433: Week 7 Matchups

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Speaker 1: This is the lad Podcast with your host JJ Zacherretha.

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Speaker 2: J J Zacherretha, what's up everyone.

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Speaker 1: It's JJ Zachares and the editor in chief at fandel and at number fire dot com. And this is episode four hundred and thirty three of the Late Round podcast, the many shows that are part of the FanDuel podcast network. Thank you for tuning in. Quarterback was decent last week, aside from Andy Dalton, who looked pretty bad on Monday Night. I missed cam Akers too, thinking that Acres would get more work that clearly didn't happen, and I'm never listening to Sean McVay again. And then my other big miss was probably Juju Smith Schuster. Now I've been down on Juju all year. I gave him a chance last week because I did like his matchup, but it flopped big time.

00:00:48
Speaker 2: More on him later. Things weren't all bad though.

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Speaker 1: Last week on this show I called out Trey Burton, who had a big day.

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Speaker 2: IRV Smith was serviceable.

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Speaker 1: The New York Giants and the Miami Dolphins defenses came through. Adrian Peterson found the end zone. There were some hits as well. I'd like to do better, but I'll give last week a five or six out of ten before looking at players I like more and less than the consensus. This week, I wanted to let you know that Fandel's Sportsbook is giving you a chance to bet on the NFL this week risk free with their exclusive same game parlays. Simply place a three leg or more parlay on any NFL Week seven game to be eligible for the offer, and follow all along as the game unfolds. If you don't win your bet, Fandel will refund your bet up to ten dollars in site credit, so definitely check that out at Fandel's Sportsbook. Must be twenty one years or older in president in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Illinois, West Virginia, Indiana, Colorado, or Iowa. Refund issued a non withdrawable site credit that expires in seven days.

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Speaker 2: Max refund ten dollars. Terms apply.

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Speaker 1: Gambling problem called one hundred gambler in West Virginia, visit one eight hundred gambler dot net. In Indiana, call one one hundred nine with it. In Colorado, call one eight hundred five to two forty seven hundred. In Iowa, call one eight hundred bets off crushed it. Let's get to these matchups. I like Joe Burrow this week more than others, or at least that's what it looks like. Cleveland ranks is the twelfth best matchup for opposing quarterbacks and adjusted fantasy points allowed this year, which is only slightly worse than their unadjusted rating. The Bengals haven't been great at protecting Joe Burrow, but Cleveland's pressure rate is actually bottom ten in the league. Despite the season that Miles Garrett is having, Burrow himself has been pretty strong for fantasy purposes, partially because of.

00:02:32
Speaker 2: His scrambling ability.

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Speaker 1: He scored at least fifteen fantasy points in all but one game this year, with that one game coming against the Ravens, and based on his passing yardage total, he should actually have more touchdowns than he currently has, a lot more. He's one of the top regression candidates on the positive end across the league. That doesn't mean everything will overcorrect this week. Don't take that the wrong way. That's not how regression works. It just means that what we've seen so far from Burrow as his baseline that might not be his baseline.

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Speaker 2: So I like him this week.

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Speaker 1: I also don't mind Teddy Bridgewater, who I talked about on the fifteen Transactions episode earlier this week. I won't reiterate what I said on that show totally, but he's also a regression candidate who's really underperformed and touchdown rate this year.

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Speaker 2: So we've got that going.

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Speaker 1: We've got the idea that Teddy's baseline is probably better than what we've seen so far. And then there's also the matchup New Orleans on the season ranks as the third most advantageous matchup for opposing quarterbacks and adjusted fantasy points allowed to the position. So Teddy is a very viable streamer. And I actually don't mind Baker Mayfield as a deeper play this week. I can't imagine a lot of you would have to start Baker, but just hear me out for a second. He's only really been bad fantasy wise when he faced Baltimore and Pittsburgh, two teams that can get to the quarterback. Pittsburgh's first and pressure rate, Baltimore's third, Cincinnati is not that they ring dead last and pressure rate, And according to Pro Football Focus, Baker hasn't been totally terrible when he's had a clean pocket this year.

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Speaker 2: He ranks eighteenth and passer rating in clean.

