808: Week 4 Sleepers

00:00:02
Speaker 1: This is the lad Podcast with your host JJ zacher Retha j Jake Zacher reson. What's up everyone, It's JJ Zacharyeson in this episode eight hundred and eight of the Late Round Fantasy Football podcast sponsored by FanDuel. Thanks for tuning in. Last week's sleeper show was actually pretty good. On the bad side, Matthew Stafford wasn't that great of a streamer. Kendre Miller didn't see the workload that I thought he might see. Josh Reynolds did absolutely nothing, quite literally. Roshawn Johnson and the Bears continued to be bad. Zach Ertzt didn't do much and neither did Taysom Hill. But there were a lot of positives last week. C J. Stroud came through as a strong play. So did his wide receiver Tank Dell, who had a top ten performance two to Atwell was a top twenty wide out. Adam Thielen was the wide receiver three on the week. Jerck McKinnon was a top ten running back. Jake Ferguson was a tight end one. Even Rico Dubtel he had a big performance. He was the RB seventeen in PPR formats. Considering the types of players that I'm talking about on this show. I'll take those results. Let's try to keep it up here in Week four. Things are tougher this week than last. I'm not gonna lie, but we'll begin by looking at players roster in ten to fifty percent of Yahoo leagues, And as usual, we're gonna start a quarterback and I'm gonna go back to CJ. Stroud. Now, I'm not necessarily in love with his matchup this week against Pittsburgh. The Texans have their fair share of offensive line issues right now, and Pittsburgh is not Jacksonville, the Jags Stroud's opponent last week. They've been the twenty sixth ranked team in pressure rate this year. Defensively, Pittsburgh ranks eleventh. Even still, the Steelers are a bottom half team and passing EPA allowed per drop back to start the year, and they've been completely average and adjusted Fantasy points allowed. It's a tough week for quarterback streamers, and that's also partially elevating Stroud. Here another streamer I like Jimy Garoppolo. Now, he is in concussion protocol right now as I say this, so he might not go this week. But if he does go, you have to like this spot against the Chargers. That game has a better total than the alf wour mentioned Steelers Texans game, and the Chargers are top five teams so far this year and adjusted Fantasy points allowed to quarterbacks on top of that, like I said in the ten Trends episode, Jimmy g is kind of airing it out. He's top five in air yards per attempt and he has the second highest rate of throwing at fifteen plus air yards, so you can play him as a streamer if he ends up going. Now, moving on to running back, I'm going to assume that Devon a Chan, which is what he wants to go by now that he's not available in your league, so I'm gonna skip over him. You're most likely playing him if you have him. I'm gonna kick things off here though, with Roshan Johnson, the gap between Roshan and Khalil Herbert it shrunk a little bit last week on the snap share front. Rochan played forty five percent in Chicago snaps. Herbert was at fifty five percent the week prior. There was a nineteen percent difference. Chicago might be able to move the ball this week against Denver because everyone's been able to move the ball against Denver. The Broncos are currently the worst team in football against running backs and adjusted fantasy points allowed. We saw what Miami did to them last week, and they've allowed the third highest adjusted target share to running backs. That's how the Bears deploy Roshan Johnson, so there's a chance that he has an okay outing now. I do think that Matt Brida is a much safer play and better play than Roshan Johnson as long as Saquon Barkley's out breed against Seattle. Seattle's the eighth best matchup for running backs so far this year and adjusted fantasy points allowed. More importantly than the matchup, though, is Breda's usage. The Giants offense had a really hard time last week doing anything offensively against San Francisco, but Breda played the most snaps in that backfield by far. He had an eighty two percent snap share. In a much better matchup, he could get it done in Week four, and speaking of that game, in Week three, we saw decent Elijah Mitchell usage in a positive game script for the forty nine ers. Mitchell finished the day with a thirty three percent running back rush air in a nine percent target shair. There's nothing wrong with that when you're looking for guys off the waiver wire to play, especially in a good offense. This week, the forty nine Ers get the Cardinals. Arizona's been playing better than expected, yes, but San Francisco is a fourteen point favorite. That's according to Fandels Sportsbook. They may end up riding their backups more than usual in a game like this, and that would favor Elijah