Fantasy Football - Starts of the Week + Week 1 Breakdown, It’s Football Time! - Podcast for 9/4

The fantasy footballer studio is sponsored by Walmart. To the fantasy footballers podcast with your host, Andy Holloway, Jason Moore, and Mike Wright. Oh, welcome in. What? It's football time. Uh, finally. Oh, me. Uh, welcome in to the show. Yes. Thursday.

September 4th. I wasn't sure we were going to make it. It's football time. This was one of the longest offseason. Yeah. It just felt like forever. It's here. Jason. Yes. Yesterday you wanted it to be today and now it's today. Now it is today. I just had to be patient. The passage of time. Not necessarily my specialty. But yeah, I'm very excited. I'm also thrilled. that we're getting the game we are getting tonight? Yeah. I mean, there's so many fantasy football relevant pieces tonight. Can't wait. Very much rooting for the Cowboys. Oh, for the... This is just... For the miracle? I mean, it's just... I told Jason this morning, it's just a play, you know? It's one pick six in the game. It's an eight and a half line, right? If they get one pick six, they will lose by... Two and a half. Ten. Yeah.

This is perfect. This is exactly what we need. We need Mike doubling, tripling down. Yeah. Bejohn's invincible. That's Jason. Well, that's the Mike. Philly can't lose tonight. I will be, I will definitely be rooting for the Cowboys. And, and I mean, I don't care who wins, but just I want them to. Is that because you have the DAC CD stack? Well, yes, that's a big part of it. Big part of it. You're not, you're not rooting for the Cowboys. It's, it's more. He's a Jerry Jones guy. I am rooting for the Cowboys simply because I want the Eagles to have to keep doing stuff.

I want the Cowboys. I want good action. And I feel like there's two ways this game goes. The Cowboys show up and it's a fun game. Or the Cowboys don't show up and we just watch like an NFL team beating down a college team. You know what I mean? Yeah, no. They got beat by 30 plus points last year. You know, it was not not competitive between these two teams. But we have football tonight. And we're excited. Very exciting. We broke down the Thursday night game on yesterday's show. We have news to talk about today. We have our first starts of the week segment of the year. And then we're going to jump right into the matchups for week number one of the NFL and fantasy football season and get through as many matches as we can today. And we'll come back with more matchups tomorrow because we're getting into the swing of things here at the fantasy footballers. It is week one. And it's time to set those lineups and get things.

Ready to Rumble. So make sure you use all of the resources. If you've been a UDK user, and that's been the draft kit from February all the way through today, the kickoff part of the year, now is the in-season app. It's time to shine there. The ultimate dashboard is part of the in-season app, all of the weekly rankings, start sit tool, waiver wire pickups, spot start tool. And then as we gather data through the first handful of weeks, You can start to see the streamfinder tool and the strength of schedule tools. It gains its power. Yes, it is charging up. Yes. So lots going on there. You can learn all about it at Fantasyfootballers.com and check that stuff out there. Join thefoot.com is the community. And we're going to get right into it. It's time for news. News and notes from around the league. Presented by Progressive Insurance. All right. We're into the news.

The 49ers signed. Oh, he took him to the cleaners guys. You know, this was the, like, you got this was pretty funny. You got him. Juan Jennings, uh, the big, the big potential holdout, you know, he got them to add three million and playtime incentives. Honestly, I mean, it feels like when we're talking NFL contracts, this seems like pennies, but I mean, for Juan Jennings. Just playtime and you get up to an additional $3 million? That sounds very childish when you call it playtime incentives. Like what is he going to the McDonald's play place? He's going to do blocks. Then he's going to do trains. We're going to pay you for playtime. Well, I mean, it's funny because it's like to me he lost everything that he wanted. I mean, this is like a token addition to me. Like he didn't get any guaranteed extra money. All the stuff he said he wanted. It's just like, okay.

If we end up playing you a bunch, all right, we'll give you some incentives. I don't know. It's nice to have it figured out. Everyone would take an extra $3 million incentive. Yeah. Denied. Oh. We've got Christian Kirk. Hamstring injury didn't participate in Wednesday's practice. There's actually been a couple of injuries that popped up this week. including Kean Coleman with a groin injury that we need to monitor as well. I don't know if you want to check groin index.com, Jason. I'm on it. Let me look. I don't even need to check it. Well, it's his groin on there. It is. What did he say when he got hurt? He said, ah, my groin. And then the only other one right now is Kate Otten, who is, oh, my groin. Okay. Those are direct quotes. But no, it kind of sucks because I think Keon Coleman is the player that I was looking to get, you know.

