429: Week 6 Matchups

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Speaker 1: This is the Late Podcast with your host JJ Zacherretha y Jake zacherreson What's up everyone. It's JJ Zacharice and the editor in chief at FanDuel and at Number five dot com. And this is episode four hundred and twenty nine of the Late Round podcast, the many shows that are part of the FanDuel podcast network. Thanks for tuning in. Last week was pretty good on this matchup show. I did well with quarterback streamers. Running back was generally fine, and I hit on Marquise Brown, Darius Slayton, and Jamison Crowder. I didn't see the uptick and target share for t Y Hilton coming, but I'd say overall it was a pretty strong week, probably the best of the season. So hopefully we can continue into Week six now before digging in with the Kansas City Chiefs and Buffalo Bills set to face off on Monday night, Fandel's Sportsbook is giving you enhanced odds on the game. 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The way people are viewing quarterbacks this week seems to be on point. I don't really have any disagreements on the negative vent, so I figured i'd talk about a handful of fringe starters or quarterback streamers on today's show. The first is Kirk Cousins. He was pretty average last week, but a lot of that had to do with an unexpected first half where there wasn't that much scoring overall in the game, and that was against Seattle. The game against Atlanta this week has a fifty four and a half point over under, and in terms of adjusted Fantasy points allowed, no team has been friendlier to quarterbacks this year than the Atlanta Falcons. I do think Cousins should be fine in this matchup. There's some worry that we see another below expectation performance from the Falcons, but if they play to the level that we know that they can play at, that'll be good for Cousins because they'll have to keep up the pace. Minnesota won't just be able to be this run heavy team like they want to. You could also look to Ryan Fitzpatrick. I talked about Fitzmagic on yesterday's ten Trend Show, noting how he's been the QB three in Fantasy football since taking over his job again back in Week seven of last year. He's now had three straight QB one performances, and he gets the Jets defense this week. That's nothing special against the pass. Most importantly, though, Miami's got the fifth highest and fled team total on this week's slate, their implied total is twenty eight points. We don't see that often with Miami, so I would play Fitzpatrick pretty confidently. And then lastly, one of the fifteen transactions players from this week, there's Andy Dalton. That Dallas Arizona game has a fifty five point over under right now over on Fandel's sportsbook, and the Cowboys are just two and a half point underdogs. Arizona also ranks as the eighth most advantageous matchup according to my adjusted Fantasy points allowd numbers. And like I said on the show a couple of days ago, you're really trusting in the Dallas pass catchers to help Dalton here. It's not like Dalton's some scrub quarterback either. We've seen him finish as a QB one in fantasy football in the past. We've seen him elevate multiple players in his offense. Just because he's not Dak Prescott doesn't mean he's automatically bad. I do expect the Cowboys to be less pass heavy than they were with Dak under center on the season. In neutral game scripts, Dallas ranks eighth and pass rate, and they've been the most pass heavy team in overall ratio. Even still, Dalton is in play as a solid QB two or streamer this week. Miles Gaskin is not getting the love that he deserves in the fantasy community. This is a repeat from what I talked about yesterday, but he's seen about a seventy percent running back rush share per game over his last three to go along with about an eighteen percent target share over this time, and with Jordan Howard out this past week, he was the back who handled all of the work close to the end zone, and now he gets the jets A team ranking is the fourth best matchup to opposing running backs and adjusted fantasy points allowed. He's a locked in RB two, but he's not being ranked that way, and I really don't understand it. We've been waiting for the confidence to play cam Akers, and I think he's fine this week if you need a back, which a lot of you probably do because they're bye weeks, and let's be honest, the running back landscape is not very deep. It's not like it's easy to get production off of your waiver wire. Akers only saw a twenty eight percent running back rush share last week, but Sean McVeagh talked about him getting more touches this week, and it's a good matchup against a beat up forty nine Ers defense. You still have to go Henderson over Acres, But like I talked about on yesterday's show, running back production in fantasy can often be coaching driven, and it wouldn't surprise me if we see more work for Acres than we saw this past week, especially since he was effective on his limited touches. Adrian Peterson is most definitely in play too. He's seen about seventy five percent of Detroit's running back rushes over their last two games, and this week they're three and a half point favorites against the team that ranks is the second best matchup for running backs when looking at adjusted Fantasy points allowed to the position. And by the way, I keep bringing up adjusted fantasy points allowed, that's just schedule adjusted, so todjust for the matchups that these teams have faced. So I like Adrian Peterson in this spot. Now. I mentioned this last week, but the game didn't play so it didn't matter. But Rex Burkhead is a scary start. We've got Damien Harris as the early down guy there right now, and in the Patriots line game, James White came back and he had a twenty three percent target share. Rex Burkhead's target chhair went from thirteen percent to thirty six percent, all the way down to just three percent with James White back. So I'm not confident in Burkehead's projected workload at all. You may be considering him as a flex, but I think there's too much of a risk, and the same kind of goes for JK. Dobbins. I like Dobbins last week as a deeper play, and he was the RB thirty, so he was fine, but his peripherals are not very good. He's seen just seventeen percent of the team's running back rushes and seven and a half percent of the team's targets this year, and he hasn't come close to his thirty one percent running back rush yer that he saw all the way back in Week one, back when we had a lot more hope for JK. Dobbins here in twenty twenty, Baltimore also gets Philadelphia. That's a team that's been well above average against running backs this year. Really, what I'm saying here with both Burkehead and Dobbins is that if I'm going to target a running back, and a split backfield like this. Either the matchup has to be awesome like we saw last week