guys considered petitioning for like maybe only letting four or five defensive players on the field? I've thought about it. Yeah, I assume you have. I've thought about less. And what about like every touchdown? One defender. Every touchdowns were like 500 points. No, see, that's ridiculous. What a stupid comment. The scoring of football is great. Yeah. Let's talk about the Megalobul. The playoffs, Jason. You wanted to let people know what's going on. Yeah. So if you are playing in the Megalobole, which I'm sure you are. If you're not, hopefully you get in next year. That is our humongous Megalodon-sized tournament. And the playoffs will be starting like all leagues this coming week. But there is a difference.

Our waivers lock in this, so you need to be prepared. And I want to make sure everyone that is moving on to the playoffs knows you will not be able to make waiver transactions in the playoffs. So maybe pick up a backup quarterback if you so want or your insurance running back or someone else's insurance or Mitchell Chavisky, you know, the hero that we never saw coming. It's the hero we need. And then if you're curious who makes the playoffs. Every single league, the top three seats in your league, move on to the playoffs. You could find all the information, all the rules, all the scoring, every, the leaderboard at megalobole.com. We try to make it very, very easy. We've got all the messaging up there, the alerts. But we want you to be aware and not caught off guard. Also, special shout out to the only undefeated Megalibol team. Is it me? No. Megahertz.

Okay. 26-0-0. So how many teams do you know the count on the top of your head? How many teams were in the league? Oh, in the league? Around 20,000. One undefeated team heading into or nearly heading into the fantasy playoffs. And I'll bet he doesn't win it. I'm going to take the field. Well, look, it's a good bet on the field. I'm all be 20,000, but it'll be thousands. So check that out. Megalobole. dot com for all the details don't say we didn't warn you right isn't that part of this that is part of this and the winner is in our listener league next year i will do my best to win it so that we open up another spot and you are doing your best to win our actual listener league so that you open up another spot for the footland i'm working on it oh it's good because i'm doing my worst you're thinking of the uh yeah that's the eventual winner yeah no i i i

Otherwise, that might be. I told my team to lay down. That's the only reason why. Only path to most important. So the reason it's not competitive right now. All right. Let's jump into the news. News and notes from around the league. Presented by USAA Insurance. Do we have some, hold on. Zach Wilson. Hey, that's our music. Zach Wilson has been announced as the starting quarterback this week and moving forward. I mean, it had to be done. Everything that the Jets have done with the players that they have available, I believe everything that they have done needed to be done. Well, the second Tim Boyle start, I don't think needed to happen. So pretty close. But the point being, Zach Wilson was an anchor upon this offense. It was not working out. You had to try something different. Just, I mean, if nothing else to.

to satisfy some public pressure. You show them that your backup quarterbacks are not the answer, and now we put who is, I guess, the best option for them back in. The real way to do it would have been to play all their backups like one quarter at a time. Just go like one quarter, another quarter, another quarter, and then they're done. It's like one game you prove to the fans that no, Zach's actually the best we have. At what point would Breece Hall become their best quarterback? Like run a system. Miami system? Yeah, exactly. Exactly. Run a wildcat system. Run the ball all the time. Little dump offs over the line. I think they're trying to run it all the time. Oh, that's true. They don't have an offensive line. The Saints updates injury-wise. Derek Carr limited at practice remains in protocol, but it was being reported. He was making every throw. Like there's a decent chance car plays. Tayson Hill did not practice foot and hand injuries. That goes to Wednesday's practice. So we, there's a little worry there with Tayson Hill.

