MEGALODON Episode - Week 12 Matchups, Turkey Day Awards & More! - Fantasy Football Podcast for 11/22

The Draft King Sportsbook line, Kansas City, minus eight and a half. The overrunners 43. You know, last week, I think there were some, there were significantly higher expectations for the Miami offense than what we got against the Las Vegas Raiders. It was a seven-point game, I believe. Wasn't that final score 1710? Which one? Sorry, I was looking something up. Raiders, Dolphins last week. I can look that up. I don't remember off the top of my head. It was 1320. Yeah. Okay, a seven point game, 13 to 20. Look, this one was very tempting to me, believe it or not. Really? Yeah, the Chiefs offense is struggling. The Raiders defense has been very good, especially against the quarterback position where right now Patrick Mahomes, Patrick Mahomes' fantasy output the last three weeks, people are questioning whether you start him. Like, there are other options that are performing at a really high level. And when you have Patrick Mahomes and then you look across.

your league and you see Brock Purdy putting up big games and Sam Howell putting up big games and Dak Prescott putting up big games. You're like, I signed up for that. I paid a lot probably to put Patrick Mahomes on my roster and they're averaging the least touchdowns per game that they've averaged in the last five years. And we've brought this up. We brought it up early in the season, but I completely credit the majority of that. I mean, certainly the wide receiver core for the chiefs deserve some credit. But the Kansas City Chiefs defense is fully legit. They're a top five defense this year. They don't need to go out there and put 40 points on the board. It's rare that another team has been able to hang with them and cause Mahomes to get into a real passing situation. They're able to run the ball with Pacheco. So it's been one of those situations where you just don't need Mahomes. You don't need the wide receivers to catch the ball. They can drop it. And usually you.

the chief still win. The game ends up somewhat simple for fantasy purposes. I mean, on the, on the Raiders side, you play Jacobs and Adams. The nice thing about Adams is, you know, he had a, he's had a couple decent target games in a row, but he also had like a good performance against the Jets two weeks ago, which was a tough matchup. So it's a really tough matchup. It is. With Sneed, but. That's what I was going to say, a credit to Mike Clay. talking about Legerius Sneed and just how great he's been shadowing the past nine games, and he has been overwhelmingly shutting people down. And like, it's funny because the one... Except for Josh Palmer. I say the one real big blip is Josh Palmer, who went five for 133. Maybe he underestimated his opponent, but big names that Sneed has been shutting down. So I'm playing Adams, but... It could go really poorly. Yeah.

against a good defense with Aiden O'Connell. The nice thing is, is Adams put up seven for 153 and two with Jared Stedham against the highest ranked San Francisco defense last year. So he at least can do it against bad ones. But I'm scared. As someone who has Adams, I'm nervous. Yep. And Jacobi Myers, you kind of. Jacobi Myers shouldn't be on your roster. Yeah, it sucks. Yeah, I mean, he's a good player. He looked great with Jimmy Garoppolo. But the Aiden O'Connell, new Raiders. You can't be playing the wide receiver too, especially in this matchup. Four for 46 last week. Do you care? Nope. Patrick Mahomes, Isaiah Pacheco. You know, I had resistance last week to my Rashi Rice thought processes, but it's just, look, every week you are, you're playing this roulette of Doom. Like, I would not start any wide receivers for Kansas City. No, it's Kelsey and Pacheck out. Okay. Okay. I'm in on that.

Buffalo, Philadelphia, Draft King's Sportsbook line, Philly minus three and a half. The over under is 48 and a half. Okay, okay. A little bit of chance of rain. Are you, do you want this game? I want to find the weather first. I did not enjoy watching the Eagles play in the rain this last week. I really hope. that it does hit this over under and that you get it back. You don't want this rain? I don't want this rain. No, I don't want this rain. Okay. But, you know, hopefully Josh Allen, the new offensive coordinator, they can figure out the woes of the Buffalo Bill's offense and be able to keep up. I mean, obviously, whenever you've got Josh Allen against Jalen Hertz, you hope and maybe even expect big things. But we just had Jalen Hertz against Patrick Mahomes and had a pretty stinky affair. I mean, that was.

