Fantasy Football: The Things I Learned – Week 10, 2017

By Chet Gresham – @ChetGresham
Follow @walterfootball for updates.

Below, check out my fantasy-centered recaps of key players from this week’s contests. For instance, did a player come back to earth after an aberrant breakout, or were they simply affected by something like game flow?

Saints 47, Bills 10
Tyrod Taylor completed 9-of-18 passes for 56 yards and an interception. He could get nothing going against New Orleans’ defense and was pulled in the fourth quarter, as the Bills were getting blown out. He is still the starting quarterback, but another game like this and they could look to Nathan Peterman.

Kelvin Benjamin led the Bills in targets with six and in yards with 42. It’s not much, but he was also targeted in the red zone and looks like he’ll be the lead receiver moving forward.

The Saints’ running game absolutely destroyed the Bills, with Mark Ingram leading the way, as he rushed 21 times for 131 yards and a career-high three touchdowns. You’d think that wouldn’t leave all that much for Alvin Kamara, but that would not be true, as Kamara rushed 12 times for 106 yards and caught all five of his targets for 32 yards. These two are tearing the league apart right now, and a home game against Washington doesn’t feel like a matchup that will slow them down next week.

Drew Brees has now had two of his last three games end in zero touchdown passes. This week, he did get a rushing score, but he only put up 184 passing yards, as his team ran all over Buffalo. And since the Saints are winning, I doubt we see Brees go into pass-first mode anytime soon. It will take a big deficit to get him chucking the ball and right now, the Saints’ defense is playing too well.

Packers 23, Bears 16
Jordan Howard is the only fantasy option in Chicago right now, and he had a dud against the Packers, as he ran 15 times for 54 yards. Green Bay’s run defense remains solid, despite the offense not giving the defense much rest of late.

Dontrelle Inman played his first game as a Bear and tied for the lead in targets while catching 6-of-8 for 88 yards. It’s a promising start, but the Bears do not want to throw this much usually and Josh Bellamy and Kendall Wright were right up there with seven and eight targets themselves. I like Inman, but he’s likely fool’s gold in fantasy.

Brett Hundley can throw the ball, and he showed it this week, as he completed 18-of-25 throws for 212 yards and a touchdown, making a couple great throws to Davante Adams for a touchdown and a big-gainer. I don’t think Mike McCarthy is ever going to really let Hundley go, but it’s good to see the reins loosening a bit.

Both Aaron Jones and Ty Montgomery left this game with injuries and could miss next week. Jamaal Williams took over and rushed 20 times for 67 yards and caught one pass for seven yards. He’ll be worth a pick-up in most leagues, as the Packers are set on running the ball to keep Hundley from making too many mistakes.

Lions 38, Browns 24
DeShone Kizer had probably his best game of the year, as he completed 21-of-37 passes for 232 yards, a touchdown and an interception, plus added seven carries for 57 yards and another touchdown. It was good to see and keeps him on the streaming/DFS radar, but not next week against the Jaguars.

Isaiah Crowell had his second strong game of the year, and it came in back-to-back games. He rushed 16 times for 90 yards and a touchdown, and caught 1-of-2 targets for five yards. He scored his first touchdown of the season last week and now his second this week. He came on strong to end last season, so this could be another push from him.

Matthew Stafford completed 17-of-26 passes for 249 yards, three touchdowns and an interception, which looks especially great if you watched this game needing Stafford to play well and instead saw him sputter and get pressured often in the early going. He came on strong, however, like he often does, and put up his third game with three or more touchdown passes. Now in his last five games, he’s averaging 314.8 yards passing and has 10 total touchdown passes.

Golden Tate had another strong outing, catching 6-of-7 targets for 97 yards and a touchdown, but the biggest fantasy news might be the return of Kenny Golladay, who caught 2-of-3 passes for 64 yards as he played ahead of T.J. Jones. Golladay’s ability is apparent on the field, and I would be happy grabbing him of the wire now that he’s back.

Titans 24, Bengals 20
Andy Dalton completed 20-of-35 passes for 265 yards and two touchdowns, but continues to help slog this Cincinnati offense in the mud for the most part. This would have been one of Dalton’s better fantasy games of the year, but he lost two fumbles to hurt his overall numbers. He gets Denver next week, so stay away.

Brandon LaFell out-targeted A.J. Green 10-7 and had a strong game with six receptions for 95 yards and a touchdown, while Green caught five for 115 yards and a touchdown. Those target numbers should be flipped, but Dalton doesn’t seem to want to test the extra coverage Green sees from defenses.

Marcus Mariota completed 25-of-44 passes for 264 yards, a touchdown and an interception, while rushing six times for 51 yards. Those rushing yards are good to see, as it shows he is completely healthy, and he also needs them to be useful in fantasy more often than not.