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Speaker 1: Pockets that's ahead of guys like Kyler Murray, Matt Ryan, Lamar Jackson, Gardner Minshew among many other quarterbacks. Aside from those games against Baltimore and Pittsburgh, so four games, Mayfield scored between fourteen and sixteen fantasy points. Cincinnati on paper, is pretty average against quarterbacks. This game has an over under north of fifty points and it's projected to be close, so I would hope that I wouldn't have to start Mayfield, but this is not a terrible, terrible spot for him. Now on the flip side, I'm a little bit lower on Tannehill this week than the consensus. Taylor Lawan is now out for Tennessee and then they get Pittsburgh. I just mentioned this, but Pittsburgh as a team generates more pressure on opposing quarterbacks than any other team in football. So I'm just worried about how that Titans offensive line is gonna hold up. And that's on top of the fact that Tannehill's looking at regression coming and that's what I mentioned on the show earlier this week. I'm just a few spots lower than the consensus for Tannehill. Where I think he's firmly a mid range QB two instead of a higher end one. Antonio Gibson saw his usage drop from week five to week six, going from a ninety two percent running back rush share to a forty three percent one last week, pretty tilting. So as a result, there's more risk involved with Gibson this week than there probably should be, but he's got a great matchup. We watched Kenyan Drake do work against Dallas last week, and the Cowboys rank is the ninth best matchup and adjusted fantasy points allowed to the running back position. I really just want to mention Gibson because even though his peripherals dropped, his snapshare and his backfield share dropped, I'd still feel comfortable playing him this week given the matchup, and those peripheral numbers could easily just jump back up this week. I also think that you could use Joshua Kelly in a pinch. I would still be playing Justin Jackson over Kelly this week, but it's been a couple of tough matchups for Kelly. Going up against Tampa Bay and New Orleans, two teams that can really stop the run, it shouldn't be as difficult against Jacksonville. The Jags rank is the second best matchup and adjustin fantasy points allowed to running backs. They face one of the lowest pass to rush ratios in football, so we could see the run heavy script for the Chargers, and the Chargers are seven and a half point favorites. That's why we could see that script. Justin Jackson saw more work on the ground than Kelly the last time that we saw the Chargers, but we can't say for certain that that's how it's going to be weak in and week out without Austin Eckler. I think we should be confident that Jackson sees more receiving volume for sure, but Kelly could see more rushing work in any given week, especially if there's a positive game script. He's more of a bruiser and we know that he's the goal line back, so I think that he's really under ranked this week by analysts, and I think that Latavious Murray makes some sense if you're a little bit desperate this week too. Caroline has been atrocious against running backs all season long. Murray's seen forty four percent of New Orleans running back rushes this year. His target share is just five percent, but if there's a positive for New Orleans, he could be involved. He's not a bad flex play. Now. Rex Burkehead keeps being ranked in like the low thirties over on Fantasy Pros each week, and I don't get it at all. That's why I keep bringing him up on the show. He continues to see very little receiving work with James White back. He saw a two point nine percent target share the first week that White was back, and he didn't have a single target last week, so he has one target over his last two games. I don't know why you would play him this week over someone like Joshua Kelly, but he's ranked ahead of him. Maybe I'm wrong, but I think that this is logical. I would not be playing Rex Burket and the same goes for Jamal Williams. Williams over Kelly is kind of weird to me. The Packers could have a great offensive performance this week against Houston, and Williams has seen a spike in target share at times this year, or at least he has one week. A few weeks ago he had a twenty four percent target share, but that was also.

00:07:51
Speaker 2: Someone of an anomaly.

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Speaker 1: So while I get and I understand as sort of a deep play to get a piece of that Packers offense. You can play Jamal Williams. You can throw him in your lineup. I just don't think he should be as highly ranked as he is. I don't think I would be playing Jamal Williams over someone like Josh Kelly. I think Kelly has a much better floor, and then you could argue that he also has a better ceiling because he has more touchdown upside. He's the clear goal lineback. Jamal Williams is not that. So while I don't mind Williams is sort of a dart throw, I'm kind of surprised by how high he's ranked this week. Like I said on yesterday's episode, t Higgins has seen at least twenty percent of Cincinnati's targets in each of his last four games. I already mentioned how Burrow has a decent matchup in Cleveland against wide receivers, is the second best matchup according to my adjusted Fantasy points a loud method. You should be starting Higgins this week and probably every week moving forward.

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Speaker 2: I also talked about Christian Kirk on.

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Speaker 1: Yesterday's show and how we shouldn't let production cloud the peripherals the lack of target share that he's seen this year, but it's hard for me to ignore the matchup this week. Among all wideouts with twenty or more targets this year, Kirk is the fourth highest average depth of target. Meanwhile, Seattle leads the NFL in percentage of targets allowed to wide receivers, where over seventy eight percent of targets against Seattle have gone to wideouts.

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Speaker 2: And more importantly for Kirk's.

