Week 4 Matchups + Wheel of Shame, Tua Talk - Fantasy Football Podcast for 9/30

I'm back and we are covering the rest of the matchups this week. We're also getting into our Draft Kings lineups and discussing the game and some of the things that happened last night on today's episode. Like this video, subscribe to the channel, click the bell, and enjoy the show. The Fantasy Footballer Studio is brought to you by Samsung Galaxy. Visit Samsung.com to learn more. The Fantasy Footballers podcast with your host. Andy Holloway, Jason Moore, and Mike Wright. Oh, welcome in. The fantasy footballers back with you, Mike Wright, Jason Moore, Andy Holloway, a Friday episode of the podcast, matchups, news. Shame. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. I forgot. It's nice when you can forget. Yep.

It's fun being on that side of things. Yes, I will be shamed today. And I deserve it because you two, you took all the chalk and you won. So we were good. Well, you didn't have the foresight to play wide receiver two on the week, Mack Hollins. I mean, superstar of the Las Vegas Raiders. It's a good point, Mike. The fantasy face off the wheel of shame later on during today's episode of the show. You can find us on Twitter at the FF Ballers, so I encourage you to do so. We're on Instagram, TikTok. YouTube, you want to watch the show, YouTube.com slash the fantasy footballers. You can subscribe, click the bell, and you'll be notified when Mike goes live every Sunday morning for Sunday Live, where he is, you know, tilting with you, giving last minute advice. And honestly, he's been making these sneaky roster pickups before. Don't put that pressure on me.

You know, and he never misses. That's the thing about Mike. He never gets those calls wrong. He said earlier this morning that he has a really special one for this week. I can't wait to hear who I guess I do. I'll be tuning in for sure. It is Friday. Put Clan Friday. Every Friday during the season, we give away $100 to Fantasychamps.com or you can pick up a trophy, a ring, whatever the case may be. And today's winner. Over on Patreon, laminar throw. Laminor throw is the username over there. Congratulations. You win a $100 gift card. Thank you for supporting the show. Go get a ring or a trophy or the belts. Yeah. But speaking. Swag out. Yeah. And it's just a short little thing. But speaking of Foot Clan, they have asked for something for many years. Oh, yeah.

And there might be a special announcement on Monday. That's all I'll say. Yeah, the tease for the tease. Just don't. Yeah, the tease for the tease. Yeah, don't miss Monday. Well, this is how you do. I mean, like the big movies, you know, they have the teaser. Right. And then the trailer. Yep. So the trailer is coming Monday. That's right. Okay. Let's talk about the Thursday night football game. Bengals 27, Miami Dolphins 15. This was, there's two storylines here. To talk about the first one is what happened with Tua, Tua, the very, very scary injury, concussion, and then post-concussion symptoms on the field. It is stealing the headlines, right? This is dominating the news right now with regards to, you know, was Tua actually injured last week when the team claimed it was a back injury where he cleared concussion protocol in like eight.

real minutes, not eight game minutes, and then was back out on the field. You know, my take on this is, first of all, it's been, I'm thankful that the news has been very positive relative to Tua. Yeah, what it looked like. Yeah, what it looked like, the possibility of there being a neck injury, the possibility of it being something that he had to stay in the hospital. He's been discharged. He flew back with the team. It's, I say this. with respect it's just a concussion it's not a concussion and broken bones or something of that nature um so you know to me this whole debate comes down to the NFL hires medical professionals the teams hire medical professionals they're supposed to follow a protocol um us at home we don't know you know the the whole story about concussions is sometimes the worst hit in the world is not a concussion and the lightest hit that you've ever seen is the most severe concussion

We're not trained in being able to identify that. So to me, that lays the responsibility at the feet of the medical professionals hired by the NFL. It's not really, I can't make a judgment call on what they did or didn't do behind the scenes. If the medical team didn't do what they're supposed to do. They should be fired. I mean, they should be consequences. Yeah. Responsible. It's just, it's scary when you see what the, you know, the, and they showed it a lot. Way too much. You know, and it was, it was a scary sight. And whenever you worry about the health of a human being, you, you know, we're going to get up in arms. We're going to see what can we, what could we have done better? And hopefully if there were problems done, they get rectified. And, and, and moving forward, I agree with you, Andy. The main thing is it's good.

that he has progressed quickly and did not have. The amount of time he was down as well, not just the pictures, but the amount of time he was on the field when the stretcher was coming out, there were, you know, really big worries that now those worries have at least been alleviated. Yeah, so we'll find out a lot more. The MRI is still to come. They'll be very thorough about this injury. On the field, players had to shake this off, which was almost impossible to do. But the Bengals win a second consecutive game at home. Joe Burrow, a nice fantasy day, 287 and 2. Didn't throw a pick in this one. Joe Mixing got a ton of work. Should have had a much bigger fantasy day. Had multiple goal line opportunities on multiple drives that he didn't get in. Yeah. I say he had a lot of carries inside the five. 24 carries. To have only one rushing touchdown. I mean, 24 carries turning into 61 yards.

