315: Week 11 Matchups

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Speaker 1: This is the Labor Podcast with your host JJ Zachertha j J. Zacherson. What's up everyone. It's JJ Zachares and the editor in chief at Fandel and at number five dot com. And this is episode three hundred and fifteen of the Late Round podcast on many shows that are part of the FanDuel podcast network. Thanks for tuning in. Things got back on track last week, and thank god they did. I was all over the Jared gothbad game. I like Deebo Samuel as a deeper wide receiver play, Christian Kirk came through, Tyler Lockett didn't have a great game even before his injury, and Lashaw McCoy didn't even play. There were some misses like Gus Edwards being a potential deep play at running back, but it was a much, much, much better week than Week nine. Now, before looking at some players that I like more and less than the consensus for this week, I want to let you guys know about Fandel's eight hundred thousand dollars NFL Thursday Night Special. For nine dollars, you can build a lineup using Steelers and Browns players, so players from the Thursday Night game and have a shot at the two hundred thousand dollars first place prize. Again, that's just for nine dollars. For more details is at fandel dot com or download the Fandle app today. Eligibility restrictions apply. If I'm being honest, There's not a whole lot to disagree with against the consensus rankings this week at quarterback. But I do like Kyle Allen as this week's top streamer, at least this week's top traditional streamer, so I'll kick things off with him. Atlanta's defense this past week was good against New Orleans, but the larger sample size still tells us that they're very beatable. They rank fifth worst and pressure rate, second worst in sacrate, and fourth worst and yards per attempt allowed. Quarterbacks against Atlanta and Fantasy football are also averaging three and a half more points per game versus their season long average. The game in Charlotte has a high over under and the Panthers are pretty big favorites, which gives them an implied team total of over twenty seven points. This is a great spot for Kyle Allen and Derek Carr is in a good spot as well. A lot of fantasy managers get nervous when their quarterbacks are facing bad teams and as a result, are big favorites, but in order to get that lead, the team needs to score points. The Raiders will need Derek Carr to get to a double digit lead. They've got an implied team total of twenty nine and a half points this week, which is the highest in the league, and like Atlanta, Cincinnati's allowing three and a half fantasy points above expectation this year, so Cars should be projected to perform better than he has throughout the season. Now. One player I wanted to touch on today was Baker Mayfield. I'm not in love with him as a play. As I talked about on the ten Trend Show yesterday. The Steelers have allowed just a little over ten fantasy points per game to opposing quarterbacks since trading for Minka Fitzpatrick. It's a matchup that you generally want to avoid. But I do think that people are just a little bit too low on Mayfield. That doesn't make him a great play, So don't take this the wrong way, but I'm slightly higher than the consensus on him this week, as weird as it is, given the splits that I talked about with the Steelers and Minka Fitzpatrick. Mayfield's played a pretty tough schedule this year, and he's ranked better than QB ten in a single week exactly zero times. But over the last two weeks, Cleveland's face Denver and Buffalo. Those are two teams that rank really well against the pass in general and in adjusted Fantasy points allowed, and Mayfield wasn't terrible in those matchups. Now, Pittsburgh's right there with those two teams. They've actually been better than Denver and Buffalo with Minka and the pressure that they can generate scares the hell out of me if I were to play Baker. But don't forget. Mayfield is also a positive touchdown regression candidate based on his yardage total. And I like to talk about this every episode, but yards correlate to touchdowns. But based on that total, he should have almost five more touchdowns than he currently has. So simply using his twenty nineteen performances from a fantasy perspective and saying this will happen again isn't necessarily the best process in the world. Now his floor is zero points. I mean, he could be terrible on Thursday night. You may be listening to this on Friday laughing at me for even suggesting that he's undervalued this week, but he's been in tough spots all season long, and ranking him at QB twenty one just seems a tad bit low. I think it's more of a mid range QB two rather than a low end one. But I'd still absolutely be playing someone like Kyle Allen or Derek Carr over him. I honestly think that you can make the argument that Baker should be played over Jared Goff at the very least, the gap between the two players shouldn't be as significant as it currently is. Like I talked about last week, Goff has been strong in four games this year, ranking QB eight or higher in those contests, and he has a QB twelve performance as well. But against the Panthers, the Browns, the forty nine Ers, and now the Steelers, he's really struggled. And each of those teams rank in the top half of the league and pressure rate, And what does he get this week the Bears, who are fifth best in pressure rate this year. I'm worried about the offensive line, and I think that we could see a low scoring game in this one. And don't forget when we saw Goff against the Bears last year, he threw for one hundred and eighty yards with four