Corey Davis led the Titans with 10 targets, catching four for 48 yards. Unfortunately, he almost had a touchdown, but fumbled before he got over the goal line. It appears he is going to be the Titans’ No. 1 receiver and should be due for a breakout game sooner than later

Steelers 20, Colts 17
Jacoby Brissett had a decent fantasy game based on two 60-plus-yard touchdown passes to Donte Moncrief and Chester Rogers. Brissett completed 14-of-24 passes for 222 yards, two touchdowns and an interception, but also suffered a concussion, despite being allowed to play the rest of the game. Thankfully, he’ll have the bye week to heal.

Ben Roethlisberger didn’t play that well, statistically, in a spot where he should have, but he did manage to throw two touchdowns in the second half to lead his team to the victory and save his fantasy day. He continues to miss deep targets, which is a big part of Pittsburgh’s offense.

Juju Smith-Schuster continues to play well and has probably been the Steelers’ MVP over the last two games. This week, he caught 5-of-7 targets for 97 yards and a touchdown, while Antonio Brown was held in check. It appears that if teams want to sell out to stop Brown, they are going to get hit hard by Smith-Schuster.

Buccaneers 15, Jets 10
Josh McCown came back to earth this week, as he completed 23-of-39 passes for 262 yards, one touchdown and one interception. He was unable to handle the Buccaneers’ pressure and took six sacks, despite the Bucs only having eight sacks on the season! McCown is always going to be a matchup fantasy play, and this week, he didn’t quite live up to the matchup.

Robby Anderson caught his fourth touchdown in as many games and finished the day with 4-of-7 receptions for 85 yards and the touchdown. His score came with just a minute left in the game and no real possibility of coming back, but garbage time is also fantasy time.

Bilal Powell was out-touched 12-11 by Elijah McGuire for some reason, which rendered both fairly useless in fantasy. It was a surprise to me, as I had Powell in many of my daily fantasy leagues. He has always performed well when getting the majority of the work, so this split still seems like an odd choice to me.

Ryan Fitzpatrick completed 17-of-34 passes for 187 yards, one touchdown and one interception. He was mostly awful, as he often is.

With Mike Evans out, DeSean Jackson led the way, catching 6-of-10 targets for 82 yards. Evans will be back next week though, which will hurt Jackson’s targets.

Vikings 38, Redskins 30
Kirk Cousins had a huge fantasy day due to two rushing touchdowns, which he augmented by completing 26-of-45 passes for 327 yards with a touchdown and an interception. He was playing from behind all day and never could catch up, but it did help his numbers, despite not playing all that well. He is a high-energy player who will push and push until the game is done, which does help his upside each week.

Rob Kelley had his leg rolled up and never returned. Samaje Perine took over as lead back, rushing nine times for 35 yards and catching one pass for 25 yards, but Kirk Cousins was the player getting the goal-line touchdowns and Perine needs those to have any real value.

Case Keenum completed 21-of-29 passes for 304 yards, four touchdowns and two interceptions. He carved up Washington’s defense and got out to a huge lead, but his interceptions allowed Washington to stay in the game. Keenum played well enough to hold onto the job of course, but Teddy Bridgewater does wait in the wings.

If Minnesota has a lead, we will see more Latavius Murray, and if Minnesota is trailing, we will see more Jerrick McKinnon. That’s what happened again this week, as Murray led the way as the Vikings built a big lead. He carried the ball 17 times for 68 yards and a touchdown, while McKinnon had 12 touches for 47 yards.

Jaguars 20, Chargers 17
Melvin Gordon had 21 touches for 42 yards, while Austin Ekeler had 15 touches for 119 yards and two touchdowns. Ekeler even was in to run the clock out with the lead, but he fumbled the ball, and ultimately that was the reason the Chargers lost. Gordon will stay the lead back, but he’ll need to step up against the Bills next week.

Blake Bortles completed 28-of-51 passes for 273 yards, one touchdown and two interceptions. Why Bortles threw the ball 51 times is hard to answer, as the biggest deficit Jacksonville had was three points. The Jaguars were passing so much late in the game that Leonard Fournette wasn’t even on the field. All that passing almost lost them the game, as Bortles threw both of his interceptions after the 2-minute warning.

Leonard Fournette rushed 17 times for just 33 yards and caught two passes for 13 yards. Of course, his inability to get anything going was part of the increased passing, but I’d rather have Fournette running than Bortles throwing the ball to the other team. Maybe Fournette’s month off from live-game action hurt him this week, but he’s still a top running back, who will continue to see good usage.

Rams 33, Texans 7
Tom Savage completed 18-of-36 passes for 221 yards, a touchdown and two interceptions, plus two lost fumbles. He’s not good, which everyone knows, but T.J. Yates is next in line. Yates isn’t going to do much better though. I do expect we see Yates, but it will just be more of the same.

