Transcript of Week 1 Studs & Duds + Panic Players, Deep Breaths! - Fantasy Football Podcast for 9/8

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Welcome to the fantasy footballers podcast with your hosts, Andy Holloway, Jason Moore, and Mike Wright.

Welcome in. Yeah.

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No way, no how.

Exhale. Monday, September eighth. The fantasy footballers podcast. I'm excited to react to the weekend with each and every one of you. I'm Andy Holloway, joined as always by Mike, the fantasy hitman. Jason Moore is here.

Big breaths, people.

Here we are. Most of week one in the books, we still have a Monday night football game that I am very much looking forward to. Minnesota, Chicago, whatever's left of the Chicago secondary, Justin Jefferson, J. J. Mccarthy. We'll see what Caleb Williams and Ben Johnson, because it looked like the Ben Johnson, the Lack of Ben Johnson might have hurt the lines. But again, this is the weekend of reacting, not overreacting. It's very possible that Green Bay has a top five defense, and they're playing at home in Lambo, and you're definitely going to have some transitional pains, so we'll see where they go. I don't know if Detroit will look like that again.

My Super Bowl pick on whenever it was the last episode or last week or whatever, I felt so amazing about it because my Super Bowl pick was the Green Bay Packers getting to the Super Bowl, and they beat the Detroit Lions, their NFC foe, so handedly, and they were going to lose to the Baltimore Ravens. And I was And they beat the tarnation out of the bills. I was like, Oh, man, this looks... Wait a minute. They lost. That game was awesome.

We had a morning and afternoon where I think there was one game that hit the over.

And it It was the Jets?

And it was Jets Pittsburgh, where Aaron Rodgers... I got a text from my son. My oldest son doesn't play a lot of fantasy. He was in a league this year, doesn't know a lot of the players. And he's like, Dad, you had me draft Bo Nicks, and Aaron Rodgers dominated this weekend.

Yeah. And I was like- Always draft Rodgers.

I was like, Yeah, that Bo Nicks didn't look good. I mean, Monday, Sunday, today, there were a lot of inappropriate Bo Nicks puns coming into the Twitter.

I bet you could not guess it.

No, you I didn't. But it was like, yeah, why didn't you have me draft Aaron Rodgers? And that is a good summary of week one. We had big time wide receivers that struggled. We had a lot of surprises, and we will get into all of it. We have studs and duds on the show today. We have news to catch you up on, including some injury news. We had a calf that held up, Mike. We had a calf that held up.

Yeah, don't worry about it.

Oh, are you victory lapping?

No. What? Oh, no, no, no, No, you do not get to ask me that question after our slack, when the injury came through and all of you were like, We were the only ones who believed he was going to get hurt. No, no, no, no, sir.

When you say all of you, you really mean owl.

I didn't mean it in a sense that it's inappropriate. I meant it in a sense of you'd be tempting fate. Not in a sense that you should celebrate his healthy calf. I just meant if you do it, watch out.

Yes.

But it was nice. In my main character syndrome.

It was nice to have him out there.

Yes, I will prevent that. Somebody is living on the edge right now. Yeah. He just said... But look, I was trying to celebrate you, but I got flamed.

Sorry. I am definitely not victory lapping the health. I will victory lap the- Chr. Mccafry is awesome, and he will be the entire offense. I saw a tweet from Hayden Winks that he was It was the expected points for runningbacks and his expected fantasy points. Chr. Mccafry is 12 ahead of second place. He is just such a stud. Is he going to stay healthy? We'll be watching every single week.

Look, it was great. It was great to see. We're back by popular demand Monday, Sunday. All the responses from the weekend, which, by the way, sometimes you can take the temperature of how a weekend went by the proportion of good I don't mean quality because none of them are quality. But the good-oriented things that were-Successful players, players that hit. The amount of puns that come in on those versus the negative in this week was so, so negative. For the most part, because expectations when they're not met, that's how it goes. But we'll start with the good Monday, Punday. Jason, go ahead.

Well, let's talk about a mecca. Oh, baby.

A mecca bazooka.

I like that a lot, a Mecca Buzuca. We had Josh Alien last night. Josh Alien last night.

And Zay Power.

Yeah. How about Dalton? Can, Kate?

Yes, he can. Jackson Smith, W Jigba. Huge performance.

And your guy Tyler Soren.

Oh, it looked good.

It looked good. Bo Samuel.

And Breast Lightning, of course.

He is back.

Very nice.

To infinity and Keon.

He had a big game.

Justin Fields of Dreams.

Travis ETWin.

Yeah. And Cedric Thrillman.

Unfortunately, Bo Picks.

Yes, we're into the bad. And R. J. Hardly.

He was, oh, Hardly on the field, but he was okay.

And Tua turned the ball over.

Yes.

Oh, AJ Brownpants.

Yeah, we got to bring that back. Kam Skatepoo.

And Ken Mown Walker. Oh, that's good.

Yeah. I a poop checkup?

Dude, where's my Jamard?

That's good. Calvin Diddily Squat.

Oh, don't bury him, but look out for Nico Coffins.

Another one of those tough wide receivers. I rekeal, by the way, one year anniversary of his last 30-yard catch today. Oh, no.

Oh, Lamuson Williams.

Terrible McLaurin. Yes.

Stank Bigsby.

Stank Bigsby.

Wrapping it up. We didn't know if Tank Bigsby got hurt.

Well, that's because he didn't get a carry in the first quarter.

He couldn't find... Well, he got a nice-Co-starter, co-farter.

Am I right?

There was a starter. There was. And he was pretty good.

He looked great. But again, got to be careful when you're playing Carolina, it looks really good against Carolina.

I believe I turned to you guys and said, Whoever starting against Carolina is my start of the week next week.

Yes, you did. Which, that would be James Connor. Yeah, Carolina looked awful.

They looked so bad.

It was-I mean, you're playing Jacksonville. You had so many opportunities to do something in that game.

That was one of the... I mean, many terrible things happened. What was the Under's hit on essentially every game, except for two? Yeah. Bryce Young looking just like that again. That sucked.

Binge him quick and then take back. You know what I mean? Worked last time.

