CAN'T MISS Week 6 Preview Part 2 👀 | Fantasy Focus

We all know Saturday's game time can get a little messy. Your crew came over to watch, snacks on the table, drinks in hand, and somebody celebrating like they just won the whole season and beyond. And when that energy gets going, your walls can end up taking the hit. Whether it's a big spill or a noticeable scuff, that's where Beyer Ultra Interior Paint comes in. It adds an extra durable stain blocking finish that helps your walls hold up for the whole season. It also delivers outstanding coverage and hide in fewer coats with easy application and a smooth even finish that goes on clean from the first pass. Plus, that easy clean finish helps walls stay looking new longer. So before the next kickoff, give your space game-ready defense and coverage that goes the distance. Beyer Ultra, only at The Home Depot. What's up, friends? Welcome to Fantasy Focus Football alongside Mike Clay and Fields Yates. Looking fly. Do you have a name? Bucky. This is your name? Yep, I'm Bucky Yates. Bucky Yates. Yep, nice to meet you all. Oh, I like it. Bucky Yates. For those of you listening to the show and not watching on YouTube, Fields paying off his punishment today for losing starts of the week this week. Oh, I thought he was just wearing that. No, don't put that on him. Got it. Kind of a great reward. Dude, you told me that you wore this around the house every once in a while when your daughters put on their stuff, like their princess dresses. Yes. I now understand why. It basically is a onesie. Yeah. This is not a punishment. It's a very comfortable onesie. It's not a punishment, right? As a matter of fact, the only problem with it, and for those that are watching, you can see it right now, is it has these two buck teeth, right? Yes. Kind of covers your eyes. And this part, the hat, has a little bit of weight to it. Yeah. So it almost feels like somebody is gently pressing down on the top of my head. So in a few minutes, or a few months, I'm going to be able to see it. I'm going to be able to see it. In a few moments, I'll probably slide it back. That's fair. Just so I don't have a headache at the end of the show. But what if your takes are better? Because it's like pressing on your stern part of your brain. Well, Mike, good news for you. They can't get much work, so it probably will be better. I don't know. That's a self-own right there. Great t-shirt from Mike. Shout out to Homage for working with ESPN. Yeah, thank you. Collaboration. Yeah, you passed this one on, so I appreciate it. And I like it a lot. So throwback ESPN2 logo, and we're on ESPN2 today. What a coincidence. What a coincidence. Who knew? Jack's in that shirt. And you do look good. It's like a Smedium. Does it say Smedium on the inside? It says Smedium. So if you wear a smaller shirt that fits you, you look more jacked. ESPN2 small for Mike Clay's body. Love that. That's it. We got a big show today. Not a small show today. A big show today planned. We're going to recap all the things that were Thursday Night Football. We'll be as fast as possible on that. And then dive into the rest of our week six storylines. Dude, it was frustrating. But first, we got a bunch of news and notes we're going to dive into. We got a couple of news items on guys that have been either ruled out or some statuses for this week. We got right after the show, huge news on Jalen Hurts. Scary news too. Jalen Hurts is going to miss at least week six because of a blood clot that has developed. Remember, Jalen practiced in full on Wednesday. I think they called it a calf injury at the time. There's been a lot of questions, not as many answers right now, understandably, from the Eagles and Jalen Hurts side. All we know is that for right now, Jalen Hurts will not play on Sunday. It will be Tanner McKee. I think it stands to reason this will be a multi-week absence. The Eagles are also, and we'll talk about this more in a little bit, very shorthanded at skill players beyond Jalen Hurts as Saquon Barkley is still not practiced and Devontae Smith was a limited participant in practice and it feels like very limited. So you're talking about an offense with Tanner McKee under center. We'll see at running back, probably Damian Pierce. Wide receivers, we'll see as well. Dontavian Wicks also mispracticed yesterday. Dallas Goddard is like the only man standing from the familiar skill guys for this offense on Sunday. It's not that Jalen Hurts has been great in fantasy right now. Obviously, he has been amongst the biggest disappointments of all quarterbacks in the NFL, but man, this is a scary one. So get well soon, Jalen Hurts, and take as much time as you need to get yourself back to 100%. You're still a young quarterback. You got a lot of real estate ahead of you in your NFL career, and this is on the very short list for medical situations you want to mess around with least. Correct. No doubt about it. Take as long as you need, Jalen. Wishing him the best. Absolutely. That would be the case if they were 5-0 and not 2-3. 100%. Yeah. I know. Not to suggest you feel otherwise. That's not what I was suggesting at all. Yeah, no doubt. The one thing I'll say, flipping it to maybe the positive here is an opportunity for Tanner McKee. This guy's been around for a while in the Eagles organization. There's been a lot of hype from fans want to see him more on the field. He has had two opportunities. Both have been meaningless week 18 games the last two years. So at least he's used to playing with the backups because they rest all the guys and none are available for this one. I mean, we'll see if Davante Smith can go. You mentioned Dallas Goddard. He threw him a couple passes, but he came out last year in that game. Davante Smith actually played like a driver. So yeah, I mean, he was just firing it to him a bunch. So hopefully you can, you know, get those guys, get the ball in the hands of those players. But again, he hasn't had much, much of a shot here. But this is the Bears and Tyson Bajent. What I mean by that is the Bears had a veteran in case Keenum who was not going to start until Tyson Bajent entered the concussion protocol. The Eagles cut Andy Dalton recently, who I think we know what Andy Dalton, if we, if we thought Andy Dalton was starting on Sunday, we'd say like, all right, it's going to be the offense has been good, but it's not going to be great with Andy Dalton. It's probably going to be serviceable. And we saw that with the Bears with case Keenum in that game against the Eagles. Ironically on Monday night football, Tyson Bajent had one pretty good game and then one disaster. So Tanner McKee has a chance to be one of those two things for our purposes. We certainly hope it's closer to Tyson Bajent against the Jets where he threw for like 261, no touchdowns, but was definitely much more. More efficient than last week's dreadful performance against the decent matchup here. So I'm, I'm excited to see what McKee can do. This is an opportunity for him to maybe get an opportunity somewhere else at some point down the road as a starter. So I'm, uh, uh, I'm fascinated for this one at the very least, but we are, we are talking about the, uh, the injuries to the other guys in a minute or no, no, no. Okay. Yesterday. Yeah. All right. So let's just, let's just reiterate the, uh, the latest there. Cause I want to, I'd be curious what you guys think about, um, the past catchers Dallas Goddard, Mike mentioned on Wednesday, he's inside our top 10 tight ends. I would say, yeah. Yeah. You know, we're good there. I mean, it's just so hard. It's tight end. Exactly. Yeah. Um, let's talk about the running backs here for a second. No, no, no, we can talk about them, but I was just answering your question before you got there. No, here's my question for you guys is I get it. It's a limited player and Damien Pierce is the offensive lines of mess right now. None of the guys are good. Do I have, I think you just were, you're chewing on a little bark before the show. I'm shedding. I'm shedding fur over here. Yeah. Um, does this go to the football axiom where when you're down to your backup quarterback and you have a, at least a better defense than offense, you just try to run the heck out of the ball. Okay. I shouldn't have said no. Maybe the answer to that question is yes, but I still don't want to start. I think that, uh, we know you're playing Carolina and you've seen what they've done, what happened to them in week one, at least against Chicago. Yeah. I mean, I think you're going to try to run the football and protect Tanner McKee best you can, but they're still going to have to throw it in this game. I think Carolina is competent enough. They're going to be either Carolina will be ahead or it's going to be a close game and Tanner's gonna have to throw the football, but yeah, I, I, I do expect Pierce to be very busy in this one. Okay. So yeah. So to establish the value, cause I said it yesterday, if Saquon was out Pierce would rank somewhere between like 18 and 24 of months. My running back came in the projections. So, uh, the projections have now reflected Saquon being out. So if you are mining the waiver wire for running backs last minute, uh, there aren't many to consider, but Damian