Jalen Hertz's second worst game of the season. Yeah, look, it was a weird one because that was a game where like the Philadelphia defense has been vulnerable and yet chiefs couldn't take advantage of it. Chiefs couldn't put up any points. Well, the nice thing is Stefan Diggs can catch and they've got, you know, a guy that can really exploit the weaknesses of the Eagles defense. So Dalton Kincaid as well has looked, you know, like the new hotness. The matchup is fine. So I do think that the bills are going to be able to move the ball, which hopefully will pressure the Eagles to put up more points. You feel uncomfortable with James Cook right now? Yeah, I think I am because he is, here's what we know about him. He's very talented. He looks good. When he touches the ball, he does well. Last week with the new offensive coordinator.

He was a top 10 running back because he actually got a touchdown in the receiving game. And that came inside deep in the red zone where he hasn't been on the field. If you're telling me he gets between the 20s and a little bit of the red zone stuff, now I'm interested. Now the matchup isn't good. But, you know, you're hoping that he does more work through the air. That was where he got his touchdown last week. Any spicy surprises in this game? Gabe Davis. I mean, truly this matchup is. No. I'd rather play Khalil Shakir. I don't blame anyone for not wanting to play Gabe Davis. You said spicy surprises, and Gabe Davis could certainly against this Eagles defense have one of his big, weird, explosive games. What's the snap counts for Gabe Davis? Are they the same as they've been? Let me check. His targets for a runner dreadful. He's turning into Alec Pierce. Sure. I was looking at Shakir because Shakir went from his, he was always in the 30s.

And then 65, 71, 74, 78. Both of them are spicy risks. Oh, for sure. I mean, you know the floor for Gabe Davis is flat out of zero. This is why right now he's on my bench against you, Andy, when he, in this matchup, could be a week winner. And so if I get into a big hole, and this is a later game in the week, so I think a lot of people who have Gabe Davis, and because there's so many games early in the week, He is someone that you're going to have to look at your matchup and say, do I need a big explosive option versus just someone that can go out and reliably score me, you know, eight or nine points. If eight or nine points isn't going to get it done for you and you're going to lose if that's what you've got, then take your reliable guy out and put Gabe Davis in there and hope you get 25. Yeah, he's the George Pickens. He's the Jameson Williams. Dalton Kincaid, though, in this matchup, Eagle struggle.

And they have struggled recently against the tight-in position. Kincaid, if they need to score points, he should be heavily involved, right? It's a great play, yeah. Yeah, very safe. DeAndre Swift, yep, AJ Brown. Yeah. Yeah, Devonte Smith, yeah. Yep. And do we have any knowledge on Dallas Goddard? I think there's a chance he plays in this game. The matchup is pretty good. I don't know. that you want to start him in his first week back, and we don't, it's so early in the week. How can he possibly play? He was considered doubtful for the Monday night football game last week, so. They didn't put him on the IR, right? Yeah, but didn't he fracture his arm? I mean, he shouldn't be playing, but yes, he did fracture his arm. Yeah, there's a chance he could be out there, but I, I'm not optimistic. And I, look, first game back out there. Yeah, I'm not, I'm not playing him, but I did look at maybe.

at the trade deadline for the end of season. It could be the Dallas game, according to Seriani. So probably out this week. Baltimore 8 and 3, Sunday night football, taking on the Los Angeles Chargers. So we've got what? We've got three Thursday games. We've got a Black Friday game. We've got Sunday morning games, and we got Sunday night games, and then we got Monday night games. A lot of football this week. I hope we got leftovers because I'm going to be chomping all weekend. Baltimore 8 and 3, Chargers 4 and 6, trafficking sports book line, Baltimore minus 3 and a half.

The overrunners 47 points. Chargers are four and six. That's just, that's, that's unacceptable. If you've got Justin Herbert, you can't lose the majority of your games. You ever targeted Quentin Johnston, though? You ever done that before? That's one of the ways you could lose. Yeah. That drops last week. I mean, it's not just Johnston. Donald Parham, huge first down, drops in the middle of the field. Keenan Ellen, two drops. One of them. bounced off his chest, a little sunny outside. That's a lot of sunny. That was in the end zone, right? Yeah, that was a touchdown. I also had one on the sideline, though, that he dropped where he would have gone in as well. You know, they put up points. The overrunner's nice. Justin Herbert's got a tough matchup, though. I mean, the Ravens' defense is not a good time. And he doesn't have, you know, Mike Williams isn't there. Josh Palmer isn't there. Austin Eckler, I don't know if he's there. I think he is. I think he's okay.