All right. You can follow the show over on Instagram at fantasy footballers. Over on X at the FF Ballers. That's where we put out the thread for the Monday Punday. A reminder, jointhefoot. Com is the community. It's a great time to get over there. You get all the premium in-season tools, including the ultimate dashboard, the lineup optimizer, which you also get access to the expanded Start Sit, a bonus episode of the show, and it's where you want to hang out all season long. Join thefoot. Com. There's an app for all of the tools as well. Let's talk some news.

News and notes from Around the League, presented by Progressive Insurance.

Well, he didn't have a big week. Nobody really did on the lines. I actually read that the 10 catches for 31 yards for Jamir Gibbs is the fewest yards in the history of national football on 10 catches. Wow. You did it. Yeah. So the Lions didn't look good, and neither did Jamison Williams. But before the game, they signed him to a three-year, $83 million extension, which was a bit of a gut punch to the Isaac to Slaw. Oh, my gosh. You didn't lower it. You didn't lower it. Take that. Quinchawn Judkins, signed by the Browns. Signed by the Browns, a fully guaranteed deal. There is a real possibility he plays in week two against the Ravens. I thought Dylan Samson looked good. I thought Jerome Ford looked slower than Dalton Schultz.

Yeah. I mean, Jerome Ford said, Hey, Quin Sean Judkins, I got you. You're going to get a fully guaranteed deal. Watch this. I mean, he was so bad. Dylan Samson, though- He's got juice. I think he will retain the passing down's role. So this might be a backfield between the two rookies, but they need Quinchawn Judkins. They could not run against the incredible run defense of the Cincinnati bangles.

Well, there was a surprise. Also, we found out that Chris Rodriguez was going to be a healthy and active. If you join Mike, which you should do on Sunday Live, there was discussion about this and many different things that were going on right before games began. But Chris Rodriguez, who we thought would have a goal line opportunity, was inactive, healthy and active. Bill Crosky.

Bill Crosky. He once won a staring contest with the Sun.

Okay.

Bill Crosky.

Oh, you got another one, huh? No.

He made his teachers raise their hand to speak. Okay, all right.

He looked good. He looked really good. Injury updates. Xavier worthy dislocated his shoulder right out of the gate. Travis Kelsey-Injured Xavier Worthey with his shoulder right out of the gate. We'll find out more about Worthey's prognosis. Try to play this year. Normally, when you have the dislocation, you need surgery at some point, but you can play with the brace after an amount of time, times. So we'll figure out that. George Kittle. This one is a bummer. I made you take George Brittle out of the Sunday puns.

Yeah, you did.

You can't do it. The man at least had the decency to catch you a touch down.

We've asked players to do this for years. If you're going to get injured, get a touch down first. Is that too much to ask?

It's the decent thing to do.

It's the decent thing to do. Well, he did that. He had four catches, and then he left due to a hamstring injury, did not return. This morning, I was looking it up. He's been on injury reports 19 different times in his career, five times for hamstring injuries. We are hoping- That sounds terrible. Yeah, we're hoping that that means that this will be a brief absence, if any at all. From the four previous or five previous ham string, I guess this would be the sixth, because there were five previous, he had only missed a maximum of one game with a ham string injury.

Now, does this game count as the miss? Because he missed the majority of this game. No, this one is not counted. Darn. I do love that as soon as it happened, and he had already... It sucked because he would have been the tight end one on the week. He was dominating. Yeah, he was on his way. But it was nice that he didn't go back out to re-aggravate it. He knew, and he stayed on the sideline. So hopefully, if he missed his time, it's short. I'm prepping for up to three weeks, but we'll find out more when he gets the MRI.

Well, yeah, the remainder of the game. I mean, you had Juan Jennings, who also got hurt in the game. He's going to get an MRI. So go with George to the MRI machine. Jennings had a shoulder injury. We I don't know how long he'll be out. You ended up with the backup tight in who's never really played.

A name no one.

Tonjus McBasketball. Yes. Tonjus ends up with the game-winning countdown. On an insane catch. It was great. The pass was horrible. It would have been the third pick for Purdy.

It should not have happened. It should not have worked, and yet it did.

I wonder how San Francisco is going to play if they don't have Kittle. I'm curious what it's going to look like because no Kittle, no Jennings.

I think they're rebranding to the Christian McAfree. He touches the ball so much.

Yeah, it's weird because it's not the best offense to just dump it to him all the time, but they got it done. They had the game-winning drive. Evan Ingram left early, calf injury for the Broncos. That sucks. Brock Bauer is left with a knee injury. Tom Pelacero said that he talked to Brock Bauer, and Brock Bauer said he's fine. If you He took a hit on the knee. If you watch the play where it happened, to me, it happened on the long run up the sideline on that 35, 40-yard run when he was wide open. He took a hit to the knee going out of bounds, He says, There's no concerns. We'll monitor that.

It was so scary because when you watched live, it looked like a noncontact. He got injured the play prior. Correct. Then the play where you saw the injury and where he was limping around, he He goes out, runs a route, nothing happens, and then he's limping. It's like, Oh, no.

What I had seen was he wanted to go back in, but medical would not let him go back in.

Drake London left the Falcons game. I think people missed this, at least when it was happening, he left in the fourth quarter, shoulder injury, didn't return. Considered day to day as of now, according to Ian Rappaport, I saw some replays of the injury, not a doctor, but they're talking about AC joint sprain. He basically collapsed on his left shoulder in the end zone, went down really hard on it. We'll see if he will miss any time.

He probably will. It seems like it is going to be an AC sprain. Hopefully, it's not anything majorly serious, but you got to be prepared to be without Drake. London, his usage was great before that.

Yeah, it didn't turn into a great line because he caught eight passes for 55 yards, which is okay. I'll hit it. But 15 targets Well, you're going to see, and if he missed his time, Kyle Pitz ended up with seven catches in this game.

That's right. Seven catches for Kyle Pitz. It didn't happen. Still has a hard time.

Also, get ready for Casey Washington.

Like I said, Kyle Pitz.

Casey Washington.

And then, Pukinaku left briefly with a concussion came back, or a concussion check, sorry.

What looked like a bleeding eyeball.

Yeah. And then, Chris Olave left with a chest injury, but also returned.

Olave and Jalen Waddle both fulfilled their quotas.

Waddle left again, looking in miserable pain, and then came back out there.

I don't know how he can make the joke about how he does this every game as much as we do. And still have it happen. Yeah, and still have it happen.

