Week 12 Waivers + Full Stream Ahead, The Crushed Soul of Jason

You don't know that he's going to be hit on that shoulder in a way that will knock him out. If they knew that, they wouldn't play him. Well, sure. I'm just saying you know he's going to take damage. It's just a matter of whether he can hold up. Is he going to leave the game? Here's a deal. With James Connor, I think you move him down a lot and you play him over really bad options. But if you have a good pivot and if he's active. Brian Hill. Devonta Freeman doesn't play. Do you play Brian Hill or James Connor with the chance you lose Connor?

I think I go Brian Hill, even though the disappointing, you know, obviously horrific game. Oh, it is Tampa Bay? Oh, it is Tampa Bay. I had to play, I'd take the risk with Connor. I guess all I'm trying to say is that it's a very risky situation. So if you're a team that cannot afford to get, you know, one or two points from Connor, he may not even be out there. That's the truth. So, and it makes Jalen Samuels an interesting, like.

lottery ticket for your team because if Connor's unavailable or limited, Samuels could be a lot better. And this is the Bengals we're talking about. Yeah, the nice thing is if Connor is out there, Jalen Samuels still has value. You can play him. James Connor plays the entire game. And if you're in a PPR, half point PPR, Jalen Samuels could still be a worthy play. But his upside is always to become a near belcow in the absence of Connor injury.

All right, Devanta Freeman, Austin Hooper, Dan Quinn said that they are, quote, trending the right way. I don't think we expect these guys to be back this week, but it is a possibility. It's one of the reasons that you can't, you couldn't have dropped Hooper. You've got to wait and see what happens. He was too good for too long to throw him out, but he could play. I doubt it. But, yeah. It's, that's such a tough.

situation because I doubt that they play this week as well. That initial prognosis we were all given from the media was a month. So if he misses this week and then you have next week, we've been talking about players coming off of these injuries and are you actually going to play them in their first game back? Yes. So if he's back this week, you play Austin Hooper. I know we've been talking about.

You know, we've basically said, unless they're a superstar, you need to give yourself that buffer and not throw them in. But Austin Hooper is a superstar at the position. There's nobody that you, you know, you're talking about, okay, grab Hollister off of waivers. I like Hollister. But Hollister versus Hooper in a matchup against the second worst team against tight ends, you're going to roll Hooper there. The way I would look at it, he's not going to practice Wednesday. Hooper's not. And they said.

Hopefully he can get out there Thursday Friday. If he doesn't get out there Thursday Friday, he's not going to play. That's probably what's going to happen this week. Dorset is in the concussion protocol as well. Okay. That offense has got to figure some things out. Yes. T.Y. Hilton, making great progress. It will be three weeks tomorrow from the injury or from dealing with this calf injury, I believe. Ahead of the week, 12 matchup against the Texans, which is a Thursday game. So you do have the advantage of...

You know, you're going to know ahead of time whether to pivot off of T.Y. Hilton, are you playing him if he's active? I am, yes. It's been enough time that if he actually comes back, especially on a Thursday, to me, a midweek game and they say, yeah, you're ready to go. They're fully confident that he is actually ready to play. And the matchup is so good against the Houston, Texas that I would play. Will Fuller is also a game time decision. I would not play him.

Regardless. Yeah. Correct. If he's out, do you look at Stills at all? On Thursday night? Yeah, you can. He's a flex option. But, you know, that role this season has had a couple big blow-up performances. But the majority and the vast majority of the games, that role of the stretch player across the field from Hopkins has not been valuable this year. You're 100% right. And then after what they did last week on offense, hard to have any confidence. Colts are pretty...

competitive defense there. So news and notes is always brought to you by the Sleeper app. Before we get into the waiver segment, I want to introduce you to the Capital One Walmart rewards card. Earn 5% back at Walmart online. Games for the kids, headphones for dad, a laptop for mom, doesn't matter.

You get 5% back at Walmart online. You'll also earn 2% at Walmart in store, restaurants and travel, and 1% everywhere else. When you want all that, you need the Capital One Walmart rewards card. What's in your wallet terms and exclusions apply Capital One in A. Put me in, Coach. All right, before we start getting into the names for Week 12 waivers, Mike, Jason, I want to kind of get your thought process.

when you look at waivers at this point of the season, right? We've got the Packers, Giant, Seahawks Titans coming back off the buy, the Cardinals, Chiefs, Chargers, Vikings going on to the buy. But how do you look at a waiver pickup now? What are you evaluating it by? And we'll talk about drop candidates as well. Well, I know we had this question on the Patreon live stream last night, which was, is it too early to start looking at playoffs?

And it's definitely not. We did our playoff primer a week and a half ago. This is the time when you are looking at your matchups, looking at your opponent's schedules, whatever you need to do to either make the playoffs or if you're secure in the playoffs to win in the playoffs. So I'm stacking multiple defenses. I'm stacking quarterbacks if I'm streaming still and I need to play a week or two out. I'm looking at matchups right now.

Like, you know, when you're looking at, you're running backs, your wide receivers, I'm not looking for a guy that I think can really turn it on and be something special, you know, three or four weeks from now. I'm looking at who's got the best matchup this week, get a win and move on, with the exception of, you know, as a tiebreaker. Dallas Goddard is nice because he's okay, but then he also has that ability to be great in the future should as Zachert's injury happened.

Anything to add to that, Mike? I mean, if you are a team with a secure playoff position, you have a luxury of, I guess, the stash mindset still? Yeah, I'm just, I'm holding on to my handcuffs and really nothing to add for what Jason said. All right, let's talk about wide receiver pickups. Who's standing out for you? Devante Parker had a big game last week, 7 for 135 on 10 targets, has Cleveland, Philadelphia, the Jets, Giants, and Cincinnati.

