807: 10 Trends for Week 4

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Speaker 1: This is the Late Podcast with with your host JJ Zacher Jake Zachers. What's up everyone, It's JJ Zacharyeson in this episode eight hundred and seven of the Late Round Fantasy Football podcast sponsored by FanDuel. Thanks for tuning in. Before get into the trends this week, I want to send another reminder to check out Lateround dot com. You can sign up for the Late Round Fantasy Football newsletter. It's absolutely free. You can join the Patreon for things like rest of season rankings and live Q and a's. You can purchase this year's Prospect Guide or Draft Guide. Head tolateround dot com to learn more. Let's get to these trends. The first trend this week is about Derreck Henry. He scored just two PPR points in Week three, his lowest point total in the game where he's carried the ball at least ten times. So far this season, Henry's averaging three point two yards per rush his previews. His career low came in twenty seventeen, when he ran for a four point two yards per rush rate. According to Pro Football Focus, Henry's averaging just two point seventy three yards after contact per attempt in twenty twenty two, that number was three point six, in twenty twenty one three point two eight. In twenty twenty it was three point eight five. This offensive line is a problem, and in Week three it faced one of its toughest matchups on the year against the Browns. But Henry's now been out snapped by Taj Spears in two of three games this season. That's thanks to these negative game scripts that combined with worse efficiency, is why he's off to a slower start here. In twenty twenty three, the Washington Commanders faced a serious negative game script in Week three against Buffalo. They had a negative game script in Week two against Denver, but it wasn't like this. They were trailed by ten points in the first quarter and they lost thirty seven to three. In that game against the Bills, Brian Robinson was effective seventy yards on the ground, but it was only on ten carries. He saw eighty three percent of Washington's running back rushes, but he was held to zero targets. Meanwhile, Antonio Gibson saw five targets on twenty eight routes run, and he out snapped Robinson thirty two to nineteen. Gibson even fumbled in that game again, and he was still seeing more looks than Robinson, at least from a snap perspective. Now things could change, but it seems clear that Gibson is the receiving back in that offense, and that could be trouble for Brian Robinson. He could get games scripted out. It's something to monitor moving forward. Sam Laporta is an absolute monster. He's now finished as a top eight tight end in all three weeks this season in PPR formats, he caught at least five balls in every game. Only zach Ertz has seen a higher target share at the tight end position. Not only is he a tight end one moving forward, but he's pacing the break basically every rookie receiving record. You have to just throw him in your lineup until he gives us a reason to not throw him in your lineup. Now. I had Jordan Love as a cell last week and that was looking pretty good until the final ten minutes of their game against the Saints. But I do think that if someone in your league thinks he's going to be a top four, top five quarterback in Fantasy from here on out, which is where he's at right now, you should still sell now. The odd thing is compared to consensus rest of season rankings, I'm actually now higher on Love than other analysts. But I do think that if people are buying his current ranking, he's a cell. And here's why. So far in twenty twenty three, quarterbacks have thrown a touchdown pass for every one hundred and seventy seven yards through the air. Yards correlate to touchdowns, so this is a quick and easy way to spot regression. Jordan Love has thrown a touchdown pass on every ninety three point six passing yards so far this year. Green Bay has nine touchdowns to start this season. Seven of those nine have come through the air. One of the two on the ground also went to Jordan Love. That type of ratio is higher than what we typically see. Combine that with how frequently Love is throwing touchdowns, and it's obvious he's gonna regress to some degree even when Christian Watson is healthy. The key here, though, is that regression doesn't mean irrelevancy. I thought justin Fields was the better upside play rest of season. I talked about that last week. That's not the case for me anymore. Even with this regression love to me is a low end QB one. I just don't know if that's saying much. Now, speaking of how teams are scoring touchdowns, let's talk about Minnesota. Yes, they have a high pass rate, but even with that high pass rate, we wouldn't expect only passing touchdowns to come from that offense. So far this year, they have nine passing touchdowns and zero rushing touchdowns. I have a formula that I built last year that shows expected passing touchdown rate. Basically, it tells us what type of pass to rush touchdown ratio we'd expect from a team based on how often they're throwing the ball, a team running the ball a lot with skew more towards rushing touchdowns, and vice versa. Minnesota has the highest pass rate this season, and based on that pass rate, we'd expect eighty three percent of their touchdowns to come via the pass. They're at one hundred percent right now, so regression is coming. I mentioned how bad Denver's defense has been this year on the fifteen Transaction Show like multiple times, but get this. After Week threes game, Denver's now allowed sixteen offensive touchdowns this season. Chicago's next on that list. With eleven touchdowns allowed. On the flip side. All the way at the top, you've got the Cleveland Browns. They've given up just one offensive touchdown this year. It was that big play to George Pickens. Cleveland's now top ten and touchdowns allowed, sack rate, pressure rate, and passing EPA per drop back allowed. They've got tough matchups upcoming against the Ravens and forty nine ers, but this defense is legit. Denvers not so much. One pleasant surprise this season is Jimmy Garoppolo. I know that sounds weird. I don't think he's been like amazing. It's just that for fantasy football, he hasn't been horrible. For his pass catchers. Jimmy g and the Raiders currently have the fifth highest air yards per ten for eight in football. Garoppolo's actually thrown at fifteen plus air yards at the second highest rate in the league. DeVante Adams is gonna get his, but Jacobe Myers has been really good to start the year too. It's good news for them that Garoppolo has been pushing it down the field. I don't think enough people were talking about Kyron Williams usage. According to Fantasy Life's Utilization report. No running back in football has had a better route participation to start the year than Kyron Williams. On top of that, Williams has now had back to back games with a one hundred per running back rush there, meaning he's seen all of the rams running back rushes for two straight games. Just for some context, we've only had five of those types of games this year. Kyrien Williams has two of those five. If this usage continues, he's going to continue being a very very good fantasy asset. My rest of season rankings continue to like Kyen more than the market does now. I talked about Sam Laporta earlier and how he's crushing it in fantasy football. Another rookie tight end who's doing really well is Luke Musgrave. It's just that his production hasn't totally been there. Musgrave has yet to score more than ten point nine pper points in a game this year. That came in Week three. But he's seen the sixth best route participation at tight end to start the year, and his fifteen point eight percent target share is top fifteen at the position. I still think that he's someone that you have to have rostered moving forward. The last trend this week is about Adam Thielen. He was something that I featured on last week's Sleeper Show and he was fortunately one of my hits. Don't worry. Don't worry, I'm gonna call out my misses on that episode two. But Thelan has now seen a twenty nine percent target shair in a twenty five percent target share over his last two games. He's seen twenty three targets during this time. This week he gets a revenge game against the Vikings. That's a beatable defense. After the Vikings, they get the Lions, Dolphins, Texans, Colts, and Bears. I don't think Thelan's gonna continue this, but he should be pretty usable. That's it for today's show, though, thanks to all of you for listening. If you get subscribe to the Late Round Fantasy Football podcast, make sure you are by searching for it pretty much anywhere podcasts can be found, and don't for to follow me on Twitter at Late Round QB. Thanks for listening everyone. We got a show tomorrow, the Sleeper Show. I'll talk to you then,