Yeah, we'll see. Josh Dobbs gets the start for the Vikings. All right. Justin Jefferson, full participant in practice. He's back. You know, TBD, what he can do with Josh Dobbs, but we've seen decent games for Hawkinson and Addison, and we know Justin Jefferson is better. So he should probably be in most lineups. Isaiah Pacheco did not practice Wednesday. And what I didn't like is the comment from head coach Andy Reid saying he's being checked out by the team, as though there was maybe. more to the story. So we'll monitor that. Pacheco's been on fire. That would be a big loss. Yeah, a massive loss. But we get to say Clyde Edwards O'Leary over Johnny Taylor this week. So that's always fun. I keep track of those. You're just saying because we're at like three, I think. Yeah, to explain that, they were drafted together. Yeah. And so any week where Clyde is somehow the choice, Mike is rejoicing or maybe, you know, it's a small bit of ointment on the burn of making the wrong selection. A very small bit. Yeah.

You're putting neosporne on a decapitation. It's not going to help. It's not going to make you feel good. Eagles tied in Dallas Goddard expects to play this week. Full practice participant. Welcome back Dallas Goddard. That's big. Would you start him, Andy? I know you at one point earlier this week thought like, yes, he should go right back in your lineup. Do you still feel that way? Like people who've been holding on to him having tight end trouble. Of course. Yeah? Yeah. That's an of course this week against. Dallas. I would. I mean, I thought about him as a start of the week before we got this announcement. The Titan, you know, it's tough in the Titan streets. Sure. Dawson Knox, the 21-day window open for the bills. I guess we could save it for the actual Eagles breakdown, but I wanted to talk about Devontas Smith with Godder coming back. So we'll put a pin in that. All right. A little tease there. Mike's got stuff to say. Hang in there.

They'll say it later. Dawson Knox could play this week. We'll see. 21-day window open. So how are you feeling about your Dalton Kincaid, Andy? Decent this week and slowly declining in optimism. Although I think when you have a player that's involved themselves as much as Kincaid, hopefully the snaps or the targets can be like there's a higher baseline than before the injury. But I'm nervous. I mean, really nervous, actually. It would be Kyle has dug up some information, but it would be an upgrade for Stefan Diggs, who has performed better when they are running 12 personnel. Darren Waller expects to return to practice next week. Hopes to play in week 15 against the Saints. Okay. Yeah, okay. Would you play him? No, not the first week back. This is a hamstring injury that he's re-aggravated already. I need to watch him.

play a full game. And, uh, Naji Harris questionable, but expected to play for tonight's game. And they already announced, uh, Pop Douglas out. Devante Parker questionable for the football game. We're going to watch tonight. Go trubs. Team trubs. Team trubs. Team trubs is in troughs. Nah. That's destiny, Mike. That was today's news and notes presented by USAA Insurance. Learn more at USAA.com. slash insurance. Fantasy forecast. The final two buys, Cardinals, commanders, not playing football this week. Everybody else is, starting with the five and seven Tampa Bay Buccaneers traveling to take on the six and six Atlanta Falcons, the Drafking Sportsbook line, Atlanta minus one, over under 39 and a half. We had...

A pretty impressive couple of weeks from Bijan against Arizona and New Orleans last week. Expected more from his matchup against the Jets. He was just 2.9 a carry. I think it was one of his worst games of the year on the ground, efficiency-wise. But you're obviously playing Bijan. Expectations should still be high. Tyler Adjir had his season low in snaps last week. Yeah, I think Bijon is... someone that you've got to start, but this isn't a good matchup. Schedule adjusted, the Buccaneers are second against the run, and they're really bad against wide receiver. So this is a pass funnel defense. Thankfully, Bijon is a very good pass catcher. So hopefully he gets involved and gets the targets. That's where his fantasy day is going to be fine. If he doesn't get those, he probably doesn't get much on the ground. And Tyler Algiers is not someone you can obviously play. What about the wide receiver matchup for Drake London in all but.