It's not a joke anymore. It's just we're like, Oh, there it is.

Yeah. He did it again. And man, did they look bad.

Oh, man, they looked so bad.

Olave, though, 13 targets in his previous game with Spencer Rattler had a ton of targets. And according to our data that I'm looking at on our website right now, played 156% of the snaps. So that's great.

Who did?

Olave.

That is 156%.

That is an impressive amount.

Our data team is doing good work in week one.

Making a Boo Boo.

He played 100% of the snaps for the Saints and 56% of the Cardinal snaps.

I wish we could use them.

That was news and notes sponsored by Progressive Insurance. Quote today at progressive. Com. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company affiliates and third-party insurers. Not available in all states or situations, coverage subject to policy terms, limits, and conditions. I'm going to hit the button, take a break, and we'll come back with Suds & Duds. Before the break, Mike was, I could hear him laughing a little bit because Jason could not be more miserable with the Cardinal's victory.

They suck so much.

I am in complete agreement. That was There were a lot of- That team was embarrassing.

In their defense, there were a lot of good teams that looked bad in week one.

That's fair, and hopefully, genuinely- Like the Broncos.

The Broncos were horrible.

Yeah, they looked. They were equal to the Cardinals. They looked like the Cardinals. It was the same situation where you go in excited for a team. I haven't been excited for the Cardinals in, I don't know, half a decade. And this year, I was actually thinking, Hey, I think they could be a playoff team. They could win this division. And you get a Spencer, Rattler, version of the Saints that you should just go in and smoke. Nine seconds left, you basically were on the goal line. They were about to go to overtime, and you couldn't do anything against them. My only hope, I know a lot of reports were coming out about Kyler being sick, being ill.

Is that why he dressed that way?

That might have been what caused it. Maybe the mirror check was like… But that's my hope. He did scramble a lot more, Kyler did, and did nothing with it, which is rare. Usually when Kyler runs, it's a successful play.

He made bad decisions on when to scramble.

I'm just so hopeful that he was horribly ill. Horably ill.

Jason was horribly ill watching him. There you go. It was a weird week for several quarterbacks. We'll get into all of it right now, but we'll start with the positives.

This week's fantasy Stud Muffins, presented by Loz.

All right, we are into the studs. Top five quarterback scores on the week. In four-point passing, it was Josh Allen.

Goodness, man.

By a lot. My goodness. And then it was Justin Fields and Daniel Jones. Yeah.

Hey, Justin Fields. The Daniel Jones one is pretty shocking, but the Justin Fields one is not surprising to me at all.

It should be. But it's- But it's not. Well, I mean, he has been statistically one of the worst passers when he's gotten opportunities. I will say from watching the football game, he was outstanding on every level. He had so much zip on the passes. Hyper accurate, making plays, constantly getting outside the pocket and battling through a collapsing pocket. He played outstanding. Mike, you deserve a ton of credit for believing in him, and we'll see what continues. They ended up losing the game, which, by the way, Pittsburgh was... We have the survivor pool we're doing. Pittsburgh was two of my three entries. Uh-oh. Didn't realize how close that was on that one.

For Justin Fields, because he's Justin Fields, and we've seen it, next week, he could come out, and he could fall on his face. That absolutely could happen. My hope for Justin Fields is he's on a team that wants him. Like, Pittsburgh, Justin Fields started okay last year. He was four and two.

I think Chicago really wanted him.

But Chicago, they had garbage around him.

That was also the early career, rookie, second-year type of player.

I would hold out hope that this might be a year for fields to just be a top five guy.

Lamar Jackson was number 4, Justin Herbert, number 5.

So yeah, one week- The Herbert one is one that is like, man, if that pass rate sticks, then he will be... It's never been It's been a question of, Can Justin Herbert do it? It's been, they just restrain him all the time.

And not they did not. And not they just the pass rate, but the rushing. We saw this is what I wanted last year with Jero because he has always used his quarterbacks in the running game. He is way more athletic than you think. He had designed runs, and he had quick scrambles. I loved it.

Yeah, 318 passing errors, three passing touch downs. You got to remember, there's conflicting forces in Los Angeles. There is Harbaugh's loving to run the football mixed with Harbaugh's unadulterated man love for Justin Herbert, and he believes in Herbert. Last year, in the second half of the season, they made the switch, and they continued it. It's not like It wasn't a great week for Omari and Hampton. Obviously, Najee was basically not involved. The usage was great. We also knew that this was the number one rushing defense in football. Very difficult match. Let's all just see what a few weeks looks like. But moving on. Daniel Jones 22 for 29 against the hapless Dolphins, seven for 26 on the ground with two rushing touch downs. He looked really good.

He did.

Now, he'll play Denver, then Tennessee, and Los Angeles. This was a really impressive performance by the Colts all the way around. There are a lot of weapons, and Tyler Warren adding him to that offense. Tyler Warren is a dog. That connection was awesome all game long. But Michael Pitman?

Yeah. Okay. Dude, I need to drop back on my board.

Come on. You need some help over there?

This is so good. We built this city.

I mean, let's not get over the skis, but- That's what I was going to say.

Hey. Hey. Some credit really, really needs to go to the Miami Dolphins. Yes. A lot of credit. Next week, they've got the Patriots, and I think it is the perfect matchup to find out-How bad they are? Who was true. You know what I mean?

Who Who has the Patriots?

The Dolphins and the Patriots play each other. So, Drake May, who had some plays that looked amazing and some plays that were just outrageously bad. This will be a perfect test next week to be like, if he comes out and does a Daniel Jones a person nation in week one, it is great. I think we can just chalk up the Dolphins to being one of the worst secondaries in the league.

Patrick Mahomes had 258 yards in a shutdown, one rushing, touched down, ran a ton. He is owned one, and everyone else in the division, Raiders, Broncos, Chargers, all want to know in the AFC West week one in the books. Aaron Rodgers, four passing touch downs, and looked amazing. According to my son, should have been the number one pick in fantasy.

That game was so weird. Look, you had the mirror match, the flipped quarterbacks. You had the offenses, which are both you before week one. You're like, They'll be okay-ish. Their defenses are going to be the strong part of the team. They went into the upside down.

That was a really surprising turn of events. But it was really fun. The ancillary pieces, it looked like it was like D. K. Metcalf and no one, and you got Garrett Wilson and no one. Then other people got involved, especially on the Pittsburgh side.