Mitchell At wide receiver, Tank Dell is still under that fifty percent mark. He's an easy go to this week. He saw an uptick and snap so over the last two weeks with Noah Brown's injury and Noah Brown is not getting that job back. Dell has given us two top twenty performances in PPR League so far this year, and he's seen a twenty three percent and twenty four percent target chair over his last two games. Now he gets Pittsburgh, a top five advantageous matchup when it comes to schedule dusted Fantasy points allowed to wide receivers, so Dell is a solid play in Week four. Both Chargers wide receivers I'm talking about Josh Palmer and Quentin Johnston. They're under that fifty percent mark still, at least at the time of this recording. I'm sure those numbers will jump up a little bit, but regardless, they make for fine enough plays against Vegas. I'm expecting Josh Palmer to be on the field more than Quentin Johnston because that's what we've seen so far this season, So Palmer makes a lot more sense than QJ here in Week four, but they get the Raiders. Vegas has been okay against wideouts this year, but it's a beatable secondary. A huge reason they've been fined in fantasy points against is because they rank dead last or first, depending on how you want to look at it, and adjusted target share allowed to wide outs. Teams have not been targeting their wide receivers that frequently against the Raiders. Now that may not change those numbers are adjusted for opponent. We might see this Chargers team not target their wide receivers as heavily, but right now, now the Chargers have the second highest wide receiver target chare in the league. They're still going to attack the perimeter. They're still going to use their wide receivers, and that's going to be helpful for both Josh Palmer and Quinton Johnston. Like I said, I would play Palmer over Johnston, but if you're in a pinch, I understand going with Johnston. DJ Shark is coming off a game where he saw nineteen percent of Carolina his targets, scoring eighteen point six PPR points. And let's just be honest for a second right now. Today, at this moment, Andy Dalton is better for this team's fantasy production than Bryce Young today. Chark and the Panthers get the Vikings this week. They've been the third best opponent so far this year in adjusted fantasy points allowed to wide receivers, and they entered the season with a poorly ranked secondary. Now I would be playing Adam Thielen over DJ Shark, but I do think he's viable after playing more snaps than any other Panthers wide out in Week three. The Tennessee Titans do not have a good pass defense. They're first in air yards per attempt allowed. They're a bottom ten team at defending the pass according to EPA per dropback. They've had decent success at getting to the quarterback, but they've been much better against the run than the pass. They're actually fourth in the league and rushing yards over expected per rush allowed. They've been good against the run, but they're not so good against the pass. Teams against Tennessee are likely to find success through the air. Cleveland found success in Week three, the Chargers did in Week two. Derek Carr in Week one had over three hundred yards. Now it's the Bengals. I don't usually love Tyler Boyd in fantasy football, and I don't think that he's some smash play, but he does have his seventeen percent target chair on the season and he's run a route on at least eighty six percent of Joe Burrow's dropbacks in every single game. Tennessee has been pretty average against the slot this season, but overall this matchup, it's good for the Bengals passing attack. Now, moving on, let's look at some tight ends. I love Luke Musgrave this week. As I mentioned, he's been top six in route participation in this season at tight end and he's top fifteen in target share as a rookie tight end. The Packers get the Lions this week, and Detroit's been a top five matchup for tight end so far this year and adjustin fantasy points allowed, Luke Musgrave makes a ton of sense, and then I think Gerald Everett makes sense as a streamer too. I know Donald Parham has been stealing some touchdowns, but Everett's been the one who's seen higher route participation each week this season. There's no Mike Williams for the Chargers anymore. That could lead to more tight end usage in that passing game. Everett has a ten point two percent target share on the season. That's not anything special, but the matchup is at least there against Vegas. I prefer Luke Musgrave, but I do think that Everett makes sense as a deeper play. This section of the show features players rostered in fewer than ten percent of leagues, so we're digging pretty deep. I've got a quarterback to call out first. It's Andy Dalton. That's how deep we're digging. And this is assuming that