interceptions. In my opinion, he should be benched this week. Sam Donald's a deeper streamer this week for those of you who may not be able to get someone like Kyle Allen, but his range of outcomes is pretty scary. That's why I think he's ranked too high at QB sixteen. Now, Washington's been pretty average against opposing quarterbacks, but the entire goal of their offense is to slow things down and be methodical with their run game. It's highly unlikely that we see a shootout in this game. Quarterbacks have averaged just twenty two pass attempts per contest over their last three games versus Washington. So sure, Donald can provide some fantasy points, but you're really banking on efficiency here and it's just really hard to trust that given how Sam Donald has performed this year. Carson Wentz in a tough matchup, is ranked below Sam Donald, but I would actually go with someone like Carson Wentz instead of Donald. Brian Hill was a hot waiver wire ad this week given the Devonte Freeman injury, and he's most definitely in play in Week eleven, Caroline is allowing the third most fantasy points per game to opposing running backs, and even when you adjust for their opponents, they still rank fourth worst. And Hill honestly might end up being somewhat of a workhorse for Atlanta. Last week he saw sixty four and a half percent of Atlanta's running back carries in a six point three percent target share, and that was with DeVonta Freeman getting thirty two percent of the team's carries in a twelve and a half percent target chair. So Hill should be in your lineup this week as an RB two, and the same goes for Austin Eckler. Yes, he was a sell candidate for me this week on the fifteen Transaction Show, But on that show I mentioned this matchup against Kansas City. It's a juicy one. The Chiefs are allowing the second highest adjusted fantasy points to opposing running backs this year, where they're giving up over six more points per game versus expectation to team running backs. So obviously Melvin Gordon is going to get a chunk of that, but Austin Eckler should as well, and I'm interested to see what happens if Kansas City gets a lead in this game. They're not massive favorites, but we know it's possible. Eckler's seen his snapshare dip below fifty percent in both the Chargers last two games, but they ran zero plays while trailing in one of those contests, and they ran forty five plays in a neutral game script in another. So the scripts have favored Melvin Gordon a little bit over their last two contests regardless, though, Eckler's a good RB two for you this week. Now. If Matt Brida isn't able to go, I like Raheem Mostert as a deeper play. Brita was actually able to do some damage against Arizona the last time these two teams faced off against one another, which seems like it was basically yesterday, and Mostard got some run against the Seahawks on Monday night. He finished the game with a twenty four percent running back rush share, and he was playing all the snaps in overtime. So if bred is out, or if there are reports of him being limited, I think Mostart's in play now. On the flip side, let's talk about Todd Gurley. The Bears have allowed the second most receptions to running backs. That might make Gurley a decent play this week, but it's tough to trust a receiving matchup for a running back who's playing on a team that's targeted running backs at the lowest rate in football this year. Like I said on yesterday's show, become a touchdown dependent fantasy asset. And while he can still find your lineup this week, I'm not nearly as bolish as the consensus. They have him as a top twenty running back. I could see this Rams Bears game being ugly. And then there's Sony Michelle. Guys, in games where Sony Michelle hasn't found the end zone this year, he's ranked as the RB seventy one, forty five, twenty two, thirty seven, and forty three. He's basically worthless without a touchdown, and that may be hard to come by against Philadelphia because the Eagles have allowed the second few of rushing yards to running backs this year. So maybe Michelle scores at the goal line, But as you guys know, I'm not a fan of banking on touchdowns week in and week out. In some cases, depending on your depth, Michelle can be benched this week. I've got mostly deep plays for you guys at wide receiver this week, starting with the least deep of the four, and that's my man, Marquis Brown. He's currently ranked as wide receiver twenty seven this week, but the matchup is there. Houston has allowed six and a half more fantasy points per game this year than they should have given their szonent's wide receiver team averages. That's the second highest mark in the league, behind only Tampa Bay, who really really sucks at defending wideouts. But the Texas have given up the eighth most air yards this season as well. That obviously bodes well for a deep threat like Hollywood Brown and Hollywood himself has seen seventeen percent or more of Baltimore's targets in every single game played this year, and that target share could yield more targets if the Ravens are forced to throw the ball more, and that could be the case in this game. Baltimore's second to last across the league in pass attempts this year, but Houston's defense has faced the six most pass attempts. So I'm into Hollywood as a wide receiver two this week, but he's being ranked as a wide receiver three. Deebo Samuel's in play again too, even if we see Emmanuel Sanders and George Kittle. Now, obviously if those guys are sidelined, I like Deebo even more, but he had been seeing an increase in usage over his last few games heading into Week ten. That's why I liked him last week, and