Pierce is at least on that radar in the 10 team league. Ideally you're not starting him, but we also understand with four teams on a buy and all of the running back nonsense this year. Right. And the 12 team league, he probably will be a starter. That's the part. Yeah. I'd rather play probably Woody Marks than Damian Pierce. Um, I think that same zip code though, right? Yeah. Same, same conversation. Yeah. Yep. Yeah. Michael, why don't you go awesome for the Eagles? I'm for the Texans. Actually his last full season there, he averaged like over seven yards per carry. Now, granted it was on like 54 carries, but still, I mean, he, he showed some explosion. And then last year, I remember they waved to me. He was on the chiefs. He had what? Seven total touches or 14 total touches all of last season. So we haven't seen him much. He had almost that just last week filling in for, uh, Will Shipley, but yeah, uh, Woody Marks, uh, no David Montgomery. He's did not travel to London. So he obviously he's ruled out. We expected that all week long. Uh, Woody Marks last week subbed in and played all but 10 offensive snaps in that game. 15 carries four targets at 85 yards. But, uh, we've seen this before last year. Woody Marks member had over 200 touches and had one top 10 fantasy outing average under 10 yards per carry at a handful of touchdowns. And I mentioned that because that's what you need. If you start Woody Marks, you're 15 plus touches, some, uh, work in the passing game, but you really need him to find the end zone. I think for this, especially against this defense. Yeah, exactly. Right. Because you're playing Jacksonville, fewest yards, league, low yards per carry to running backs. Uh, this is a tough assignment. Um, and that's the only reason I think it's close between Marks and Pierce. I mean, Pierce does have a good matchup. Marks has a brutal matchup. So it's, it is a tough call. Both of them, I would say are fringe RB to friend for his top 20 running backs. I'm with you on that. We got some news on AJ Brown as well as status for Sunday, still up in the air, but he's practicing at least first time we've been seeing him back on the practice field. There's no guarantee that he will be out there. I'll be surprised if he, I don't think he's going to roll out. Yeah. I would lean more out. If he does play, I would probably play him. I've been waiting to pull him off of my injured reserve spot on my squad. I, especially with four teams on a buy and there's some good wide receivers this week on a buy as well as a bunch of wide receivers that have just underperformed to start the season. So if, if the Patriots say that he is good to go and we're not getting like kind of that vibe that it's going to be, we'll slow play him back. Exactly. Yeah. Then I'm rolling with AJ Brown if he plays, which we don't think is going to happen. Yeah. You know, I was just thinking about this on the fly here. So I lean him not playing but i think if he does play he will be limited they play on thursday night again they travel to chicago next thursday context so maybe good context i wouldn't be surprised if we get reporting one way or the other like a adam schefter on sunday uh if during fantasy focus countdown says like aj brown will play but would be more sort of on the t higgins plan last week okay where higgins was playing in kind of critical spots for cincinnati if that's what it feels like that wouldn't surprise then i don't want to play aj brown like that's but long ways to go here but if it depends on your situation that's the thing i'm playing malachi fields in a league and i had aj brown in my ir i'd rather play aj brown off throwing him in there in your flex yeah but but mike variable could come up to the podium this morning and say aj brown is going to play on sunday and then if he says it just sort of matter-of-factly i'd be playing him like i would normally agreed yep all right caleb williams was a full participant in practice on thursday he says his status for sunday uh against the falcons is still not decided definitely feels like it's trending towards hill playing yes it feels decided another team i mentioned the patriots they played the bear so caleb also has two games in four nights i think if caleb does play then you might see a little bit less of the designed rushing but one of the things about caleb williams as opposed to some of these quarterbacks a la josh allen is that like caleb is a master of scramblers and extending plays yeah not necessarily designed runs i think he actually was hurt on a design run against the vikings but that has a more rare design run for him relative to other running quarterbacks so if caleb williams does in fact play i will have him and i have him he is currently projected to play mike has him in the projections we have him in the rankings startable on sunday against atlanta to me the more the bigger question is what does it mean for the pass catchers i feel pretty good about caleb being a top 10 to 12 ish option absent a crazy matchup like the vikings each and every week i i have him lower this week i have him in the mid-teens one thing i'm worried about is with that injury is he going to run does he i mean i think like you mean around the pocket so i i think that could be a limitation here so i'm not i don't really want to start him this week okay i don't feel that strongly about it i i think he's more of a in the teens this week and then we'll see how it goes here's the the if there's a silver lining of having your quarterback coming back from an injury it's that you had to feel in that spot for a few weeks right so you did have a plan in three four and five this would be one where it's like a classic if you have kirk cousins that for some reason you picked him up to fill in for caleb williams you're playing kirk cousins yeah but if it was i'm trying to think of a good example like if you kind of played the game week to week and you landed on jacoby brissett and you have him against the rams i'd play caleb over to i would agree with that would you play tyler shuck this week i would play tyler very close i think i would lean towards shuck very close to each other okay caleb right there and they are that is a very close conversation so it was shuck unfortunately falling down a little bit rb or qb 14 or so for me right now after i remove thursday night uh is caleb yeah okay so you don't love him no not this week i'm definitely worried about him running after you removed the quarterbacks from thursday night football he moved from 14 to 14 oh yeah okay so maybe i have him i didn't even think about it was playing yeah we'll get to that in a minute yeah that's uh yeah we'll get to that in a minute jeremiah love mike yeah jeremiah love uh this he's still not practicing this week no practice wednesday or thursday it seemed like i was kind of on the fence is this real or is he they're just like holding him back a little bit to rest him a bit but missing thursday as well is definitely a red flag so still in the projections but we're going to learn a lot about this one uh this week he plays he's in rb rb2 slash flex option actually he's right in that conversation with woody marks and damien here he's right in that that big bulk tier of running backs who kind of feel gross but you know just like we got somebody jeremiah love woody marks and damien pierce all in the same tier it is what it is i'm i'm i don't want to pretend like i know more than nfl head coach but i don't know what they're doing with jeremiah love it doesn't make a lot of sense to me hopefully they get that fixed i just traded him i bought low and dynasty in the league last night trying to get my hands on more shares of him for the long term still very young player but uh not sure if he's going to go if he goes again he's in that tier if he's out tyler algier steps into what ahead of those guys i would put him ahead of woody marks ahead of damien pierce i think he becomes a mid-range rb2 he's there's gonna be a ton of volume bam nights there so he'll get some run as well but it's gonna be a chance for tyler algier to push for 20 touches in this matchup against the rams who remember james cook had two touchdowns and 118 yards against them just last week so an opportunity for algier if love is out you know what sucks for tyler algier is fantasy have always basically not liked him yeah because he's either vulturing touchdowns from bijan robinson or doing this and all he's doing is his job he's crushing it he's unbelievable but like he's one of the most least appreciated people unfortunately in fantasy football he reminded me a lot of michael turner when he was with the chargers and it was that was lt the lt era he would steal touchdowns and all that kind of stuff and then we were like okay then atlanta gave him a nice check to be back and he had a good run with atlanta uh we thought that was what was going to happen with algier you know he finally get out from under bijan robinson and go to arizona be a feature back nope they immediately draft jeremiah love for some reason which we still don't understand i mean i don't inexplicably his his usage is inexplicable like cpu is getting too hot right now we actually have to shut you down because the well