Starts of the Week + Week 13 Breakdown, Spotty Starts, Funny Jokes - Fantasy Football Podcast for 12/3

going to be, you know, and, you know, maybe Akuta, you know, some of the young guys. So you're saying, like, you think Stafford's not safe? I don't think any of them are safe. Even Stafford this last week was saying, you know, when he's talking about his future, he's like, we'll talk about that some other day. It was not a boat of confidence. So, yeah, I mean, obviously they could resign them both. They're great players. I think they should. It's always funny to me when you say, we're going to build our team better by.

Getting rid of good players. But getting rid of some good players. You know, but at the same time, it's, you can't, you can't be confident in the future of Kenny Gawaday as a lion right now. Oh, man. I heard Patrick Mahomes giving a lot of credit to Matthew Stafford earlier in the week and, you know, the way he, or maybe it was Aaron Rogers actually that gave credit to Matthew Stafford. And it does make you think about what kind of career Stafford has.

you know, the arm talent and the ability and skill. If you just like, I don't know, dropped him with Andy Reid somewhere. What kind of career does Matthew Stafford have? Because I think we have all seen it for long enough to know how tough he is, the arm talent, all of that. But that's how it works. I love Stafford. I do too. That dude's awesome. He's just, you know.

When you watch a guy grid it out and tough it out and play through everything. He's just one of the fun players to watch. You know Mike likes him because he wears his, you know, he wears his hat backwards. That's right. That's pretty cool. That's what cool guys do. And we wear snapbacks. That's right. Maddie snapbacks. Also, as I call them, hats. Hats. All right. Let's get into the forecast. But before we do that, I want to thank today's sponsor, Hello Fresh. You've heard about Hello Fresh.

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Shipping. Fantasy forecast. All right, the New Orleans Saints at 9 and 2 take on the Atlanta Falcons, who are 4 and 7 right now, but maybe a bit of a trap for fantasy players these days. The Saints are two and a half point favorites. It's a 45.5 point over under. And dip.

You know, the implied point total in this game, 24 for the Saints, 21 for the Falcons. Falcons coming off an absolute drubbing over the Raiders. And this is an interesting game because you have Tayson Hill, Tayson Hill behind Center again. The questions around Alvin Camara, Michael Thomas, and the Falcons, this is not the Falcons of the early part of the year on defense.

Yeah, I mean, that is a fair thing to say. But the New Orleans Saints are one of the best teams in the NFL. I'm not concerned about the Saints against the Atlanta, because I don't feel like it's, I'm not. I'm not concerned that there is a trap. From an offensive perspective, you're not concerned about the Saints offense? Correct. I'm concerned about where do those fantasy points go? I should say I'm not concerned at all with Taysam Hill. I mean, it tastes him hell.

has proven to me that he will get it done for fantasy, mostly because he's going to put up, you know, 50 plus rushing yards, the chance at multiple rushing touchdowns, and still has Michael Thomas, the one actual good game we saw for Michael Thomas was a couple weeks ago against these Atlanta Falcons. Now, actual concern is what is the split between Alva Camara and Latavius Murray? Murray is getting far more work.

We talked about after that first week of, like, Sean Payton is a good offensive coach. And he, knowing that he had a plan for Taysam Hill and he was going to give Taysam Hill the shot, he's not going to force Taysam Hill to B, Drew Breeze. And we've seen that turn into Alvin Kamara's not getting targets. Now I know last week against Denver, you basically have to throw that game out. But it's troubling.

for the ceiling of Alva Camaro versus Latavius Murray. I mean, they're, you know, right now we have Camara at like our running back 12 and Latavius at running back 24. I don't know that the gap should be even that big. Atlanta is number two against the run, by the way, over the last six weeks, number three on the season. They are very good at stopping the run.

Part of the reason early that they were so good at stopping the run is because it was so easy to pass on them. You really didn't. It was one of those reverse funnel defenses. But when you look at over the entire course of the season, really being able to not give up fantasy points to the running back position, this just projects to me to be a really low scoring game. I mean, two weeks ago, the Saints held these Falcons to nine.

real-life NFL points. There's not a lot of fantasy production that's going to come from that if New Orleans is slowing the game down with Taysam and playing such great defense, which they are. Now, He was banged up in that game, right? He was banged up. So he started the game. He finished the game, but there was a chunk in the middle where he was. 35% of the snaps. I mean, yeah, so Julio wasn't involved.

Yeah, he missed a good portion of that game. Obviously, that makes a huge difference for Matt Ryan. We've talked about that. I think the Rulio 11 is not in play here. I think Matt Ryan is a sit no matter what happens. Yeah, because you have a risk with Julio if he does play this week. And then the Saints defense has just been the best in football over the last six weeks. Number two against fantasy quarter. They're giving up 10 fancy points a game to opposing fantasy quarterbacks. Yeah, I guess I. Yeah, go ahead.

I'd much rather play Kirk Cousins. This week I would much rather play Ryan Fitzpatrick, presuming he is the starter against the Cincinnati Bengals. I'd rather play Cam Newton against the Chargers. I'm with you, Andy. I'm pretty much just out on that Ryan. Can I throw a name out there? Asking for a friend?