DeAndre Hopkins caught 7-of-13 targets for 111 yards and continues to see highly focused targeting from Savage, especially late in this game when it was getting out of hand. It’s not a winning recipe for the Texans, but if you have Nuk on your fake team, it’s a pleasant surprise after they lost Deshaun Watson.

Jared Goff completed 25-of-37 passes for 355 yards and three touchdowns, as he dismantled Houston’s pass defense. He’s now had his best fantasy games in back-to-back weeks, and his momentum should help him moving forward even against tougher defenses, as the Rams are hitting on all cylinders.

Robert Woods was the biggest beneficiary of Goff this week, catching 8-of-10 targets for 171 yards and two touchdowns. This is after a two-touchdown game last week, which were Woods’ first touchdowns of the season. His 94-yard touchdown this week was of course the longest of his career and shows that he is not just a chain mover, as he’s seeing targets all over. And with Sammy Watkins still just seeing a target or three each week, Woods should continue to have the most upside in this receiving game.

Falcons 27, Cowboys 7
Dak Prescott completed 19-of-29 passes for 176 yards and was sacked eight times, six of them by Adrian Clayborn. Prescott did rush for 52 yards and a touchdown, but also lost a fumble. Ezekiel Elliott would have helped slow down the pass rush most likely, but the loss of All-Pro left tackle Tyron Smith probably had more to do with the constant disruption up front.

The post-Elliott Dallas backfield looks fairly set with Alfred Morris as the lead back and Rod Smith as the receiving back. Neither did much in this blowout, but both have upside in this offense and are worth rostering, while Morris is likely a weekly start.

Matt Ryan completed 22-of-29 passes for 215 yards, two touchdowns and an interception. Early in this game, it didn’t look like Ryan was going to get anything going, but he played well in the second half, hitting Austin Hooper and Justin Hardy for touchdowns. Ryan’s playing well right now, but just doesn’t have the explosive offense of last season.

Devonta Freeman left his game early with a concussion, which pushed Tevin Coleman to the forefront. Coleman rushed 20 times for 83 yards and a touchdown and caught his lone target for five yards. If he can’t get cleared for next week against Seattle, Coleman will be a must-start.

49ers 31, Giants 21
Eli Manning completed 28-of-37 passes for 273 yards and two touchdowns, but also lost a fumble. He played well for the most part, but facing the 49ers’ defense is always a “get right” spot. He’ll remain a strictly matchup-based fantasy play, but it does look like he’ll be able to keep Evan Engram and Sterling Shepard fantasy relevant.

Sterling Shepard caught 11-of-13 targets for 142 yards and looked good doing so. He will continue to lead the Giants in targets, which should keep him as a WR2 in fantasy moving forward.

C.J. Beathard completed 19-of-25 passes for 288 yards, two touchdowns and an interception, plus made two rushes for 18 yards and another touchdown. This is how bad the Giants’ defense is right now.

Beathard spread the ball around pretty well, which kept the individual numbers down, but Marquise Goodwin caught an 83-yard touchdown and continues to be a legitimate deep threat.

Carlos Hyde rushed 17 times for 98 yards, but did see just three targets, catching two for six yards. Hyde had only dropped below three receptions in a game one other time until this week, so I expect him to continue seeing good targets after the bye.

Patriots 41, Broncos 16
Brock Osweiler completed 18-of-33 passes for 221 yards, one touchdown and one interception. This line might have won a game against the Ravens, but it’s not getting the job done against a team with a real offense like the Patriots. This was as good a matchup as we can ask for, and he was unable to do anything in fantasy, so just keep moving along, nothing to see here.

Emmanuel Sanders looked healthy and good, as he caught 6-of-11 passes for 137 yards. Osweiler isn’t good enough to keep Sanders consistent, and neither is Paxton Lynch, but if this Denver defense continues to give up big points, the Broncos will at least have to target Sanders and Demaryius Thomas enough to make them viable.

Tom Brady completed 25-of-34 passes for 266 yards and three touchdowns. He was able to pick apart this defense with short passes all night, completing passes to nine different players. That of course hurts the upside of all of New England’s receivers, but keeps Brady as a top play at the age of 67.

Dion Lewis again led the way on the ground, getting 14 rushing attempts for 55 yards and a touchdown, but he saw no targets, which hurts his upside. He also returned a kick for a touchdown, which helps you in some leagues, but of course that’s not something you can count on happening very often. James White and Rex Burkhead also scored touchdowns, but through the air. We just have to realize that all three of these running back have value, but they’re not going to have consistently high value.

For more thoughts, check out Walt’s updated NFL Power Rankings, which will be posted Tuesday morning.

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