it's frustrating i know by now he should be established and as an rb1 in fantasy that hasn't happened yet so just crazy because it's like jared like they picked third and we knew fernando mendoza was going number one and the jets had already franchise tagged bruce hall and they picked number two yeah what are you doing did you really think that you would well it's like if jeremiah love had fallen to and i'm just making this up the giants at 10 even if they had made prior camp scott was already there like at some point when one of the best players in the draft falls to you at 10 you got to just pull the yeah right um there's talk if you made it to the cowboys at 12 when they pull the trigger there even you know all these various teams that didn't really need a running back but could use one of the most dynamic playmakers for arizona it's like you don't have to extrapolate this out very far to realize that you have an excellent chance of getting jeremiah love at number three if you want and by march it was well established that jeremiah love was amongst the best players in the draft they signed tyler algier then they draft jeremiah love and now we're getting coaching remarks about how and mike mentioned this yesterday like yeah we couldn't throw the ball to jeremiah love much last week because we were having to lean on him and pass protection because we were conceding so much pressure it's like really no like cardinals fans really now then take on a tackle with that pick yes like what do you or take a guy that tackles like arville reese who's been killing it so far this year and by the way we're seeing these guys drafted this early these high pedigree running backs like bajon robinson and jamir gibbs and cmc in his prime like just carrying offenses it's been working for team saquon barkley a couple years ago love you're not doing you're not using love that way like i mean if you're going to take him at three yeah he can be valuable we're seeing that from these other guys but you're not using him in a way that he's he's able to move the ball for your offense we all know where this leads right this leads to like the rams signing him or trading for him three years from now and he absolutely kills it i don't i don't yeah no i strong communities are built in the places where life happens where families build their lives where students build their futures where businesses create opportunity bloom energy provides reliable power for the places communities depend on every day from hospitals and college campuses to stores and factories clean quiet power that uses little water right where it's needed so communities can keep moving forward bloom energy power america relies on today's forecast falling leaves football and an 80 chance you're going to need to do a few more things for that backyard project running low on yard bags need a leaf blower let express delivery from the home depot bring them right to you get fall project essentials delivered fast so you can get it done with plenty of time left for the game get what you need in two hours or less with express delivery from the home depot subject to availability or to select in-stock items at 4 p.m restriction and fees apply the all-new caramel apple five-hour energy shots are available now a sugar-free fall treat straight from the orchard fall is back which means those sugary fall treats are too thankfully five-hour energy just dropped their new caramel apple flavor so you can get that fall flavor without the sugar enjoy refreshing apple and sweet caramel comfort in every sip caramel apple five-hour energy shots available online for a limited time at fivehourenergy.com or amazon anyways we digress this has been a fantasy therapy session with michael and field talking about jeremiah love hopefully you guys yeah are on the same page just know we feel it just as much as you do let's talk about thursday night football i don't feel a lot about this game i don't want to talk about i don't want to talk let's start with the denver broncos because they won bo nicks is garbage this year awful i don't know and i don't like it's i don't even know what to do with him if you have bo nicks on your roster you can drop it i was gonna say you know what to do with them yeah bye-bye historically low average depth of throw so far did you see that stat yeah it was 700th out of 700 all time yeah doug clausen he used to work with us here at espn moved over to cbs had her stat that through six games bo nicks amongst 701 qualified quarterbacks leads or has the lowest average depth of target through six games 4.9 yeah dead last dead last out of 701 that's not good for your wide receivers usually right no they're a disaster they are a complete mess there's nothing fun to watch about this offense jk dobbins fell into the end zone last night so did rj harvey congratulations that might happen every third week for those rj harvey leads the broncos in receiving again and guess who leads the team in receiving this season jaylen waddle but barely over rj harvey who missed a game rj harvey could be ahead of him uh waddle is 228 this season through six games which is beyond unacceptable it's 38 a game rj harvey's Oh, 33 a game. He's only five yards a game behind James. Jalen Waddell in receiving yards. He missed a game, and he's second. And then it's Evan Ingram. And then it's Pat Bryant, who's missed two games. And then Cortland Sutton has, guys, 123 receiving yards this season in six games. He had three targets last night. Yeah, I mean, guys, what are they doing? It's a mess. I have no idea. By the way, what do you think? And I said this last week. What does Davis Webb think? Davis Webb is like, I got canned after four games on the job as the play caller. And I got scapegoated because I'm not saying Davis Webb was doing a good job, but it clearly was not Davis Webb that was the primary issue with this Denver offense. The Jalen Waddell trade makes no sense to me whatsoever right now. Like, the Jeremiah Love thing, as much as I don't want to have to continue to go back and pick that scab and open it up, is that there is a world in which Jeremiah Love over the next two to three seasons emerges as one of the most dynamic playmakers in the NFL. You don't make draft picks just for what the player does as a rookie. Plenty of examples of that. Heck, the Raiders aren't even playing that important overall pick in the draft right now. Jalen Waddell was a wit's win right now. He's not an old receiver, but he is in the middle of his prime for a team that hosted the AFC Championship game last year. You traded away future assets for a player that can help you win in the moment. How pissed do you think Mrs. Payton is right now? Pretty pissed. Sean Payton told his wife to draft Jalen Waddell in fantasy. That was an anecdote from Troy Aikman on the broadcast. Might have been Joe Buck on the broadcast. But one of the Monday night games, or the Monday night game in which the Broncos played in week one, they talked about that. I mean, that team's got to be sick to itself right now. It's awful. The Broncos, as we go into next week, and I apologize for not knowing offhand who the Broncos play next week. They play at Arizona. At Arizona. Crap. I was going to say it makes the match up. Yeah, but absent a great matchup, no Bronco should be close to your starting lineup right now. Not if you can help it. Yeah, I do want to say this. This is their schedule so far. At Kansas City, that's tough. Jacksonville, very tough. Rams, tough. And they put 30 points up in that game. At San Francisco, tough. They only scored 14. At the Chargers in Seattle. I mean, Chargers definitely are a little feisty defensively. Better defensively than offensively. That's a lot of very good defenses. So maybe there's hope. So give me the next three to four games. Arizona, then Kansas City again. That one's at least at home. Then at Carolina, and then the Raiders. So the next four are good. Then they go to Pittsburgh. It's a little tougher. But Miami's on here. The Jets are on here. They've been better. Fantasy playoffs are at Jets, at Raiders, and then home against the Bills. It's pretty attractive. Oh, actually, that's through 16. Week 17's at New England. All right. That's much better going forward than we've seen so far. So the only hope here is, look, they've been in these tough matchups against really good teams, really good defenses. They'll be better going forward. That's all I got, because otherwise it's been hard to watch. I don't really understand. I don't understand how Bo Nix can be so good his first two years in the league. Get Jalen Waddell added. Still have an elite offensive line. You still have Sutton there. It'd be worse. It'd be way worse. Probably like 30% worse than what it was last year. I think that's one of the drumbeats that's coming out of Denver. The offensive line's not playing that good. The talent's still there, though. Yeah. Shield, what level of confidence do you have in Jackson, Smith, and Jigba? Medium to high. Medium to high? Medium to high. Medium to high? Something positive. Good. Okay. Yeah, let's talk about this. It wasn't positive for a lot of the games, to be honest. Two for 11 at halftime. Yeah. You know what's funny is our