Transcript of Starts of the Week + Week 1 Breakdown, Injury Panic - Fantasy Football Podcast for 9/10 New

Welcome to the Fantasy Footballers Podcast with your hosts Andy Holloway, Jason Moore, and Mike Wright.

Oh, welcome in.

Yeah, I knew that was going to happen. I told these guys before when we did like 2 shows yesterday and spitballed And it was coming back and it'll be a minute. Welcome into the Fantasy Footballers Thursday, September 10th.

Well, I'm sure you lost a bit of your voice just with all the emotions and screaming and shouting at what a, what a just fun game.

No, Jason, we are not doing that.

I thought the game was fun.

No, the game ended fun. Yes.

Yes, but you can't have that end without it being tight.

Yeah, I agree.

This is part of football, man.

Yeah, I mean, we have so much to get into. This is going to be a long show. Yeah, we do. We have matchups today, starts of the week today, NFL news galore, injury news galore, and then a recap of the game, which we have to do. And so—

Which includes injury news galore.

Yeah, I mean, it's just, it's absolutely wild. A reminder of the community over there at jointhefoot.com, hop in there. The season is starting. Get access to the ultimate dashboard and a million in-season tools and you can support the show that way. But we can jump right in because I know it's going to be a long show.

I—

it was 13 to 10. Seattle beat the Patriots. The game started with Sam Darnold being injured almost instantaneously.

First drive.

The team has come out and been optimistic about the outlook for him, but we don't have a final report on the injury and duration of absence. Drew Lock ended up 16 for 22. I thought he did a great job. I was actually impressed with after the jitters of, I think, the first 2 drives.

Right.

I feel like he settled down and basically executed the only offense you needed to have when you're at home in Seattle. I thought the play calling of McDonald was, was kind of, or like the decision making on 4th downs and stuff was very conservative. But I, in the end, it just He executed exactly what they needed to do, which was don't take too many risks. Keep the game close. Let your defense come alive with the, with the, the 12, right? The fans got on their feet and then, and then Drake May made the appropriate amount of mistakes to lose that game.

Yeah. Or the Seahawks made the appropriate amount of amazing defensive plays either way. I mean, the, the nice thing about Drew Lock is he said after the game, he's like, I know our team. I know the players that we have. My biggest, like the only thing I needed to do was protect the ball.

Yeah. I mean, I thought they were going to actually win the game there. They were moving the ball enough where, you know, as somebody who thought Seattle would win it and then, and then seeing them, I did not think they were going to win it once Darnold went out and then they come back and it seems like they had it and the penalties, offensive snaps where they had a chance on the goal line. I mean, there are so many things to talk about in this game.

A lot of takeaways.

I mean, you had You had Drake May's performance, obviously, from a fantasy perspective, 178 yards and a touchdown, 3 picks. I believe in the last 7 games played, he has 7 touchdowns, 7 picks, and 7 fumbles. AJ Brown.

7 picks and 7 fumbles?

And 7 fumbles in the last 7 games. AJ Brown goes down.

7, 7, 7?

Yeah.

That's a jackpot.

That's pretty lucky.

That's normally good.

Jack poo.

Oh no, Jack poop.

Jack poop.

But I mean, so like all respect to the Patriots for what they did last year. They had the easiest schedule since 1999. It ended up that way. They won their games. They deserve, I mean.

And in the games, Drake Maye looked awesome.

4,400 yards.

What is it?

I don't think Drake Maye is going to be like, I'm not taking last night's performance as Drake Maye is not a good quarterback or he's not going to be a good fantasy quarterback. This was in Seattle. Your number one new wide receiver goes down. This was a— this is the number one scoring fantasy defense last year in Seattle.

I took it as actually the opposite of what a lot of— I watched that game and I thought Drake Maye, he didn't play that bad. I know he threw 3 picks.

I do not think he played that bad.

But I don't think he played that bad. That drop from Romeo Doubs that busted a drive. That was humiliating.

Are you talking about Romeo Doubs who had fewer receptions than Uh, Lann Larison, Eli Raradon, Demario Douglas, AJ Brown, Hunter Henry, Rhamondre Stevenson, and Matt Collins.

How many Guardian caps was he wearing?

4.

It was unbelievable. It was. I saw a clip on, on Instagram just talking about like, when it's after a mistake, it looks so stupid. And it does. Um, but yeah, AJ Brown going down. But the thing is, is that because it implies a bigger brain?

So a mistake means that you're dumber.

It just, it looks like you're a bobblehead. It just—

He had as bad of a debut as you could have had.

Yeah. And the thing is, is for fantasy purposes, Drake May ran the ball 7 times for 47 yards. It was like, oh, okay, the wheels are going to work. Now I expect him to be without AJ Brown for a handful of weeks.

Yeah, we can kind of COVID the injuries in this game right now, which is AJ Brown looks like a high ankle sprain. The X-rays were negative. There was some concern about a fibula fracture. That didn't happen. Romeo Doubs, the one contribution he did provide last night was a locker room update about AJ Brown, which said he looked really good and seems like he's going to be okay.

Left in a walking boot. If it's a high ankle sprain from last year, we know it's usually 3 games.

I mean, this is one of the risks. I, you know, with, you know, AJ Brown's been banged up before, but you're an older receiver. Recovery times might be a little bit— I mean, Jason's kind of sighing with the Jason was not in a good place because in part, like he's got AJ Brown on a lot of teams. We all liked AJ Brown.

Yeah.

There's nothing you can control about that.

Yeah.

And fantasy MVPs are not won in weeks 1 through 4 either. So, you know, last year this happened to George Kittle.

Are you kidding me? Guillotine leagues are lost in week 1. What is?

Guillotine leagues?

Well, that, that, yeah, that is true.

Our Chops league, my feature was the incredible stack. Of Drake Maye.

Oh no, that's your team?

Oh, I'm toast, bro.

Get wrecked. I'm done.

Week 1, I will be out.

Maybe. There'll be other injuries. There'll be other people.

You can always be surprised.

Well, I can tell you this much.

Just look at my projections.

I think you would be happier to be in your case than in my case because we play in very few important leagues. We try to keep it to a minimum. I'm out in League of Record. I've made that, you know, from get-go.

You are not out. Stop it.

No, no. In League of Record?

I mean, you're 0-0 right now. But yeah.

But my point is, in, you know, we've got this League of Shadows. We've got our listener league. I've got the Megalobowl. Those are like the rest of my leagues.

Right.

AJ Brown, AJ Brown, and AJ Brown.

Oh, all 3.

You know, you want to know something funny? I'm going to share a little story from our League of Record really quickly.

Kill me.

Yesterday, and we're going to talk about it, Brock Bowers surprise surgery, meniscus multi-week. We'll talk about it. So he goes down. People have been trying to trade for him in our league. And so I hear from the manager. who's like, he's starting to kind of tongue-in-cheek send some offers over to the Brock Bowers manager because he had already been trying to get him. And now he's like, oh, I've got Kelce I can send you to help you out. And that was the AJ Brown manager. So, so during the middle of the day, he's kind of, you know, making light of the situation or maybe take, trying to take advantage. By night, he didn't have AJ Brown. I mean, this is fantasy football at its best. I want to talk about both running backs for a moment.

Yes.