Man, I don't know. I know that I might be a little bit pessimistic because of how he looked last week. And obviously, the fantasy production was bad. But something looked off with Austin Echler last week. I mean, Andy and I noticed it not at the end of the game when the stat line was bad. It was like he's running weird. He's running slow. He looks not like himself. And, you know, I haven't heard anything. I've looked for injuries. I have not. To my knowledge, seen anything? Yeah, I'm with you. And I tried to look at the whole season as, you know, kind of looking at how he's been. He's had, you know, 27 yards rushing, 45, 29, 47, 64. So the first game of the year looked real, real good, tons of work, tons of everything, normal Echler. And the receiving game was good the last three weeks. So he could be fine.

Yeah, I mean, it's all receiving it. But it's Baltimore, so you also have to look at it and say, hey, what's my ceiling here? Yeah, this is about whether or not they get him back involved in the receiving game. This last week, only two receptions for six receiving yards. That won't get it done. The previous weeks, the previous weeks before that was eight targets, seven targets, seven targets, 94 yards, 23, 48 yards through the air. They did need him. So I'm really. You had a drop, too. Or two drops. He had two drops in that game. Poor Justin. But yeah, right now you're playing them, but you just are hoping you get vintage. Yeah. And then Keenan, of course, leads the NFL in targets. I think if Everett sits, Parham is an interesting option. I don't want to play Donald Parham against the Baltimore Ravens. You're playing Kate Otten or Parham? Kate Otten. I guess. I liked it last week.

I like Parham's involvement. But, yeah, I get it. It's a tough matchup. Lamar. Yeah. Lamar loses Mark Andrews. I think the offense needs Mark Andrews. I think that's something we fundamentally know from three years of watching Lamar Jackson play quarterback is it's not the same offense. Now, he had a big game last week. So, you know, he's going to have to put it on his shoulders. He's going to have to run the football in Los Angeles. They love to let you do whatever you want. Yeah, you just have to ask Harbaugh. What would you like to do? And if he says, I'd like to run the ball, they'll say, right this way. If they want to throw the ball and really show that they can do it without Mark Andrews, they'll say, be our guest. Be our guest. So in this matchup with Herbert on the other side of the ball, I would imagine Harbaugh's going to want to run it. And that means that you could start Gus Edwards, who's been obviously on fire, nine rushing touchdowns in the last five games. He'll get another one.

But I also think you could start Keaton Mitchell. Even though it was disappointing this last week, you saw Justice Hill, I believe, with one carry. He's basically been usurped. Keaton Mitchell continuing to get more work, continuing to get healthier from that previous injury. He looks great. And if there's a matchup where you could get it done, it would be the Los Angeles chart. Would you play kind of similar art type of players? Would you play Keaton Mitchell or Ty Chandler against the Chicago Bears? I would play Keaton Mitchell. Would you play in a flex spot, Keaton Mitchell, or take a shot at the Nanzai Flowers wide receivers for Baltimore in a, you know, Chargers giving up 32 points a game? Yeah, if I'm in a PPR league, I'll go Beckham because he's been involved. I know he's dealing with his injury, but I would go Beckham ahead of Keaton Mitchell. I would go Keaton Mitchell ahead of Rashad Bateman. Okay. All right, Isaiah likely, my start of the week, I'm going to be starting him nervously, but hopeful. Sure.

Chicago, Monday night football game, Bears at 3 and 8, Josh Dobbs in prime time, Vikings at 6 and 5. The D.K. Sportsbook line, Minnesota, minus 3 and a half. The overrunner is 43. This is definitely a game that I could see going either direction with Justin Fields being back out there. It was a 1913 game in week 6 when they played. What are your expectations here? I mean, we've got to wait and find out about Justin Jefferson. If he's back, let me ask you this. Would you... Put him right back in your lineup. And then would you be sitting Addison knowing that, you know, Josh Dobbs is not Kirk Cousins. Yeah, that would be interesting. If he is back, I'm going to definitely put him in my lineup. I'm not sitting on Justin Jefferson on my bench. And if that happens where Jefferson is back, I probably would look elsewhere for Addison. Addison without Jefferson, you know, last week was three for 44. He's still a great player. I don't think he's a must bench. He's not someone where it's like.

