659: Early-Season Schedule Analysis

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Speaker 1: This is the Labor Podcast with your host JJ Zachersis J Zacherson. What's up everyone, It's JJ zacharyesin and this is episode six hundred and fifty nine of the Late Round Fantasy Football podcast sponsored by FanDuel. Thanks for tuning in. Some people think strength of schedule analysis is stupid, but I disagree. What matters is how you use the analysis, how much you weigh the analysis when you're drafting players. Is strength of schedule everything? Of course not, it's not even everything when we're projecting player performance within a single game, but analyzing strength of schedule can be helpful and it's been helpful for me in the past. I do this episode each year instead of looking at full season strength of schedule, where a lot can change as the season goes on, like injuries and such, I focus the analysis on the beginning part of the season. That's because of a couple of reasons. Number One, everyone is healthy right now, well most players, So when we're analyzing these matchups, we have a decent idea of who's playing. Number Two, having your fantasy assets get off to a good start, that's important. If there's a running back who's projected to face a really tough game script over and over again during the first three or four weeks of this season, and if that running back then does poorly, you're gonna start doubting that running back. He's not only gonna lose value within your fantasy league, but you're also gonna wonder if the back himself, if he's the one who's not able to perform, or if it was just matchup based, and you don't want that. You'd much rather have a player who dominates right away. But again, I'm not saying this type of analysis is everything. I'm just saying it's an input. It's something to think about when you're drafting your team. It's information information that you can use to be a more well rounded fantasy manager. Now, before looking at these situations, I want to let you know about the established The run Draft Kid established run as rankings for any fantasy format that you might be playing in, and they continuously update as news breaks. You also get access to Evan Silva's top one fifty and along with it a change log that you can read to see why players are moving up and down his draft board. It's a great way to make sure you understand why players are ranked where they are the goals to help you make better decisions, not tell you who to pick, and if you're into best ball drafting, their's strategy, rankings, and insight can help you out a ton with roster construction. I know that I've learned a lot through their analysis. Established to Run gives you a different perspective on fantasy football than I do, and I think the combination of my work and theirs can help make this draft season a successful one. So head over to Established run dot com right now and purchase their draft kit. And when you do, use promo code JJ for a ten percent discount. That's promo code jay J. Also, don't forget to sign up for Fandle Fantasy. For users, you have yet to make a deposit on Fandle Fantasy, you can deposit today to receive two free entries. All you have to do is deposit a minimum of ten dollars in your fandal dfs account and you'll be instantly rewarded with two free vouchers. Be sure to deposit now and play for free. Head over to fandle dot com or download the Fandle Fantasy app today. Eligibility restrictions apply. Go to fandle dot com or download the fandal app for more details. I'm want to start things off today by looking at some good early season schedules, and then we'll close up the show by looking at some bad ones. One thing that's helped me in the past with this analysis is using Pro Football Focus as rankings. They do such in depth work with player analysis that with so many moving parts around NFL teams during the offseason, it gives me a nice baseline for the analysis. It gives me an objective way to view all of this. I also like using FanDuel sportsbooks numbers for win totals because they can help tell us if a team has an opponent that's supposed to be good or not, and that can impact gamescript. I use those tools to give me a reference to then investigate the schedules a little bit further. And after doing all that analysis, I've got five things to watch out for on the favorable side early on in the season. Their conflicting reports out there right now as to how the Broncos are gonna split up their backfield this year. As we know, we saw a huge split in twenty twenty one, but with Melvin Gordon signing back, with Denver pretty late and Javonte Williams not being a rookie anymore, some have thought that Williams will be the primary runner this year. Cecil Lammy, who's very connected to the Broncos, he thinks there's no running back competition between Gordon and Williams and that Williams will be their lead back. But Benjamin Albright, who's also connected to Denver, said that the running back split looks like it's going to be pretty even once again. Regardless, Denver's opening schedule is pretty sweet technically for the passing attack too. But when look at the first two games in the season and look at the game lines over on Fandal Sportsbook, no team has a larger cumulative spread than the Broncos in weeks one and two. What I mean by that is they're five and a half point favorites against Seattle in week one and then their ten and a half point favorites against Houston in week two, which makes sense because Seattle and Houston aren't projected to be very good in twenty twenty two. What that means that we could see a really nice positive game script for this offense and these running backs. So Javonte could eat, but Melvin Gordon could gain some value after a couple of weeks in the season as well, and the matchups through the air shouldn't be a concern either. Seattle their first opponent their thirtieth and Pro Football Focus is secondary rankings this year and Houston is thirty second, so this offense should feast early on. They really don't face a tough secondary until about week six, so this is all another reason to be bullish on this Russell Wilson led Broncos team. We might see cam Akers get off to a nice fantasy start too. The Rams get the Bills in Week one, and over on fandal Sportsbook, that game has the highest total on the slate on that Week one slate. That could lead to scoring opportunities, which then would help cam Akers. Week two is a matchup against the Falcons. The Rams in that game, according to Fandels Sportsbook, are thirteen point favorites. This could very