boss, Scott Clark, texted me at one point. I think it might have been in the middle of the third quarter or before that. Still awake at that point. Listen, I was up. I know. The whole game. Burning the candle at both ends right now. I know. And he texted me, and he goes, JSN's going to end up with 11. JSN for 125. And it was one of those, and I was like, I mean, it should be awesome. Pretty close. Because we all need it. He probably had that. Well, for 134. That's pretty good. I mean, I told him. 16 times. At the end of it, I was like, congratulations. You're the new projection to the ADSBA. My take on JSN is this. There might be other wide receivers who are as good as him. I don't think anybody is better than JSN at wide receiver. And I'm not talking fantasy. I'm talking real life. He might be the best in the NFL. Remember when the other. Who said that? That they were like. This was when JSN was maybe going into year two. Or actually, it might have been when he was coming into the league. Like, his predecessors at Ohio State were like, he's the best one that's ever come through here. That person was correct. Yeah. And at that point, it was like, well, he hasn't done a lot yet. And now, I mean, you're seeing it. I mean, the guy's ridiculous. Yeah. He's amazing. I mean, it was an absolute master class in the second half from JSN. 12 for 134. He now has 100 plus yards in five of their six games. 25.4 fantasy points. Unfortunately for JSN. And he's the only one doing his job for Seattle. Yes. Yeah. Mike. Although, shout out to Rashichi. He'd finally get in some runs. Yeah, did some stuff. Actually, I know he had the fumble. But, you know, he made some plays as a returner. And eight targets for him. That's new. I had to actually. 51 attempts for Sam Darnold. I know. Well, yeah. Well, that's where I was kind of leading. Sorry. Game script was different for Seattle than what we're used to. Yes. And it eliminated Emmanuel Wilson from the game plan, which. Oh. He got 15 opportunities last year. I know. I know. I know. But didn't. Didn't. Didn't. Didn't translate too much fantasy success. And that burned me a little bit. Yeah. I mean, I will say this. Emmanuel Wilson. Some of these leagues, hopefully, I'll go on and win a couple. You know, at least one league. I'll take one. Yeah. We'll take it. We'll take a championship. But let's say we go on and, you know, you win your championship. You don't really remember those guys that maybe helped us out for a month. Because this could be it for Emmanuel Wilson. Yes. Max Arbonne might be back now next week. Sounds like he will be. Yeah. And that might be it. That's almost definitely it for Emmanuel Wilson, barring other injuries. But he had a couple of really good weeks for me. Filling in, you know, some tough spots with Brees Hall and Travis A-Chan and Devon A-Chan. Like, I needed Emmanuel Wilson over the last month. So, thank you, Emmanuel Wilson. You burned me last night, but you've been good the last month. That's a good spin by you. Yeah. He only burned me medium to medium rare. You guys are right. He charred you. That's right. He had been scoring receiving touchdowns. So, I was like, he'll be okay. But he got scripted out last night. Don't drop him or anything. Like, until Zach Charbonnet comes back. Like, who knows if there's a setback. You don't ever want to wish it into existence. But, like, you've got to keep Emmanuel Wilson. I didn't expect him to be down 14-3 throughout most of this game. Had they been close or ahead, he would have had 20 carries in this game. But he ended up not playing a lot. All right. Let's look ahead at some other games here in week six. Baltimore Ravens. Cleveland Browns. Lamar Jackson. Going to play in this one. Sounds like. Derrick Henry. Zay Flowers. Oh. Lamar DMP again yesterday. Yeah. What is with that? Sounds like he has maybe less. Oh, really? Okay. All right. And then Denzel Boston on the other side. Only Denzel Boston at this point. When you're looking at that running back room there in Cleveland, no quench on Judkins. Talk to me about what's going on back there. Yeah. Let's give you the state of the Browns running back room, and you can decide whether you want to play anybody this week. Quench on Judkins. Back-to-back DNPs. Of course, he got hurt at the end of last week's game. Back-to-back DNPs does not bode well for him playing on Sunday. He's been removed from the projections. Judkins, I think he's still in there. I take that back. He's still in the projections. I'll make a call there today. I'm going to let you finish your thought, and I'll explain my line of thinking. So we will see on Judkins and whether he is. He is practicing today and whether he has a chance to play on Sunday. But if he doesn't, here's what the rest of the running back room looks like. Dylan Sampson, who's coming off of a knee injury suffered in week one, according to Todd Munkin, has a chance to play. A chance. He did not practice on Wednesday. He was limited on Thursday. So even if he does play, it does feel like the Browns would be wise to be judicious with his playing time, right? And if he does play and the Browns say, well, you're going to have to be the starter because we have nobody else, he has three games in his career, does Dylan Sampson, with at least 10 carries. Here's how those games have shaken out. 12 carries for 29 yards. 11 carries for 27 yards. This was a good one. 10 carries for 32 yards. Oh, boy. He has a career average of 2.7 yards per carry. This is a guy who makes his money as a pass catcher. He plays on Sunday. You're going to need him to make his money as a pass catcher. If he plays, we'll still see some Jaleel McLaughlin. He's been around the block. He's been around for a while. He has four career games with 10 or more carries, so it doesn't feel like he is a lock to see a bunch of opportunities. Andrek Estime was signed from the practice squad of the Vikings last week. How much is he really going to play if he does suit up for the Browns on Sunday? Jarrett Patterson's on the practice squad. He actually has the best rushing resume out of the three guys that have been there for a while in Cleveland. Estime, I'm not including in that category. But, yeah, this would, in a 10-team league, feels like a stay away as long as, or assuming Quinn John Judkins is out. I unsubscribed three names ago when you were trying to be able to run through it all. That's not a list of guys. That's not a list of guys that you want to start at the running back spot. But it's great to be able to know this is where we're at right now for the Cleveland running back. And this could be a game where they get game scripted, especially if Lamar plays, which does not sound likely. But I think that if I can, assuming Quinn John Judkins is out, I am staying away. Yeah, Samson, interesting young back, obviously better receiver than rusher. And we've seen that statistically so far. He was good as a receiver last year, but obviously horribly inefficient as a rusher. But, yeah, I think if Judkins is out, which, again, I'm feeling pessimistic, I just don't know where to put the touches right now. Because, obviously, if Samson plays, he'll handle it. I don't want to, like, give a high projection to Jaleel McGlock on people, start scooping them up and putting them in their lineup. Like, I think they're probably going to spread this over three running backs. And, much like, say, Green Bay, they're going to throw the football. Like, they're not going to want to be leaning heavily into these running backs unless they're ahead in this game, which, to your point, unlikely, especially if Lamar plays. Yeah, he's just Jaleel from the Glock. He's going to play a little, but he's not a lock. Bam. Nice. That's projections that he's not going to get. I don't know. What about Denzel Boston? There was a joke there, but I couldn't execute it. Are we at a point where Denzel Boston has shown us, even though he's not getting a ton of volume, he's just got the consistency? I mean, I like his usage. I like his usage a lot. I mean, he's clearly established as their number one. He looks like the real deal. He's 22nd at receiver and fantasy points per game so far this season. At least 12 and a half fantasy points in four of five games to the floor has been really nice for a guy that was a second-round rookie in an offense we thought would struggle. struggle this year. So he's been really good. The usage 91 of the snaps so he's not leaving the field 20 of the of cleveland's targets 45 of and guards so far this season which is huge is going to lead to big plays and tied for second with a lot of other players in end zone targets he has five of those this season which helps explain why he's three touchdowns in five games by the way the opposing number one receiver against baltimore has scored at least 18 fantasy points in four consecutive games so a lot of opportunity here for boston i i thought that casey concepcion after what we saw last week he was going to miss this one sounds like he's going to play which is great it looked like that might be a multi-week injury concussion whatever it may might have been but looks like he's good to go um and he's been busy as well i think he actually has more targets in boston