If Jeffers is back, you can't play Addison. But he becomes someone that you then have to take a look at what your options are and consider benching him. If he's going to be probably at that point the third read in this offense because Hawkinson, you know, Dobbs looks to the tight end a lot. Other thoughts on the offensive side of the ball? Running backs, Mike. For Minnesota? Yeah. I think they both might be in play. Alexander Madison. is still getting a ton of work. We saw 65% of the snaps. I turned into 20 opportunities. Unfortunately, he did fumble again. And Ty Chandler is, it's very, it's very nodgy Jalen Warren right now of Madison, more the Rumbler and the big guy who should see goal line work. But Ty Chandler is so incredibly fast. I'm concerned about the Bears.

rushing defense and how great it's been. Over the past six weeks. Like I could see, I understand your argument for both. I could see an argument for neither because of that. I mean, it's been kind of tough playing runners against them. Yeah, I get that. Minus last week with Gibbs and Monty. Right, but the amount of opportunities those guys should get. You're confident? Confident, no, but volume wise, I'm okay. Fields and more. DJ Moore has been really great in the starts where Fields is playing. So I think you can be confident in DJ Moore. The Vikings haven't been great at stopping wide receivers. However, their defense has been much, much better. This is not the Vikings of last year. Flores has come in, really got them doing great work. There's a reason why they've won so many games lately without.

their starting quarterback and starting wide receiver. It's their defense. And so Fields is a little scary to me here. His rushing baseline, I mean, this is a both and where he can be bad. He can lose this game, be very bad for NFL playing, throw picks, fumble the ball, and still be good for fantasy. He scares me from like a succeeding level. But for fantasy, I'm going to start Fields. Viking six best against the run over the last six weeks. Are you playing any? Bears, runners. I don't think so. I mean, we don't know the health of Deonta Foreman yet, so it should be Khalil Herbert as the primary ball carrier. It was an ankle injury, Roshan, Herbert, taking the load potentially. Yeah, it's going to be a timeshare no matter what. Vikings defense has been good. Justin Fields could vulture touchdowns. We saw the beginning of the year that you didn't really want any of these bears running backs. So I'm not.

I'm not in on the Bears running game. With Foreman being questionable and possibly playing, I think that makes it nearly impossible. Just don't mess with it. Yeah, of, I mean, desperate times call for desperate measures, of course. But this past week, even with Foreman on a bum ankle, I mean, he was the guy who, he was, it looked like the plan was going to be, it's going to be Deonti Foreman again in the entire game. So that concerns me of. You're just having no confidence of knowing who actually will be the guy. I believe Roshan out snapped Herbert in the second half, if I'm not mistaken. So you have no idea. Chandler over any of those, right? Yes, yes. You can't start any of the Bears. And the reason why is because it's a Monday night football game where you don't know if the Antiformin is going to be active on a week where you've got three Thursdays and a Friday game. Like you're going to have to make these decisions.

before you have the knowledge of if it's going to be with or without formant. So just avoid bears to start. All right. We have a couple of injury updates. Zach Taylor says T. Higgins will likely be out there at practice. Thanks, Zach. What about the game? We'll find out. And we got a hashtag for you. If you want to win the signed Giovante Williams jersey, signed D.K. Mackab jersey, signed A.J. Brown mini helmet. I guess we're going with this one. Hashtag spicy surprise. We're going to go with spicy surprise. Make sure you throw it up on Twitter. Tag us at the FF Ballers. I'm sorry on X, the artist formerly known as Twitter. But go to Twitter.com. Hashtag spicy surprise. We got one more big segment before we close it out. We could get some Thanksgiving with that one. We could. I think we've done some research. The team tells me it's going to be okay. All right, all right.

We're not going to be okay. We're fine. What could go wrong on X? Yeah, you know, I'm a little worried. All right. Spicy surprise. Into the face-off we go. Fantasy face-off, presented by Draft Kings. Well, I lucked out last week. I finished second. Cooper Cup went out. I thought I was doomed, but I wasn't doomed. Mike finished last. Yeah, the Brees Hall, no real work in the fourth quarter. And I would lose by three points? Yeah. Cool. That was great. You should be ashamed of yourself. Yes. Wheel of shame. Speaking of shame, if this is not turkey related, I will shame all of you. Spin the wheel.

Well, let's find out. Let's see what we got. The wheel is spinning. Jason had a turkey face once. Banana rammer. Yeah, there we gobble, gobble, baby. Gobble, gobble. All right, good work, please. A little different than the, uh, on the kitchen table. We want you to be a real. Yeah, we want you to live turkey. Oh my gosh, guys. That smells bad. Holy latex. Yeah, put that latex over your face. Oh, gobble, gobble, indeed. Wow, you look so loud in here. You look pretty bad. Oh, baby, you're a real turkey. What's that thing called the snood? Yeah, he's got a snoot hanging off the tip there. Oh, man. If I pass out here in about 45 seconds. You know why? Yeah. You look great. Is it because you can't breathe?