First, let's start with Ja'Darian Price. This was a rookie debut if I've ever seen one in the sense that 10 for 52 looked very fast.

Yeah, he looked good.

When he had— here's what my highlights were and you share yours. When contact was made, he seemed to fall forward. He seemed to fight through the end of the tackle. I liked seeing that. He also made the historical Reggie Bush mistake, which is it works to bounce it outside in college and then I try to bounce it outside in the NFL and whoops, I'm not faster. Yeah.

I mean, that's obviously going to be a common and frequent rookie problem. The other part of the rookie issue here, I thought he looked great.

I really did.

I thought, you know, as a runner, he was fast. He had the juice. George Olani had 8 carries to his 10 and George Olani did nothing with them. 29 yards.

I think you mean George Salami.

Yeah.

Oh, I apologize. George Salami.

Thank you.

And you know, it's, it's a little frightening. You can make— it's just confirm your priors, right? He's a rookie week 1. They're going to— they're obviously going to get him more work as he goes on.

At least trust you're going to have him.

Exactly.

Or we love a committee.

This is a committee. They had the MVP of the Super Bowl, Ken Bone Walker, who was way more efficient. They said, no, come out. We've got Charbonnet. And this is—

Emmanuel Wilson was in on the goal line.

They are committed, committed to a true 50-50 timeshare, which, you know, last year the Seahawks were a great team, great defense, great run game, irrelevant running backs like Kenbone Walker and Charbonnet both through the fantasy year. I mean, they were like—

Sort of a coin flip situation.

Yeah. You weren't excited to start them. They were someone that you could throw in your lineup and get the running back 24 on a week. That is a scary proposition going forward. I did like that he had 2 catches just to see him involved in that facet of the game.

I test. I agree. I thought Price looked very good. The— and I—

you cannot—

we need far more games than this.

Yes.

He can't be top 12 though if this is the issue though is 10 for 52 for one running back and 8 for 29. That literal, that's Ken Bone Walker and Charbonnet. That was the box score from last year. That's what would happen. So that is—

That will be dumb, but it was dumb last year.

Yes.

And Charbonnet will return. That's the bigger story for me.

Sure.

I think if this was the best year—

I think Salami just goes back in the freezer.

Oh, look at Salami up there. Here's the thing is that Charbonnet is going to return. They're going to trust Charbonnet more than Halani. He's going to perform better than Helani, even though he's not the most efficient back. He is a more well-rounded back. But again, if you believe that Price has the juice and the team is smart, which they are, the utilization should improve.

I feel like I'm looking in a mirror right now.

Yeah. What you were saying all last year about Kenneth Walker.

This is me last year.

I want to talk. Oh, go ahead, Jay.

I'm on the side that I believe Ja'Darian Price will not get the volume. become a bell cow for this team.

No, I don't think bell cow's in the cards. I think, I think committee back with explosive plays is in the card, which is probably RB 17 to 25 peak. Unfortunately.

I mean, is he as good as Kenneth Walker? Do you believe he's as good as Kenneth Walker last year?

I don't know.

I don't know.

It's way too early.

But my point is, he looks great though. Kenneth Walker was the running back 22 last year. And so if he is as good as Kenneth Walker, Yeah.

Emmanuel Wilson at the goal line, even though that was the delay of game, I believe it was.

But just seeing that alignment, you thought you were going to get a grand salami right there.

I did.

Yeah.

I was— and I told you I was watching that and I was like, well, I know that's not Price.

No.

And but that's like, that's devastating to see if you're saying it's not even going to be Holani on the goal line. It's going to be Wilson. I know it's just one snap. But you gotta, you don't want to overreact, but you do want to, and I'm, I'm going to be your— you want to alter.

Yeah. No. So that was a huge story. JSN had a huge game.

Oh, he's so good. 8 for 122 and a touchdown.

45-yard touchdown. Yeah. And so touchdown was awesome.

That was ridiculous.

He's just slippery.

Like Patriots, what are you doing?

He's like a slippery fish in the secondary.

He is slippery. There was, there was just a little play.

He never looks as like dynamic as the OBJ or like Chase.

Exactly. He doesn't seem as explosive as Ja'Marr Chase, but you watch him with the ball in his hands. He just goes like, And he gets extra yards all the time.

And I'm going to say something. I know, again, this, you could, you can chalk it under confirming priors. I'm just going to tell you facts and information and you can draw whatever you want. The entire earth wanted to pile on to Rhamondre Stevenson last night. I'm going to tell you the facts about Rhamondre Stevenson and what I believe, and you can do whatever you want with it. There was never an argument this offseason that Rhamondre Stevenson was going to be a good pick because he's explosive like Travion Henderson. Last night, Rhamondre Stevenson scored 13.8 fantasy points in our league of record. That is more than Drake Maye scored. He was the second highest scorer or the highest scorer on the Patriots. It wasn't efficient, but here's the facts I want to tell you. Number 1, Rhamondre Stevenson had 60 of 71 offensive snaps for the team. Number 2, 50 of his 51 rushing yards happened after contact. Number 3, 5 times he was hit in the backfield where their offensive line did nothing. If you remove the 5 times he was met in the backfield, because I went one by one, he ran for 4.69 a carry on the rest of his carries.

He caught 5 passes in the offense.

Yeah, we'll be catching more without AJ Brown.

Sure.

And the Seattle Seahawks were the number 3 rushing defense in the NFL last year, giving up an average of 3.6 per carry to all running backs that they faced. To me, if you want to, you know, let me get the effect here. If you want to go, Oh, give Rhamondre the great plotting award of the year and you want to bury your head in the sand about how often he was used. It's only going to be better than this until Travion is back on this team. I still think the workload is going to be high. And by the way, he had a higher top speed than Jadarrius Price last night.

That's hilarious.

It is hilarious because it's like, oh, Jadarrius showed his speed. He was so fast. It's like, so Rhamondre was faster.

The argument for Rhamondre was always Belcow utilization. That's it. He's not, he's not a spectacular back on talent.

On a good offense too.

On a good offense. Yeah. It's just like now if AJ Brown's out, his passing work is going to be high and they're going to play defenses that are not, you know, in Seattle on the debut. So to me, if you can have a game that people on Twitter think is the worst game of your life and you're the highest scoring fantasy player on your team and anybody who started him, I have him in a bunch of leagues, very satisfied with the output of a game where They didn't score a touchdown outside of Eli Raradon, never got on the goal line. I just think it was overblown.

No, I mean, Rhamondre is going to be a phenomenal play at the, at the very least the next month. He should be a, like, honestly, he should be a running back 1 over the first month of the season. I really do. I really do think that he's going to be so involved in the passing game. You're going to have Trayveon Henderson still coming back. I will say that on the positive for Trayveon Henderson. I know it was the Seahawks, but this looked like a team that needed another weapon, especially with— as soon as AJ Brown went out, it was like, my goodness, they, they are lacking weapons.

Big Mac is back, baby.

Well, this was the expectation we had in our preview on Tuesday with it was that this would be a low-scoring game where the defenses were out ahead of where the offenses were and that the Patriots were going to struggle dealing with new offensive pass catchers. Because they hadn't done it before. Now it was alarming to me that Romeo Doubs had zero catches and Mack Hollins was targeted as much as he was.

And if you go to the snap counts, it's the 3 targets for Doubs that is far more troubling.