this year somehow but um he's more of the short area guy like debo samuel sort of player uh boston more of the the downfield player so uh yeah boston has made it to lineup block status it's pretty insane that a guy has scored at least 12 and a half fantasy points in four consecutive games and he's not going to be able to play four of his five games and he's never seen more than seven targets in a game so far this year boston yeah good at the game good player he's just been crushing yeah and obviously getting in the end zone with all the end zone looks that you talked about mike so love that in deep like the air yards and the target chairs and the snaps and the end zone targets as long as that continues the guy's gonna be he's gonna have like a t higgins type of season i'm gonna take the ravens in this one what about you guys ravens uh yeah the ravens taking the ravens across the board versus the old browns that's right yeah good divisional game though in cleveland they have a winning record and it should be a feisty game guards on the precipice of the world series did you know that what's that say the guardians do you know they are oh i've heard of them yes uh cleveland's baseball squad yes uh the brewers i didn't even that shows you how little i couldn't believe the brewers were in the world series that's wild good for brewers have been the brewers have been remarkably consistent for like a half a decade now finally over the top back in the world series for the first time in 44 years love that love that for fan bases when you go so long and then you finally get there that's actually a great i've so thanks for that guys when you get there though oh it's gonna feel great someday maybe hopefully daniel for a year titans and colts let's look at the next game this one we can probably be pretty quick on we can tighten up the pace here carnell tight carnell tate excuse me for the titans down in the taylor tyler warren on the other side mike i don't see tony pollard on there and running back is kind of a mess talking about tony pollard i think he's an interesting name to discuss this week because we need running backs yep we need running backs in our lineups and he fits the bill it's been rough so far we're going to have to wait and see what happens next week we're going to have a little under nine fantasy points per game but he's handling 70 percent of their called runs have gone to him this year eight percent of the targets a little unlucky in the touchdown department we that number the fantasy point number would be better if he was finding the end zone is expected total is 3.5 which is 14th among running backs he's only scored once usually that stuff will fix itself he'll probably be under that number because the offense isn't very good but it should be closer to three uh not much in the passing game 24 yards and 11 targets but this is a good matchup for him in a week where we need running back help the colts have allowed the third most yards six most fantasy points to running backs so far this season and they've allowed some big games derrick henry jalen warren uh uh um ken walker all had 23 plus fantasy points two of them were at 35 plus so an opportunity here for pollard to right if you come out of this game and you're like wow tony pollard scored two touchdowns whoa no way how about that like this is and he always does it he always does it a couple times a year you see like the draftings millie maker you're like the guy who wanted had pollard as his rb2 like are you kidding me like this is there's always weeks like this and perhaps this is the week for pollard i don't think that this is the week for josh downs but i just want to know if you guys have heard this story before newsflash guy who's disappointed more than he's been good has a good matchup five weeks six weeks into the season do you want to roll the dice on him how many wide receivers do we have like that i feel like there's a bunch of a lot yeah three or five games so far this year josh downs three or fewer catches three or five games under 47 or fewer receiving yards the good thing is the titans have allowed the eighth most receptions and seventh most receiving yards two wide receivers so far this year seems good so yeah he if you had to play him this week i've got him in the wide receiver probably 30 to 35 range he's an unsatisfying flex option yeah but that's because you've got amon raw jmo justin jefferson jamar chase and t higgins on by he's really more like wide receiver 35 to 40 but he's only up there right now in the flex consideration because he hasn't done it we tried to trust him the last couple weeks it just hasn't materialized yeah so yeah i'm with you i thought he should have been in lineups he had a great opportunity one of the guys on the shortlist of players who could reach 10 targets in a given week and it just hasn't been there and daniel jones is struggling and yep it's it's just been bad i think we and i mean this sort of societally are trying a little too hard to make josh downs into something that he isn't remember the talk this offseason was he's not going to just be a wide receiver that plays in this slot he's going to play all over the formation it's fine he's a very talented young player very talented he's a very talented young slot receiver that's where we are on josh downs in my opinion yeah but he's finished i believe each season of his career so far he's finished like between 30 and 30 seven and fantasy points okay fine like that so if you like those kind of wide receivers congratulations but again with teams on a buy and no alec pierce like you're thinking all right if with the volume he should be able to at least give you that at least give you in the 30s and like that makes him a palatable wide receiver three or flex it hasn't been there i mean that's not even happening no very very disappointing all around who are you taking in this game michael uh i'm gonna take the colts i'm taking the colts as well i am also taking the colts clean sweep with our producers question mark slow playing it wow the drama is building yes it is they're picking the stealers and it's the cold the colts across all right like at some point the titans are going to win one yeah sooner or later yeah maybe 2027 you could score big with sofi's biggest rate drop event of the year borrow better week from october 19th through the 25th get lower rates on loans to consolidate debt fund a business tap into home equity or refinance student debt view your rate at sofi.com score terms and conditions apply at sofi.com score valid october 19th through october 25th home equity loan borrowers must lock in their rate by october 26th 9 a.m eastern time restrictions apply loans originated by sofi bank na member fdic nmls 696891 equal housing lender many people's first serious relationship didn't start with a kiss it started with a kickoff or perhaps it was love at first hike but unfortunately many of these football lovers don't live in the same city as their team which is why mariette bonvoy has hotels close to nearly every nfl stadium bringing fans closer to the teams 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from the projections yeah when i sent these names in he was still in there he's no longer in there braylon allen now a lineup lock yeah so allen basically replaces breese hall slight discount but allen's been plenty serviceable in breese's absence but would be locked in as a lineup lock without we saw yeah so in theory this should be the last absence for breese hall because they did not put him on ir this is gonna be his third missed game you never know but in theory they would have put him on ir if it was gonna be a four year week to week we'll see yeah teams are i think two things on that is one sometimes you just don't know on how long an injury is going to last you don't know how long an injury is going to last you don't know how long is we don't have infinite players that we can designate to return from ir yeah right the niners have already talked about this you want a water i got you a water me i got you a water today i just oh i just know that you love water okay thank you i do love water hey wow i sound partial i got you a water yesterday so yeah typical typical daniel i don't know well you didn't know you've never asked for water before it just looked like you yeah i could see that your water was some of us show up prepared with water other people just ask our teammates to get them awesome so delicious yeah um anyways espn plus water yeah um the niners have already mentioned like debo samuel has a four-week injury but they probably won't place them on ir because they've already used so many players they've already used their designated to return that's wild status niners having injury issues yeah who would have thunk it never heard of that uh so the jets might be it might be a little bit of strategy not just um like a misread of the injury itself let's talk about the patriots running backs though as it does not sound like we'll see travion henderson on sunday but no idea he did practice yesterday yeah that was a surprise back-to-back days being listed as limited for travion they play again next thursday night still gonna leave him out of there he's