Maybe he can get involved early on, but he might not even play in week one. Same with Christian Kirk. And so Jaden Higgins suddenly becomes pretty interesting right out of the gate in Houston. We started last year in Houston, Nico, Del, Diggs. All of them, you know, Diggs was really relevant early on. Nico was on fire early on. There's room for a lot more than just Nico in this offense. So maybe Jaden Higgins needs to be. more closely paid attention to. For sure, there's room. I mean, Tank Dell was awesome while Nico Collins was awesome at times. Same with Diggs. There will be a necessary second target in this offense. Has to be. Marvin Mims practicing in full. He was recovering from the groin injury. Jaden Reed didn't practice. Dude. The vibes are bad. And Don Tavian Wix was limited. But like this is what I expect. Dobbs. Yo.

Don't start talking about Romeo dogs. But this is what I expect from Reed of he will never, I don't think he'll practice on a single Wednesday. I think you're 100% right. And it's just, it's, it's going to be torture. Naji Harris expected to play on Friday against the Chiefs, but tough to predict how much he'll play according to Jim Harbaugh. We talked about it briefly yesterday. I didn't expect, I mean, I don't think anybody can expect Najee Harris to play a bunch of snaps. No. But supposedly going to play. Yeah, I mean, he's been. jogging and like doing mostly stuff to the side for the majority of offseason. I can't imagine that they just go, okay, it's 50-50. Right. No, we'll see what happens, Kansas City, Los Angeles from Brazil. We'll preview that game today. Any other breaking news that I need to know about Al? You got anything back there? Not right now, but we'll keep an eye up. All right. That was News and Node sponsored by Progressive Insurance. Quote today at progressive.com.

Progressive casualty insurance company affiliates and third party insurers, not available in all states or situations, coverage subject to policy terms, limits, and conditions. Oh my goodness. Yes. It's time. Yes. Starts of the week. Presented by Paramount Plus. Oh boy. It starts of the week time. We'll kick off week one with each of our favorite picks. I mean, it starts of the week and we just were talking about whether there's any new news. I'm seeing a. Do you need me to hit a button? No, no. But Almary and Hampton will get the start over Najee Harris, according to Jim Harbaugh. Okay. Oh, boots on the ground. It's nice when it's set. It needed as fantasy players would love anything like that. That's fine. That makes me feel better, yes. Did you see the, speaking of fantasy players, the McDaniel quote about Ollie Gordon? I did.

Did you watch the press conference? No. When you watch it, it's like, oh yeah. He's just like, this is a fantasy football question, right? Nice try. He's like, just hymns and halls. He'll have zero plays or all the plays? Zero yards are all the yards or somewhere in between. Yeah. And I did, I don't know the context, but I just saw a tweet with a quote from the Lions OC being asked about the split between Montgomery and Jemir Gibbs. Okay. And we'll see. Well, oh, good. Yes, we will. But the nice thing is we'll see this weekend. Yeah. So starts the week. We're kicking it off. These are our confidence. Don't want to tip your hand too much. These are our confidence plays, players that we think have great matchups and opportunities in week one. It's time to get it off to a good start. I mean, week one is sort of the weirdest week to do this because if you drafted players, you're playing the players you drafted. You're not.

Getting to, you know, I have seen some start-state questions that make a lot of sense when, you know, Jerry Judy or RJ Harvey. Sure. I saw that yesterday someone was asking me that one. Yeah. That's close to me. That's a really close question. I think when you drafted some of those guys like Caleb Johnson is another perfect example where where you drafted him might be a starting spot, but you probably want to give that some time. You might have drafted, you know, even someone like a Keenan Allen. Yep. Or someone that really late. that just, look, there's a rationale for why they get off to a hot start. All right, let's start at the quarterback position. I'm going to go with Joey B, Joe Burrow at Cleveland, putting to bed the way he has. You're dancing with the flames right now. This is like he's been the least valuable player to play in the first couple weeks. He destroys you on week one. So this is the first full season where Joe Burrow is not recovering from an injury. That's true. They have a 26.5 point implied total.

