Fantasy Football Podcast 2015 - Week 16 Christmas Episode Part 2, Fantasy Forecast, Playoff Mailbag

He said, will they be dumb again and not put him in the slot? And I said, yes, they will. They will be dumb again and they will play him like they did last week. And you will have your phone out wherever you are and you're following this game. And you will see Matt Ryan incomplete to Hardy. Matt Ryan, incomplete to Tammy. Matt Ryan, incomplete to Freeman. And you will never see Julio's name pop up until the game gets out of hand. And...

It doesn't mean I wouldn't start him. Like you said, he's just outside the wide receiver. All right, it's championship week. He's going in my lineup. It's championship week. You've got two great wide receivers in there, and you need a third. And your options. If you have two great ones that are above Julio Jones at 12 in our rankings, then that's amazing. Well, let me give you who you've got then. I'll go by your rankings, guys, that you've got ahead of Julio. You've got Jeremy Macklin and Demarius Thomas in there.

Okay, you're starting those guys over. Okay, let me give you a little better because I see you wins and like, no, I'd start, I'd start Julio. I might move him up a couple spots. Mike Evans and Sammy Watkins. Mike Evans and Sammy Watkins are in, because I would play both of those guys over Julio. I think you would as well. And your third decision now is Julio or Deshawn Jackson. Oh, Julio Jones represents what he's done all year. He's the top three receiver.

Even in the game against Norman, 10 or 11 points, I guess I'd play Julio. Because I don't have, that's literally just shame mitigation. The name that jumps off the list from your rankings of confidence in how you feel about the wide receiver position this week, Julio Jones or Martavis Bryant, who gets a delicious matchup. I'm playing Martavis Bryant.

Okay, so we have found your threshold. You'll play Bryant over Julio. And it's very possible that people have both of those guys. Oh my gosh. What am I going to do to people? I would ask. Yes. Yes. No, I would as well. Yes. This is a team that cannot score points. They had 29 points over the last three weeks, and they came out last week. And it looked like they were getting it together like they do sometimes against bad matchups. Now they have a terrible matchup. I mean, in the sense, last week it was a good matchup, is what I mean, against Jacksonville. And Julio got it done on volume. Right. Now, let me tell you who I am.

confident in starting from Atlanta, which I think a lot of people are not confident. I'm confident starting Devante Freeman. I am personally, now, but Jason, two weeks ago, he played Carolina and he only got no touchdowns at 12 carries for 40 yards. He only got no touchdowns. Voice of Public Opinion has no grammar skills. No, none. That's weird that the Voice of Public Opinion and Jason, uh,

Both. Sacrifice the English language on a frequent basis. Yeah, so, I mean, two weeks ago against Carolina, he had a, he had easily his worst game of the entire year, and that's including when he wasn't starting in week one. So, Devante Freeman has to scare a lot of people. He scares Mike, because Mike would play Darren McFadden ahead of him. Would he? In standard. In standard? In standard. In standard, yeah. So.

You know, I am confident starting Devante Freeman. I fielded a lot of questions, and I think he's going to be okay. I don't necessarily, I definitely don't think he has one of his 30-point big blow-up games. But this is, one of the big differences that you have to realize is this is a home game for Atlanta. Last time they were in Carolina. Those things make big differences for teams in the NFL. It's not the same as. It's also not every day that you're a seven-point underdog at home. Right. So I honestly think.

The Panthers fighting for perfection. The inability of the Falcons to do much on offense. I don't disagree with you at all about Freeman, but man, am I not excited about the Falcons office? Here's the only narrative that I will go with that maybe the Falcons, maybe, was when you're thinking back, now I'm remembering they lost the game. But when the Patriots were fighting for perfection, last game of the season against the Giants, who...

No one gave the Giants a chance. The Giants were not playing well at all. They were in the playoffs, but they did not look like a very good team. And they almost beat the Patriots. The teams can rally at home. These things happen. That was the year that the Giants won the Super Bowl. Correct. But to that point, nobody was considering them a Super Bowl contender. They were just in the playoffs. I agree with you. 49ers take on the Detroit Lions.