Especially Kenneth Gainewell.

What? Arthur is the worst.

He is the worst. No, the history of The history of Arthur is he's right.

We'll see. Is that just a John Smith bit?

Correct. Yeah, but he's also... It's John Smith in lieu of Kyle Pitz, but we know that that was the right call.

That one, they That one is so interesting.

But he had the most snaps. That was one of the only over-unders. Yes.

Well, they were all over-unders, but that That was one of the few overs.

Thank you. Jalen Hertz. Jalen Hertz had a couple of rushing touch downs, didn't pass for a lot of yards, hurt us with AJ Brown. Michael Penix. A lot of these sophomores, it was up and down to me. Unfortunately, Jason is responsible for Bo Nicks because Bo Nicks was looking outstanding. And then Jason says, Wow, he's still good outside the pocket. And then he made some of the worst throws you've ever seen.

I said it right before the first pick because he comes out in this game and he's looking on fire, drilling perfect bread basket throws on a rope. And then he just was awful. As soon as I said that, the rest of the game. Yeah, you're right. Michael Pennix, Bo Nicks, Drake May. We'll see Caleb tonight, but they all showed flashes of good and flashes of just real bad.

Baker led a game-winning drive, although that game should have gone to overtime. We wanted more of that game, but Youngway Coo could not-Yeah, couldn't tie it up.

They'll tie it up. I will. Week one, Abuka was awesome, but Baker was 17 for 32, 167. He had the three passing touch downs. This It was against the Falcons defense, so I'm going to be a little skeptical for the Bucks until we get a couple of games under our belt.

Running backs, top five scores of the week, Derrick Henry.

Oh, my goodness.

Still good.

I hate you.

It was... Jason and I, we brought it up. We were matched up in the League of Records. That one felt like it was over on Thursday after Dak and A. J. Brown laid an egg for him. Then all of Sunday, we were also matched up in our dynasty League, our main one. It looked easily like Jason would win. I have the Burrow chase stack, which fell completely flat.

It's very rare when Jason says, I won.

Oh, yeah. I don't like to jinks myself in that situation.

I think I was down at the 1%.

But it all worked out for me. My three runningbacks from yesteryear that were supposed to be great were great in Béjan and Bries and Travis ETN. So I was like, Yeah, all right. We split one-on-one.

Unfortunately, you did not have the King, the King Henry here. Derrick Henry, if you missed it, you should go back and watch all the highlights from the game. The insanity community. I really needed Derek Henry, so I was glued. The third quarter of Derek Henry barely touching the ball and then moving to Justice Hill a lot, just in that particular quarter, it seemed very odd to me. It was a really strange decision by the Ravens when Derek Henry is just doing whatever he wants, and they're like, We'll do something else.

It was literally like an adult playing with children. That's what it felt like. At that point in the game, I think he only had 13 or 14 carries. It wasn't like, We got to give him a break or rest. He couldn't have a lot of carries because he kept housing them. He kept ending drives with the 30 plus yard countdown.

Oh, man. He's the best.

Béjan was number two. He got it done in the past week.

Yeah, we're lucky he had that huge reception.

Givante was number three. Yes, Givante Williams with the two touch downs. James Cook at four, and Christian McCaffery at number 5 on the week.

With no touch downs.

Yeah. 32 opportunities, 10 targets. He was everything. You watched the Niners game, and I know that, look, they had a ton of injuries, right? There's no Iuk that got rid of Debo. There's no Kittle for most of the game. Juan Jennings goes down, so it's like, What do we do? And their answer was just... It was basically like, I would say three-fourths of every play was in the hands of Christian McCaffrey.

32 opportunities. Just stay strong.

Stay strong.

We had Travis Etienne, 16 for 143 against Carolina. Three targets, 61% of snaps. Bigsby saw 21%, Tootin, 6%. Second-highest rushing total of his entire career.

I will remind us that what we said before the week, you got to remember what you thought before the week. We said, Don't worry about production. Someone's to have a monster game here. Worry about the snap counts and the breakdown of... That's it. I'm not going to sit here and say Travis ETN is going to be great rest of season. 143 yards against Carolina. It seems easier.

There was a lot of inept tackling by Carolina.

Sixty-one % of snaps to Bigsby's 21 to Tootin's 6 %. And their other running back, I want to say LaQuint-Allen. I don't remember his name off the top in my head. He was actually more involved early on than some of the others. But it was clear that Travis ETN was their primary starting running back.

And if you drafted him and you're like, he's on your bench, I think you should feel confident next week against the Cincinnati bangles.

On the other side of the ball- Hey, hey, hey.

No, our Footclan HQ, our ultimate dashboard. I was looking at my teams on there and said, Hey, I think you set your I'm in my lineup wrong. You should have Travis ETN over Adam Thielen. And I was like, Okay. And I made that switch. So he's in my starting lineup, Mike.

Okay. And you built that product.

I did. I was part of it.

Don't victory lap that, too. That's true. Adam Thielen has not played.

Oh, okay. Fair. That's right.

Oh, my gosh. It would be so great if he had three touch downs. In the other side of that game, you look at the snap counts here. Even in a super negative game script, Chuba Hubbard, 67% of the snaps 16 for 57, also had a receiving breakdown. That's a good sign for those that believed in Chuba Hubbard. We were definitely believers. But in a negative game script, you didn't see him come off the field in a bunch of Rico Dautil or something. Saquon, 18 for 60 in a touch down, five targets. Brees Hall, let's talk about him. We had a show two, three weeks ago, and it was like, what's one player that would be most likely to flip the script the narrative in the offseason. We brought up Brees Hall because we had been there before. We've been here where the offseason, no one wants to believe in Brees Hall, and then Braille and Allen gets all the offseason hype. And it was the same situation- Back there with Michael Carter. This was a really impressive performance, 19 for 107 on the ground. He didn't get a bunch of pass catching. He only had two receptions, but they went for 38 yards.

Well, he did get four targets, but that was 100% of the running back target. I was happy with that. It was an eyeball test. He looked really fast, where for some reason, he just didn't look that way last year at all. He was one of the most telling players this week for me where you want to talk about a changed opinion because I don't want to… You don't want to underreact from week one either. We talk about don't overreact, but that was one where it was like, Oh, okay, he looks like he is playing for a contract. He Yeah. He's auditioning for his free agency.