It's the second highest of the week. And you're going to have big plays. Cleveland's defense last year allowed the highest percentage of 15 plus yard plays. So Joe Burrow, Jamar Chase, T. Higgins and company. They get it done. Yes. You're going to be happy with Joe Burrow in week one for once. Well, he has been a quarterback one in week one. once before in his career. Wow. One time. A quarterback won, not the quarterback one. No, no, just the top 12. No, like last year he was the quarterback 29 and the year prior, the quarterback 31. All right. We're going to change that. I agree. It probably will happen. I'm going to go with Bo Nix. This is one of my higher, you know, statistically, like when I finished the UDK, I was like, wow, I think he's going to score a lot more fantasy points than where he was in drafts at the time. This week one,

They are at home against Tennessee, seven and a half point favorites with a 25.5 point team implied total. Knicks averaged 21 fantasy points per game, 250 and two and a half passing touchdowns at home last year. Denver should take care of business. And Knicks has a strong week one output. All right, Bo Nix against Tennessee. And I'm going with Jordan Love, a lower drafted quarterback in draft season. He's taking on the Lions. This is a matchup I want a part of the Packers are. They're two and a half point home favorites. They have a 25 point team implied total. The wide receivers, I get it on paper. Seems a little bit scary, but I think that they figure it out, you know, a bit harder to run on or run against the Detroit Lions. And I think we get back to Jordan Love being the captain of the Packers. All right. My running back, I'm going to the same game Jason just mentioned. Bow Nix against Tennessee was his quarterback. I'm going.

J.K. Dobbins against Tennessee. I like it. I am looking at veterans to play early in the season. It's not necessarily a sexy start, but it is going to be a productive one. J.K. Dobbins, literally last year out of nowhere, started the year as the RB4 RB4 in the first two weeks of the season. They have not equivocated. J.K. Dobbins, it's the number one right now. They rested him a ton in the preseason. RJ Harvey feels like the flashier, sexier play, but I believe that Sean Peyton, of all people, he really trusts veterans. He said nothing but the right stuff about J.K. Dobbins. And so I think the early down work here in week one, Tennessee, they're heavy favorites. I'm a big fan of J.K. Dobbins. It took Camara a while to get going as well. And then, I mean, even when Camara was going, it's like you have Mark Ingram, you have Alvin Camara. There's room.

in Sean Payton's offense for two running back. Yeah, it's a great matchup. And he's got two legs right now. That's a really important thing. Are they? Are they both strong? No, they're both strong. Are they? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Look at last year how he started. One of those legs might atrophy as a season goes on. But I think he's okay. Speaking of people who might atrophy as the season goes along. How dare you? Well, but right now, Mike, Ken Bone Walker. The plan. I mean, look, this is pretty simple. If he's going to be on the field, and he is, he's not on the injury report right now. Which was. Then he's great. It was amazing because we've gotten to the point with Ken Walker where the actual news is like, they're like Ken Walker practice today. Right. Yeah. That's the news. That was the news I saw recently. Like he practiced and that's good. That is very good. Part of the plan.

This is a team. Mike's brought it up, but like they, this, they want to run the ball way more than they did last year. They've talked all offseason about the turnover game. They've got all the tight ends and the full backs. Full backs, baby. Yeah, this is a system where they're going to give Kenneth Walker the ball and the 49ers as a matchup. It's not the defense you remember from years past. They lost a lot of weapons on, well, on both sides of the ball. But even last year, they were 29th. versus fantasy running backs. They allowed the most rushing touchdowns to running backs in the entire NFL. So Kenneth Walker is going to get off to a strong, smoking hot start this week and then trade him. Okay, Mike. He breaks. Mike, it's your turn. I'm going with James Connor against the Saints. Look, for the first six weeks, the Cardinals have the best strength of schedule for the running back position, starting with week one. The Saints last year.

Just a wet, hot fart, 30th and rushing yards per game allowed, 26th and fantasy points allowed. And just taking out week 17 where Connor got hurt last year, he was averaging 19 opportunities per game. The Cardinals are heavy favorites. I think they're a full touchdown favorite despite being on the road. And I think that Connor is going to wear them out in the second half. All right, my wide receiver start of the week is JSN, Jackson Smith and Jigba against San Francisco. Is he going to play a bunch of inside, outside? I don't care where he plays. It don't matter. He is the clear number one for Sam Darnold at home last year, where he is this week. He averaged eight targets, 72 yards per game. That's a great baseline. And against the 49ers, 20 targets in two games against them last year. I think Jason gets off to a great start and makes people.