then in Week eleven he had a twenty five percent target shair and he had over one hundred receiving yards against the Seahawks. He was very clearly the best wide receiver for San Francisco once Emmanuel Sanders left that game. The matchup against Arizona is an above average one, and Samuel should be in line for some work regardless of those injuries. That's just where things have trended now. Randall Cobb had a big game last week, but I think it could happen again in Week eleven. Maybe not that big of a game, but a strong one. He's now seen a twenty three percent in an eighteen percent target share over his last two games, and he'll get a Detroit defense this week that hasn't been very good against slot receivers. According to data compiled from Pro Football Focus, over thirty five percent of targets against Detroit this year have gone to the slot. That's the fourth highest rate in the league. They've also allowed ten slot touchdowns, which ties them for the most in football. Cobbs played nearly ninety percent of his snaps from the slot this season, so he's gonna benefit from this matchup. And my deepest of deep plays this week is Russell Gage. Now hear me out for a minute. Gage has stepped in for Mohamed Sanu over the falcons last two games, and he's actually averaged seven targets per game. He's seen the target share of eighteen point four percent and fifteen point six percent over his last two games. That's pretty decent, and against the Panthers this week, the matchup isn't all that bad, especially with Austin Hooper sidelined. Caroline has been average at stopping opposing wide receivers this year, but specifically, they've watched about thirty five percent of their targets against them go to the slot. Gage has played seventy nine percent of his snaps from that area of the field over the last two games without Sunu, So he's a very intriguing waiver wire option that you can just plug into your lineup. DJ Shark was someone who caught my eye as being overvalued this week. He should still be in your lineup, don't get me wrong, but he was the wide receiver eleven on Fantasy Pros and I was kind of shocked by that. Indianapolis has been a pretty average matchup on paper this year, and they've actually seen just fifty one percent of the targets against them go to wide receivers. That's sort of a continuation of last year too, but that's one of the lower marks in the league. Jacksonville has Nick Foles under center now, which means we don't exactly know how things will go for that offense, and they've got an implied team total of just twenty and a half points this week. Now. Djhark is fine, like I said, and he should be in your lineup, but wide receiver eleven is pretty high straight up. Though, I'm not very into Larry Fitzgerald this week, like you can probably bench him. He's averaged about a sixteen percent target share over his last four games after hitting the twenty three percent mark over his first six, so things are trending down. But he's also facing San Francisco, a team allowing over eight fantasy points below expectation this year to opposing team wide receivers, and they've been especially good against the slot. Just twenty three percent of targets have gone to that area of the field against San Francisco and they've surrendered just one slot touchdown all year long. So, like I said, I think that you could bench Larry Fitzgerald. Kyle Rudolph is a strong streaming option this week. He's still available on a lot of waiver wires and he surprisingly finishes the tight end three eleven and four and three of his last four games. But he's also seen a target share north of ten point seven percent in each of his last five and if Adam Thielen is out again and that could and should continue, so he's more of a volume play than anything else in that same game between the Vikings and Broncos. Though, as noa fan, and I sort of regret not talking about fant on the ten Trend Show yesterday because without Emmanuel Sanders this season, Fan seen a twenty seven point six percent and a twenty two point two percent target share in that Broncos offense. Those are high numbers. He'll face Minnesota this week, which looks like a tough matchup on paper. They've allowed the tenth fewest fantasy points to opposing tight ends. However, they're the only team in the NFL that hasn't allowed a tight end touchdown this year, so those numbers are kind of skewed. They've actually allowed the seventh most yards to the tight end position, so I like Noah Fan as a deeper play. I talked about the Oakland Raiders on the fifteen Transaction Show this week, but I think that they're in play is big favorites against the Bengals. You guys already heard the reasons why, despite the fact that they've gotten to opposing quarterbacks at a pretty low rate this year. But if you won another deep play, I think Washington could be it. The Jets have been sacked at the second highest rate this season, and while that's not all on Sam Darnald, Donald's been sacked an average of three times per game since he's returned to action. He's also thrown eight picks in those four games. This game itself looks to be a low scoring one, with an over under that's south of forty points, and that means that Washington likely won't just sink your team, so I think that they're fine this week as a streaming option. That's gonna do it for today's show, though. Thanks to all of you for listening. If you've got subscribed to the Late Round podcast, make sure you are by searching for it pretty much anywhere podcasts can be found, and don't forget to follow me on Twitter at Late Round QB. Thanks everyone. Talk to you tomorrow with the weekly Mailbag show.