Unsolved Mysteries + Georgie Porgie, Ride the Snake - Fantasy Football Podcast for 9/22

But I am intrigued. That is a good way to look at it. Does their defense affect your decision making on the offensive side? And right now, I probably would not as well. I think it is possible by the time, like you're not playing any Houston Texan today. And then you're going to sit the Panthers against the Dallas Cowboys, not going to sit any Dallas Cowboys. But if the Panthers show up against them, boys.

You might be hesitating about starting Jalen Hertz. Sure. Against the defense. Now, Mike, what is your viewpoint? Because I think you can interweave the Washington defense with how we saw them narrative-wise playing on offense, right? Like you kind of, we all viewed them as a great defense that maybe puts the offense in a position where they can do what they did last year, which is win with kind of a muddling Gibson-led run-led offense.

Is this defense not as good as we thought it was, or are they just finding their footing to start the year? Man, they are one. I mean, it's perfect that they're in the Unsolved Mystery area because they are one of the most baffling things about this NFL season to me so far, especially against the Giants where, yes, Daniel Jones is showing up, you know, and he's playing pretty well, especially for how much.

crap that everyone gives him. But the fact that Washington couldn't, didn't just demolish him in that offensive line, that's where it's really worrisome if you are playing that DST. And now, you know, are they worth holding on for, you see that as a fantasy defense? Yeah, you see that Atlanta matchup and the Saints matchup coming up in weeks four and five. That's juicy.

I want in on that for Washington, at least the defense I thought they were, but they got to play Buffalo now. Are they good enough that you're going to play them against Buffalo and take whatever number they give you or stash two defenses? And I think that answer has to be no. You've got to move on. You've got to pivot away and just take that lump. Yeah, there's no way I'm wanting to play Washington. Whether I would hold them depends on the other.

options on my bench and the waivers, but I would be looking for a different DST to play against Buffalo. Unsolved mystery number four, Clyde Edwards Allaire. In week one, 14 for 43, week two, 13 for 46, a tweet this morning from Jared Smola summarizes, sorry, the situation. 51 running backs have 10 plus carries through two weeks.

Clyde Edwards O'Lear ranks 51 in Pro Football Focus's running grade out of 51. 49th out of 51 in elusive rating, 50th in yards after contact per attempt. He's 3.3 a carry this year. He was 3.8 from week 9 on last year. With the fumble that cost them the game. With the fumble that cost them the game. This team right now.

doesn't need the running back to be the focal point of the offense. There's no real reason to believe that they would make him the focal point of the offense. Right. So expectations moving forward, I mean, I have seen the widest gamut of what do I do is with Clyde Edwards-Alair. And when I say that, I mean trade offers, right?

Do I trade him for, do I drop him? I've seen that. Oh, don't do that. And I've also seen, like, do I trade him for James White? Do I trade him for some of these. Tony Pollard. Elijah Mitchell. So I'll give somebody else the floor here to weigh in. The first thing that, what, I'll start with this, he's, those numbers are not surprising from that Smola tweet. He, if you're watching him on the field.

It, he looks bad. But what's, the craziest part in this, there's just fits perfectly with what I, I think the rant was yesterday of just, it was sometime this week of why did you draft Clyde Edwards a layer? Like, as a team, what were you doing if you're not going to throw him the ball? Currently, Kansas City, 8% of their targets are going to the running back position. That is dead last in the NFL.

through two games, where last year they weren't setting the world on fire at that, but 18%, which was right in the middle, 16th. So, you know, I would imagine that just will naturally turn into more targets for Edwards Aller moving forward. But at this point, I mean, he's probably going on my bench. If I have...

If I have anybody that I can plug in over him that I think is a top 24 running back or even a top 30 running back, I'm going to let Clyde Edwards O'Lare sit for the future. Chargers, Eagles, Bill's football team. That's four weeks. You know, with the exception of teams that just completely shut down the running game, you know, the Steelers who outside of breaking a long play, you just...

don't get to run on them at all. I don't think that the Kansas City Chiefs are one of the offenses you really match up hunt against. You know, they're going to be able to score. The problem is, like Andy said, they don't need Clyde Edwards Allaire to score. They don't have to rely on him to be good because of Pat Mahomes. But Pat Mahomes is so good that the offense is going to score a ton of points. They're going to get a ton of yards. They're always going to move the ball.

And he is still the running back getting the vast majority of everything. He has done very, very little with it. And outside of that fumble, they have not needed it. They should be 2 and 0, if not for that play. And this is one of those you don't want to overreact. Because in the end, take the names out of it, take the, you know, take a step back and think about it this way. This is a starting running back.

getting the majority of the work on a great team. Every, you know, you look back at all these different teams, all the Andy Reed offenses, even the Pat Mahomes offenses, and you will find bad stretches for everybody not named Travis Kelsey weeks in a row. And if these two weeks, these atrocious showings happen in week 12 and 13, you know, you look at his rookie season, right? Like Clyde Edwards, Alair.

was not special. He was a major disappointment and very valuable on, you know, the course of when he was playing. He was still at the running neck position. I think that the hope that I had of having the high upside, the year to leap forward as a player, that looks like it is unfortunately shot. But he's still a player that is getting the majority of the work for a great offense. And I can't imagine.

that I would look to move him while his value is super low. I wouldn't trade him for the Tony Pollards and James White's of the world. But you trade him for Tyson Williams? I wouldn't because if you look at going forward, Tyson Williams could, if we say crystal ball four weeks from now, is Tyson Williams the starting running back for the Ravens? I would say, probably, but I know Clyde is the starting running back for the chiefs outside of injury.