And it was correlated to snaps. Doubs was getting far fewer snaps than Mack Hollins or DeMario Douglas. So that's concerning. Like, I think, I mean, genuinely, I think Romeo Doubs is a drop in fantasy.

Probably, but it's hard to know because Mack Hollins came into the AJ Brown role. You know, AJ Brown got injured right at the beginning of the second half. So you had Hollins playing a role that he wasn't usually— I think AJ Brown would have stayed in that game.

Before AJ Brown left, if you go watch the snap counts, if it was just first half snap counts, when AJ Brown was alive and well, the snap counts for Romeo Doubs was 4th in the pecking order of the wide receivers.

It was very strange.

The only issue with dropping him is that I assume we're going to be without AJ Brown for a couple of weeks.

And no, I'm—

who is—

that's an over.

Yeah. Maybe, maybe, you know, it will be hard to pick up.

It will be hard not to drop him is the better point.

Oh, because yeah, I've got it.

Because if you have zero production and you're getting low snaps and then you're going to have a swath of waiver wire pickups we're excited about because Pat Bryant breaks out in week 1.

Hey, so I'm all for it. Major takeaways from this game. Call your shot on J'Darian Price, whether you think he's explosive and looks good and will get more work or whether you confirm that he is going to be in a committee and can't be a top back. Drake May is much better than he performed yesterday. I think he's like an immediate trade for candidate because people are going to be very, very low. No AJ Brown. I think AJ Brown will be great when he comes back. Rhamondre should be awesome. And then the latest news we have on Sam Darnold is waiting on an MRI. The biggest fears of like a season-ending like hip fracture Look in the rearview. Short-term IR is still not off the table.

The quote here, dodged a bullet.

Dodged a bullet, but it's still— I would—

Still could miss time.

Yeah, still could miss time.

Yeah, that's encouraging for the—

And also, JSN is so good.

He's very good. And Cooper Kupp wasn't given opportunities last night. He had a touchdown called back. He made some plays.

Yeah, he had an awesome one-handed catch.

And because just the outcome, you know, like what is this? with, with, with Darnold missing time for JSN, you know, I just to touch on it real quick of like, this isn't a, this doesn't feel like Joe Burrow last year. I'm sorry, Ja'Marr Chase.

Oh yeah.

Last year where Brownie came in and you're like, this dude is completely incompetent and you're just, you do have to fully panic on Ja'Marr Chase. I don't, you're out, your, your output's going to go down.

Yeah. But volume of a day.

But Drew Lock is at least Drew Lock's not Paxton Beck. Right.

I mean, personality-wise, he might be, but we'll take a quick break and talk all this news.

News and notes from around the league.

Well, the first thing I'm going to share real quick is that today was the day day of Josh Jacobs in court and he pled no contest to the charges that were brought against him, which included a no contest plea on 5 different conditions. He needs supervision and counseling and pay restitution to the victim and no contact with the victim. And oh, by the way, one of the conditions, no further criminal acts. Oh, one of the cool agreements you do when you've committed criminal acts.

They're going Jim Carrey on him. So we're not breaking the law. Yes.

Yes, we are. So we might have more information about—

That's where it'll probably just be an immediate 6 games then.

Probably. Yeah. So we talked about AJ Brown and Darnold. We don't need to talk about them again. George Kittle off the injury report will play tonight against the Rams.

Come on, George.

It does not.

Come on, George.

Being off the injury report does not mean he is at 100%. So make— we've talked a lot about whether or not you play him and who you would play over him, but it's good to see.

Oh, by the way, with all this injury news, I just want to remind people one of the extra perks of the Foot Clan is an Injury Blitz podcast that comes out tomorrow. And I can tell you right now, Matthew Betz is all over this stuff. And I'm going to give you the breakdown here because we got news yesterday that Raiders tight end Brock Bowers, who—

7 days.

Was it— is he expected to miss just a game or 2 after undergoing a meniscus trim?

Nope.

Stop it.

Matthew Betz, I talked to him this morning, our injury expert, and I wanted to get his breakdown of the scenarios. Now, I will say this, from what I can— I cannot find anybody, and he has reached out to multiple Raiders beat reporters, and he cannot get anybody to confirm 100% it's the same knee. But we all assume it is because he was in camp with a brace on the knee. He ended up with a meniscus trim on Tuesday. Here's the 2 scenarios that Matthew Betz outlaid for me. Number one, it could be a fluky thing that happened in camp. And if that's the case, he could reasonably return in a few weeks and be the same guy this year. Or option 2.

Oh, I don't like this.

If it's related to the PCL and bone bruise issue from last year, which caused Brock Bowers to be out and ineffective, it would be a red flag to him. He said if he suffered meniscus damage because of recurring instability in the knee, because of the PCL strain, it is a concern for all of the rest of season effectiveness. Vast majority of PCL sprains heal well, but there is a subset that don't. And the one he can point to, Ricky Pearsall.

Oh boy.

Because you can have recurring lingering issues. It like Pearsall was another strained situation where it was like, well, if you're going to get surgery, why didn't you do it 3, 4 months ago? I think the same scenario we're sitting here with Brock Bowers. You had these Twitter videos that were like, what do you believe? And he's kind of limping and he's doing these runs and then he's kind of sitting to the side of practice. Oh no, he's fine. And then what? Clint Kubiak came out and said everyone's going to suit up an hour before this was announced.

Yeah.

I mean, thank you for revealing yourself to us. Yeah.

Kubiak. That was dirty. I mean, there's no way that Kubiak did not know that his player had had that his star most important player had had surgery.

I hope coaches do that for the podium. Is they like, They tell everyone, don't tell me anything. The medical staff don't tell me.

Possible deniability.

But I would say I'm very concerned with Brock Bowers. I don't think that there's much that you can do. If you could trade him high for a haul, someone's like, oh, I can get Brock Bowers.

Maybe I'm going to ask you horrible questions right now.

Okay.

Horrible questions. Would you trade Brock Bowers right now for Tyler Warren? I told you I'm going to ask you horrible questions.

So I think I would. And that's—

Tucker Kraft.

No, no.

Colson Loveland.

Yeah, I think I would. I had someone ask me today, would I trade AJ Brown immediately right now for Garrett Wilson? And I said yes, because I think AJ Brown is going to be better than Garrett Wilson this year.

You just want the extra 3 games.

But you get a— yeah, you get a month of fantasy production. Like, that still matters. You still have to make the playoffs in order to win a championship.

So that's a tough one.

If you add those extra games in and then you go, I don't know how they'll come back After the injury, maybe they're slow. You know, play how you're going to play. In the playoffs, I think AJ Brown will be better than Garrett Wilson. I hope that Brock Bowers is way better than either Loveland or Warren, but I just, I would make that.

We are so back.

I, that's it, Mike.

We're one game in. We are so back.

Oh man.

We weren't even a game in before the Brock Bowers thing came out.

And then, hey, just another note.

Season pass on the tilt machine, baby. We bought it. We bought it.

Definitely not here to, you know, call for panic in the street on Brock Bowers. We just, we don't know. We do know that if it's, if it is exactly what they say it is, typical recovery timeline is closer to 3 to 4 weeks. The one, the 1 to 2 weeks is, that's a very aggressive Wolverine cure.

In your bra.

Yeah.