It looked very sleek and fast.

Devon, 8chan7 for… This one, look, seven carries. Three catches. Now, he scored. But I wonder your reaction to that, because you look at 10 total touches for Devon Achan. Ollie Gordon only saw three. They were throwing the whole game. But this could be a little bit of the Miami Dolphins season. It could go downhill quick.

Tua was so unbelievably bad. You talk about how much they threw the ball, and Devon Achan had four targets. Devon Achan is usually in games with Tua He's on a 100 target pace. It was so weird to me that they weren't involving him in the passing him. I don't expect that to stick. I don't understand what happened with the Dolphins. They were so bad, I couldn't really make sense of J.

K. Dobbins was the start of the week. He ends up getting into the end zone, 16 for 63. The split in the first half, it looked really 50-50.

Are you talking about 50-50 with Badey?

Well, Badey was out there a bunch.

Sean Bateon, though.

But in the second half, when it got under the line, I think that's when you need to pay attention, there was a lot of Dobbins. In the second half, when it was the final drives to put the game away. 16 for 63, rushing, breakdown. Harvey was very good. He had a 50-yard run.

Harvey looked like he has juice, and he will definitely get more involved as the season goes along. I think it won't take long before he overtakes Bade. And Badeh was more of the passing game. This is what was interesting to me. It was looking to see who's got the passing game role. Does J. K. Dobbins have that? And he didn't really have that role. That was Bade. So R. J. Harvey, looking as good as as he did, I could see him sneaking in, keeping J. K. Dobbins in the role he clearly has right now, and then having R. J. Harvey just overtake Tyler Badeh.

J. C. C. Crosky-merritt. Ten for 82 and a touch He looks so good. You know, Echler, solid veteran nap counts were in his favor, but the juice was Bill.

Yeah, Echler had a good game. He's got the same role he had last year, which was a role where he was very often in the top 24 weekly runningbacks. This looks like it is Bill Crosky is going to be the One of the one, two punch here throughout the season.

Top five wide receiver scores on the week. Zee flowers was number one, Quentin Johnson, number two, Emeka Agbuka, number three, Keon Coleman, number four, and Debo Samuel. One of the reasons not to victory lap a season on Deebo, we said a couple of things. One, I thought he'd start strong. Veterans start stronger at the top of the year. But two, it's the offense. Everything about Washington fits the pursuit of Deebo Samuel because they do so many short area targets, screens, end-arounds, misdirection, close to the line of scrimage. It's really nice for Jaden Daniels to have somebody somebody capable of doing that. But their offense looked pretty good. They didn't get it going until... I mean, it was 14 to 6 for a long time. But Keion Coleman, really nice to see the target count there. I think he was at 12, had the deflection One, he had a second, two, three, four, five, six, seven, seven, that wasn't intended for him, but also had a couple of intentional targets in the end zone that didn't work out. He had one where he... I think he had two two-point conversions that were targeted him. One, he ran out of the back of the end zone.

The other one, he ended up... The ball wasn't really placed in the right a lot.

If you look at his last several healthy games, his target share percentage is really good. They talked a lot about what a great camp he had, what a good offseason he had. This is what you hope. You hope that there's a guy that can come in here and start demanding a 25% market share for Josh Allen. Now, it won't always be the bill down by 15. That's going to be more rare than when you play the Ravens. But it does look like there's potential chance for him to emerge as a clear number one wide receiver option.

What do you make of the huge performance? Two touch downs, five for 79. This was not one weird broken play. This was a good performance.

Yeah, He was clearly ahead on the depth chart. Trey Harris was the second-round pick, so it was, Could he take over? And then you had the weird offseason where Lambert Smith was the one making some noise in training camp, all in all along. It's Keenan, it's Lad, and it's Johnston as the three primary starters. So if you buy into the pass rate and what Justin Herbert did in week one, then I think you should buy into Johnston. He's not going to do this every single week, but he was out there running a ton of routes, and it really was divvied up. You're talking the targets were divvied up between the three guys.

Here's a tweet from our Kyle Borgenioni. Okay. 22 plus fantasy games in full PPR since the beginning of last season, since the beginning of '24. You have Justin Jefferson, CeeDee Lamb, Nico Collins, Tyree Kill, T. Higgins with three of them. Nice. You have Drake Lunden, D. K. Metcalf, Jalen Waddle, George Piggins with two of them. And then you have Cuge with four of them, more than any of those players the most in fantasy football.

Explosive.

He's the player they're going to look to around the red period. It's not going to be... That's where he thrived last year at times. So I think if he keeps catching the football, that'll be good. Emeka Abuka. It was a weird game because two big touch down. Jason, you said you felt a little disappointed in Abuka just from a target standpoint.

Yeah. I mean, genuinely, the way that they were playing, the Bucaneers, when they were down, needing to throw the ball at times. And he wasn't a hyper targeted guy the way that Chris Godwin was hyper targeted last year before the injury. Look, I'm not going to be disappointed on a two-touchdown first NFL game. Awesome, right? Mecca, Booyah. But I was- Booyah, grandma. A little bit disappointed in the utilization throughout.

Well, you did have Mike. You brought up Baker's performance. It was saved by touch downs. Mike Evans was not good. Right. We'll see. I'm pretty excited.

It's It's good that they're one of the teams like the Lions. Packers, it tops your defense, but that's the Lyns' first game without Ben Johnson. This is the Bucks. It's been Baker's MO to just keep getting new offensive coordinators, but Liam Cohen leaving will be something to be paid attention to.

Keion Coleman was 8 for 1-12 in a shutdown on 11 targets. He ran 94% of the team's routes. That's a good sign for those of us that believe Keion could break out and be their true number one. He looks like that guy to me. Debo, we talked about it, 7 for 77, had the rushing shutdown. He also had 40 snaps in the slot. That was double his previous career high in 2022.

Wonderful.

Very cool. Garret Wilson, nine targets, seven for 95 in a countdown. Should have had two touch downs.

Yeah. Should have had two.

Yeah, he did. Don't know how he got tacked, honestly.

I think he slipped. I need to watch it again.

No, I I remember it really well. The defender came in. We thought he might have even facemasked him, and it wasn't. It was just an awesome tackle around the shoulders, but it still felt like, just have a little bit of momentum and you should get in. It was weird.