It's because I can't breathe. And what I'm breathing in is definitely 100% poison. Yeah. We better hurry. This week we're doing a Thanksgiving slate. So just the Thanksgiving Day game. So it should be fun. Mike, do you want to gobble your way to the first selection? Come on, baby. Stack Prescott, 6,800. I am playing against the DAC CD stack. I ain't going to be. I ain't going to be without that this week. I got Dak. Okay, I've got Dak as well. We all have Dak Prescott. Mike, you're running backs. Your snoo's getting in the way, bro. I don't know where to put my snood. Lay your snoot on the mic, yeah. Okay, so I got Jemir Gibbs at home, 6800, been an absolute stud. And then I'm going with Charbs. I got Zach Charbonnet at 5300.

I've got the other running back from the Detroit Lions. I've got David Montgomery at 6,300. I think he's going to eat up some touchdowns. And Brian Robinson at 5,900, who's been just really involved in the passing game. Get healthy, Antonio Gibson. Take a week off. Well, I don't have any lines running backs on the Thursday game. I've got Christian McCaffrey at 8,700. And I do have Brian Robinson as well at 5,900. Mike, give me those three wideouts. Well, one of them is CD Lamb, of course. I think that everyone's going to have CD. But then I have Jackson Smith and Jigba at 4,100 and the award winning from the fantasy footballers Turkey Day Awards. I got Ammon Rae St. Brown at 8,500. Interesting. You doubled up on the big boys. I did. I think Green Bay is going to get shalacked. So you went CD Lamb, Amman Raw, St. Brown, and Jackson Smith in Jigba?

That is correct. So did I. Those are my three wide receivers. Okay. Andy, talk about Brandon Cooks. I have all monroe St. Brown. Okay. I have Brandon Cooks. You don't have C.D. Lamb? He has McCaffrey. Yeah, I don't have C.D. Lamb. And I have Jameson Williams at 3,400. All right. All right. I won't be unhappy. No, I know. If CD Lamb goes off, you beat me in League of Record. Look, I didn't, I want to play the game, man. Either of you have CMC? No. No. Okay. We'll see how it goes. At tight end, I have Logan Thomas at 3,500. So do I. Jay. I wish I did. Oh, who do you got? I've got the nastiest player I've ever put in this season. I have no.

No offense. Oh, baby. At 2,700. Maybe Drew Locke comes in and throws it to his old Bronco, buddy. Okay. But I have Jamison Williams as my flex, and then I was out of cash, so I have the Packers. I have Christian Watson. So do I. In my flex at 4,300, hoping that the injuries to the other. Packer wide receivers open up things for him and the Seahawks at 2,600. Well, you both, you're both silly goosees. I have Christian Watson at 4,300 and I have the Cowboys. I got the Cowboys at 3,800. I had the Niners in there for a while, but no, I'm all about the Cowboys defense. Yeah, the Cowboys defense at home single-handedly.

So that is it for Fantasy Faceoff this week, presented by Draft King Sportsbook. Download the Draft King Sportsbook app now and use the promo code Ballers to get $150 in bonus bets instantly when you place a $5 bet on any football game. That is the code ballers only at Draft King's Sports Book. We have done it. Dragging my snoot everywhere. What a spicy. Mike's got his snoot out. Am I allowed to get out of here? Nope. Yeah. No, we got one more spicy surprise. We have the big hashtag out there. You can share it with us. We hope every single one of you has a fantastic Thanksgiving holiday, time with the family, time with football. Be safe out there. Enjoy it. Enjoy every minute. And we got a new DFS podcast dropping on Friday as well. So if you get through them, if you got to hear, you're about done with this show. And you might need something else to listen to so you can listen to that. And it's a dynasty show out.

It is. Okay, that's another one. So Sunday Live, ballerslive.com, catch mic on Sunday. He'll be filled up with Jack in the Box. That is it. Have a spectacular holiday, everybody. Thank you to everyone in Jucers Alley. I guess you guys can have a good holiday too. And thank you to the footland. Goodbye. Gobble, gobble, gobble, gobble. Thank you for listening to another episode of the Fantasy Footballers podcast. Join our fantasy football community on join thefoot.com. And follow us on Twitter at theFF ballers.