Fantasy Football Podcast 2015 - Week 13 Fantasy Forecast, Starts of the Week, News

What are the fantasy things to look for from the quarterback position in this game? Are either of these guys start worthy? No. I think Hoyer is streamworthy. I do. I wouldn't be afraid. I think there's better options than him, but I wouldn't start Taylor against the Houston defense that looks amazing. The Bills, they have not been that great a defense this year, and I think that the Texans can come out and win this game, and they could do it on the arm of Hoyer.

He's not a terrible play, but there's just so many great streamers available this week. I can't imagine that Hoyer is the only one left on your wire. We've gone through all those guys like Cutler, Tannehill. Two quarterback leagues, I think Hoyer's. Wilson, Mario. Yeah, sure. Two quarterback league, yeah, you're going to. He's going to be one of those guys that are the questions where it's like, hey, I might have somebody that I think is better, but I think you could throw on the bills. Yeah. Now, Carlos Williams is still reportedly doubtful for this game.

Right. And I would say from the Bills, I talked about Watkins is my sit of the week. Now that once again, does the sit of the week mean that they're just going to do absolutely nothing? No, I just think that he will be held in check as compared to what he did, especially compared to what he did last week. Really, the only Bills player I have confidence starting is LaShawn McCoy. He still looks spectacular with Carlos Williams being banged up.

That's great news for McCoy. Carlos Williams vulturing a touchdown. So Shady's getting it done through the air and on the ground. He's getting the yards. The problem was can he get the touchdown to put him over the top to be a monster game? And Carlos Williams was a great obstacle in the way of McCoy doing that. But we saw last week that he got to score on that nice...

Dump off pass. So McCoy is, even though the Texans are great on defense right now, I still play McCoy. I want to give a little credence to your Sammy Watkins held in checkpoint. The last three weeks for Houston, 197 yards through the air, zero touchdowns against Cincinnati, 216 yards, one touchdown in week 11, 228 and zero against New Orleans. This is a passing...

defense that ranks number three in the league now. And they've obviously been winning games mostly from the defensive side. And so I'm with you. I think Watkins is somebody you start if you have to start him, but you're counting on one big play to somehow happen. And he can do it because that's what great players do. But we're saying, Timper, the expectation? Yeah. And I think Tyra Taylor is going to be just...

Half murdered. Yeah, I mean, he's going to be hit a lot this game. So he's a guy I would stare way clear of personal. Did you guys see the JJ Watt trash talk quote that was coming out of the... No. So J.J. Watt in the game was telling the Saints, he's like, you guys better find a new right tackle. He's like, I like Drew Brees. I don't like hitting him like this. Oh, that's funny. Oh.

Yeah, that was not a good game for Mr. Breeze. All right, so the Ravens, the Ravens head to Miami to play the Dolphins in the game of the week. This one is very interesting. This is my...

Game of the week that I am excited to see. I actually messaged Mike yesterday and said that this is the game I'm the most interested to watch. It's because you are a Lamar Miller owner. That is 100% the reason. I am very curious. Mike and I are on different sides. Mike has a gut feeling that Lamar Miller is bad news city for Lamar Miller right now with Ajai coming in. Free agency.

Free agency looming, all of that. I have the almost the exact opposite feel of Dan Campbell really wants to run the ball, likes Lamar Miller. They were putting Ajai in the red zone and not scoring. And so they fire the O.C. And I think that he wants it to be the Lamar Miller show. So I don't know. I mean, it.

Really, these are gut feelings, which we really like to base our stuff on film and on stats here. But you have to go with gut too. This is why I'm interested to watch this game, because what happens in this game, I think very much will determine the playoffs. What does it look like for Lamar Miller or Ajai? We're going to see a glimpse of that this week. So.

I'm personally excited to see Devante Parker get some snaps starting in this game for the first time. What does the offense look like, like you said? This is more of a fantasy curiosity game than it is, you know, a great NFL matchup, but, you know, the Shob-Aken combo isn't exactly something I get worked up about. Right. Not aching for it. No, I mean, I have Aiken on my bench, and I'll probably never play him this here because, I mean, it's just hard to do. He's had three okay weeks. You know, it's never on my bench? Bacon.

It's always starting lineup? Absolutely. Is that, so breakfast food starting lineup? Bacon. Bacon's got to be first. Unless cereal can be, nah, I'm still going bacon. I would put bacon in my cereal. Let me ask you this. Would you just eat bacon for a breakfast? 100,000% yes. Yeah. I feel like bacon is great and should be eaten in mass quantity, but it's still part of a complementarian mindset to breakfast. You know, until you've done it.

You don't know. And I have absolutely done it. I've had a breakfast of bacon. I live the life. I walk to walk. And let me tell you, there's no regrets. Okay? Not until I get my first heart attack. Will I stop eating bacon? Until you've done it. You watch your mouth, son. I love the dolphins. Do you lived in my greasy shoes? I love the dolphins defense as a fantasy play this week. High upside. Yeah, I mean.

What is the likelihood that they have a pick six for a touchdown in this game? You got to put 50-50. You got to put it 50-50. With that shop, and so Buck Allen for the people who they picked him up, he's a full start for me this week. Miami's rush defense has been hemorrhaging.

as of late, and I think he's a very strong play. And to that point, the Ravens, I know we complained a little bit, you did in the beginning of the year about Tressman, not really involving the running back in the passing game enough to your satisfaction. As an owner, you probably wanted about every play. But the Ravens are still one of the highest in the league with...