This matches with what Mike and I think Jason as well have said, this could just be the dirtiest league winner you've ever did have. They pop up every single year and he's owned in about 60% of league. So he may not be available, especially in a competitive league. Nice thing is he's owned in our listeners leagues because we've been talking about him for weeks. He is, but he would be the number one pickup. Going.

7 for 135 against Buffalo. I mean, that's incredible. That's really, really amazing what Devante Parker has been able to do. And it's just, what a funny year. What a funny year that Devante Parker was drafted to be something special. A first round pick is just horrifically bad for multiple years. They essentially, they rework his deal because they don't want to pay him his real fifth year option money.

They're on a, they're tanking. And now this is the year that Devante Parker actually shows up. But it's great to see. And yes, he is, uh, like we, we have him in our NFL league one. We've just been holding on to him. And he's going to be, he's probably going to be flexing for us for the rest of the season. It's, yeah, it's wild. But you saw and see with Fitzpatrick and Parker is the main target what you hoped for when the year began. You hope that maybe.

flinging at Fitzpatrick would do the thing he's done in many rosters, and now he's doing it. Since week four, he has not finished below the wide receiver 36 on a single week. There are very few people. That's Sammy Watkins finished in the top 36? Doubtful. That's a great question. That is very doubtful. Yes. Once three weeks ago, he was the wide receiver 30. Oh. He has not finished inside the top 30 since week one when he was the number one wide receiver.

Yeah, yeah. All right, so let's talk about some lower owned options. You're looking at matchups. You know, Russell Gage at 3% owned is a spot start against Tampa Bay. Atlanta playing better. And, you know, four targets against Carolina wasn't impressive. But if you are almost at a touchdown. Yeah, if you're running out of the, out of the slot, if Hooper's out, I think Gage is interesting against Tampa. Tampa stops and slows down the run.

They're going to do it again against running backs that Atlanta's running out there. So I think you could do worse than a spot start, you know, Tampa Bay giving up the most wide receiver fancy points per game. Russell Gage is, he's interesting to me, but more so once we're confirmed that Austin Hooper is out. I expect him to, but that really takes things up a notch for me for my interest in Russell Gage. If, let's say Hooper plays, I think I'm more interested in James Washington. They get to take on the Bengals. It is on the road.

But it's also the Bengals. And we talked about that wide receiver core is really beat up. Is juju going to play? Is Deonté going to play? And James Washington, he didn't really come through with his opportunity against Cleveland, only three for 49 on five targets. But...

We're talking to Spots Start here, and I think that Washington is very interesting. Yeah, I completely agree. If this was against a good defense, I mean, even with – Yeah, I'd be out. Even with Ju-Jugan and Deonti Johnson got, you go, okay, well, now we only have to worry about James Washington. Well, worry all you want. You can't do anything. You're the Bengals. And so I do think James Washington is a really good play if both those guys –

are out and he's alone against the Bengals. He's going to have enough targets. You know, we always joke about dividing up Mason Rudolph's yards. It sucks. He doesn't have enough to divide up to those three guys. Well, if you're dividing it by one, I'm okay with that. You get the whole pie. Ah, that's my favorite time of pie is when I get the whole pie. Debo Samuels more heavily owned, but he was eight for one 34 last week.

I think there's a decent shot. They have to sit Sanders down. I don't know why they wouldn't. That's kind of my opinion. Unless there's no risk of re-injuries, just pain tolerance, he's going to recover regardless. I don't know why you wouldn't give Sanders the opportunity to get healthy at the record that they're at. And even if he's out there, I mean, who's to say it doesn't happen again where he re-aggravates the injury or is painful and plays a limited, you know, maybe he's only out there 50% of snaps. I think Debo is probably next on this list. I would agree.

Yeah, he's 54% owned by the numbers that we have, but he's heating up by the standards that we have. Yes, he is. Has Green Bay. Yeah, and Green Bay, and they're tough to, like, what do you make of Green Bay's defense? Middle of the road. Yeah, middle of the road. I think we were fooled a little bit in the very beginning. Yeah, they're not upper echelon, but they're a solid defense that, you know, you can beat them. You can beat them with innovative play calling, and that's what Kyle Shanhan's all about. Debo's been very involved, establishing trust.

Darius Slayton, don't forget about him. Yeah, what's tough for Slateon is, but he has a tough match. He has the matchup against Chicago. But those, Slayton is, I think, the one, the one stash that I'm willing to make this week's waiver crop because the fantasy playoffs for the Giants and Darius Slayton at Philly. Your eyes got big. At Philly, Miami, at Washington. I mean, those are three.

plus matchups for a wide receiver who's coming off of a breakout campaign of 14 targets, 10 for 121 and 2. Are you dropping Tyler Boyd for any of these guys? Yes. I would move on from Boyd. Are you dropping Juju? No. No, I wouldn't drop him yet. Sammy Watkins? Yes. Robert Woods. No. No. Okay. All right. Those are some of the more requested drop candidates from the Foot Clan.

Anybody else who want to mention it wide receiver that's at the top? Are you looking at Josh Gordon? Maybe you're a contending team. He has Philadelphia this week. It should be a very good matchup against Philly, especially for his skill set down the field. Josh Gordon or Randall Cobb this week? I would probably go Josh Gordon there another week in the system. The difference being like Cobb is, Cobb should be brought up because you want to talk NBA Jam rules. He's had two. He's heating up. I mean.

You want to stay in this, except he's on the road in Foxborough against the best defense we've seen in a long time. But if they're focused on shutting down Amari Cooper. That's fair. I mean, this could be a Randall Cobb game. But the thing is, is while I do expect them to take out their number one options, and it might be a down game for Cooper and Zeke, I don't expect Dallas to do a whole lot to make, I would just be really fearful to play Cobb.