What do you guys make of that, if Gare, 100% of the routes?

Well, that better be the case.

Well, even elite wide receiver don't run every single route.

There was never a question of whether he was going to be on the field, getting the most targets, getting A ton of targets. The only question was, how catchable are these targets? How good are the targets? Yesterday- He caught seven of nine. No. I mean, that's because they were all catchable. Justin Fields was on fire. He was doing everything he wanted to do and had a great game. We have seen a handful of really amazing-looking Justin Field games in the past, so he needs to put it back to back. It's a great positive outlook for him. I'm more bullish on the the potential that, Hey, Gary Wilson can do enough with Justin Fields. I would be fine taking the shot, if you want to call it, and try to trade for him now before he puts it together over and over and over. That's okay. But I would probably personally wait another week. The problem is, if you wait another week, you're not going to get them.

All right. We had Keenan Allen, 10 targets. We had Marvin Harrison with a breakdown.

Five for 71 is not... I mean, for Marv, that's great.

Five catches on six targets. I mean, the catch rate last year, they were not in sync.

Not enough. Not enough targets. I agree with that. I'm still worried about it. Still not sure Marv is better than really good.

Yeah, fair.

Courtland-sutton, nine targets, six for 61. So any other wide receiver? I mean, JSN was amazing.

Oh, JSN was unbelievable. He also played outside the Most he's ever played in his career. He had a 53% target share, not of wide receiver of the team. That is an outlandish number. If you get on a course of a season, a 30% target share, if you finish the season at 30%, you're borderline guaranteed to be a top 12 wide receiver. That's just a super high number. He's starting the season with 53 % of the targets. And the thing is, the bull case for him going into the season was, look, he was that dude last year. Now, you take away D. K. Metcalf and you take away Tyler Locket. Obviously, they drafted rookies and brought in Cooper Cupp, but those are downgrades. And so Jackson, Smith, and Jigba looked great. I'm fully in on J. S.

He's got Pittsburgh next week. We'll see if their defense is just falling apart, and then Saints, and then Arizona. So it's a pretty decent run. So speaking of targets here, can I interest you in 42% of Patrick Mahomes' targets? Because that's what Hollywood Brown received, and it was 16 targets. We're probably not getting there, but with worthy out, Rice out, he is going to be a hot topic of discussion for the way from there.

You know who I was super disappointed in in week one from the Chiefs was Travis Kelsey. I know he got the countdown, so everyone's going to be fine. Fantasy-wise, he didn't bust. But it was like they needed him before the injuries without Rice, and it wasn't that guy.

Four targets, two for 47 with the score.

Then Xavier worthy goes out. How many targets? For Hollywood? No, for- For Kelsey? For Kelsey. Four. Yeah, four targets when you had all the injuries to everyone else? I don't know, man. There's a couple of these elder statement vets where you go, I don't know, Mark Andrews. The Baltimore Ravens just scored 40 points. Put it on them. Mark Andrews had one target, 100% catch rate. It was just like, I don't know.

We had top 10 tight-in or top 5 tight-in, Brock Bowers, Dalton Kincaid, Travis, Kelsey, Juan, Johnson, Tyler, Warren, all really close in points, somewhere between 12. 8 and 11. 4. Nice debut for Warren. You talked about the Kelsey shutdown, Kincaid with the long shutdown. Brock Bauer is hopefully healthy. Outside of that, Harold Fanon was a story because Harold Fanon ended up with nine targets for the Browns, which is a real problem for David Najoku, who was a common theme in the Dudes notation there.

If you don't know who Harold Fannen is, he's a rookie tight-end who fell a little bit in the draft. No one knew where he was going to go because he played for a small school. And then he tested bad. And he didn't do well at the combine. But his production in college is pretty much the best production of all time. The fact that week one as a rookie, he comes out and is this involved, 67% of the routes, a 21% target share, which I don't know for a fact, Kyle, please double-check me on this, but I think he led the team in target share. That's an incredible... That is really bad for Najoku. I've gotten Najoku in a lot of league, and obviously, it's wonderful to say, Oh, look how many passes went to the tight end from Flacko. That process worked. But if you're splitting them between two guys, you're going to need a lot more passes.

Yeah, Judy had eight targets. It might have been fan, and they're up at the top. Then it may be one week wonder, but I'm going to highlight Jowan Johnson, who had 11 targets against Arizona. The Saints for how close the game was, they do project to be a team that will be losing. And he ran around on 96% of their dropbacks. He was fully utilized as a pass catching weapon, hot off of his contract.

You do have a couple of years, Kelen Moore with Dallas Goddard was over a 20% market share. So there's a little bit of signal there to say that Juan Johnson could be the number two pass catcher for that team.

Okay, we are going to take another break here and jump into some of the...

Uh-oh.

Maybe we'll see if there's any panic in the streets. We'll find out. All All right, let's do it.

Pooped in his big boy pants.

I'm very frustrated. The Joe Burrow performance. Well, look, they had seven yards in the second half of the game, and they won.

Seven. They got dominated by the Cleveland Browns. Truly dominated.

The defensive line for Cleveland. The defense in general, I mean, Newsom against Chase.

I mean, it was just-The offense as well.

Burrow had 113 yards.

Yeah, Burrow had 113 yards. The Browns looked really good. They looked like a good team. They should have won that game. They should have won the team. So easy. It wasn't like their defense was so good and they were let down by their offense. Their offense was very good. The issue in why they lost was because Joe Flacko had two perfect passes, one to Jerry Judy that was popped up and then turned into an interception. Then another really nice one to Cedric Tillman that was hit him in the hands and popped up and turned into an interception.

Also missed extra point and missed field goal, I believe. Then you lose by a point.

Crazy. Yeah, they should have won the game. The Browns definitely look like a better team. I think the Browns had 2x3 yardage, too.

No, more than that. They were at like 3: 40 something. I think Joe Burrow in the-That's a tough loss. In the 1: 40.

The bangles in week one.

That's why it He almost upset, which at least...

It's impossible.

All right. Bo Nicks, 25 for 40, two picks. Barf. Bo picks.

Those did not hit his wide receiver in the hand.

They hit the opposing team. And the other thing was that he had 78% of his attempts under 10 yards. I think his average depth of target was 4. 3 yards. He couldn't get the ball down the field. It was an asset in the beginning of the game. You're like, Oh, cool. He can throw moving. Then it was like, Oh, my gosh, please stop moving when you throw.