28% of passes to the running back position. We saw that last week with Buck Allen getting some more of those dump-off passes. He's a quantity. I mean, I think his talent is there too. He's a young guy, but he's getting enough work to where he should be a viable start. You lose your starting quarterback, your starting running back, and your star-wide receiver. And the offensive coordinator, trespassment coming in is not going to just stick with the same.

system that wasn't his. He's going to say, I've got to manufacture offense, and it's going to go. That's why I love Buck Allen here. I think Buck Allen has a baseline of four receptions a game, and he could go higher than that. You've seen him manufacture that, too, with the tight-in position with Crockett Gilmore, with use check out of the backfield, with different mixing pieces and things like that. The offense has limited upside. Like you said, there's a reason why you kind of like streaming the Dolphins this week. I'm okay with that. I'm not all about it because I just...

I don't know. The Dolphins just, who knows how much they've given up, how much this season is in trouble, what the offense does. Tannehill can give points back, which counts against your defense, which is a problem. But, yeah, I like the idea of Buck Allen. Now put this in context. Buck Allen, David Johnson, Thomas Rawls, three of the big free agent signings over the last week, a few weeks. So how do you like them rest of the season? I love all those guys rest of season. I guess rank them. It's more of the question. Rank them.

Honestly, I'm not looking at matchups, so I'm just thinking of offense right now. And because of that, I'm going to put David Johnson, number one. The Arizona Cardinals are the number one offense in the entire league. They score boatloads of points nearly every single week, and that David Johnson is the goal line back. He was the goal line back earlier. They kind of went away from that. They were not having success.

On the goal line, if you watched the San Francisco Cardinals debacle last week, you saw the Cardinals get about 18 plays inside the five, and they were doing all sorts of different things until they finally said, screw this, David Johnson run it in, and what did David Johnson do? He ran it right in, because that's what he does. So he just has the highest opportunity to me to score a touchdown weekly.

Second, I would go with Rawls just because he's the workhorse back. Fred Jackson will get some of that action catching the ball. Buck Allen is lowest because the offense is a lower-powered offense. We're still not exactly sure what the split will be with Terrence West who surprised. He didn't have a ton of snaps, but when they snapped the ball with Terrence West in there, he ran it. That's his ratio of snap to getting a touch was very high.

And was that just revenge game against Cleveland? We're not sure. So they're kind of a situation I need to monitor. I'm not going to let that dissuade me from playing Buck Allen at all this week. But that's how I would rank those three guys. And I would put Rawls first. I mean, you weren't looking into the schedules or the matchups. Rest of season, Rawls has a very nice, juicy playoff schedule.

All three winnable matchups. You've got a who's a workhorse. Do you have those three up? I'm just curious. I can't remember the three matches. I can pull them up again here. They were pretty good. The only bad one was the Rams, which are not that good of a run defense. People are very scared about playing a guy against the Rams D. And the truth is, at the running back position, you're fine to play that. Thomas Rawls goes week 14 at Baltimore. They're okay. Cleveland. That's great.

And then St. Louis, like I just spoke of in week 16. So I like Thomas Rawls. David Johnson's got a little bit tougher matchup the rest of the way. David Johnson plays Minnesota, week 14, so that's a tougher one. Philadelphia, delightful. Arizona is going to score a ton of points. And then Green Bay, which you would have to put at a middle tier. So I guess it leans slightly to Rawls. Yeah, I would go Rawls David Johnson. The thing that I like about Rawls is the 53%.

rushing attempts. Like they run more than anybody else in football. But yeah, they're all three I love. And all three could honestly outperform the other guy depending on whether they catch fire, they get goal on opportunities. And Rawls doesn't have anybody really cutting into his workload. We don't know yet with David Johnson, but I wouldn't be shocked if Kerwin Williams comes in or Stefan Taylor has a lot of usage. Yeah, because you don't necessarily if your Aryans handed off to the... Right. And we saw with Buck Allen. There is...

risk with David Johnson. If Johnson comes out this week and fumbles, then there's troubles. There will be trouble, absolutely, if he puts the ball on the ground. But I'm going to believe that he won't. Maybe that's a little foolish because he has a record this year of already fumbling a good bit. But just the opportunity for points is too great with Arizona.

I wanted to take a quick look at the raw snap counts from last week, and it was at 65%. So not through the roof, not out insane, but certainly getting the majority. All right, we're going on, we're moving on. Bengals go to Cleveland, take on the Browns. Okay. Breaking news, not my almost upset of the week. Yeah. So I guess the questions here circle around will Eifford play?

And will Barnage be the same type of tight end in terms of production with a different quarterback Davis or Mansell? I think he'll be better with Davis than he would be with Mansell. I'm not afraid of Barnage, which I've been the one leased on him. But the way that they run their offense watching the Browns games recently, it's just he's super involved and there's not a lot of other options. You know, you've got Travis Benjamin and Barnage as essentially the two main guys that soak up all the targets. What about Dwayne Boe, Mike?

He's, dude, I'm telling you, Dwayne Bo, he's just getting ready. He's getting ready. He's warming up. He's, he's gone. I've got it on good authority. Hybernation? No, it's kind of like hibernation. It's one of those chambers that they use in like Dragon Ball Z, and they go in for the ultimate training. And Dwayne Bo is going to emerge and just be a monster. Is there a pop culture vein that Mike is not aware of? I mean, does he, does he know every? Maybe the girl, like, you know, Jim?