Oh, Ashton Jensen.

2 Liar Liar references.

That's what we're going for today.

Jason, you're up.

I'm up. I'm working on it.

The panic machine.

It can't be a goose.

Okay.

Because I already hit that recently.

Yeah.

Ashton Gentry, full participant. There's some good Raiders news for you. Tucker Kraft not on the injury report ahead of week 1. There's some good injury news for you. And we're back. JCM limited with the groin injury. Groinindex.com member, lifetime member currently on this offseason. But JCM, Rashad White practicing in full. That could be something to watch in week 1 for the Commanders.

Rashad White practicing in full. is very similar to Bill being limited. Okay.

That's, that's funny. Malik Nabers practiced in full on Wednesday. Seems like he's going to play.

Come on, baby.

And the news that I have been waiting for as a, as an emphatic and excited Chris Bell fan, the Dolphins head coach Jeff Haefele says there will be, there will be no pitch count for Chris Bell. They also listed Bell and Douglas as starters. Just put that in the, in the category of better offense than you think. Chris Bell is a first-round wide receiver talent, talent-wise. And I believe, I believe he is the alpha talent on a team with no talent at wide receiver that we know of outside of these 2 rookies who are now the starters. You talk about Malik Washington or you talk about Tolbert or these other guys they brought in. They just made 2 rookies the starters.

And that's what a team like this should 100% be doing. They should throw them out there and be like, okay, if we lose, we lose. Let's see what we have. Let's get them reps. Let's get them experience. I didn't think because of the recovery timeline, the fact that he's a rookie and the training camp and the, you know, being out there for reps would have a full snap allotment from week 1, which is why I was on the Caleb Douglas side. If I knew for sure that both players, and it sounds like we know for sure that both players are full-time starters from week 1, that's what we're being told, then I would switch to certainly to the Chris Bell side. The upside is higher, I think, with Chris Bell. Both are worth a shot. But right now, before this weekend's games, look at the worst player on your team, on your roster, your last round pick, and maybe think about swapping that out for Chris Bell just to see if—

Yeah, this might be a chance to get him before he's a big pickup next week.

Yeah.

And speaking of In our League of Record, Malik Washington was one of my last picks for, because I needed him for a double flex. I'm like, I just need a guy who's going to get 5 or so targets. With this news, I have pivoted to Devon Vailly as my nasty boy, wide receiver 2 for the Saints. Yeah.

Would you, if you could play Vailly or Caleb Douglas, who would you play?

Vailly. Okay.

If you could play Vailly or Romeo Doubs, who would you have played?

Yeah. Who I would have?

Matt Collins is easy.

I would currently have a big fat zero on my roster. I do.

time this year.

I would have done it.

It's Starts of the Week.

All right.

Starts of the Week brought to you by Apple Card.

All right. We've got the trio of Start of the Week picks at every position. You want to give a quick overview on how we view Starts of the Week? Just like, what does that represent for people? Because we don't come in here and say like, Yeah, I mean, Jameer Gibbs is the start of the week.

Honestly, it's different in week 1 than the rest of the, than the rest of the year. Usually we are looking for someone who is a questionable start. You know, it's not, it's not always like this guy's going to be the best player of the week. This is like, hey, if you've got a tough start decision, this guy looks like someone that you should put in your lineup. I would say that week 1 is slightly different, right? This is like you're going to start the guys you drafted. more often than not in the order that you drafted them. But this is a, you know, this is confidence plays in those borderline. We think that they've got a really good matchup, something special about their situation where I want them in my lineup.

Jared Goff. Jared Goff is going to— he's going to be my start of the week.

All right.

New Orleans. Great opportunity at home. Week 1, I think Goff is like, Goff is, I hate to say this. He's the only person I actually look at on the waiver wire and I go, man, he's probably going to be way better than Josh Allen in week 1. And I should probably like, if I had any, you know, like he's probably going to score more fantasy points than Josh Allen in week 1. I know I'm not going to make the switch.

You won't?

No, I'm not.

I know you're benched. You can easily make that move.

You think? Because it just doesn't matter. I just won't play a quarterback.

Well, I'm saying you've got guys to drop.

Oh yeah. I mean, I could do it for sure. I, it's hard for me not to play Josh Allen in week 1 of the season. I mean, that seems, I have Amon-Ra. That would be a stack situation.

Yeah.

Jared Goff. He's my start of the week. I think he's a must start this week.

Yeah. I like that. This, these are quick and simple for week 1. Baker Mayfield, a guy that might be on your waivers or was, you know, a later round, a later round pick. He's playing on the road against Cincinnati in the highest over-under of the week. He just got paid $55 million a year on a new contract. I mean, the Bengals—

Both those guys are on waivers in our league.

Mayfield. You know, I mean, you pay the man his money and then play in Cincinnati against, you know, an improved but still terrible Bengals defense in the highest over-under of the week.

You should be playing. And just, you, you want to play against the Bengals. Either the defense is bad. Or that offense is going to put up points.

Exactly.

It'll be a great matchup. I'm going with Jackson Dart against the Dallas Cowboys. It is Sunday night. It's the 3rd highest over-under of the week. The Cowboys, like the Bengals, will have a better defense, but we— all we have is last year's data. And last year against the Cowboys at home, Jackson Dart, 230 and 2, completed nearly 70% of his passes and 5 carries for 32 yards on the ground. I think Dart's in a good spot to start the season.

All right. Amariyan Hampton against Arizona is my running back start of the week. Hot Hampton gets it going. Double-digit home favorites. Cardinals suck. And there you go. Yeah.

I'm going to go, I'm going to go Breece Hall. He's on the road against Tennessee. His groin is intact. He should see 18 to 20 touches in a winnable game. The Titans, they ranked 28th in points allowed to the running back position last year. The Jets offensive line has also been improved. So he is a, I think he's a great play this week.

And Jason, I got your guy. Your running back is my start of the week.

Oh, let's go.

Bucky Irving. He's a running back too, but he is in a very good spot against the Cincinnati Bengals. Jay, it's the highest over-under. New Bucs OC Zach Robinson ranks number 1 among all play callers over the past 5 years for percentage of zone-based runs. Last year, Cincinnati allowed near— nearly 5 yards per carry on zone runs. Do we have a perfect match here? Also, Sean Tucker should be out. We don't know for sure that that will give the goal line to Bucky, but it definitely gives it a boost in probability.

DeVonta Smith at wide receiver is my start of the week against Washington. It's time to watch him take over as the alpha for Jalen Hurts. Commanders defense Last year, the pass defense was pretty much the worst in the NFL. Easy start, DeVonta Smith.

I'm going to also go with the DeVonta. I'm going to go DeVonta Adams. So if you have a DeVonta, you should start him tonight in Australia. So is it actually tomorrow?

Sort of.

Yeah.

Kind of. I'm like all in on DeVonta Adams. I have, I believe he's a wide receiver 1 this year. I mean, he was a wide receiver 1 last year with 14 touchdowns, saw 16 targets inside the 5-yard line. Which is the most targets since targets have been a stat. So, you know, this is a great matchup against the 49ers. He had 19 targets in 2 games against the 49ers last year.