I think he was really sniffing those farts.

I'm Patrick Mahomes.

Check out this cool throw I'm going to do.

They're very lucky to have won the game. If they weren't facing Cam Ward in his rookie first appearance, they could have easily lost that game. Agreed. Trevor Lawrence. Really disappointing. This is the same Trevor Lawrence. It was Carolina, and he had 178 and one.

This game did have a super long lightning delay, just like the So I mean, lightning delays are now 2: 00 against NFL offenses.

Yeah, team, you guys are really-Thank goodness they didn't have a retractable roof.

You guys are really hammering the weather.

I didn't. Just there's a solution. I didn't. I just said the game got shut down, and then the offense is Trevor Lawrence.

Just play him underground, man. Trevor Lawrence. Where you like it, mole man.

Yeah, that'd be great. As long as there's enough depth.

Yeah, for sure. If you've got enough height on the ceiling underground.

You're simulated on a computer, why They didn't.

You're not listening.

They didn't play.

No, they did.

They came back and played because they were just impatient.

But T-Law is the most similar quarterback to me as Kyler Murray, where he's not that dude. He's good enough.

He feels like it more and more every week.

You're going to- But you did pay him like the dude, and you're stuck with him.

Yeah, and you're stuck with him. If either one, Kyler Murray or Trevor Lawrence, hit the open market, half the league would go and pay him the highest. They're not bad as a quarterback.

Jay Cutler was highly in demand.

They're not terrible quarterbacks. They really aren't. They are above average quarterbacks, but they're not great, and they will never be great. Send in the cars. Yeah, sure. Exactly. I don't know, man. I think their car was better.

Dak had a tough week. One, two was disgusting. And C. J. Stroud, I thought he made a lot of good throws, but then you look at the stat line.

They got embarrassed.

Yeah, they got beat, so they couldn't get it done.

That offensive line is going to be a big problem.

That offensive line, and I think they lost an alignment during the game. Another one was banged up during the game. They don't have depth, and they don't have talent. So the Texans are real. Their defense is awesome, but their offense could be a real issue this season.

Kenneth Walker. We need to have the conversation. Ten carries, 20 yards.

That's not the problem.

40% of snaps.

That's the problem.

Yeah. And... Yuck.

Yeah, it was a full-on time share. I think he had one more touch or one more opportunity than Charbonne. Charbes had looked much better in the production. This is not a Defcon 1, but we're probably at about three in terms of this. They're just going to split, and maybe Charbes is just a better fit for the offense. It was extremely disappointing.

There is the outside chance, and I do think it's an outside chance that this was managing the injury Kenneth Walker has been dealing with. But even if that was the case, even if this was like, We're going to limit Kenneth Walker in this game, Because in this early offseason, he was dealing with stuff. Charbonnay looked awesome. He did.

Number one in success rate in week one.

Charbonnay was great. I mean, he was better for this system. This is a new system, keep in mind, with Kubs, with a fullback. And Charbonnay was fantastic. Charbes has never had... He's basically averaged a 24% market share in games that he's played with Kenneth Walker. He's only been a backup. And in this game, he was 48% of the snaps. So this is projecting to be a complete split, and Charbes looked to fit the system better in week one.

There's not really something to be gained by Seattle banking too much on Ken Walker if Sharbes is productive, And Walker has been hurt so much that if you bank on him and he goes out, then you're hurt. But if you have a committee and he goes out, you're fine. Yeah. All right. We had David Montgomery, 11 for 25 on the ground, only 37% of snaps. He averaged 42 last year. The game script was definitely more Jameer Gibbs-oriented. So pay attention to it. We expected a little bit more Gibbs this year. If it goes from 42% to 37%, that won't surprise me. It It also won't surprise me if this is more of their game script this year than it was last year. They were ahead of so many games last year, and we'll see. It's one week, but something to pay attention to.

But the success of David Montgomery is the lines offense has to run extremely hot, and they could bounce back after one week. But that's the thing, is the offense overall has to be nuclear for David Montgomery to be startable.

My opinion is that this was not a problem with the Lions, that this was not a problem with the offensive coordinator, that this was the Green Bay packers. If I was in a court of law, if I would bring you a piece of evidence, it would be that Jamir Gibbs had 10 targets. He had 10 receptions. Jamir Gibbs, the fastest, most dangerous guy to have the ball in his hands, he had 31 yards. That defense was swarming and tackling and beating up the Lions. I saw it over and over where I was like, Dude, you get Gibbs a little throw out to the flat, and you're just waiting for him to just break it off. And then 12 packers were there, even though they're playing 11.

Next week is against Chicago at home.

That's a great matchup for them running.

Zade, you feel like as of right now, we're very early, but you'd be like, I'll put Montgomery back in my flex next week. 100%.

Personally.

Yeah, it might be a decision based on some of the other guys that you have.

Right. I mean, I'm not starting him over everybody, but I think he is... Next week is an absolute flex play.

I play Dobbins over Monte.

What's the matchup?

I don't know. I think he's saying it doesn't matter.

I mean, it's Indianapolis.

Oh, sure. Okay.

Chabian Henderson, five for 27 on the ground, six targets, six for 24 through the air, 35% of snaps. Ramondre, seven for 15, 65% of snaps. You'll see more Henderson sooner than later, but just wait.

Yeah, but it's It's inevitable. It will happen, but how long will the Cromujians hold out?

He is just playing a little bit smaller. When he's going to be fourth downs, maybe some goal line, I don't think you're going to see... I think you're going to see a lot of Ramondre in those situations, unfortunately, But the targets, you're looking for the high value opportunities and touches, and hopefully, Travian Miami next week. That went pretty well for the Colts.

Listed, these are the way, but it's like, Trevian Henderson is listed at 5, 10, 202. Jameer Gibbs is 5'9, 202. They are almost sized, identical. Gibbs.

Yeah, Gibbs and Handle. Yeah, but watching him, he's not. No, he was just bouncing around.

Guys are different in different uniforms.

He was bouncing He's not getting around, though. When he was getting hit, he was getting hit hard. I'm not saying anything like, We want him to catch the football and get in this space. I don't think he's ever going to be... Well, we'll see. We'll see what happens. Marian Hampton, 15 for 48 against Kansas City's running interior.