I truly believe he's a number one in fantasy. Speaking of someone who I think gets off to a strong start making you believe they are a number one in fantasy, it's Mike's my guy. Teteroa McMillan, you drafted him to be great and not on your bench. You know, if you look at top 10 drafted wide receivers over the last six years, they average seven plus targets per game as a rookie. Jalen Koker is out. They shipped off Adam Thielen. And you got a Jaguar's defense that's a perfect week one matchup. They were atrociously bad last year, 30th in fantasy points to wide receivers, 31st and expected points added per pass attempt. So it's like everything is lining up for Team Mac to come out and week one show you, oh, he's that dude. I've got him as my wide receiver 15 this week. Like there's almost no world where I'm not starting him. The matchups, you got the Panthers, Jags, and then we have the Falcons Tampa Bay. I think those are sneaky games that

could give us some fantasy bonanza this weekend. That's why I have Drake London as my start of the week. The game, we're looking at a 47.5 point over under. That's currently the third highest right now. It's in the dome. You know, we saw the numbers with Michael Pennix, a 40% target share and Tampa Bay. They played the highest rate of zone coverage last year. And London, last year, 33% of teams. first read targets versus zone. So he was the go-to guy. I like both of those matchups. I want just, you know, as many players as I can get. And I think Drake London, obviously we drafted him very high, but this is like a situation where Drake London would not surprise me if he's the number one wide receiver on the week. All right, wrapping up our starts of the week with the tight-in position. This is another game I think we'll have a pretty good production for fantasy, actually. It's got a 47.5 point over under.

It's Tyler Warren against the Miami Dolphins. Oh, man. In week one, the rookie, my my guy, and, you know, the top target in Indianapolis is going to be Tyler Warren this year. That's going to be the player that you want. Miami's defense stinks. Yeah, and especially even last year, you know, we'll see what happens, you know, as they change into the new season. But eighth, most receptions given up to tight-in position last year. It was something you actively targeted. Pultz have an implied point total of almost 25. So you like that. I think they get off to a good start. I think both teams score a lot in this game, to be honest with you. What is your Tyler Warren's stat line week one? That's a great question. I'm going to go six for 72 in a touchdown. Oh, that is definitely. That would be spicy. Well, I mean, I'm not, I'm just telling you what's going to happen. I'm not really. Oh, yeah, yeah. It's not a prediction. No. It's a report. Right.

Okay, for my tight end start of the week, you might have been upset. You might have been the last person to draft a tight end and you're like, oh, shoot, I've got to take Mark Andrews, which I had to do in our 14 team listener league. I had a big problem with the tight end. I had one where I kept punting, kept punting and I ended up with Andrews. And it's like, yeah, you might, you might feel like you were stuck, but you're going to have a great week one starting tight in. unlikely to play. And you've got a 50 and a half point over under. I believe it's the highest of the week. The bills play a ton of too high safety, 55% of the time last year on their dropbacks. And Mark Andrews had a 15% target share versus that look, which was higher than Sam Leporta. 0.46 fantasy points per route run higher than Brock Bowers. This is a perfect week one matchup to...

cure the ills from the beginning of last year for Mark Andrews. All right. That was starts of the week presented by Paramount Plus. Watch the Lions versus the Packers game this Sunday. Get started at Paramount Plus.com slash NFL. Before we move to the next segment, my start of the week. Oh, my start of the week. Oh, my God. Is David Nogoku versus. Why didn't you cut me off? Oh, we were just having a good, a good look. It's week one, man. Oh, I got a little rusty. Well, I don't know if you knew this, much like Red Zone, we actually interrupt. Yeah, yeah. We interrupt the right in the middle of the content with some commercial breaks. So David Najoku versus the Cincinnati Bengals. Son of a gun. The matchup is fantastic. Fun stat here from the Borgogun. Last year the Cincinnati Bengals allowed the most tight in receptions of any team over the last eight years. And like there's there's a whole bunch of other stuff. But you know what?