Better not be Derek Carr. No, that's a good one. That would be another question. That's a good one because of course it should be Derek Carr. But because we made him a start last week and he had negative fantasy points, we feel we can't recommend it. But the true recommendation, if you take that bias and that short-term memory, you know, you've got to have the memory loss there and just play the odds. I think Derek Carr is a better play than Matt Ryan. I was going to ask you, Carson Wentz.

Or Matt Ryan. No way, man. That one I'm out. That one, the actual matchup doesn't make sense. Like Carson Wentz against the Green Bay Packers secondary. I'm fine. I love Miles Sanders against that run defense, but no, no, no Carson wins. So you like Tastom Hill and I get it. You know, I'm not looking at Atlanta just because they've improved on defense and saying, you know, they're going to shut down.

this entire offense, but I'm with Jason on the narrative. I would take the under in this game. I think this game could be more competitive than week 10. I don't know if Julio's back out there. Calvin Ridley, it looked like he was leaving with another injury. If he's out there, you're playing him. Yes. But the running back room, you know, last week people threw Brian Hill in there. Nito Smith had a better game. Todd Gurley's back in practice.

and the Saints are too good against the opposing fantasy running backs. I mean, 9.5 points per game given up over the last six weeks. I think you could just, I don't know, bench all three of them and just be content to move forward with somebody else this week. I'm sure we'd all play Gore over any of these options. Yes, I agree with that. The fact that, like if Todd Gurley is, in fact, back, he's getting all the limited practices, or if he ends up doing that, Limitone on Wednesday says to me he probably will suit up.

But it's going to be what will the snap breakdown be between him and Brian Hill? I think it's a sketchy start for any of the Atlanta Falcons. Do you flex Latavius Murray? Oh, yeah. Yeah, I do. Over Melvin Gordon against Kansas City. Would you play him over Melvin? I would not. I don't think I'd play him over Melvin. I mean, well, and Melvin has that Philip Lindsay is hurt if you remember. So if Melvin Gordon's all alone with the Denver Broncos, then you have.

A lot more confidence. What about Dobbins, who you like taking it to 100? Would you roll Dobbins over Latavius? I would. I would as well. And then Jared Cook's kind of been deleted alongside Alvin Camara's passing work. Adam Troutman's playing more snaps right now. Cook is not... Which is crazy. I did not realize this. Yeah, you can't use them right now. There's just not a trust with the passing work from Taislam Hill, who I think is still yet to throw an NFL touchdown. Is this...

Is that accurate? That is accurate. And just a quick dynasty note, he's probably not on your wire, but there is a chance that Adam Troutman was left alone there. I think that you should pick him up. All right. Haydenhurst, you're okay on the outskirts of the tight end department? Yeah. Yeah, well, you might be forced into it. I mean, on the Falcon side of the ball, you might be forced into Haydenhurst. You're going to start Calvin Ridley.

questionable. I mean, you're probably going to start Julio if he's out there. You could do worst. Didn't Haydenhurst? Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Come on. That was a good one. It's just the, you gave us. Yeah, I think it was crickets. You gave us the pause. It was such a setup. Yeah. Guys, guys, guys, guys, be quiet. Guys, be quiet. Because you had to hear my incredible joke. You could do worst. That's a good joke. Thank you.

I'll be here all week. I guess for a remote recording, it's pretty, it's all right. It's not bad for remote. Thank you. The Detroit Lions at 4 and 7 take on the Chicago Bears who are remotely a joke. It's just remote. That's a better joke, right? That's a better joke. Thank you, Al. The Bears are 5 and 6 in a tailspin here. Bears are three-point favorites. Okay, divisional matchup between the two teams that are now on the bottom.

Mitch Trubisky's going to start this game. Matt Nagy has a funny air to him these days when asked about the quarterback. It's almost like he's just accepted his reality finally. What's the quote? I'm trying to remember off the time I'm having it. Is Mitchell Trubisky going to play quarterback? I don't see why not. I don't see why not. I mean. Who says that? Everything is everything.

You are the head coach. You can feel like that in your heart. Like deep down in your spirit, you know and you recognize that Mitchell Trubisky is not the answer. Nick Foles, that was probably a swing and a miss. He's not the answer either. But you are the head coach. You are the CEO of the team. You can't be out there in public going, I guess. Whatever, man. Whatever, man. Sure. But you've been begging him not to be such a magician. The opposite of this is going. This is still, man. This is still Job illusions.

Like, if he had been out there, like, yeah, did you see, like, we saw a lot of positive stuff from Mitchell Tribisky last week. And yes, he will be the start of moving forward. He might as well have said, what other options do I got? Yes. And that's not, how do you inspire confidence in your offense? Like, Alan Robinson, your superstar wide receiver is, he's going to be a free agent. And you're over here, just like, yeah, whatever, man, I don't really care. I don't care anymore about this offense. Now, I, you know.

I'm going to get fired at the end of the year. I don't care. Alan Robinson had a nice game. He's top five in the league in targets. You're going to play Alan Robinson against Detroit. You're going to play David Montgomery, who's been great against a terrible Detroit running defense. Yes. And that's going to be the end of your Chicago offense. Is there any temptation to play anybody else? I know Mooney had air yards, but they're always empty. I mean, that's it, right? No, that's it.