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Speaker 1: Big playability, Seattle's allowed the most fifteen plus air yard completions per game this year, So even if Kirk's targets are limited, he has a shot to make another big play in this matchup. Now, going further down this list, if you do want to get a piece of that Packers offense, you could go to Marquez Valdez Scantling. No relevant player has a higher average depth of target this year than MVS, so a big play is always possible. But now he's facing a Texan secondary that ranks is an above average matchup, and it's in a game where the Packers have the highest implied total on this week's slate. MVS has also seen work. He has an eighteen point three percent target chhaer on the season, and without Allen Lazard over the last two weeks that numbers jumped to twenty percent. So a guy getting that volume in a high scoring game who also sees his targets down the field, that's someone that I want to throw a dart at.

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Speaker 2: Not physically, of course.

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Speaker 1: DeMarcus Robinson saw a twenty three percent target share without Sammy Watkins last week, and he ran the most routes on that Chiefs team. He ran thirty four routes versus Tyreek Hills thirty three, Byron Pringle seventeen and Mikol Hardman's thirteen. That's according to Pro Football Focus. He's the Sammy Watkins replacement. So Sammy's out again this week. I think he's absolutely in play against a Denver secondary that shouldn't be a big threat against his Chiefs offense.

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Speaker 2: So the two wide receivers.

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Speaker 1: I want to talk about on the other side of things are two guys that I feel like I bring up almost every single week. I'm not sure how you start Michael Gallup right now, regardless of matchup with Dalton under center. In Week six, Gallup didn't see a hopeful boost and target share instead, it was just under twelve percent, and now on the season, his target chair is just twelve point one percent. That type of target share is a little bit more meaningful because the Cowboys are pass heavy, but that pass heaviness may not come out this week because they're facing a bad Washington team. If they see a positive game script at all in that game, I would expect them to be more run heavy.

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Speaker 2: They don't want to put the game in Dalton's hands.

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Speaker 1: He's not Dak Prescott, so i'd absolutely leave Gallop on my bench this week.

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Speaker 2: And then there's Juju Smith Schuster.

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Speaker 1: Juju now has the lowest average up of target in the entire league right now among wide outs with twenty or more targets. He hasn't ranked higher than twenty seventh and weekly scoring since his Week one game where he scored a pair of touchdowns, and he's averaging just four point seven PPR points per game over his last two and the Titans, who he's facing this week, have also been really good against the slot. No team has seen a smaller percentage of targets go to that area of the field than the Titans, so Juju should not be ranked nearly as high as he's ranked this week. In my opinion, at least for most of you, he can be benched until we see more. It's really amazing to see how bad the tight end position is each and every week.

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Speaker 2: If you need a streaming.

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Speaker 1: Type this week, though, I've got two for you, I have very little confidence in both.

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Speaker 2: But that's what you get at the position. Logan Thomas's peripherals have not gone away. They're still there.

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Speaker 1: He ran the third most routes in the league last week a tight end, and he came through with a score even though he had just a ten percent target chair. Thomas has a seventeen percent target chair on the season. That's a top ten number at the position. So I think he's playable against Dallas. And if you want a true dart throw, I guess it's Richard Rogers. I guess there's no zach Ertz. Doesn't sound like there's gonna be Dallas Goddard. We know there are injuries to the wide receivers. Miles Sanders is out, so who's gonna step up. Maybe it's the dad running Richard Rodgers, who ran nineteen routes last week. He'll be the tight end one for filiate looks like, so he should be able to capture maybe five or six targets that's not totally easy to find on the waiver wire. Speaking of that Philadelphia game, I think both defense is in that contest are very much in play.

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Speaker 2: This week Philadelphia gets a New York team.

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Speaker 1: It's a lot of top eight defensive performance in each one of their losses this year. We know Daniel Jones turns the ball over a lot, the Giants rank in the top five, and pressure rate allowed the game has a low over under. The Eagles are slight favorites. Everything points to them having a strong outing, but don't ignore the Giant side either. Philly's banged up everywhere, including their offensive line, which should allow the Giants to get to Carson Wentz. Philly's allowed the most sacks in the league this year, and the Giants actually have an above average pressure rate defensively, so they can have a good defensive outing for fantasy managers and back to back weeks. I think it's very possible. But since this is a Thursday night game, I'm totally prepared for a shootout and I'm ready for people to listen to this podcast on Friday, Hit my mentions and say JJ, you're a moron.

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Speaker 2: Wouldn't be the first time, but that's going to do it for today's show. Thanks to all of you for listening.

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Speaker 1: 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. No forgets to follow me on Twitter at Late Round QB. Thanks everyone. One more show this week, the Mailbag episode that'll be out tomorrow. I'll talk to you then,