We're going narrative street when Joe Flacko was announced as the starter. And you have a video of David Nogoku in some sort of ATV. I don't know what exactly the vehicle was. But he's riding July 30th with Joe Flacko. And he films himself celebrating. He's very happy. Just be like, Joe Flacco. And then Flacco is smiling. Those two dudes are bros. And I think they're going to bro down. And. This weekend against the Bengals. All right. Guess what? We'll take a break and then it'll be time to get into the matchups. All right. Without further ado, let's get into week one. Fantasy forecast presented by prize picks. All right. We'll kick it off with a Friday night game from Brazil. The Kansas City Chiefs. Bonjour. They take on the Los Angeles Chargers.

who get the, you know, I guess they get the privilege of being the home team on the road in Brazil. So they lose a true home game. But the Vegas line here. Did they? Yeah. The Chargers. Well, I mean, I get what you're saying because they don't have the strongest. They might have more fans of Brazil. Oh, okay. All right. I mean, it will be, it'll be exciting. LA people are like, not mad that I said. No, no, it's like, yeah, whatever. Chargers fans. from San Diego. We have two teams. Who cares? Vegas line, Kansas City minus three. The overrunner is 46 and a half. So last year we had Packers Eagles open up in Brazil. The field was a major problem. Hopefully that won't be the case this year so we can get some good football. Last year, both of the games Kansas City and Los Angeles played. Casey won them, but they were close 1710, 1917. The Chargers have actually covered the spread in three of their last four meetings against the Chiefs. Okay.

But we'll get to see the newly rebuilt backfield for the Los Angeles Chargers we just talked about. Hampton getting the start. Naji Harris should make an appearance. He is number one in total games played since coming into the league at running back. His availability being an ability, that has been his greatest ability as a pro. He doesn't miss time, and so he accumulates and he can take a lot of punishment, and he'll be back out there. So let's start with the running backs, actually. Let's start with Hampton, Naji, and then what we see on the other side. I've noticed in almost every draft, Kareem Hunt. He goes super late, sometimes not drafted. No interest in Kareem Hunt. But it will be, you know, it will be Pacheco and Hunt in the backfield. What do you expect to see from Pacheco? And are you kind of watching him the most this week as in...

Is this the same guy that we had a couple years ago? Yeah, for sure. So going into last year, I loved Pacheco. He was my guy. He was all alone in the backfield. Week one, week two looked amazing. Then he broke his leg. And that's when they went out and signed Kareem Hunt. So Kareem Hunt was not on this roster to start last season. And the reports out of camp have really been positive about Pacheco. They have been saying he's back to his former self because he never, when he got back last season, he did not look great. He didn't have the same explosiveness.

wasn't the same player. Cream Hunt was probably the better player on the field. He just kind of did the right thing every time, knew the system. They used him around the goal line. They used him in the passing game. But he's a year older, and it wasn't like Cream Hunt was special, just Pacheco wasn't last year. So it was a one-two punch. So I'm really curious, does it become Isaiah Pacheco's team again? And Kareem Hunt is just a pure backup or? Is this what we saw on the field last year where it's a one-two split? As of this moment, I'm fine starting Pacheco as like an RB2. You probably have to where you drafted him. I would never start Cream Hunt, but I'm going to keep my eyes on that one big time. Goal line will be something to watch. It will. With Cream Hunt. And I think the team, barring Pacheco looking, you know, hugely better on every snap than Cream Hunt. I do think Cream Hunt will have a role in the offense, but not one word like I'm flexing him at all this week. And he's obviously.

Like if Pacheco did go down, Cream Hunt is going to be valuable the rest of the year. Hampton, we're comfortable starting Hampton, obviously, but the matchup's not great. We talked about this yesterday. It's a tough matchup. We'll see what it looks like in Brazil in week one. But, you know, how many touches would you expect Hampton to get? More than 15? I think that's a good base line. Yeah, no, I definitely think more than 15. You're playing against the Kansas City Chiefs. Their defense is good. It's going to be a lower scoring game. I don't think that the Chiefs are going to go out and get up.

two, three touchdowns and make you have to throw the ball a lot. So Hampton will be, I think, north of 15 touches. All right, the wide receivers, Xavier Worthy, probably, in my opinion, didn't get enough attention in drafts this past couple weekends. Rashi Rice is going to be out six weeks. Hollywood Brown, he's going to be out there. Now, Hollywood Brown is the guy I'm at the wide receiver position. I'm most interested to see of the... Does he have it? Does he have it? The last year, you know, hurt pretty much the whole year, comes in for just a few snaps towards the end of the year. But on almost every single one of those snaps, he was seeing a target. So he's just kind of one of those interesting, nasty boys. If you're in a real deep league and you're looking for someone to throw on your bench who could, like, explode in value, Hollywood Brown fits that bill for me.