still left out of the projections for right now uh we'll see if we have more clarity later today that would cause us to adjust it but let's assume he's out romandre stevenson finds himself in what should be a very large role in week one without travion henderson romandre played 85.1 of the snaps he had he had six targets he had five catches the jets are bottom 10 and fantasy points per game allowed to opposing running backs we'll see some of cory kiner but i do think that if travion is out you can feel confident in cranking it up with romandre who is as high as rb10 in our rankings that's mike and as low as rb15 that's daniel yep still a must start and if henderson's active we drop him down to like 20 yeah there yeah so that's where he was beforehand and then i moved him up to 10 some of these coaches may not be as good as they used to be but they're still a must-start and i think meet on Friday morning with the media and announce where things are at. I'll check if Anything that's been said by Mike Vrabel while Mike tells us about it. Yeah, let's talk Drake May. I want to talk through this one a little bit because, you know, two weeks ago we were panicking on this guy, and who would have thought he'd go all the way the other direction, right back in the lineup block status. All the way up. I mean, there was some reason to believe that could happen, as I'll get to in a second. But, yeah, weeks one through three, one touchdown, six picks, didn't clear 208 yards in a game, didn't reach 10 fantasy points in a game, three-game sample. After all we saw late last season in the playoffs, we're like, uh-oh, there could be a problem here. But weeks four and five easily leads all quarterbacks in fantasy points. That includes last week, fellas. Back-to-back SQB1. Yeah, and last week was a career high, 39.5 fantasy points. He didn't do that last year at all, 374 yards, 25 rushing yards, five total touchdowns. He crushed it. So what I looked at was maybe some explanation of why this happened. I looked at his strength of schedule. The first three teams he played, the defenses ranked 25th or lower in fantasy points allowed to quarterbacks, so three tough matchups. Last week and the week before, they ranked top six in fantasy points allowed to quarterbacks. And keep in mind that I'm removing the impact from Drake May from those games. So three tough matchups, he really struggled. Two really light matchups, he was exceptional. This week, guys, the Jets have allowed the fourth fewest yards, seventh fewest fantasy points to quarterbacks. Our third in sacks, David Bailey has been crushing it. No quarterback has reached 20 fantasy points against the Jets so far this season. So now we're going back the other direction. It's going to be a real test here to see, A, if the Jets' defense is legitimately competent, or I think they're at least competent. We'll see if they're good. And if Drake May can do some damage against the defense, it's not really struggling against the pass. So I do view him as a lineup block. I trust him enough. We have a long sample of him being a good fantasy quarterback that he's a top five play for me. But I'm fascinated to see how he does. Yeah, it's like the two opposing forces is like a Jets' tough matchup versus Drake May's growing confidence and his skill set. He should be able to handle good matchups, or I should say bad matchups, and still put you in the 20-plus point range. Given his prowess as a player. So projected for 20.2. To your point. Nailed it. Would that be the most that any quarterback has scored against the squad so far this year? Yes. It sure was. 20.2. Yeah. Yeah. Nailed it. Love that. Okay. All right. Who are you guys taking in this game? The Patriots. I think I am as well. Sorry, Aaron Glenn. We have a Jets. What about the producers? I thought we were doing Jets. Jets on the road. Wow. That would be a statement game for the Jets. Our producer, Zach, is a Jets fan, too. Yeah. But then they'd be three. They'd be three. They'd be three and three. Both teams would be three and three. That would be huge. This would be the Jets stamping of their season being a legitimate one. Much like around this time last year when the Patriots beat Josh Allen and made a statement and went on to crush it for the rest of the season. Next one up, Steelers and Bucs. Buc-ee-s. Oh, that's right. And that's the only lineup block we got on this side is Buc-ee Irving for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. We got Buc-ee's, Buc-ee, and the Buc-ee-nears. Oh. Buc-ee's all around. Wow. Jalen Warren and D.K. Metcalf are the other lineup blocks in this one, guys. Not my best work. Aaron Rodgers has had three straight games with three-plus passing touchdowns. It feels like he's at least earned himself to be in the conversation to say, is he a streaming option for this week? Doesn't mean he is, but let's talk about whether you think he can be in that conversation. Not quite there. I've got him as quarterback 16, but I'm the most optimistic out of all of our rankings. You mentioned the fact that over the past three games, he has three touchdown passes in each of them. That's awesome. That's great. 7.5 yards per attempt. You may say. You may say, well, you know, last week he had this Jalen Warren 80-yard touchdown pass in which Jalen Warren, I think, had like 84 yards after the catch. That's fair, but over the past three weeks, Aaron Rodgers' average depth of target is 8.2. It was 5.9 last year. Now, last week was not nearly as aggressive as the two weeks prior, but Aaron Rodgers, in both weeks three and four, was driving the football down the field. So, a more aggressive version of Aaron Rodgers, a Steelers offense that all of a sudden is not that bad. And a couple of guys that are playing awesome football right now, Aaron Rodgers, trending up for fantasy purposes. He is my quarterback 16. Yeah, I was talking to Ben Solak yesterday on the new NFL League-wide podcast that he's hosting, and we were talking a little bit about this because I noted the stat that Aaron Rodgers, or 91% of the Steelers touchdowns have been passes this year, which is highest in the NFL and very, it hasn't been the case for Rodgers the last couple of years, but that was a staple, like when he was in Green Bay, they always scored an enormous number of their touchdowns. Their percentage of their touchdowns through the air. Who was their head coach? Mike McCarthy. Yeah, and they, and, you know, Rodgers, a little selfish near the goal line. He wants to throw the football. McCarthy obviously allows him to do that. That's been the case so far this season. And a note that Ben made was all-time passing touchdown leaderboard right now. Peyton Manning is third with 539. Aaron Rodgers is now fourth with 537. So, if he throws two touchdowns in this game, he throws three to pass Peyton Manning. Yeah. All-time. Next, it's Tom Brady, Drew Brees are 1-2 on LSU. He's a ways to go to get there. How far ahead is Tom Brady? Tom has 649. Brees is 571. So, a huge gap. And then Manning's at 539. So, Rodgers is not going to get to second this year. Well, he'll never get there because he's retiring after this year. But anyway, a lot of incentive for Aaron Rodgers to not hand the ball to Jalen Warren, but instead throw a slant to DK Metcalf or perhaps Jimmy Bernard. Ooh. Boom. Nailed it. Nice segue, Michael. Like it. That wasn't even planned. No. That just happened. Improved it. Yeah. Let's talk about Jeremy Bernard. Super excited for the rookie. Michael Pittman's on IR. Roman Wilson was injured after one target last week. And in that game, Jeremy Bernard paced the Steelers in routes with 32 and targets with nine at six catches, 80 yards in that game. Looked pretty good. Aaron Rodgers likes him. I mean, Bernard has barely seen the field so far this year, and he has at least eight targets in two of his five games. Five NFL games. I just mentioned the Steelers score a lot of touchdowns through the air. They don't have much competition for him right now. Even Ben Skoranek is out for this game, so they're really shorthanded. It's going to be Metcalf. It's going to be Bernard. It's going to be Pat Friermuth, and it's going to be in the backfield primarily, Jalen Warren. Buccaneers have already allowed 20-plus fantasy points to three different receivers. They can be exposed there. So a big opportunity for Bernard, who I like as a flex this week. Only thing I want to add to this, as I imagine people probably saw this quote, but in case you didn't, with Rico Dowdle coming back, either this week or eventually, Mike McCarthy did say, hey, with the way that Jalen Warren is playing right now, our offense runs through him. So I don't think that when Rico Dowdle returns, it all of a sudden becomes the split backfield it was prior to that toe-in. Yeah, not short-term. Maybe at some point. Yeah, at some point. Dowdle will take more on, but not right now. Who are you guys taking in this one, Bucs or Steelers? I got the Steelers picking against Jalen Daniels. I was going to say, that feels wrong today for you, Field. I feel like you should just have to take the Bucs. On principle. Yeah, just on principle. On principle, yeah. The Steelers on the road for me, which, yeah, disrespecting Daniels