I mean, fantasy, it worked out, but that's gross. Well, if you get stuffed on the goal line five times, that's going to change your yards per carry. But it wasn't just the goal line. I mean, he looked, his longest run of the night was seven yards. And not that I need, I don't need him ripping off 20-yard carries every other time he touches the ball, but it just, it continued a, now a four-week trend of Cincinnati. can't run. They want to run, but they cannot do it very well. Their offensive line has not just been bad in the passing game for Joe Burrow. That's grabbed the headlines, but their offensive line has just been bad all the way around. That being said, the opportunities that were given to Joe Mixon, it doesn't matter what he does with them. Zach Taylor's like, yeah, again, yeah, again. Samaja only had two, two opportunities, one target, one carry. So, to 28 opportunities for Joe Mixon. The wide receiver room for Cincinnati, T. Higgins.

Seven for 124 and a touchdown on nine targets. Jamar Chase, four for 81. One of those four from Tyler Boyd. And Jamar Chase, after week one where I think he had 10 receptions and a touchdown, it's been a slower few weeks. He did score last week. It's in week one, T. Higgins was knocked out of that game early on. And then Jamar Chase went on to be an absolute target machine. Jamar Chase is fantastic. T. Higgins is equally as fantastic. And Higgins was doing this while pretty hobbled and banged up for a lot of the game. On the other side, Teddy Bridgewater had to take over for Tua, went 14 for 23, 193, and 1. It was a pretty good performance from him. Mostert and Chase Edmins. We need to talk about this breakdown. Rahim Mostert had 72% of the snaps. That is elite.

Yeah, that's above what a real RB1 versus, you know, change of pace back normally has. So, you know, Chase Edmonds dropped the touchdown pass in the first quarter, but the usage and workload for Chase Edmonds has diminished. The trust for Mostert, he was 100% of the two-minute drills. He was the majority of the goal line. He was the majority of all snaps. You didn't really see Chase take the field in the fourth quarter that I remember. I mean, even down in distances where I thought, okay, Moster just broke off a 24-yard run. Now we're going to see a play with Chase Edmonds. So I don't, you know, they had a hobbled Jaylen Wado. You would have thought Chase Edmonds would be more integral. Yeah. Like I'm sounding the alarm on Chase Edmonds. Now he scored. He scored in this game again. He scored last week. Back-to-back weeks. And like you said, he should have had two touchdowns because they obviously have some goal line packages.

dedicated to Chase Edmonds, but you can't rely on that. You can't start him. And people will be like, oh, should we cut him? No, of course, you're picking up Somaget P. Ryan off the waivers just in case. You're not cutting Chase Edmonds. It's more about you need to be picking up Rahim Moster because if this utilization continues, he'll be good for fantasy. He had opportunities to score touchdowns just, you know, they didn't come. I'm curious as the weeks go on, will this? be the norm or not. You know, this was a short week of recovery for the dolphins. And obviously in the beginning of the year, you had Chase dealing with some injuries. So we'll just have to stay tuned. But Rahim Mosterts a must-pick-up. We'll talk about that on waivers tomorrow. Tomorrow? Tomorrow's Saturday. Cool. Jason will have. Are you in Monday mode? Yeah, I am. I am in Monday mode. That was like post-game Monday? Yeah. Well, you missed yesterday's show. So your week's probably all disorienting. Yeah, I feel like I'm back for a new week.

So I will be here tomorrow, Footland. But, okay. Just letting you know, 42% in week one for most to 55% to 56% to 72%. And the history with Mike McDaniel makes it very interesting. He was good. He was 4.6 of carry. He had a 25-yard run. Yes, we'll talk about it on Tuesday. Tyree Keltin for 160, 14 targets. He's good. And then Jalen Waddle just two for 39 came off the field. It seemed hobbled. Multiple times he came off the field. Early and late in that game, he is not 100% right now. It's also a bigger worry for me with him and Teddy Bridgewater if that's how the future is going to be. Agreed. I say he was questionable coming into the game. That's right. And it was, you know, the announcement. Everyone was active. But it's with the way the injury designations are now, it's really hard to know of if a guy is questionable.