Three games this year, you would have been unhappy to have played him. Obviously, he's a capable receiver. We haven't seen the target numbers up where they were earlier in the year. Any confidence in playing Drake London this week? Yeah, I do. This is a matchup we've been targeting. The Bucks, 28th on the season, adjusting for points for the wide receiver position, and 29th in the last six weeks. So the trend has... does not betray the season total. And I think that Drake London is a fine flex play this week. He was six for 54 against these Buccaneers in week seven. If you got that, it wouldn't kill your week. That's fine for a flex. And two weeks ago, he was five for 91, which was very good. Last week was the Jets. You're not going to expect wide receivers to do great against the Jets. I think you forgive that. This is a good matchup. And it's worth noting, I know all you strong men out there will be upset, but it's in a dome.

And this week's weather is worse than last week's. A lot of rain and more importantly, a lot of wind. So you've got some matchup worries to keep in mind this week. So I think Drake London is completely in play. And like you said, you'd be happy three times, I think probably four times this season that you've played them. I think this week will be another happy moment. On the other side of the ball, Rashad White is a lock, of course. He's the RB6 on the year. His opportunities are always there. He is. He's up against it this week. It's a tough matchup for running backs, but Rashad White is kind of their second best wide receiver. I mean, Mike Evans, he's a lock. White, you just play him. I would be curious when they played earlier in the season. I'm looking that up. So ATL, he was 19 opportunities, 13 for 34 on the ground. Six for 65 through the year. That's where it is. That's where.

You can't look at him like a straight running back. Exactly. That's where Rashad White is. He is, again, I think he's still up against it, but he should catch, what, four plus passes? Mike Evans, averaging 84 receiving yards per game. He's a lock. Anybody else that you're interested in? I mean, Chris Godwin hasn't been in top 36 wide out since week seven. He caught a touchdown last week. Thank goodness, but no, he has not proven anything from just simply catching a touchdown. He's been bad all year. I don't think you start him. This matchup's pretty simple. It's Mike Evans, Rashad White, Bejohn, and then I believe Drake London. Mike and I believe Drake London. Okay, Detroit, nine and three, taking on the foreign age Chicago Bears. I'm going to make Jason the Weatherman today.

The sound the alarm on some of these. Draft King Sportsbook line, Detroit minus three and a half. The overrunners 43 and a half. It's been back down to 40 and a half and then back up to 43 and a half. So I don't know if that is literally like someone's watching the Doppler. It could be. I think there's a lot of concerns about weather this weekend right now. And obviously this, any weather we're giving you on Thursday for Sunday is subject to change. Make sure you pay attention to Sunday live with Mike. subscribe to this so that you get the alert, the notification, you know, when we go live. That's on YouTube. Yeah, on YouTube. And then, but this, this looks like there won't be rain. Right now it's 6% chance of rain, but 13 mile an hour wins. That should be okay. Like I don't, I don't look at this as one where you've got to worry too much about the weather. It is interesting, I think, that the line is just Detroit minus three and a half. I, I,

For a 9-3 team that's played pretty well, obviously they jumped all over the Saints survived last week. I guess I'm a little surprised that lion is not bigger. Really? I mean, divisional game on the road and the lions, even they are 9 and 3. They can be a great team, but they can also be just really mid. These two teams played a couple weeks ago. The lions did win, but only by five points and they were at home. So I think the line makes sense. And honestly, the Chicago Bears defense. has looked much improved. I think that they are not just a dumpster fire the way that they have been over the last few seasons. I don't look at the bears as some smash matchup for my opponents across the board anymore. Gave up only 10 points in Minnesota. They did give up 31 to these lions that two weeks ago, like you mentioned. Jared Gough, how are you feeling about golf this week on the road in Chicago?

About the way you always feel about Jared Gough, like it should go right, but you also know he likes to slip on banana peels from time to time. And throw interceptions directly to opposing players. He's fine. He's a top 12 quarterback. Is that considered an efficient interception? If you throw it directly. Right to the opposing. Yeah, like the most efficient interception throwing the league. I did not make him work for this. Right. I mean, it probably feels. better than when the wide receiver tips it. I like the idea. Because they get to do the thing where they run out the field. Like, oh, no, that was, that's my bad guys. I was the one who threw the ball directly to the defendant. Oh, because they get to tap their chest and say that's on me. No, no, because it's like, look, I made a mistake, but I owned that mistake. So you don't get to say crap to me. I like the idea of a player realizing that they, on average, throwing interception every, you know, like 65 pass attempts. And when they reach, when they're getting close, they just get it out of the way.