after they went into Dallas and beat them last week. Come on. Dallas did not understand the assignment. No, they did not. At all. So hopefully the Steelers get things done here. All right, let's do a little bit of a mailbag here before we move on with a few more games. Shout out to our buddy, Eric Moody. As always, follow him on social media, at EricNMoody, answering all your questions. This first one comes from Christina Buswell. Do I start Drake May versus the Jets or Jordan Love versus the Cowboys Drake May has me scared. Jordan Love has a great matchup against the Dallas Cowboys. Yeah, I know that name. Is that a Kentucky logo? Go Cats. Kentucky, yes. Go Cats. Go Cats. Who could that be? I'm going Drake May. I've got one spot ahead of Jordan Love. I have the, actually, you know what? I'm also going Drake May over Jordan Love. Jordan Love has a great matchup. Unbelievable situation. I have no issue going May, but funny enough, I do have one spot ahead so far this season. Love has actually been better than him overall this season, even if May's been better the last couple of weeks. Better matchup for Jordan Love. We'll talk about him in a little bit. But it is a toss-up, so I have no issue with either one. Yep. Agreed on that. I think you had two good quarterbacks there, Christina. Sparkzilla says, I freaking love this question, and I'll tell you why. You know why? Because we sit here, and I think probably more so this year than prior years, we've been dismissive of a lot of guys. And we're sitting here earlier like, yeah, Damian Pierce, like, don't want to start him. He's in the 10-team league. And Woody Marks, don't want to start him in a league either. The people want to know who we need to start when options are incredibly limited. These are sickos, and I love it. We all love it. They're part of us. That's it. That's why I talked about Tony Pollard and all these guys here. Like, oh, that's gross. But we talked a lot about Pierce, all these borderline guys. All right, so it's Kendra Miller and who? Brian Robinson. And Brian Robinson. I'm going to go Kendra. They barely used Kamara last week. Kendra got extended runs, so I'll give him the edge here. All right. They're playing the Giants. So, yeah, it should be a manageable matchup. I don't feel great about either one, but Brian Robinson, you're just praying for a touchdown. I would coin flip. Good matchup against the Jets. You're praying for a touchdown with either one of them, to be honest. I guess so. That's fair. Yeah. All right, next question. This one comes from B. Schaub. Pick two of these, please. Blake Corum, Dallas Goddard, Roma Dunze, Damian Pierce. I'm going to throw Blake Corum off to the side for right now. Great. I am going to land on. You have to do Roma Dunze with Caleb Williams back, right? You have to with that list. Roma Dunze. I think I'm Dunze and Pierce. I'm just going to pass on the tight end. Dunze and Pierce as well. I could see any of those three is fine, but I'm going to go with the running back who could see 15 touches over tight end with a backup quarterback. I was going to say, if it was Jalen Hurts, would you go Dallas Goddard? I would feel safer with Goddard if Hurts is there. I think so, too, but I'm with you guys on Pierce and Dunze, I think, would be my two. All right. And one more here. Benny Jr. wants to know that. Oh, it says, that buggy suit is fire. I see why Field had to get that operation done. All right, all right. I waited until I got out of the house. To be fair, Rosie texted me, and she said, suit is a strong word for what that is when we put it on the board. It is more of a onesie. It is, yeah, costume, onesie. It's incredibly comfortable, and it has pockets, too. Oh, my gosh, what can it do? Why are we rewarding him for losing? I know. You've got to be better about these. Yeah, I actually have problems with both of you guys. This is better than what I got. You know what, Mike? If that's how you feel, I will grant you one spin of the wheel. No, I won't. Mike thought about it. He's like, wait, did I get something good there? Is it a good spin? It actually would be funny if we took two of the little options on the wheel, the segments of the wheel, and made them positive. Like treating it to lunch. The way this year is going, they'll keep coming up. Yeah, like eat ice cream during the show. Mike would love that. Mike hates ice cream. No one would like that. All right, let's move ahead. It's not that I don't like it. Here's some Faya yogurt with granola. Ugh, the worst. Cowboys and Packers. A lot of guys in this one. Javante Williams, CeeDee Lamb, George Pickens, Jordan Love, Christian Watson, Matthew Golden, and Tucker Craft. We just talked about this, so let's dive right in. We had a conversation about Jordan Love and the matchup. Mike, tell us all about why Love has been. This is the good Love, unfortunately, this year in fantasy. This is where we could love Love. Before, we did not love Love with Jeremiah. But Jordan, we do love right now. The Packers, without a run game, are operating the third pass-heaviest offense in the NFL. That's why Jordan Love is all the way up there at second in terms of passing yards and fifth in passing touchdowns. With 10, he has exactly two passing touchdowns in all five games this year. So that gives you a nice floor in fantasy. He's been really good, despite the fact that, much like Matthew Stafford and Jared Goff and guys like that, he is a negative. Not even a zero. Zero as a rusher. Or as a rusher. He's a negative as a rusher. Negative two yards and seven carries so far. And what's wild is, according to fantasy points allowed, I have him with the hardest schedule so far this season through five games. He now goes to the easiest rest of the season, and includes this week. The Cowboys have zero interceptions. Five sacks. That's one per game. The worst EPA against the pass. They've allowed 10 passing touchdowns. They're fifth in fantasy points allowed to quarterbacks. Love is the streaming quarterback of the week. When does this change? We haven't had any Cowboys defense. Or just for the Green Bay Packers being such a pass heavy team. Like we have no updates. We have no updates on Josh Jacobs. It doesn't seem like they're trying to make a trade right now to get another running back and shore up that situation. This feels like this could sustain for a long time this year. I would not be surprised based on Matt LaFleur's track record if for some reason Jacobs is not returning that like they trade for Tony Pollard or something. Or find a way to get James Conner. One of the Giants running backs. There are. Yeah, exactly. I have to imagine they'll go shopping because they even phased out Caleb Johnson last week. He didn't play until the game is over basically. And they had to run the clock out. So yeah, they're they're struggling at that spot. But for now, why would they change anything? And this and again, the schedule lightens up. This is it's also a little early. Like I think Tennessee is probably a week or so away from being. Okay, we're pushing our out some of our veterans. Yeah, they're on five James Connors on healthy. Like there are a few guys like enough teams need running back depth early in the season to plan for the unknown. As Mike's microphone just fell down. It's like the Titans. It's just falling apart Wow, sirs, you know, it's not falling apart. Well, no, that was a bad way to set this up. Dang it. This is going to be the Packers first real test against an actual quarterback. Dak Prescott taking on Green Bay here. Dak what he has done so far. Great point. Dak has four straight games with 275 plus passing yards 18 plus and 18 fan plus fantasy points in three straight before going into last week's abysmal 12 and a half points against Tampa Bay. Here's the problem. Those three games in a row that he's had he only has one passing touchdown in three games straight. You got to fix that especially with this receiving crew like that can't happen. But when you look at the Green Bay Packers it kind of looks like they've done pretty well against the quarterback position. Here's who they played this year. Give it to me. Carson Wentz Gino Smith Michael Pennix Jalen Daniels Tyson Bajent slash case Keenum. So there's not like a single top 12 quarterback at least on that list. That's enough. 