And I'm going with Tetero McMillan. Like, he's the number 1 for the team. He will get the target share, the highest target share of the team. And he is playing against the Bears where their secondary last year, 31st in schedule-adjusted fantasy points allowed to the position. 29th in yards per game, 29th in pressure rate. This should be a game that Bryce Young will surpass 200 yards, should be. And the benefactor will be T-Mac.

Last start of the week, Sam LaPorta, the other side of that Goff situation against New Orleans. I'm stacking them up. You obviously have a touchdown chance with Sam LaPorta in this high over-under. The weakest part of the Saints defense defending the tight end position. Sam LaPorta.

Yeah. You're not worried about the coming back from the injury? You're all in?

Yeah. I'm feeling good.

I'm going to go Isaiah Likely against Dallas to stack with Mike's Jackson Dart. I mean, if you drafted him late, this is a great way to see what's going to happen. You know, in his 9 career games without Mark Andrews, he's averaged 50 receiving yards, 12.5 PPR points. And I promise Mark Andrews will not be on the field. He's not on the roster.

I was almost sad that I still had Kyle Pitts available to me in our League of Record draft because my plan, me and my son who run the team, we were like, we want Isaiah Likely. But with him there, we're like, okay, we got to take Kyle Pitts. But I just wanted, I wanted Likely. I think you could rely on him this year.

I think you made the right decision, but especially week 1, that Dallas matchup is very good for tight ends.

I think with, with Darius Slayton going away is like, there's a commitment to him.

And Nabers might be on a snap count start a little slower.

I do. My outlook for Likely has gone up, but this will make you happy, Andy, because Kyle Pitts Kyle Pitts at Pitt is my start of the week.

Pitts v. Pitt.

It's Pua. But I mean, this time it's just—

Pua loves to throw it short.

It's just too— oh, that's his favorite thing, man. That low A-dot. That's how you get it done. That's Tua's way. Steelers last year, a problem defending the tight end position. 30th in schedule-adjusted points, 29th in receptions allowed to the position. Kyle Pitts, while it's probably an ADOT of 3 to 5, he should be good for 5+ receptions, getting you some volume.

All right. That was Starts of the Week brought to you by Apple Card. Apply in the Wallet app on your iPhone today, subject to credit approval. Apple Card issued by Goldman Sachs Bank USA, Salt Lake City branch terms and more at applecard.com.

Fantasy Forecast presented by PrizePicks.

Here we go.

Week 1, the full slate. Tampa Bay.

Stay healthy, people.

Yeah. I mean, that's probably worth saying.

The first game was so bad for injuries.

And pregame and postgame. Tampa Bay Buccaneers travel to Cincinnati to take on the Bengals. Vegas line, Cincinnati minus 3.5, over-under 50.5. We just talked about Baker, Jason's start of the week. Just talked about Bucky, Mike's start of the week. High over-under. I can't help but think of every beginning of the season in the context of Cincinnati failing.

Yeah.

So, you know, losing as favorites at home against Tampa would be a tough, a tough start for Mike's Super Bowl favorites. But it's a different year. 9-10 is the Joe Burrow.

Excuse me. Read the— read his entire—

9-10-1.

Thank you.

In September.

Thank you.

The worst part for fantasy managers, he averages 15.7 fantasy points per game. And that jumps up to his normal range, 20, 18, 22, 20 for the next 4 months.

He's kind of a Yeti too. Joe Burrow just seems to put up points when it gets colder.

Except for like Henry is good in the beginning and then gets better. Burrow's bad in the beginning and then gets—

Let me give you the week 1 fantasy points for Burrow the last 3 years. Last year he scored 8.8 fantasy points. The year prior was 8.1 fantasy points. The year prior was 3.2 fantasy points.

So big game, big opportunity at home. Got to get it done. Got to get it done for Ja'Marr and Tee Higgins. Chase Brown. Lots of auto starts in this game. I think I will kind of on week 1, like we said, there's not a lot of start decisions from the main players, but there are situations on depth charts that are interesting. To me, the biggest story of this game is going to be the wide receiver room for Tampa Bay and what it looks like when the game is over. High over-under. Baker can get it done. Bad defense. You should sit here and say, hey, Emeka, Ibuka. I think Ibuka, Godwin, and one other mysterious name is going to have a game in this.

Yeah. Is it Jalen McMillan or is it Cade Otton that gets—

Is it Tez Johnson or Ted Hurst?

No.

And I would say that—

What about me?

Yeah. I would say that—

Pack a chainsaw.

When we're looking at these week 1 matchups, the most important thing is not really even who to start. It's what to watch for. Like, that's the most important thing. We need to go into these games going, what are we going to keep an eye on? And to me, it is both the wide receiver core and what's the pecking order, the snap counts, but also the running back core. How much is Kenny Gainwell involved?

Yeah.

How much does he siphon away passing work from Bucky Irving? That's, that's going to be the Buccaneers are a very interesting watch and it's fun that it gets to be against the Cincinnati defense.

Yeah. The Bengals are also, I want to see how different it actually is. A lot has been talked up of this. We're going to be under center more to help us get more explosive runs to help with the play action to really sell things. Chase Brown remains a, just a very strong, like he finished incredible. It started real bad because they didn't have a quarterback, but just multifaceted in the game.

I see PrizePicks has him at 23.5 receiving yards. Does that seem low to you?

It seems low because Vita Vea just got a $30 million contract extension after he was like, I want to, I want to be traded. They're like, no, they paid the man his money. It's hard to run against the Buccaneers when Vita Vea is healthy and motivated and playing well. But the little dump-offs to Chase Brown, 23.5 receiving yards, that seems like easy to me.

New Orleans travels to Detroit. So we have a couple of the games that were featured in our starts of the week. The over-under here, a delicious 49.5. Detroit minus 7. And I'm going to be honest, I feel like that's respectful of New Orleans. When you're at home and New Orleans with what they were able to do last year, Detroit, I could have seen this being a bigger line, maybe 8.5 or something like that. Detroit has the second— Detroit, yeah, has the second highest implied point total. Detroit is going to be cooking this week, which is— they're one of the only teams where you can say, you know, Goff this week, Gibbs, Amon-Ra, Jameson Williams, and LaPorta, I think, are all in play. Sure.

Absolutely. This, this game environment is exactly what you want. The pace of play, you know, from Moore on the Saints is awesome. The fact that Detroit is going to score a kajillion points, I'm all about this game. If there's— and this is why, you know, you talked about Devon Bailey as your kind of emergency play as a wide receiver too. It's because of this game environment. It's perfect for fantasy.

All right. Well then on the other side. Travis Achane Jr. gets the opportunity to make his Rumble-ia debut. Tyler Shuck, we'll see if he takes a step forward.

Brother, the, the PrizePicks projection has Shuck at 246.5.

I thought that was insane.

Only Joe Burrow and Dak are higher.

Well, they're going to need to pass the ball in this game.

This is what we're talking about.

So Juwan Johnson, Olave, Vele in a pinch.

Honestly, Travis Achane Jr. is going to get a lot of work in the receiving game. It's not, it's not something that Moore's offenses usually over the last couple of years have, have excelled at targeting the running back. But that is one of, you know, Travis Achane Jr.'s calling cards and they're going to be passing once they're down.

Anything else from this matchup that you think is a tough decision or something you're watching for, as you said?