We talked about Matt Stafford. Golden Tate has been on a tear right now, which is not surprising because when Calvin Johnson is hurt or limited, it's the Golden Tate Show. Absolutely. Extremely reliable right now. Love him in the playoffs. What is going on with the running game in Detroit? It's gotten better. It's gotten better. We saw Mir Abdullah, the man who can change direction moving a thousand miles an hour, have a pretty good game.

I mean, it might have been his best game of the year. I'm not, I'm recalling that off of my memory. But, and you also saw the ghost of Joyke Bell came out. 71 yards in a touchdown on eight carries. And, well, he had that super weird play at the end of the game where he killed the game. Yeah. You knew they were going to run the ball. That was, they, they had this situation two weeks ago.

The Lions did against Green Bay, Joyc Bell lost yards. And in this game against the Saints, Joyc Bell ripped off a huge run. So the running game has... I'm going to go ahead and blame that on the Saints. I will, because he didn't do anything special in that. Oh, is that Millie Vanilli? He didn't do anything special on that play. I couldn't even understand what I was watching. You have to stop the clock. He ran extremely forward on that play. Yes, he did. Through a giant... I told you. He's a ghost. You can't tackle a ghost.

And on that note, so do you start Amir Abdullah? Do you chase what he did last week and start him this week? I don't think Abdullah is necessarily just chasing last week. Over the last month, he has been improving and getting more usage. So if you want to flex him, I'm okay with that. Is there any chance that you start Shandron if he's healthy? Yes. You would? I would not. I would not. I would. I think, I think. Start any of those other eyes. Yep, me too. You would start Abdullah over?

Over drone? That's a fair question. Yeah, I think I would. To me, because I'm worried about the injury situation. I would as well because of the matchup. I guess full practice the rest of the week or something like that, but he's not going to. Even if he doesn't, they cut his backup. They brought in a guy off of the street. Well, their rookie is back of practice now. That's very fair. Davis, Mike Davis. Yes.

Mike Davis is back at practice, so I think that that had something to do with that. Yeah, that could have to do with it. Mike Davis. Just don't feel great about it. That's all it is. That's very, that's very fair. We have to talk Calvin Johnson. Oh, what do you do? Certainly. He was almost my sit of the week. And the whole reason he wasn't my sit of the week is because San Francisco, you know, going on the road is just one of those defenses that's like,

Calvin should be able to get something. 26 against the pass. Yeah. Not a good passing defense. But Calvin, we saw this last year when he was hurt with his ankle. He was a decoy and he wasn't used and that's what's going on right now. How do you, if you've got good options, it's such a scary thing. Tyler Lockett or Calvin Johnson this week? I would go Calvin Lockett. That one to me is a little bit easier. But, you know, if you've got Larry Fitzgerald or Calvin Johnson this week. Yeah, I mean, I would go Larry. Any of the Arizona.

Wide receivers over Calvin? Yeah, I would go Floyd, probably Brown. Okay. That, I mean, that's interesting. Yeah, I'm not loving the idea of Roland Calvin Johnson out there. And there's a lot of people. I mean, there are a lot of people true. I mean, we're getting through this forecast and we're looking at the matchups. And there are big names coming up. Julio, Calvin, AJ Green. Devonte Freeman, AJ Green. These are big time names. And if you cannot.

which I don't even know push comes to shove depending on my matchup, which guy in which situation. If they got you here and they're starting, you might not be able to sit them down. It's just literally, can you live with yourself by, it's the whole Big Bing situation with Denver last week. If you started somebody that was a complete flyer versus Big Ben against Denver, could you have lived with yourself when Big Ben exploded like he did last week? It's hard to do that. I mean, it's one of those things that.

If you're going out there and you're going to stream five or six positions because that's your choice. Megatron, yes, if you have Martavis Bryant, maybe it makes it easy. But Megatron, and you've got a middling guy. And you've got Ted Ginn Jr. Yeah. Ted Ginn, Jr., who got 14 targets is getting in the red zone. I think you have to start Ted Ging Jr. over Calvin Johnson, which is crazy. What world? We've got to stop the show. I mean, that's a hard thing to click Save lineup on.