Bryce Young doesn't go. Of course, that's not one hundred percent certain at all at the time of this recording. But Dalton looked competent last week, and he was actually not a bad quarterback last season. He wasn't some fantasy football stud but PFF actually gave Dalton a top six passing grade last year. He was able to support Panthers pass catchers last week, and he's in an even better spot this week against Minnesota. The Vikings have struggled against opposing quarterbacks and fantasy to start the year, giving up the six most adjusted points of the position. So you could do worse than Andy Dalton this week if he does indeed start now fighting running backs in the less than ten percent range this week absolutely brutal, so tough. I'm gonna go with Latavius Murray here, but I'm not saying that with a lot of confidence. This is really just playing on the fact that Murray has seen a twenty one percent and twenty five percent route participation over the last two weeks. He clearly has an edge over Damien Harris, and this game against my it's interesting because it could be high scoring. Now, I like James Cook, but Latavius Murray leads that Bill's backfield with four goal line rushes this year, so maybe he's able to fall into the end zone within this good environment this weekend. At wide receiver Darius Slayton, He's kind of in an interesting spot this week. He's run by far the most routes for the Giants to start the season, and he's seen a respectable eighteen percent target chair. The Giants really haven't gotten things going offensively, though, but I don't think that's all that surprising when in Week one they faced the Cowboys. In Week three it was the forty nine Ers. This week it's Seattle. The Seahawks have allowed the most air yards in the league to start the season. They're bottom five and expected points added per drop back aloud. That's resulted in them being the best matchup for wide receivers right now and adjustin fantasy points allowed. I wish that I could recommend Wandel Robinson. You just can't play him right now after running just eight routes last week, so I'll play it safe and go Darius Slayton. Another veteran that you could look at is Curtis Samuel. Samuels played seventy two percent of his snaps from the slot to start the year while running the third most routes for the Commanders, obviously behind Johan Dotson and Terry McLaurin. He probably won't be on the field in many two wide sets, but the Commanders could end up trailing big this weekend because they get a good Philadelphia team The Eagles are eight and a half point favorites. A corny Fandals sportsbook Philly also sees their targets against them get funneled to the slot at a higher than normal rate. They were one of the top teams in football last year and slot target percentage allowed, and they're already second this season. That could bode well for someone like Curtis Samuel in a negative game script. Now, Samuel's only seen a thirteen percent target show this year. This is definitely a deep play, but I think it's logical given the matchup, and then at tight end, the options in this tier are horrible. I'm just gonna throw Cadotten out there because he's twelfth in the league in route participation to start the season and his target share is okay at twelve and a half percent. I don't feel great about the matchup because New Orleans has been good against the position in recent years, but that's where we're at with these bottom of the barrel tight ends. People have caught on and the players like Luke Musgrave or Rostered in too many leagues to be recommended here now quickly for streaming defenses. I think Denver's in play against justin Fields and the Bears. It's obviously a risky year play, but I do think it makes sense on the year. Defenses against Chicago are scoring five point six more standard points than they typically score. Seattle against the New York Giants they work too. I don't think they're a smash play, but the Seahawks, for as bad as that secondary has been, they've been top half in the league in pressure rate, and the Giants have been a good matchup and ad justin fantasy points allowed. And then you could also try to take advantage of Jamis Winston starting for the Saints and go with the Bucks. That game is an ugly forty and a half point over under and the Bucks are only three point underdogs. Bay's defense has been fairly average to start the year, but the matchup is okay enough to use them here in Week four. 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 podcast can be found, and don't forget to follow me on Twitter at Late Round QB. And remember to check out the Late Round Fantasy Football Instagram account at Late Round FF. Thanks for listening everyone, I'll talk to you tomorrow with the Mailbag Show and a new Late Round Perspectives episode.