Not worried. No, I'm not worried either.

Caleb Johnson didn't play.

He had one play, negative two yards, although I give him a positive 13 because he drew a flag.

You know what I mean?

Fifteen yards. I got to do it. No, I mean, Caleb Johnson is-Sold out to help the team. Thank you. Caleb Johnson is third on the depth chart, and until he overtakes Kenneth Gainewell-Impossible. But Kenneth Gainewell wasn't good in his own right. So I do think... You think Kenneth Gainewell was good?

I thought he looked fast, and they won the game, so I don't know.

I'd have to go back and watch.

It's hard to compare to the numbers of Caleb.

I don't think Gainewell was... I mean, one carry from Caleb, but I think Gainewell did not reach three yards of carry.

The production was-How many carries did he even get? He was seven for 19, so that was 2. 7, and he caught the ball three times for four yards. Production was due to... This is what I'm saying. What is Arthur doing? It's so bizarre to give Jalen Warren that extension right before opening weekend. And you're like, Hey, this guy we picked up, that's going to be the guy.

There's a lot more to the running backs in Pittsburgh. When you have Aaron Rodgers, it's about picking up the blitz, picking up pass protection, chipping guys. It's the ones that he feels like has experience. There were numerous beat writers in Pittsburgh that said that that was the point of emphasis for Caleb Johnson to work on in this offseason was that there were struggles at times this offseason. It's his focus. Caleb came out and said it. If he earns the trust in those situations, even when he's not touching the football, he will get on the field more because Gainewell's made to be a backup.

Yeah, history has shown that rookies often take time. Look at this list we're talking about. Trevian Henderson, Amarian Hampton, Caleb Johnson, Kam Skatebu. They're all in the duds. This is week one. I don't pull a red alarm on rookies getting off to a slow start.

Kam Skatebu was 2 for negative 3. They could not run the football. Tyron Chasey was not good, and Washington just shut it all down. Russ.

Russ sucks.

It'll be Jackson dart very soon.

It needs to be this week. It might be. I think it's going to happen this week.

It might legitimately be Jackson Dart.

Did Russ get 100 passing yards? I don't think he achieved 100 passing yards. You can't have an offense with Russell Wilson in 2025.

He did. He threw the ball 37 times, and he ended up with 168 yards. Four and a half yards in attempt. Get him out of here.

What is Derek Henry's Baltimore career rushing yards per attempt?

How does Russ keep getting these jobs?

How does that happen? Seattle. It's a resume thing. Sometimes you hire someone. Sometimes people come and they show you the resume and you go, Whoa, you work for that company?

Yeah, that does happen.

And you go, okay.

All right, wide receiver Duds. Let's say some big names. Aj Brown, Jamar Chase, Ammon Ross, St. Brown, Brian Thomas Jr. Had one catch.

He had a lot of targets.

One catch. Nico Collins, three for 25. Terry McLaurin, two for 27. Mike Evans, five for 51. George Pickens, three for 30. A lot of players with a lot of expectations. Patience, but it's one week, and wide receivers are all going to have some down weeks. It was super disappointing. I have a team with the Jamar Chase and Burrow Stack. They didn't win. They didn't even come close.

That's a stack you still want.

I got 15 points between them. That was bad. But Tee Higgins also didn't get it done. Devante Smith didn't get it done. So you had tandems. It wasn't like one guy did well.

Who are you concerned with?

I'm concerned with Tyree Keel.

Yes, that was the name that I'm probably most concerned with.

I'm a little bit concerned with Brian Thomas because I don't... Travis Hunter, the news came out before, full-time offensive player. He was a full-time offensive player. He out targeted Brian Thomas Jr. So yes, I'm a little bit... This is one of the reasons Brian Thomas's stats didn't bear out as high in my rankings as other people is I was just a little bit worried about the Lawrence with actual other weapons. They didn't really have anybody else at the end of the year, and all of his success came with Mac Jones, like his major world beating success. So I was a little bit concerned that Thomas might be good, not great. So I'm a little worried there. I'm a little worried about Terry McLaurin because Debo, the way the offense functions, if you don't hit the big play, I don't think you're going to be happy.

If you look at recent history of wide receivers who have held out of training camp waiting for that new contract, and then they come in, and then Brandon Ayouk did it, and he just sucked. He came back and wasn't good until he got injured. So that one's concerning. I'm not overly concerned on this guy, but me.

Okay. Do you need to whisper it?

Just little Nico Collins worry because of the overall offense. Just that offensive line was so bad. And to be honest, C. J. Stroud did not deal with pressure well. He kept running backwards and trying to... He had opportunity after opportunity to step up in the pocket when the offensive line was going around him. Instead, he'd try to do the old-school Russell Wilson turn and run away, but he's not that type of an athlete, and so he just gets this deep sack. Hopefully, he corrects that, but that offensive line was real bad.

We talked about Mark Andrews. He was awful. One target, one catch. Seems like good night.

Pick up, Isiah Likely.

Yeah, maybe.

We have Tucker Kraft, four targets. He got a touch down. That's not a dud.

Jordan Love threw the ball 22 times, and Kraft had four targets. Look, that is something to be aware of.

If the packers defense is what we saw on Sunday, you're going to get a lot of Josh Jacobs. I thought Jordan Love looked really good. He can make plays when you need to make them, but he might not have to make as many because you're going to have games. It's like the better get in the first half situation of Philadelphia. It could be the situation Josh Jacobs looked good to me, even against a tougher run defense.

It took him a while.

Matthew Golden, only two targets because of that same thing, two of the 22. But again, these rookies don't move away from them yet.

That was Studs & Duds presented by Loz. Loz Those Sundays are for NFL football, earn your Sunday with Loews, official partner of the NFL. We've got another game tonight. We've got WaverWire tomorrow on the show, our first WaverWire of the year. On Wednesday, backup options, TNF preview, mailbag. We got Starts of the Week coming at the back of the week. And yeah, here we go. One more game to get through. Deep breaths, everybody. React appropriately. The season is not over. You also didn't win the Championship.

It's just begun. Goodbye. Goodbye, everybody.

Thank you for listening to another episode of the fantasy footballers podcast. Join our fantasy football community on jointhefoot. Com, and follow us on Twitter @theffballers.