Does he just have a scrape or does he actually have something going on? And unfortunately, Waddle has an injury that he's really dealing with. News and notes from around the league. Presented by USAA Insurance. Speaking of those injury designations, Christian McCaffrey. Stay strong, Christian. He's at practice on Friday morning. He's listed as questionable for week four. It was looking very negative Wednesday, Thursday. I still don't think it's a guarantee that he plays this week. We'll have to see how limited or full he is. If he's a full participant, then great. If he's limited and doing work on the sideline on a Friday, you know, there were concerns about this being, you know, worse than the previous time that it sidelined him.

The problem here, because obviously when you have a questionable running back, you're looking at the pivot options on that team who could be thrown in there. Unfortunately, there's two guys that are going to get the work. It's going to be Deontay Foreman and it's going to be Cuba Hubbard. And if it's my choice between the two, Eileen Foreman, I don't know where you guys lean. Eileen Foreman as well. I think this is the year of defeating Achilles. And so. Foreman is just the next man up. Eileen, J.D. McKissick. And that's the Greek god Achilles, you're saying. We're going to finally get over the hump and defeat him. With that arrow right in that heel. Thank you. Wait, did his name get mentioned? Yes. Mike brought up. Yeah. I mean, I'm talking over here. I'm giving really good analysis. We're talking about Greek gods, but whatever. I said, you were giving who do you prefer between those two guys? And I said, I prefer JD McKissig off of the waiver wire. The device. It's working. Dalvin Cook.

Listed as a full participant in Thursday's practice. Now, is it legal for him to have a robotic assistant on the field? If it's non-scientient. His stiff arm is not going to be elite. It's hydraulic. They will not be able to tackle it. Anybody gets locked at the elbow, so he's stuck running with it out. No, this is good news. Dalvin coach should be playing. Corderole Patterson. Now, they're in London for that game, right? That's the Minnesota Saints game. So the matchup's not great, but Dalvin's Delvin. So Cordero Patterson, he practiced on Friday. We got word yesterday that he hadn't practiced on Thursday, right? So, you know, maybe they had talked about some maintenance days with Cordero. Maybe that's what it was with the age and the workload. He deserves it after what he's done to start the year.

Adrian Brown had missed two days of practice. They were personal reasons. He is back on Friday. So no concern there. And then we're going to give you some Saints and Lions news here because there's a lot between both teams. James Winston didn't practice for a third day in a row. Nick Underhill, who's a very good reporter in New Orleans, would be surprising if he plays. So Andy Dalton looks like he's going to get the start and he will not have Michael Thomas. Michael Thomas has been ruled out for this week. Ho-hum, here we are again with Michael Thomas. It's unfortunate. He's going to be Andy Dalton throwing to Chris Oliva and probably Jarvis Landry and company, and hopefully using Alvin Camara, who is listed as questionable as well, but practiced. For Chris Oliva, the move from James to Andy Dalton, I mean, it could be worse. It certainly could be worse. You like James because James chucks it down the field. However,

You know, at least a couple games. Was it last year we had Andy Dalton with on the Bears with with Darnell Mooney. And Mooney had some good performances. I like hearing that, Mike. Thank you. We're here. We're here for everyone. Don't like, this is not panic. Bench Chris Olivae because Andy Dalton is the quarterback. Okay. Yeah, I mean, Andy Dalton has shown a willingness to throw interceptions on par with James Winston in his career. Of course. All right, we have the Detroit Lions Amon Rae St. Brown Superstar wide receiver declared out for this game. We got some concerning news about DJ Chark because we had talked about it yesterday on the show that he could be a good pivot. And then he missed practiced, but Dan Campbell at least said Friday that he's jogging around but nursing the same ankle injury, but should be good. It makes it a scarier.

situation. Yeah, I wouldn't. He's not the pivot option. If he is active and he's still nursing the ankle injury from last year, I'm not wanting to play DJ Chark in my lineups. Josh Reynolds is who I think would really take a step up. I mean, he had a lot of work last week. And with Swift expected to miss, I mean, he is not ruled out yet, but I would be surprised if he plays as a pass catching. running back, no almond raw, a hobble DJ Chark. Josh Reynolds is a pretty good pivot. And Jamal's going to catch some passes too if they are limited. And T.J. Hawkinson. Dan Campbell did say Swift is unlikely to play. Don't count on him. David and Joku, after being named my start of the week, decided to take the day off to celebrate. Didn't practice yesterday. Look, when you get an honor.