I'm watching the Jameson Williams, Sam LaPorta situation where hopefully assuming Sam LaPorta is healthy and plays his full allotment of snaps, which it appears he is going to. I want to know how does Jameson Williams do?

Sure.

Because Jameson Williams blew up at the end of last year. It coincided with 2 different things, the play calling changing, but also Sam LaPorta being off the field. I want Jameson Williams to come out week 1 and dominate with LaPorta on the field. I think that would say a lot.

Yeah, I think it'd be tough. I think for all those guys every week to get it done. I think LaPorta and Jameson could see more ping-ponging this year in terms of one of those guys being the next man up because Gibbs and Amon-Ra are so involved. But this could be a good week for it with the over-under.

If you lost Brock Bowers and you are scrambling, I had tweeted out right when the news came, but this shouldn't surprise you. Juwan Johnson would be pretty much my favorite replacement who is on a lot of waiver wires. I know he's not on everyone. But I think that he is a solid play.

Alrighty. New York, Tennessee coming up next. We'll take a quick break and get back into the week 1 matchups. Jason's New York Jets take on the Tennessee Titans in a matchup of— what's the opposite of a juggernaut?

I'd say get the Pepto ready.

Hey, someone gets a win.

That is probable, but not guaranteed.

Wait till you hear these numbers though.

Tennessee minus 1.5 at home.

That's fine.

Over-under 38.5.

Bro.

Lowest of week 1.

What?

You're talking about the 29th and 30th ranked offenses last year in points per game and yards per game. They were not good. Cam Ward, you know, I still hope that he's not a liar when he said In the preseason, look, we've got a lot of, we've got a lot of stuff we're not doing yet and we'll do it when the game time happens.

So that's, that's all fine and well, but the stuff you were doing, you were not doing very well. So I hope the stuff that you haven't done, you're really good at.

That's, I mean, that's a fair point.

Robert Saleh echoed that, you know, after some of the preseason struggles, he said, you know, when it came to—

I would too.

No, I know, but I believe it. I believe that they were, not focused on necessarily like, I think there's going to be a lot of worry about starting Carnell Tate. You haven't seen it yet. Looked bad in preseason. Do I start or as a rookie, do I just like hold off? And I would absolutely be starting him.

First of all, how high of a level of a start are you saying? Like a wide receiver 3 or a 2?

Yeah, no, I would say a wide receiver 2.

Is that a wise receiver? Is that what I heard?

I see him as a top 24 play.

Okay.

I mean, it's, you know, the Jets defense is, is not going to be very good. I do think that they're going to force him the ball and design plays for him. Brian Daboll did this with Malik Nabers in his rookie season. I think there will be some design plays for him.

I am very curious to see the Wandale involvement. He's, you know, I brought up Alec Pierce as being one of the only receivers drafted that late where he had 1,000 yards the year before. Wandale was the only other one. Like, They paid him a ton of money. He's a very good player and he played for Brian Daboll. When Brian Daboll goes and gets you, it means something to me. So I am curious about the utilization there. On the other side, we just want consolidation. Breece Hall, Garrett Wilson. I'm not watching for much else. I honestly, if I had to pick a sleeper surprise performance of this entire game, to me it's Adonai Mitchell.

Yeah, people, people talked about him during the offseason. Maybe this is the year.

Yeah, I mean, I liked what I saw in the— I mean, it was hard to watch the Jets last year, but in his limited time once he arrived, I thought it was pretty good. Baltimore, the Ravens at Indianapolis. Vegas line here, Baltimore -3.5, over-under 47.5. You feeling good about this one?

Much better than last game.

I am very curious about this. Both of these teams are teams that I I'm very like, I'm not sure how it's going to go. I know that Baltimore is expected to win, you know, double-digit games and they should be great. Their defense should be great. They've got Lamar. They've got Derrick Henry, but they've gotten much, much worse on the offensive line. They lost their star fullback. I could see their offense potentially struggling. And with the change in the long-term leadership that this organization was very used to You know, a Harbaugh run in the show and now it's a completely new system in here with new coaches. I'm just curious. I want to see what we see for Baltimore. And then when it comes to the Colts, it's like that was the tale of two halves last year with and without Daniel Jones. They were— Daniel Jones was an MVP candidate. They were the number one seed in the NFL after 8 weeks and everything looked good. He got injured and then they were a putrid team. And so it's like, well, are they Are they going to be as good as they were to start last year this year now that Daniel Jones is back?

This is a great test for both teams. I am absolutely fascinated to watch it.

Yeah. So you're going to, you're going to start your studs in this one. The health of Alec Pierce is something we're watching. The distribution of the downs, Keenan Allen. You know, what does Daniel Jones look like? Jacoby Lane, a rookie we're watching mostly to see what's the snaps like.

Yeah. Snaps is everything for Jacoby Lane.

I mean, which I'm not expecting.

I'm not either.

A lot. I'm not either. It, even though he had one of the loudest drumbeats of the entire offseason, we, we know the traditional path for rookies drafted in the range that he was, that it takes time. Would expect it will be Flowers and Rashad Bateman as the primary guys, but maybe we're pleasantly surprised.

Yeah. Or day 3 picks get a bunch of buzz and get really excited.

And Lang is 3, right? Was he a 4th?

Am I remembering that right?

No, he was a 3rd round.

You get really raised. Day 2 pick, baby.

Yeah.

Hey, but even then they don't usually play enough snaps week 1 to be relevant. So that's what to watch for. And I'm, of course, you know, I'm watching the Josh Downs snaps.

Yeah.

And it's always—

Are you on the outside?

It's, it's important to know that these rookies, while they don't get a lot of opportunities in week 1, that doesn't set the table for them to never Correct. Work themselves into an offense. Things evolve with effectiveness. Rashad Bateman has the legal plus talent troubles. And we'll see what happens for the offense as it goes. And that, you know, the debut of Jesse Minner, Declan Doyle offense is, it's a big deal.

Yeah. I'm, it's, I think the Ravens are extremely exciting for week 1 to, because each like it should absolutely work out. Your concerns, Jay, are, I think are very valid. But you're like, you have superstars on this team.

Yeah.

So it should work. And the whispers, the, they're very quiet, but the whispers of Derrick Henry catching more passes this year. We'll see.

Atlanta at Pittsburgh. They can't all be winners. Vegas line here, Pittsburgh minus 3.5, over-under just 42.5. Is there a worse quarterback matchup on a single week? What's worse to watch? Rodgers v. Tua? Or Kamward v. Geno.

Kamward v. Geno, I think.

So we're getting a couple of the super combos this week. The Falcons have not had a winning season since 2017. The Pittsburgh Steelers were the slowest, most plodding offense last year, 28th in plays per game, which it's one thing to just be like disappointed in the offensive output of your wide receivers in Pittsburgh when Kenny Gainwell leads the team in receiving instead of DK Metcalf, their alpha. But it's another thing to do it in such a way that makes me so bored and so sad.

And they were the worst to watch last year.

Like if we just watched a back and forth affair where Tua is throwing 4-yard passes to Kyle Pitts and Aaron Rodgers is throwing 4-yard passes to Darnell Washington.

Yeah.

I mean, that might be the game.

Who has the lower ADOT this week between those 2 guys?

Gosh, I think Tua. Yeah, man, it— that he is done soon. He is done soon. Tua v. Rodgers.

