Fantasy Football 2017 - Week 6 Keep/Trade/Cut, Pump the Brakes, Big Questions

The following the buy, the New York Giants, I think you're living on last year at this point with the Giants defense. They're just, they're not what they were last year. Whoa. And so, yeah, I mean, he is, you know, a wide receiver three type of player. Now, I just traded for him in our league of record, but this was for the most part on the back of him being a great keeper option because I still think he's one of the.

five or six most talented wide receivers in the entire league, and he's going to be a free agent at the end of the year. Yeah, the Rams would have to franchise Sammy Walker. At this point of the season, and judging from his weird cryptic messages on Twitter, at this point, the Rams would have to franchise him to keep him. Right. And are they willing to do that or not? All right. Thursday night matchup, the Philadelphia Eagles take on the Carolina Panthers. This surging.

Carolina Panthers. Cam Newton is looking healthy. In Carolina, favored by three. And Cam Newton's getting done. Let's start with Cam Newton. I think that's the best place to start here. Are you playing him against the Eagles? The Eagles secondary, now the Eagles are four and one. However, their past defense is 29th in allowing yards. Yeah, I am absolutely playing Cam Newton in this game.

I said last week when I kind of gave the pump the brakes on Cam that if he got it done against Detroit, I would buy in to healthier Cam what he's able to do with McCaffrey and Funches and some new weapons now. You know, it's ironic because you lose Greg Olson and all of a sudden Cam Newton has to spread the ball around and be an actual better quarterback.

not have his crutch. And that's what happened. Exactly what happened in Cam's huge 20-15 year when he lost Calvin Benjamin and then all of a sudden had to figure out ways to make it work. The Eagles defense has not been great. I mean, they've been good for fantasy because they're a ball hawking type of defense. But, you know, I don't fear them shutting down the Panthers offense, especially in Carolina. And with Carson Wentz on the other side of the ball.

I know Carolina's defense has been good, but Carson's pretty much getting done on everybody right now. And so if they're able to keep the score, you know, racking up, then Cam Newton, I think, is a start this year. You've gone from full single toe dip to cannonball right into the waters of Cam Newton. I think I've gone with an elegant dive. I'm not splashing on people. I'm just taking a nice dive, little splash.

That's it. I would consider mine a belly flop. Oh, yeah? Yeah, because I'm all in for this week in particular. But a belly flop hurts, so you might have to get out of the pool in the very next week. I agree Carson Wentz, despite the matchup being terrible, you have to start him. What about any of these running backs for the Philadelphia Eagles? Garrett Blunt, Smallwood, if he plays. I don't expect Smallwood to play. We expect him out? Yeah, he still hasn't even practiced.

limited. He's out, and this is a Thursday night game. So you've got Corey Clement coming in to back up Lageret Blunt. I don't think this is a good matchup for Lageret Blunt. This is one where you're chasing a touchdown. I don't think he's going to get it done on the yards against Carolina in Carolina. So I don't really trust any of the running backs there for the Philadelphia Eagles. And I mean, 14 for 74 against the Cardinals. That's a startable week. Yeah, certainly. Ligarit Blunt has.

He has looked better the last few weeks. And I'm certainly not saying you have to bench him because he has the opportunity for the touchdown. And maybe he gets, you know, another 70 yards, especially with Wendell Smallwood out. He'll have more utilization. But I'm not excited. And I think a lot of teams out there are going to have better options. So here, in this same game, would you rather start LaGarrett Blunt or Christian McCaffrey? Oh, my goodness.

Christian McCaffrey has been, I mean, he scored last week, but overall you're talking mostly a disappointment. Mostly a disappointment as well. Scoring format certainly matters. I know that's a cheap way to get out of answering the question because in PEPR, you have to play McCaffrey. Right. But in all things consider, I'd probably start, I'd probably start Legerick-Blunt over McCaffrey. Yeah, I lean McCaffrey. I think if you're in half point,

or more of course yes but just you total yardage totally let's so the total yard is wise i would lean that legris blunt will have more yards than mcalfrey yeah i mean it's it's a strong it's a strong argument right now mcalfrey is one of the uh i think he might be the only running back in the entire nfl with 30 or more carries that does not have a hundred yards on the ground

total you know if you look at his that's not getting it done no the yards in the last five weeks on the ground for christian mcalfrey 10 16 16 7 but all his utilization comes in the passing game he's had over 30 yards receiving every single game one of which was over 100 yards you know most of the time he's catching four or five passes

I think his baseline, if you're in any kind of PPR or half PPR, is worthy of starting. Zach Gertz is an auto start being targeted almost 10 times. A week, you play him. But what about the wide receiver core for Philadelphia? Aguilar, the big touchdown. Tori Smith, the big touchdown. Alshan Jeffrey, the number one, got shut down for the most part by Patrick Peterson. Are you playing just Alshan or are you looking at these secondary options?

Yeah, I think I'm playing just Alshan. Panthers against the wide receivers, they've been middle of the pack. I think they're the 14th ranked against fantasy points. Alshan, I believe in the talent, and someone else will get it done. I mean, if Carson Wince throws for less than 250 yards and less than two touchdowns, I think I'll be surprised. And so someone's going to get it done, probably Zach Hertz.