Like an Andy Holloway start of the week. That's right. You've got to at least have a cupcake. Hey, Gabe Davis took the day off after I'm in my start of the week. It's a great honor and they celebrate this. They went out together and they celebrated. But they are both back at practice on Friday. Actually, in Joku is Gabe Davis, it's looking better, but pay attention because that that one's screaming a surprise sit to me. Gabe Davis already came back last week. We weren't sure if he was going to. That was a Monday night game, right? Was that a Monday night game? No, the bills? The bills were not. No, they were on Sunday. Okay. The Monday was the cowboy giant game. Yeah, so we were surprised that Gabe didn't take that game off, or at least we were expecting that to be a possibility. We were also surprised at how much he was on the field. He might just need another week. Yeah. So any other news you guys have, Kyle? Josh wants you to know that Tayson Hill is off the injury report. Okay.

Papa Josh with the Tayson. So, I mean, he will be the backup quarterback in this game. So if you and no Michael Thomas. So if you want to like create a Tayson Hill style narrative, you know, do they bring him in to throw the ball a couple times? Because that could be high upset. It's far more likely this week than when James is the starter. All right. That was today's news and notes presented by USAA Insurance. Learn more at USAA.com slash insurance. Fantasy Forecast. Eight games to cover before we head into the fantasy faceoff. If you don't hear the game you're interested in today, it was on yesterday's show. New York, the Jets, one and two, taking on the one and two Pittsburgh Steelers. The Draft King's Sportsbook line is Pittsburgh minus three. The over and under is a, that's an official number. Right.

There are several of those this week. Yeah, 41 and a half. So Joe Flacco is going to be handing the baton to Zach Wilson. Mitchell Trubisky should hand it to. To Kenny Pickett. Look, this has not been, you know, the Mitchell Trubisky experience has not been good, period. He's had a small drive here, a drive there, whatever, you know. All NFL quarterbacks have a drive here and a drive there. But this offense is frustrated. Deontay Johnson is being limited despite the 11 targets a game. Claypool, Pickens. You know, I'm all about Pickens George up off the waiverware. And maybe seeing if his utilization begins to rise.

Because he's just really talented. He's really talented, but his utilization would need to completely dominate everyone else. I mean, right now, a really talented Deontay Johnson has great utilization and is just an okay fantasy play unless you're in a full PPR league where you're just relying on a good baseline. I mean, right now, Mitch Trubisky is throwing 1.9% touchdown rate, which is the trash. That's trash for Trubisky. I mean, Trubisky's... He was 2.1% his rookie year, and then he lived in the fives. Yeah, he did target Pickens seven times last week, which was up from the two weeks prior. Alec Pierce or George Pickens is a rookie flyer. I would take Alec Pierce. Currently it would be Pierce. The Muth only got Luth on a couple of plays last week. Very late. Very late. It was enough yardage to salvage the day, sort of.

How do you feel about the Muth in this matchup against the currently 13th ranked against the tight end New York Jets? I mean, 21% target share. I know it came late. It was scary last week that he was going to be a goose. But in the landscape, you could certainly do worse. Who's better? Him or Tyler Conklin on the other side of the field? Oh, Conklin. Yeah. Conklin, is Conklin really the tight end four? Yes, he is. So here's the issue with Tyler Conklin. Too many targets? No, it's, I mean, the targets, it's been very enjoyable over these first few weeks. But the New York Jets have been in just the most negative of negative game scripts. Will, we were just talking about the struggles of Ms. Trubisky. Can he take this offense and pour that type of points onto the New York Jets that forces a 60 plus passing night from Zach Wilson? Because that's where.

That's where Tyler Conklin is making it happen. It's not because he's dominating the targets. It's he's getting targets because their pie is so bountiful right now. Jacobi Percet put up 31 points on them. I mean, I realize that they had the great run game and they're probably just a better offense as a whole because of their offensive line and running game. You ever seen Zach Wilson throw a pick six before? Or a couple of them? I mean, the Pittsburgh defense at home. could put up enough points to put them in that game script. But yeah, I mean, Conklin, Friermouth, it's a coin flip for me. Maybe you go with the tight end at home in Friermuth and hope that you get that touchdown, whereas Conklin's probably not going to catch a touchdown. Yeah, and we just really have a lot of question marks with all of the Jets side of the ball because of Zach Wilson taking over. We don't know what, you know, they came out and said they want to run the ball more.