We're hoping that Mike McCarthy brings some new life to the Steelers.

Well, and the same with Kevin Stefanski in Atlanta.

Sure.

And Tommy Reese. But right now, play Bijan Robinson and Drake London. Play Kyle Pitts for sure. Mike's start of the week. And then on the offensive side for Pittsburgh, I think you would probably concede Jaylen Warren's going to be in lineups.

Warren and Dowdle will both be played.

Metcalf was not in— he was not drafted in a place that means you have to start this guy.

No, but I would. You know, this is a perfect matchup. Obviously last year, the Falcons were the 30th against wide receivers, giving up over 31 points a game. With McCarthy in tow, I would say that this is a, you know, DK Metcalf is going to be in one of those situations where until one of the two things are proven, like he is really good or he's irrelevant on this offense, you're going to be playing matchups. And this is a matchup you, you want to play. So week 1 at home, I would, I would be starting DK Metcalf.

The Chicago Bears travel to Carolina to take on the Panthers. Chicago, 3-point road favorites. The over-under is 46.5. Okay. Implied point total puts the Bears at 24.5. Carolina at 21.5. What is the man? Is that— you're surprised they're not favored by more or favored at all or what is it?

No, it's— I think favored by 3 is strong.

That's kind of how I felt too, actually.

I mean, if you want to say the Bears are favored, like, okay, a point, a point and a half. But a full field goal is pretty surprising to me.

Well, we'll see. It is, boy, I'm getting reminded of the Bryce Young when he was traded for what equated to, listen to this, DJ Moore, Darnell Wright, Tyreek Stevenson, Caleb Williams, and Luther Burden. That was the net. Wow. That was the net.

We call that a whoops-a-doozles.

That is, man. That is a lot of players. Last year we had this Chicago bend don't break defense that got them pretty far.

Oh, it bent though.

It did bend eventually. And well, can Bryce Young bend it this week? He's got Ted McMillan, Jalen Coker healthy. Darren Waller, don't forget he plays football.

Yeah.

The Wallerist himself. Boy, do we even have that anymore in the drops?

Is he in the right jersey?

I think we probably don't. We're going to have to get back to it.

He's probably in a Dolphins jersey. Just imagine it was Panther blue.

Is Bryson going to do enough this week?

No. I will say that every week.

He honestly—

Will he do enough for TET? Because he's Mike's start of the week.

Yeah.

No, if he, if there's any matchup where Bryce is going to do enough, this is one of them.

I think one thing I'm watching, because we're kind of using that language in week 1, I'm watching for You know, Ted McMillan and where he's lining up in this offense. And if they start to move him around more, that's exciting.

Yeah, he was in the slot a decent amount with preseason. Like we saw it. So that would be a huge boost if they're actually willing to move him around and not just be dumb.

Odds that we are satisfied in any meaningful way by what happens in the running back room for Carolina this week?

Um, no. I think it's, it's more of a—

The odds are no, Jason.

What are they?

The odds are no.

Yeah. They are no.

Okay.

It's, it's looking for rotation.

Like, I guess, I mean, like when we get done with the day, are we like, hey, we know what's going on or not really?

I think the only way you know what's going on is if Jonathan Brooks takes control.

Jonathan breakout.

Yeah. Like that's the only, that would be like, oh, holy crap. Off of, I know he was released by general soreness.

Oh yeah. From duty.

Yeah. Where Chuba's healthy. If they switched it in week 1, that would feel like a big deal.

If it's honorable this time.

Yeah. I really hope it's honorable.

Yes.

Yeah.

Yes. DeAndre Swift is a must-start.

Absolutely.

Great matchup. Carolina 31st in yards before contact allowed. And DeAndre Swift, if he knows anything, it's how to get yards before he gets hit.

It is true.

And we'll keep an eye on Rome Odunze and the injury and whether he's 100%. We hope so. He was limited on Wednesday. I think they expect him out there. But, you know, right now it's Burden, Loveland, Odunze in terms of our priorities. Probably Loveland, Burden, Odunze.

Yeah, that's how I would do it.

Jason, thoughts there?

Loveland, Burden, Odunze for sure. I think you've got to, you know, make sure you see the practices that Rome Odunze is practicing in full. Yeah, I mean, with, with that injury, it's got to be Burden ahead of him. And Loveland is obviously, there's No world where he's not starting because he was, you know, pretty much a 3rd round draft pick.

Okay. We're ping ponging between games that we're excited about and games that are going to be interesting. Cleveland, the Browns have an implied point total of 15.5 this week. 15.5 taking on the Jacksonville Jaguars. I did hit the Duval button. It didn't work. Do it, Mike. All right. Jacksonville, 24 points implied point total. The game is only a 39.5 over-under. Jacksonville minus 8.5 at home.

Yeah. Don't worry about that part for Jacksonville.

Jacksonville, they won their last 8 games last year. Cleveland 31st in points per game. Deshaun Watson is playing quarterback in the NFL this week. So there, that's happening. Didn't he just get like pulled over, arrested again for speeding or something yesterday? I think so.

I didn't see it.

Yeah, I didn't see it.

I think Watson got pulled over or something. Maybe that was just—

Careful on your reporting here.

Cited going 86 miles an hour in a 60.

Someone just saw it.

Pled non-guilty to the citation. This happened 19 hours ago. So.

You can do that?

Yeah. It's Pro Football Talk has it too. Cited for speeding.

I mean, you can, you can get pulled over going 86 in a 60 and you'd be like, No, I didn't.

Not guilty?

Not guilty.

Hmm. Well, I don't think accepting guilt has really been—

Oh, nice. Oh, boss.

You know what he should be saying in court is more along the lines of, I hold myself in contempt. You know what I mean? But he's Watson.

Oh man.

Was that it?

That was it. That was it.

That was the last one.

3rd.

Okay. We made it.

Quinshon Judkins, Breece Hall, Tootin at the running back spot. Both guys probably in your lineup. We'll get to watch Chris Rodriguez and maybe Laquint Allen active and how that distribution goes.

The Tootin and Rodriguez of co-starters.

Yeah. They're co-starters. And if you get down on the 8-yard line and it's C-Rod every time, it's going to be bad.

It's going to feel bad.

It's going to feel real. It's, yeah, it would be bad. I'm excited to watch the rookie wide receivers. I don't know if their quarterback can get them the ball, but Concepcion, Denzel Boston, that'll be exciting.

Oh man.

Harold Fannon, that's exciting.

Casey is going to be so open all the time.

I can't wait for a couple of weeks from now. I still wonder if Deshaun Watson is going to come in here and target Jerry Jeudy the most, which will just be tremendous.

Jerry Jeudy was Very excited that Watson was named the starter.

He was asked back a couple months ago who he wanted to start and he threw up a 4 and that's—

Let me tell you this. We have a segment tomorrow because the Wheel of Shame is returning and Jerry Jeudy has a role in that segment tomorrow.

Oh yeah.

I will tell you that right now because there's nothing more shameful than the Wheel of Shame in week 1 and having Jerry Jeudy in a lineup.

Which side is he going to go?

So he is in a lineup.

I don't know, but I don't know.

I think based on seeing that, I feel like I don't know what his projection is.

I don't either, but I think it goes more.

Is it a disservice to our listenership to not tell you what it is ahead of time?

You're fine. Stay tuned till tomorrow.