Yeah, reset the timer. They want to reset the timer. That's about how fantasy players look at the sport. Like days since accident? Yeah, yeah. He's just like, I'm going to get it out of the way. Yeah. David Montgomery, Jemir Gibbs. Yeah, playing both. Both. You play them both. Where are you in terms of which running back between the two is going to make a bigger fantasy impact in the playoffs? In the fantasy playoffs? Yeah, what's your gut? My gut is that... David Montgomery is going to be the more consistent guy, have more touchdowns. You know, we saw, we've seen it both ways, right? Last year with D'Andre Swift and Jamal Williams, we saw Jamal Williams be a top 10 running back because when they get inside the five, they get the touchdowns. We have seen Jemir Gibbs more involved inside the five. I know one of those was it was called to be David Montgomery. We call it a courtesy. Right. And David Montgomery is like, hey.

You want this? You want this? Hey, little bro. But we've also seen him called, Jamir Gibbs' number called inside the five now since that point. So I think it's pretty close, 55, 45, but I still lean the David Montgomery side for consistency. I think he has a, I think he just has more touchdowns. Okay. What are we doing? And it's a revenge game this week. Sure. Are we doing anything with the Bears running backs? Deonta Foreman. It was a full practice on Wednesday. He had been their workhorse running back, a pretty successful fantasy running back while Khalil Herbert was hurt. Herbert was coming back. It looked like it was still going to be Foreman, at least for a little bit, and then Foreman, of course, got hurt. And then Rochon looked great, went out, played 74% of the snaps, was the running back 21 in a victory. Like, Rocheon was starting to really excite me as a waiver wire pickup. And then with Deont de Forman practicing in full, it's like,

Well, I could see Deont de Forman coming out and just being given back the starting role that he was succeeding at. And I could see Rocheon having that role. I don't think you could play any bear unless you know someone at the organization who can tell you who is the starter. It could be any of those three guys. I would order it. Yeah, that's what I'm on. Herbert Foreman just because he's coming back from the injury. But I don't know. Yeah, I mean, they're a schizophrenic team as a whole. And then you add in multiple running back options. DJ more, you play. Oh, yeah. Amun Rai, you play. Yeah. If you want to take a chance, do you go, let me bring Jameson Williams name up. Obviously, a very explosive player, one of the fastest in the game. You saw him on the end-round touchdown last week. It was the only play of relevance for him in that game. He barely.

had opportunities. Now, he's out on the field over 50% of the time. Would you play him and the boom potential? Uh-huh. Or would you play the actual opposite? Like if you looked up the opposite of Jameson Williams in a book, Robert Woods for the Houston Texans with the absence of Tankdale at this point. I would lean towards. Houston's playing the Jets. I was going to go Woods until I remember the match. I'm going to go Woods still. I'll go James and Williams, hope for the upside. However, a very, very similar, I think, you know, if you're looking, if you're wanting to play James and Williams, it's because you're looking for a high potential boom option that maybe can hit and be something relevant going forward. So let me ask you, James or Jalen Hyatt, another similar archetype player coming off, you know, the buy where you see that post-buy bump maybe. I'm fine. I think they're very similar.