quickly calm our nerves about acres lack of efficiency in the playoffs. And after the Falcons, they get Arizona San Francisco in Dallas, three games where we could see a high game total. So I think Akers in particular deserves a shout on this show. Another running back who was in an interesting position, Nick Chubb. We have no idea how long Deshaun Watson's going to be suspended, at least at the time of this recording, but I'm sure most people aren't excited about the Browns offense to start the year since that would be the time frame for when Watson's out. Fortunately, they've got a really nice early season schedule. Their first four games of this season, they're against teams that have no more than a seven and a half win total. They get the Panthers, Jets, Steelers, and Falcons to start the season, so if there's more of a neutral game script for Cleveland, there's a better chance that we see more Nick Chubb. So despite this looming to Shaun Watson's suspension, Chubb could get off to a decent start in fantasy. When I looked at the first two weeks of games over on fandals Sportsbook, I totaled each team's team total for their first two games, and the usual suspects were at the top of the list. The Rams had the highest first two week team total in the league than Buffalo Kansas City. You had the Chargers, the Packers Dallas, and then Tampa Bay. No one should be shocked by that. Those are all very good offenses. But do you know who was next? The Indianapolis Colts. The Colts start their season against the Texans and then the Jags, two very winnable games, hence the high team total. They then get the Chiefs in Week three, which could be higher scoring as well. So yeah, Jonathan Taylor should feast to start the year, but I think feeling good about the entire offense makes plenty of sense. So Matt Ryan could even work as an early season streamer. So I wouldn't recommend entering your fantasy season with quarterback streaming being top of mind. And then the last situation and player to call out is surprisingly someone I sort of talked down on on last week's Mailbag episode, and he's someone I generally am not into this year, but it's Antonio Gibson. Over the first two weeks of the season. According to Fandeles Sportsbook, the Commanders are actually favorites because they get Jacksonville in Detroit. Considering their win total is eight and a half this season, we may not get a whole lot of situations where they're favorites, and who benefits from those positive game scripts? I mean, technically the whole offense will benefit. Washington actually has a middle of the road team total over the first two weeks, but a player like Gibson could see more work than usual if things go as planned, and then someone like Brian Robinson could be a sneaky deeper play as well. It doesn't look like we're gonna see JD. McKissick as much to start the season for Washington. Now let's look at the flip side or teams in situations that may struggle to start the season because of their matchups. Atlanta's gonna be bad this year, we know this, but to add insult to injury, they get the Saints in the Rams in weeks one and two. According to PFF, those are two top ten secondaries entering the season. The Falcons, in turn, have a thirty six point team total in the first two weeks. Combined to Cordon of Fandels Sportsbook, that's tied for the second lowest in football. Hopefully we see something from Drake London right away, and I'm still drafting him heavily, but I wouldn't get overly excited about what he might do in tough matchups in weeks one and two. To a tongue of Ioloa, could be in some trouble too. The Patriots are their opponent in Week one, and their secondary isn't what it used to be. Even still, we know that they can scheme well, and that's obviously a concern, as is the fact that it's a divisional game, But even when you factor in New England's twenty six ranked secondary. Right after that game, Miami gets Baltimore, Buffalo, and Cincinnati, three teams with top ten pass defenses entering the league according to PFF, and over their first two games, the Dolphins have a bottom half projected team total. Maybe those games end up shooting out because some of those offenses that they're facing are good, but I do think that you should at least know that two is highly volatile to start the year. Another quarterback in a not great spot to start the season, Zach Wilson. The Jets have it rough during the first half of the season. Guys, let me just read you their opponent's PFF secondary ranking by week all the way up to their week ten by you ready for this one three ten, twenty eight, So that's a good matchup, but it's a Steelers, so maybe they can pressure him enough. Five, four, twelve, twenty six, and six. That's nine games. In six of those nine games or against teams with top ten pass defenses. Of course, that's not the end all, but it is a little bit scary. The Jets playoff schedule is nice for fantasy, but the front half is rough. They could be a team to target at your trade deadline. And then the final player situation that I want to call out is David Montgomery. We don't know exactly how this new offense is gonna split the backfield, but the Bears are tied with the second lowest team total over the first two weeks the season, according to Fandles Sportsbook, and they're pretty big underdogs against both San Francisco and Green Bay during those games. They do get the Texans in Week three, so a player like Montgomery could get back on track there, but if game script does get out of hand, you have to at least have some worry about how that can impact David Montgomery. I actually have a little bit of worry about the Bears in general during those first two weeks, but again Week three against Houston should get things back on track. If they do, indeed, start slow. Now. Just to reiterate what I've been saying, don't solely use this analysis to make your decisions. That's not the intent. This is just additional information to think about when you're drafting, because there are going to be times where you may need some sort of tiebreaker in your draft and this can help with that. That's going to do it for today's show, though, Thanks to all of you for listening. If you get subscribe to Late Round Fantasy Football podcast, make sure you are by searching for it pretty much anywhere podcasts can be found. I know for it to follow me on Twitter at LATEROUNDQB. Remember to check out lateround dot com. Go ahead and purchase the draft guide, join the Patreon, all that good stuff. Thanks for listening, really really appreciate it. I'll talk to you later in the week.