You're like, oh. So that shows our confidence in Megatron right now. Yeah. We don't know what's going on. This was a shootout on Monday night. Essentially, it turned into that. It turned into the Saints. Yes, they came back on them. But Calvin wasn't getting targets. Yeah. But what we can say for sure is if the Lions go up a few scores, the 49ers do not have what it takes to come back.

on the road. That is true. All right, we have to move on. We still have one, two, three, four, five, six, seven games left. This is why I almost forgot Calvin Johnson. Meglodon. I want to sleep tonight. All right, the Texans take on the Titans without Marcus Mariotta. The Texans should have, could have Brian Hoyer back. I really think that this is a game that they're going to control from start to finish. The Titans have been bad.

There's no other way to put it. It doesn't matter who they play. It doesn't matter what their situation is. They've just been bad. They're a bad team. I'm sorry Titans fans. You have a bright future with that quarterback and with Doriel Greenbeckham growing up. And hopefully this offseason, they can draft a running back. That is the hope for me is that they can draft somebody they can come in and be a game-changing running back. We're both looking up the exact same thing. Yeah. There's no way that's right. Is it right?

It is. Wow, we were both Googling the spread that Tennessee is favored by four and a half points. So I would say this would be... Andy's almost upset of the wig. It's a ludicrous line. Maybe that line has changed and that opened because they thought that Brandon Whedon was going to be the quarterback.

And if it trends to Hoyer, that has to flip. You're right. If Brandon Wheaton's in there and they're at home, I could see a toss-up. Four and a half? Four and a half? Yeah, that's... All right. Vegas doesn't wrong very often. Sure. Well, does that change your whole equation? Are the Titans going to the playoffs? They're in. You both look completely...

aghast across from me here while I was talking about the game. You're both thinking, okay, is that the other direction. But right now, betting is off. Betting was off on that because they're waiting on the Hoyer and the Whedon situation. So talked about Alfred Blue. Mike likes him compared to some other options because of the volume. DeAndre Hopkins, what's his story? Well, he grew up in a small town. Okay. Apparently he got a funny nickname that half of the world knows how to pronounce and half does not.

because it's either Nuck or Nuk. And it keeps going back and forth on Twitter. They keep saying, no, it's Nuck. No, it's Nuk. Can someone get DeAndre Hopkins on the phone and confirm what his nickname actually is? It's Nuk. You're 100% confident? I am 100% confident. All right. So it's settled. Last game, 11 targets, which is good to see. Because he was in that, he was basically 11 or more targets for the first one, two, basically eight, nine weeks of the season.

kind of dip back down. Now he was at 11 last week, 94 receiving yards. Still hasn't been getting into the end zone as consistently. You like him this week? He's still a must-start guy. Yeah. You're going to, the way I see the game going, you're going to have to hope that he's the one who scores early, though, because I really see the Texans taking control of this game. Unfortunately, Vegas is not. The Titans are going to dominate from start to finish. Pett and Burger, Sanky, they're going to get it done.

We know that Mettenberger and J.J. Watt have a history. Oh, yeah. They do not like each other. Oh, that's great. Great news for what I think is a good play in the Texans defense. I think that might be one of the bigger starts of this game is the defense. The Texans. So you're not playing Hoyer if he plays. You're just hoping he benefits Hopkins in a good way in that offense. Yeah. I mean, Hoyer wouldn't be a terrible streamer.

He's been very productive in his starts, very productive. He has, he has. So the Steelers take on the Ravens. Boy, this game doesn't mean quite what it used to. These games were always dogfights. It didn't matter who was where. And maybe it will be again by some miracle of Jimmy Clausen. But the Ravens at home, 10 point underdogs. The Steelers are the team that I think. That's no respect. If I had to pick a team to get to the Super Bowl right now, it's the Pittsburgh Steelers.