Tyson just carries too many variables. There's two things I'll throw in to end this. Number one, this will be the worst game of Clyde's season. This one coming up? No, the game he just played. Yes. So the game he just played will be the worst production you get from him. So if that echoes what Jason's saying about like, you know, it'll be better. It doesn't mean it'll be great. So the second thing I would advise people with Clyde is don't consider him to be an anchor to your running back room.

for your fantasy team. You may, you need to adjust. If you had them there, go pursue another running back. Go reinsure that room. Clyde looks better in the flex this year than he does in the RB2 spot. So if you, if you can go do that, then you're going to, I think, stabilize your team a little bit and just change your expectations. And the, just again on the targets, I'm sorry, you've got to hearken on it, but in a game where your number one wide receiver is taken out, like Tyree Kilb was.

removed very successfully by the Ravens. And that turned into nothing through the air for Clyde. It was like, oh, well, we're going to give Pringle a shot. DeMarcus Robinson, Hardman, let's give all these guys targets. It was very strange. I mean, wouldn't you say that the fact that they are baseman dead last in targeting the running back and that that wasn't how they were last year, they were just average NFL? Wouldn't that say that the...

probably just bounces. Like regression would go up for passing to the running back. Yeah, I totally agree with that. He's just not being good with it. I'm scratching my head over here. They changed the play. I mean, he had one catch in three of the last four games last year. So if they throw them the ball, you're going to be super helped in fantasy. Yeah. But they seem to be not wanting to do that the way they did with Damien Williams. Two and O Raiders is the last unsolved mystery. We'll be brief here because we've got to get into the Thursday night preview.

Derek Carr can he finish as a top 12 quarterback? Are the Raiders legit? He's the quarterback eight right now. They just, I mean, he put up 56 past attempts against Baltimore, 37 against Pittsburgh. He's taking shots down the field, which he has not always done. Brian Edwards one week. Henry Ruggs the next. Darren Waller mismatching every DB in the world. So I think they're real.

Man. But I picked them to win against Baltimore. And I believe in them. Derek Carr has not seen a start like this fantasy-wise since 2017. Which was the MVP season? Was that the one? I have to imagine it was. He started a year where they were, what, 9-0? Something ridiculous where he was being talked about as an MVP candidate. And then the final game of the week of the year he got hurt, right?

Yes. That was 2016. Oh, so you're saying 2017 he started hot as well? In 2017, he started off as the QB9 and the QB5. He followed that up by being the quarterback 30 and then getting hurt. And that was mediocre the remainder of the year. The year before that, however, the 2016 year, 9, 5, 22, 5, 6. That was the year I think that they had won quite a few games. Yeah, if you look at that season, they started.

One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine. Ten and two. They were ten and two in 2016 with Derek Carr. I believe the defense has improved enough for them to be in every game this year. They were one play from knocking off the Chiefs twice last year. I'm going to say that they're going to stick around. They got, they may get a layup this week. I know we joke about it being like, this is the game the Raiders would lose.

to the Brissette Dolphins, which it's super is. Like, this is the game that the Dolphins defense has three touchdowns and Brissette does nothing. But look on paper, this is a team that I think could start five or six and oh. Man, whenever you finally believe in the Derek Carr, John Gruden Raiders, which happens at some point every year.

It's like the opposite Tinkerbell. This is fool me once situation. I'm sorry, Raiders fans. I can't buy into the legitimacy just because of the history. And you're 100% right. They should, they should smoke the Brissette-led dolphins. Smoke that brisket. Oh, smoked that brisket. Oh, smoked brisket. Had some yesterday.

But I do think that, you know, I think there's a 500 team. And so being 2 and O, having some great wins, I don't buy that they are one of the best teams out there, that they're an 11-12 win team, not in that division. And we haven't seen, I have not personally seen enough. I realize Edwards had a good week one.

Ruggs had a good week two, but I don't know that we've seen enough from those two wide receivers to like prove it yet. You know what I'm saying? Sure. I mean, it's still been like week one was entirely Darren Waller. I mean, at the very end of the game, Brian Edwards came to life. But if you turned the TV off with three minutes left in that game, you'd say, well, I'm cutting Brian Edwards. Sure. And he had the touchdown call back. It took a miracle.

in week one for them to win, which it happened, but it was still a miracle at the end of the game that they were able to come back and win. Pittsburgh, it was very close until they pulled away at the end. I think they're a good team. What mystery are we trying to solve? Are we saying like the Raiders are going to be great? Or are we saying Derek Carr is going to...