19 on them. So like Dak is clearly going to be the best quarterback this is going to be the best offense that is going up against this Packers squad which also we kind of hope bring some fireworks just to the game in general. That's why we got so many lineup blocks. But I'm starting Dak this week as a low end QB one. I have him lower than Jordan Love I would rather play Jordan Love in this matchup but I'm still rolling with Dak in this one as a starting quarterback. Fascinating game. Two teams. I mean Green Bay at home got crushed by Atlanta. That was a shocker. Yes. The Packers losing to Jalen Daniels. I mean this is super fascinating to see Packers dealing with some injuries defensively as well which is which could be a problem but this is a chance to be and it's you know the books agree very very high scoring. Yes. Has shootout potential. A fantasy bonanza. I'm going to take the Cowboys in this one. I got him as well. Cowboys. This is a this is the toughest call of the week for me. I'm going Packers at home but I don't I don't feel great about that. This could go either direction. I think it's just going to come. It might come down to who has the ball last. Yeah. Do the producers take the Packers as well games. Love that. Yeah. All right. Next game. Chargers and Chiefs. Lineup blocks for the Chiefs are Patrick Mahomes Kenneth Walker Rishi Rice and Travis Kelsey. We don't even need to talk about the Chargers. Do we. Do you want to talk about the Chargers really quickly. Mike make fun of them. Rashi Rice by the way has been removed from the projection. Sounds unlikely to play. Yeah. He did not practice either day. He was when I was on the fence. He was like the last. He's the most recent person I removed. But it's not looking good for him at all. So we're very. We're going to talk about the Chiefs wide receiver. I do that first. Then I'll talk about. Yeah. So just who who's left over. If Rashi Rice is out in the Chiefs offense has been fine without getting a whole lot from this wide receiver room at all. But the next three men up are presumably Xavier worthy one. He's going to be a flex this week. Cyrus Allen and Jalen Royals guys in the Chiefs have invested in the draft over the past couple of years. Royals was a third or fourth round pick out of Utah State. Cyrus Allen a fifth round pick this year out of Cincinnati member for like three days. He was the busiest. Sleeper and fantasy football happens. I'm just telling you every year with the Chiefs. Someone gets hyped every year with the Broncos. Someone gets hyped. There are a few teams that just get this bump every single year. Rarely does it actually pan out into anything of consequence for us other than Xavier worthy. I think that if you get it right on a wide receiver for the Chiefs on Sunday, it's just a good guess. Although although although also Xavier worthy is not like you don't feel good. Flex. Yeah, you don't feel good about playing him. Yes. Yeah. I don't feel good about playing him. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. He's not a very good football player. Doesn't seem like it had not materialized. But when you're the last man standing, it feels like in that wide receiving core. What about on the other side of this one? Because like everything else you said, Chiefs super chalky. Yeah, they are. So what the Chargers maybe now? Yeah, this is maybe we're talking super flex leagues here, but this is kind of fascinating because guys, they're 28 quarterbacks. They're not even in the top 20. A lot of that has to do with the matchup he faces. The Bills have allowed the fourth-most fantasy points to quarterbacks, 26.2 points or more to three of five quarterbacks they faced this season. Two weeks ago, they allowed the most fantasy points to any quarterback in the league. That was week four. That was Drake May. Last week, Matthew Stafford looked like MVP Matthew Stafford against his Buffalo defense. And Cousins, for his part, eighth in passing yards so far this season, and he has the SEC. He's tied for the second-most passing touchdowns in the league. He's been great. I mean, from an NFL perspective. No, he's been really solid. I got no issue with how Kirk Cousins has played so far this season. Yeah, and he's had – I have him with the fifth-hardest schedule so far. He has not faced a defense higher than 10th in quarterback fantasy points per game until this game against the Bills. This is the first, like we'll say, easy matchup of the season, and he's still putting up 20-plus in three games. I feel like this is the best situation for rookie quarterbacks in general. I know we always, when someone gets drafted, we want to see them right away. But to have, like, a legitimate veteran that has had an established career, to be the guy that he is, and have Kirk Cousins also play well to start this season, it's been a great situation, even though we all want to see Fernando Mendoza. If he underwhelms in this one or they start losing a couple more games, it's going to be a quick one. Yes, of course. Mendoza is inevitable. He's the one, yeah. We're all taking the Bills in this one. What about our producers? Producers going with anything spicy? Doesn't seem like it. Nope, we're all going Bills here. Negative. No. All right. Last game, Monday Night Football. Commanders and 49ers. Lineup blocks in this one. Jane Daniels and Terry McLaurin. On the other side, Brock Purdy, Christian McCaffrey, Mike Evans, Debo Samuel. Not Debo Samuel. He should not be there. Debo will be removed. Mike Evans mispracticed yesterday because of Achilles soreness. Obviously, if he's out. He's the king of missing practice, though. Yeah, I see. What's a 33-year-old wide receiver need practice for? Sneaky ad alert. I would say in 12 team leagues. Now, I'm going to say Christian Kirk. I don't know if he's going to play this week, but that guy could step right into it. In every down roll. I mean, he's a good, polished veteran receiver. Yeah. He's been hurt. Like, he has an opportunity for a huge role in this offense. So, I mean, it's Jacob Cowling. It's Brandon Cooks. It's Jordan Watkins. That's his competition. He could be their number two immediately. And if Evans misses time, they're number one for a while. And I don't know. Just, we're always looking for these way down the reservation sleepers and in deeper leagues. Keep an eye on Christian Kirk. And Brock Purdy is a guy that can absolutely get everybody involved from that perspective. Really quickly, on the other side. I've got. Updates. And by updates, I mean update on Stephon Diggs. Did not practice. Only one practice. Because this is a Monday Night Football game, obviously. So, DNP here on Thursday. Something to monitor as you move ahead. I would rather not. Like, if you have to play him, he would be a flex option for me. It wouldn't feel great. But it wouldn't feel great. Exactly. It would feel great to play anybody in the Niners that are healthy, though. Because what a matchup they've got. Brock Purdy might throw for 400 yards on Sunday. It's going to be fantastic. Love it. Yep. We're all taking the 49ers in this one. They're also taking the 49ers. We'll obviously revisit. This game on Monday, if needed. Correct. All right. Let's dive into starts of the week. I'm so comfortable right now. Yeah. Field, why don't we start with you? Because you came in last place this last week. How did you know that? Well, because you're dressed like. Comfortable? No. Yeah. You got a reward for some reason. All right. My starts of the week. Can I borrow that this weekend? Matthew Stafford is my quarterback. We just mentioned him in the matchup. He's so good. Yeah. He was great last week. He's got a matchup against the Cardinals. You like this week. Cam Scadaboo. If not now, when? Christian Watson. We talked about him or the Packers offense in general. And then Brenton Strange, who has been good now for basically three straight weeks, but especially over the last two. But you're starting like quarterback five and wide receiver three. Well, this week. And use them again, though. No. Yeah. Those are those are both great. But just a third of the way through the season. I'll go next because I came in second place and I have the lineup to end all lineups. My friend, this is a straight up DFS tournament lineup. Yes, it's fun. I got Jordan Love. Wow. Matthew Golden. Tucker Craft with a Javante Williams comeback on the other side. My entire game is going to be decided Sunday night. You're either going to score 130 points or seven. Yes, I put everything into that game, but it was fun. Why not have a little bit of fun with starts of the weekend? Hopefully, if Jordan Love goes off, then we can have a good game here. What about you for 12 to nine game up there? Yeah, we'll see. We'll see. Again, great matchups across the board here. I've been doing this three weeks in a row. Worked last week. Kirk Cousins against Buffalo. Fourth most fantasy points to quarterbacks. Ramondre Stevenson. I'm expecting Trevion Henderson not to play. I hope that continues because I thought this was the week to use. Stevenson Jets. Tenth in fantasy points to running backs. Mike Evans. Love him this week. The target shares have been massive. Doesn't have much competition with no Debo. Washington. Fourth most fantasy points to receivers. And Isaiah. Likely the Saints' seventh most to tight ends. He's been outstanding as well. If Mike Evans. Well, he texted us last night. Mike said if Mike Evans does not play, he wanted Cortland Sutton. That was it. I love that we have the same thoughts. That's so good. All three of us. That's amazing. We're spending way too much time together. No, we're not. It wasn't Jalen Waddell. It wasn't like anyone else. I knew you were going to say Cortland Sutton. We're spending just the right amount of time with each other. Too predictable. All right. Thanks for hanging out with us, friends. We will see you on Sunday. I love this. Doing Fantasy Focus Countdown on ESPN2. Come hang out with us. Don't forget to love each other and be kind to yourself. You deserve it. We'll see you guys later. Fantasy. You in the 06010. 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