The game's not till Sunday. So there you go.

Stay tuned tomorrow's show. Also, I mean, even with that going on, Andy, we're not, we're not putting Jerry Jeudy into our season-long lineups.

That's a thank you, Mike. Thank you for letting me know.

Let's be clear on that.

We get to watch the Brian Thomas Jr., Parker Washington, Jacoby Myers situation.

This one's a huge, huge one for gathering information. So much to learn about the Jags.

And then Brenton Strange, you know, spot start if you need him. If you lost Brock Bowers, I mean, I'd start Brenton Strange over a lot of different lower level tight ends probably.

Yeah, of course.

Some of them.

Chris Johansson's not there. Brenton Strange, I think, is He's an okay dart thrower.

And play T-Law.

Who's a better play, Cade Otton or Brenton Strange? Because I feel like that, I agree with you. Jiwonson is the best of the probable waiver.

The problem for Cade Otton is whenever people have been healthy, he just runs wind sprints. Like he doesn't actually get targets. But having said that, the matchup for, for Cade is so glorious in terms of the defense he's against, you know, of at least where they ranked last year against the position.

For years.

And then his opponent's pace of play, them moving faster, giving Tampa Bay more opportunities. It's, it's a really good spot, but I don't, I feel like I will probably still play Brenton Strange.

We're going to do one more. Buffalo taking on the Houston Texans in Houston. Buffalo minus 1.5 on the road. I feel like that is, that's an interesting one too.

Sure.

Houston's a good team.

Yes.

Over-under 44.5, dominant defense last year, 6th against quarterbacks giving up just 12.2 fantasy points per game. But they didn't play Josh Allen every week, obviously, although the one time they did, they held them in check. They're 9th against running backs, 4th against wide receivers as well. Buffalo was the Super Bowl pick for me yesterday over Detroit, and Jason had Detroit over Buffalo.

Yep.

Yep.

So Josh Allen, 1-4 in his career against Houston. Houston's defense is going to put pressure on him. We'll get to see DJ Moore's debut. You're going to be starting Josh Allen 99.9% of the time. James Cook. Yep. DJ Moore, probably. And then, you know, I found myself, no matter what we said, we said a lot of things about Dalton Kincaid this offseason, which is ironic because him and Kyle Pitts just have this redundancy to the offseason hype train where it's like, we just know how talented they are in the right situation.

Right.

And Dalton Kincaid, I found myself when push came to shove in drafts, I couldn't do it. I couldn't get myself to like, I'm just like, part of me is expecting to have week 1 and Dalton Kincaid is too for 21 and we're back in the same boat and it's, you know, Khalil Shakir is active and he gets a bunch of little targets and then there's somebody else that just, I hope it's not the case. I hope Dalton Kincaid can get utilized in proportion to the gifts he has.

So the reason that I love Dalton Kincaid late in drafts was certainly not a probability play of he's going to be good this year. It was more of a breakout hope that if he actually plays 75% of snaps, I think he would be very good. It was a ceiling case. This game is actually a really, really good— I know it's a bad matchup in general. There won't be a ton of points here scored, but you can attack the Texans a little bit more at the tight end position than at wide receivers. They're going to need Dalton Kincaid. If Dalton Kincaid is 50% of snaps in this game, you, you, you can know right off the bat, it's not— this is not going to work. So that's what I'm watching for more than anything is basically just snap count because he's hyper efficient. in his routes run. Are they involving him in running more of those routes or not? He's healthy. Hopefully he does. I don't mind anybody even if they want to have a safer play and throw in Juwan Johnson while keeping Dalton Kincaid on, on their bench. That's fine.

It is Dalton v. Dalton. So Dalton Schultz on the other side or Dalton Kincaid in this one. You've got the injuries at the wide receiver position. Position for Houston. Dalton. Dalton v. Dalton, Jason. And talk about 2 different Daltons.

I mean, it's the exact inverse.

One drives, one drives like recklessly drives sports cars. The other one's a Ford Taurus, man.

Yeah. But that thing is, but that thing's been running for a while. It will hit 400, dude.

Every 146,000 miles on that bad dog.

Every suggested service handled.

Oh yeah.

We are preventing any problems.

Yeah.

Yeah. I mean, if I'm an underdog, I would play Kincaid. If I'm a heavy favorite, I would play Schultz. And if it's a 50-50 matchup, I'm going to go with Dalton Kincaid.

Dalton Schultz had a 19% target share last year, which is like, that's a lot. For a garbage type of a fantasy tight end, you would 100% take that.

And when you lose Higgins and you lose Christian Kirk from last year, he will be involved.

Oh man, so involved.

He had games of 10 targets.

Here he comes, guys.

11, 9, 8, 9.

The issue is those, you can have 10 targets with Dalton Schultz and have a bad game.

Oh, absolutely.

We'll see what David Montgomery, Woody Marks breakdown looks like. Buffalo's been the run funnel type of defense, allowed the highest yards per carry to running backs last year. Don't keep that, you know, don't just because their defense overall was pretty good against running backs, 23.2 fantasy points per game given up. You could come out of week 1 saying a couple of things. You could say that David Montgomery, we should have seen how good he was going to be. You can come out of it saying, oh my gosh, here's a perfect 50-50 timeshare and Woody Marks looks spicier, right? I mean, Montgomery's been the non-spicy choice in Detroit, but a good player. You know, what is the most likely outcome?

I think the most likely outcome is you're going to see David Montgomery get a ton of work.

This is a Joe Mixon style situation.

A Joe Mixon style thing. If you're the Houston Texans going up against Josh Allen and the Buffalo Bills, you are going to want to control the clock. You are going to want to keep your offense out on the field, play slow, run the ball as much as you can, keep their offense off and let your defense win. And I think that that is David Montgomery is going to have, you know, I would guess 65% utilization.

All right. Nico Collins, play him. We'll see what Ke'Shawn Booty's involvement is as well. That was Fantasy Forecast presented by PrizePicks. Guaranteed picks drop in the app every Monday. PrizePicks, run your game. Tomorrow we will have more matchups. We will have a Thursday Night Football game recap for you. We will have the Fantasy Faceoff for Week 1 and hopefully no more injury news unless it's positive, like recovery type stuff.

Yeah.

Not substation stuff. You know what I mean?

MRI came back. Everything's good.

Yeah.

They're going to play in week 2.

Yeah. It's not going to happen. Probably not going to happen. Latest news on Josh Jacobs, by the way, that I have is that it seems, you know, very likely that we'll have a 2 to 6 game suspension happening. We don't know how long it'll take for the NFL to finish reviewing footage and meeting with him. But I would guess that with the legal situation being wrapped up, they will expedite The Packers will try to expedite.

They will try.

And I mean, I look, if it comes back and there's a 2-game suspension for Josh Jacobs, that is going to be a pretty—

It will be a seismic shift.

It will be that. Thank you. That is the way to put it. A seismic shift in where the Marshawn Lloyd truthers will live and what Jacobs implications will be. Now, you know, 2 games seems unlikely to me, but I don't know what's going on. We did get a report that Achanechinti is likely to play. Or going to play, sorry, in week 1 against the Dolphins.

So awesome.

Nice to get a— what did I say? Some good injury news.

Yeah.

We need it.

So get out of here. Shut it down.

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