with Dobbins, or he's got to be in line for a lot of targets, and Dobbin's target share isn't nearly high enough in a run heavy offense to justify playing him with confidence. A lot of people are ready to give up on Juju Smith Schuster. I've seen it all over Twitter, and I totally understand why. Trust me, He's been a sell on the fifteen Transaction Show this season for a reason, so I'm clearly there. His average at the target sucks and he's not making up for that with a high target share. But I do like him. This week, I really like him. Cleveland's been arguably the worst team against players coming out of the slot this season, ranking second and percentage of targets that have gone to that area of the field, first in yards allowed, first and touchdowns allowed, and first in receptions allowed to the slot. Meanwhile, Juju has continued to play that role for Pittsburgh. He's played eighty percent of his snaps from the slot this year, according to PFF. I've said all season long that people have been ranking Juju too high, but I think he's a good play this week. Don't be too discouraged by last week's performance. That's basically what I wanted to say. Laviskus Channauld has now seen his target share rise from fourteen points six percent in week three, to sixteen points seven percent in week four, and then to eighteen point two percent in week five. He's being utilized more in the passing game, which is great to see instead of him being used as sort of like a gadget player. And he gets Detroit this week. That game has a high over under and the Lions ranked ninth worst and adjusted fantasy points allowed to wide receivers, So I think Leaviska is a good play. Preston Williams saw his target share at eighteen and a half percent this past Sunday, the highest target share that we've seen from him since Week one, and that's good news. Like I've been saying all show, the Dolphins face the Jets this week, and the Jets have a very beatable defense. They've been below average against wide receivers, which makes Williams a deeper play given the target share that we saw from him last week. There's obviously some volatility there but I want pieces of this Miami offense. DJ Moore right now is being ranked inside the top twenty over on Fantasy pros. I'm less bolish than other rankers are. Chicago's been the second best team this year and justin fantasy points allowed to wide receivers. And even though Moore had that big play for a touchdown last week against Atlanta, he still only had a fourteen point three percent target share. He's now failed to reach a seventeen percent share in each of his last three games. That's scary. I know I've had more as a bye this year, but this is frightening. This is a little bit scary. Robbie Anderson has been the top receiver for them, There's no doubt that shouldn't be argued. And there are players that are ranked below more this week, like Justin Jefferson, for example, who I would play ahead of him. And then there's Terry McLaurin. Look, I love Terry McLaurin as a talent, but we know that his situation sucks. And what sucks even more is that he's gonna get James Bradbury this weekend. And Bradbury has been one of the better cornerbacks this year in terms of yards allowed per snap. According to Pro Football Focus, top wide receivers have not done a whole lot of against the Giants this year. Deontay Johnson was the wide receiver forty five against them in Week one, Alan Robinson the wide receiver seventy eight. Brandon Ayuk only finished in the top twenty because of a rushing touchdown. Robert Woods was the wide receiver forty seven, and Amari Cooper last week was the wide receiver eighty. James Bradberry is very, very good. I think that you still have to play McLaurin, but it's not as easy as a matchup as people might think. The tight end position continues to be very bad. Low end tight end ones in fantasy football are essentially guys who see like ten to twelve percent target shares each week. It's bad out there, so finding deeper plays is tough. But I've got two of them for you this week. One is a guy that I talked about on yesterday's show, and that's IRV Smith, the guy who I touted before the season started like an idiot. Smith saw his second highest target share of the season last week against Seattle. He ran more routes than Kyle Rudolph and he gets Atlanta this week, and Atlanta has been the absolute worst at defending tight ends this year in terms of adjusted Fantasy points allowed. It's a dart throw play, don't get me wrong, but hopefully this is the start of a positive trend for IRV. And then there's also Trey Burton. This is even deeper than IRV Smith. I don't love the idea of going to Burton because there was some talk this week that the Colts want to involve Moali Cox Moore, which they should. They absolutely should. You guys know that I'm a Moali Cox truther. But Burton ran twice as many routes as Mac this past week, and he's seen an eighteen percent and nineteen percent target share in his two games played this year, two games that he's played since returning from injury. The matchup is fine against Cincinnati, and the Colts have an implied team total above twenty seven, so he's in play as a streamer. I just wouldn't expect the world. I wouldn't expect the world from any non elite tight end at this point at defense. This week, I like the New York Giants, just like I talked about on the fifteen Transaction Show. They rank in the top half the league in pressure rate this year and Washington their opponent. They've been below average and pressure rate allowed, and they've also allowed the highest sack rate with a low over under The Giants are a good streamer, and you could even look at the opposite side of that game, that exact same game and go with Washington if you wanted to. Daniel Jones continues to be a turnover machine and the Giants are well well below average and pressure rate allowed, while we know Washington's defensive line can get to the quarterback, so feel free to use Washington too, And you can even go with the Miami Dolphins. I might as well just talk about the Dolphins at every single level of the podcast this week. Just going back to that pressure rate data, Miami's been slightly below average and pressure rate this year. We know their defense isn't that good, but the Jets are dead last and pressure rate allowed, so not sack rate allowed, but pressure rate allowed. With Joe Flacco under center again this week in Miami has double digit favorites, you can use the Dolphins defense that's gonna do it for today's show, though, thanks to all of you for listening. If you get subscribed to the Late Round podcast, make sure you are by searching for it pretty much anywhere podcasts can be found, and know afraid to follow me on Twitter at Late Round QB. Thanks everyone. One more show this week, the Mailbag episode that will drop tomorrow. I'll talk to you then,