But I can't play the guessing game. I can't start Nelson Aguilar, Tori Smith. I start Alshan. I start Ertz. And then we've talked about blunt. That's pretty much the Eagles for me. All right. The Panthers side. Ed Dixon coming off of a sizable performance of absolute ridiculousness over 170 yards. Ed Dixon, I think, is a fine, tight-end stream in a pinch.

in a pinch, but there's a lot of better options likely on your waiver wire. Either you grab them like Kobe Fleener, I would much rather play him over Ed Dixon. The Carolina Panthers wide receivers, though. Calvin Benjamin, Devin Funchis. Funches has been getting it done in a big way the last few weeks since Greg Olson has left, but he is dealing with the knee issue. Do you have any qualms starting both of them or just one of them? Are you out of Funches because of the knee injury?

No, I'm fine with Funches. I'm also fine with Benjamin. I would start both of those guys. Almost pumped at the brakes on Ed Dixon this week. I would not. That would be a bold. Bold. I would not start Ed Dixon. The Eagles, if you look at how they've been performing against tight ends, they haven't been the best. But over the last few years, they have been. They've been really good at guarding the tight end.

It was week two where Travis Kelsey and the Kansas City Chiefs, they had over 100 yards and a touchdown with the tight ends against the Eagles. But outside of that, they've yet to give up 50 total yards to a team at tight in and only one other touchdown. So I don't think Ed Dixon's going to be the guy to get it done here. But starting Kelvin Benjamin, starting to have him funches. Right. Before we close out the show, want to hit that Phook Clan mailbag. Mailbag. Mail bag.

I got to hit the button and sing. Yeah. You did it. Very talented. I'm so proud of you. Thank you. Mailbag. This one comes in from Jeffrey in Indianapolis. Says, does the Cardinals getting AP hurt Andre Ellington's value? If so, should I try to trade in before this weekend? This is a full point PPR league. That's a great question. I don't think Adrian Peterson hurts Andre Ellington's value too much because.

They're different skill sets. Right now, if I asked you who in the NFL is leading the league in targets from the running back position, you'd be wrong unless you answered Andre Ellington. So Adrian Peterson is not going to come in and take, you know, four or five targets in the passing game. I hope he doesn't. Yeah. As a Cardinal fan, I hope he does it because he's probably not going to do as much with it as Ellington. I think.

Ellington has been fine. He's actually the last three weeks been an RB one every week. If you're in a PPR or half point, then you start him. This one comes in from Brooks from across the room. Oh, says, can you talk about making trades once the Sunday games have started any given week and why it's a terrible idea, especially if your league has a processing period. Yeah, we get.

questions and comments and sadness over things like this all the time look if you're going to trade once games have started you need to realize that you're on the hook for that guy gets injured you're taking them on yeah i mean if you are taking the risk and the league needs to be aware of that too because you know the league's going okay this trade is accepted everyone understands the risks and then a guy gets injured and the league might want to go hey i'm going to veto that

You know, you can't trade an injured guy, but it's like... You didn't. You traded a healthy guy. Yeah, the trade is done. Now, it does get murky, though, when there is, as Brooks from across the room brings up, when there's that waiting period, that voting trading period, because then technically the trade has not gone through, has not been accepted by the league, and at that point, you could make an argument that it is vetoable because a...

You're trading an injured guy for not injured. But it shouldn't be. If you make a trade in the middle of games, you have to live with those results, which I've learned a few things working for the fantasy footballers in this office. Number one, when you're playing foosball, never shoot with your goalie. That's a good tip. And two, don't trade players who are already playing football games. Yeah. I mean, we were just talking to someone on the phone the other day who he traded for Beckham.

in the middle of the first quarter. He traded away Beckham. Or traded, yeah, traded away Beckham. And the game had already started. I mean, worked out for him. But he just. But then the league vetoed it. And which they shouldn't veto it. I mean, it creates this whole messy disaster that you shouldn't have not have to deal with. All right. We got Jacob in Boulder, Colorado, Camara or Tevin Coleman. Who would you rather have the rest of the season? This is a standard league.

That's a great question. In a standard league, I'm going to go with Tevin Coleman. Touchdowns? Touchdowns. I think we have a larger, I mean, both of these guys have that breakaway touchdown ability, but we've got a larger sample size to go on with Tevin Coleman. I think Tevin Coleman is better at running the ball as a pure running back. If this was a full PPR league, I might lean Camara.

because Coleman catches. Coleman does catch passes, but Camara caught 10 passes. Camarra is going to catch more balls rest of season than Coleman, I believe. They're both good at that. These are similar players, but I would go to Evan Coleman. I want to talk briefly about the Saints backfield because with Adrian Peterson out, Mark Ingram, Alvin Camara, are you more excited for these players now with Peterson out? Because I've heard.

I've heard both sides of the coin here. You've heard both sides? Is that coin talking? When you know, when you spin a coin and then in the movies, it's like, yeah. Yeah. So you've heard. I have heard, I've heard all parts of that coin spinning in the air. Okay. I'm going to keep digging until I reached the other side of the mountain. Yeah. That, well, Adrian Peterson is not getting very many snaps per game. So it's whatever. But then you're talking about, well, Adrian Peterson is getting six or seven touches a game.

So let's just say you 50-50 that. Now Mark Ingham and Camaro are getting three more touches each. Yeah, it does make a difference. The reason that I don't see it as significantly different, like when I talk about this, I don't see it very different because I had written Adrian, after this last performance, I basically thought Adrian Peterson's going to be done. I didn't expect him to be traded, but I expected it to be a complete two-man show. Maybe Adrian Peterson would.

take a snap or two. But for most people, which means there is a difference from what we've seen in the first five weeks and the rest of season. You've got a guy in Mark Ingram, who the last two years has been a top 10 fantasy football running back, who's now in the exact same position, past his by. If you can trade for Mark Ingram, I would absolutely do it. I think he's going to be great. I like both of these guys.