You know, and that's all well and good. Again, you have to be in a position where you can continue to run the ball, which they have not found themselves in. I did not realize Breece Hall was your start of the week, Mike. That is correct. That scares me, but it excites me. I mean, yes, I explained it as my starts of the week were very iron underpants of you got to have the courage. I was the hopeful thing for Breece Hall is last week. The tide started to turn. in opportunities over to Brees Hall, he still can by, he still can take over this backfield. Like that's in the range of outcomes for him. And the Steelers, you can run on them. Like, so I do think that Brees Hall is going to have some success. Six attempts in week one, seven in week two, eight in week three. Oh, man, so easy. Week 16, I'll have 20 attempts. I did the math. Okay. So be ready for that. But no, it has been, um, he had a snap count dip down in week two. Went.

two of the highest of the year last week. So there is an opportunity there for Brees. He's tied for the second most running back targets in the NFL. That's going down. Yeah, let me say. Zach Wilson is going to be, this is going to be the experiment, right? We're going to see what happens here with Zach Wilson. You know, fortunately for Wilson, there's no T.J. Watt running after him in this game. Garrett Wilson, I think you can flex him. I think you expect him to get the ball enough. But beyond that, I wouldn't be. relying on any other jet. Agree. And historically Wilson has been bad on the road. Three touchdowns in seven games. You could have cut off on the road. 152 passing yards. That's a good point, Mike. Yeah. You know, I'll say this. At the end of the year, Zach Wilson was throwing to Braxton Berrios, I think, maybe not Keel and Cole, but was it Keel and Cole? Nobody's. Nobody's. I mean, having Elijah Moore back out on the field, Garrett Wilson.

A healthy Corey Davis, Tyler Conklin. Now you get to see it, right? We want to give them the opportunity with players. Let's go, Zach. To see it. Get it done. I'm not going with the almost upset there. The Buffalo Bills at 2-1 taking on the Baltimore Ravens who are 2-1. Here we go. Mike clapped his hands. Here we go. The over-under is 51 from Draft Kings. The line is Buffalo minus 3. So Josh Allen. Excellent. has been incredible this season, 73 dropbacks last week. So he's good at throwing the ball and he loves doing it. He is excellent. He threw it 11 times to Devin Singletary. So is Devin Singletary equally as nervous this week as he was last week? I mean, of a start? No, I think you should have a little bit more confidence this week because of what you saw last week. Now, last week they played.

So, 90 snaps. I mean, it was like getting a game and a half out of everybody there. So you, you got to assume it's not going to be that level of the amount of plays in this game. That being said, the percentage of all of his work is, his snap percentages, percentage of running back rush attempts, certainly the routes run. I actually liked Evan Singletary going forward. to be more involved. The Zach Moss experiment seems like they keep trying it and then go, oh, yeah, this doesn't work. And then they go back to Devon Singletary. I'm fine playing Devon Singletary this week. I really am. What about him or Breece Hall in the previous matchup against Pittsburgh? Hmm.

I'd be playing Singletary. Yeah, I mean, the volume, I think, is more assured because we don't know what Zach Wilson's world is going to look like. Like, I could see, I made this argument. I don't remember if it was on the air or just in the studio, but I do worry with Zach Wilson coming in off of an injury, do they want to have the better pass protector in there? Yeah, you mentioned that. You know, Michael Carter. Right. And so I just, I've got a lot of question marks there. I would go with Devon Singletary over Breece Hall this week.

Okay. Now, one thing worth pointing out as we talk about this game, I am seeing, because I mean, this game is just, this is the one. This is the one game to rule them all this week. Two injured defenses, two of maybe the best two offenses in the league. You know, at least top five for each. 20 mile an hour sustained wins, gusts stronger chance of rain. Wait, what? Yeah. What? So it's just worth knowing. But the over and under has not moved. It stayed there at 51. Okay. Come on. Don't you ruin this mother nature. Don't you do it. Yeah, nature. So Alan Sindeltery Diggs, they're in your lineup. Gabe Davis is a real nervous start right now. If you had a pivot option of equal value, I would be not playing Gabe Davis because I don't want to see him limp off and then you get nothing. Agreed. McKenzie's in play, especially if Gabe Davis misses.