Both of them I like more than Woods just in the fact that if a game script goes a certain direction, like one play gets you a full allotment of like output in fantasy, whereas Robert Woods is not going to do that on one play. I guess I lean high it a little bit. I think I do as well. But they're very similar. Both tight ends very much in play this week. Laporta is a... stone cold lock you could probably lock him in your lineup now and then like set the expiration of that lock for about 10 years because I think he's going to be that kind of a tight in and then Cole come at great opportunity for him we'll see if Justin Fields can get it going this week it's been a bit slow for him as a passer since coming back from the injury yeah I think most people are if you've got commit you're going to be starting them all right let's take a quick break and we'll come back with the colts bangles

Indianapolis, 7 and 5, traveling to Cincinnati to take on the Bengals who are 6 and 6 at this point. The DK Sportsbook line, Indy, minus 1 on the road. The overrunner is 44 points, and here we are. What's interesting is that before Monday Night Football, this game line was 40.5, and Jake Browning's performance in that game altered the line significantly. That's a huge move. Yeah, and it is indicative of, like, you know, I think the ceiling rose for all of the Cincinnati Bengals fantasy options. Like, I don't think people went into Monday night not expecting Jamar Chase to have that performance, not expecting Joe Mixing to have that performance, not expecting Jake Browning, certainly to go 32 for 37. So, you know, from a fantasy perspective, this game is exciting because Indianapolis games are generally jam-packed with fantasy production.

A lot of opportunities for both offenses. Only four times this year has Indy not hit the over. So this is a game you expect a good back and forth affair. I'm really, really like all eyes this week are going to be on Jake Browning because is he banana ramming us with one performance that just looks like, oh man, he's got it? You know, it's really hard with a guy like Jake Browning that we've seen. struggle already, play poorly, and then have that kind of performance to just buy in completely and say, well, that is who he is now. I need back-to-back performances before I'm completely convinced, but I'm excited. He looked fully legit. Did you know that that was their highest yardage total of the season more than any game that they had with Joe Burrow? I did not know that. I would not have expected that. It's impressive. I mean, Burrow.

Remember the season. Burrow was awful to begin the year. And then we really only had just a few games where it was like, okay, Burrow is back. Okay. Gardner, a couple of good weeks. I mean, good, not great. You can stream them, though. Throws the ball of time. Michael Pittman is a PPR lock. Yeah. My guy, Zach Moss, I know he had a bad week last week, but when you're that good, you lock him in. And the matchup is, is. is actually good. Tennessee last week, you brought it up, I think, yesterday, Andy. It's like sometimes Tennessee comes and just shuts down running backs. Sometimes they've given up big performances. You kind of never know which version of their defense is arriving. But the Bengals defense has pretty much been subject to assault from running backs for most of the season.

All right. So what are the questionable plays here, T. Higgins and Josh Downs? Yeah, I think that's fair. Let's start with T. Higgins. So we've laid out the offensive output. You kind of want pieces of this game. Three targets, 78% of the snaps. I don't know that I'd want to force T. Higgins in. Let me give you guys some names here. So let's go T. Higgins or let's say, Let's start at Jaden Reed against the Giants. Good match it. I'm going to stick with Jaden Reed. I'll play Higgins. Okay. Higgins or Dea... I mean, it's quick because it's tonight, but Deontay Johnson against the Pats tonight. Higgins. Yeah, I would go Higgins. All right. And then I'll give you one more. Probably not, I don't know if Andy's in, but Elijah Moore. Ooh, I'm out. You're out? Higgins. Higgins. Okay. All right.

My position on Elijah Moore is that he needs 62 targets to reach a normal output of fantasy production. He might get 62 targets this week. I don't know. Did we mention that Amari Cooper is progressing through the... He's still in concussion protocol? Concussion protocol. As is DTR, he's been practicing, which is a good sign for his availability. He has not cleared concussion protocol yet, but... It is worth noting that he's not practicing with the ones, though. Joe Flacco is practicing with the ones. He is. I... At this point, I expect it will be Flacco this week. Josh Downs has only caught eight of 18 targets the last two weeks. You know, he's... He's in for me. The volume is there. It's been rough, man. One for 10, two for 40, five for 43. I guess there are some injuries in those two games. I've been playing them and it hasn't been feeling very good. I'm okay with Josh Downs. I play him over Deonti. Yeah, I would as well. Hopefully the weather is okay.