You guys have a ton of articles.
This statement about Footballguys is a blessing but it can feel like a curse. Our staff delivers insights that change seasons for the better yet realistically, no fantasy owner has the time to read everything we publish in a week.
If this describes you, let me be your scout. Here are five insights from Footballguys articles that I find compelling for the weekend ahead. I'll share what should help you this week, touch on the long-term outlook, and sometimes offer a counterargument.
1. Sean Settle's IDP Sleepers
Sean highlights weekly and long-term speculative additions who could help you in your IDP leagues. Here are a few from his article this week:
Matthew Ioannidis DE (WAS):
Similar to Bostic mentioned above, Ioannidis is a good defender on a bad defense. He has averaged 77% of defensive snaps so far this season and is in the middle of his most productive season yet. Ioannidis was constantly in the face of Kirk Cousins last week and will be taking on a Bills offensive line that has allowed 10.5 sacks to opposing defensive linemen.
Morgan Burnett S (CLE):
There is not a lot going right for Cleveland right now. Damarious Randall was inactive due to injury and Burnett slid in and had his most productive week of the season with 6 solos and 2 assists. If Randall is out again this week, look for Burnett to put up solid numbers out of the strong safety spot.
Deandre Baker CB (NYG):
The Cowboys have allowed the most tackles to opposing corners so far this season and that makes Baker an appealing option for leagues that require a corner. He has had 15 solos and an assist in his last 3 games and could easily project out to 7 or 8 tackles again this week. If you need a corner this week, look towards the Giants in a plus matchup against the Cowboys.
Matt Milano LB (BUF):
After missing week 7 and then being limited in practice all week, Milano suited up and had a great game with 13 total tackles last week against Philadelphia. We recommended grabbing his backup last week, and it backfired when Milano played 100% of defensive snaps. Buffalo takes on a Washington offense that has been all over the board and will be tough to predict with Dwayne Haskins starting. Milano is a starter this week and for the rest of the season.
Matt's Thoughts: Milano is a terrific addition if you're in need. If not, I still recommend adding him in larger formats as a luxury pick for depth down the stretch. Settle's rationale for Ioannidis is strong. Baker has always been a solid tackler and the veteran Burnett will likely be involved in a lot of plays this weekend.
2. Scott Bischoff's STarting STacks
Each week Scott examines every NFL game to identify stackable players to maximize value in GPP play at FanDuel and DraftKings. He examines the spreads and totals for each game as well as the implied totals for each team and blends that with the likeliest script that these games will follow. Here are a pair of stacks I like:
FanDuel: Carr ($7,300) + Waller ($6,800) = $14,100
DraftKings: Carr ($5,500) + Waller ($6,300) = $11,800
Facing the No. 22 ranked DVOA pass defense and the No. 32 ranked pass defense allowing 289.7 yards per game
Game Total - 50.5
Implied Totals - Raiders at 26 points and Lions at 24 points
Game Line - Oakland Raiders -2
The Oakland Raiders are at home versus the Detroit Lions in Week 9, and they are a two-point home favorite in this matchup. This game has the second-highest total of the week (50.5), and the implied number for the Raiders has them nearing four scores (26). The Raiders have the opportunity to put up big numbers against a struggling Lions defense this week.
Carr has been up and down in 2019, but he has played exceptionally well in the past two weeks since the Raiders Week 6 bye. He has thrown for 578 yards and five touchdowns, and only one interception in those two games. He should stay hot in Week 9 against a team struggling to defend the pass.
The Lions have given up 14 scores through the air which are sixth-most in the NFL. They have given up 31 passing plays of 20-plus yards which are seventh-most in the NFL. They have allowed six plays of 40-plus yards which are eighth-most in the league.
The Lions are not built to generate pressure on the quarterback in a traditional sense as they do not have a dangerous pass rusher. They bring pressure through scheme, confusion, and blitzing at times. They have generated 13 sacks in 2019, and only five teams in the NFL have fewer sacks in 2019.
Waller has emerged as an essential weapon in the Raiders passing game. Waller has scored three times in the past two games, and he has 16 targets over that span, catching nine passes for 137 yards. The script is incredibly positive for the Raiders passing attack, and Waller should be able to exploit this matchup in a significant way.
Pivot: Wide receiver Tyrell Williams ($6,300 at FanDuel and $5,900 at DraftKings) is a big-play threat, but he is dealing with a foot injury that limited his availability in practice Wednesday. The matchup is excellent, and he can exploit this matchup if he can play without limitation. Monitor his status throughout the week.
RB/DST Stacks
Le'Veon Bell + Jets Defense
FanDuel: Bell ($7,000) + Jets ($4,600) = $11,600
DraftKings: Bell ($7,700) + Jets ($3,500) = $11,200
Facing the No. 31 ranked DVOA rush defense and the No. 31 ranked run defense allowing 160.4 yards per game
Game Total - 41.5
Implied Totals - Jets at 22 points and Dolphins at 19 points
Game Line - New York Jets -3
The New York Jets are on the road versus the Miami Dolphins on Sunday for a Week 9 AFC East matchup. The Jets are a three-point road favorite, and they should be able to take advantage of the Dolphins defense in a variety of ways on Sunday. They will be able to run the ball if they choose to do so.
Only one team in the NFL defends more runs on a per-game basis (33.3) than the Dolphins, and opposing runners are generating production through the amount of volume they are getting. The Dolphins allow a 4.8-yard average, and only four teams across the league allow a higher average.
The Dolphins have allowed eight scores in the ground which are third-most in the NFL. They have also yielded two runs of 40-plus yards which are third-most in the NFL. Bell can do damage to the Dolphins defense while running the ball on Sunday.
The Jets have struggled to generate pressure to this point in 2019, but they get a Dolphins offensive line that has surrendered the fourth-most sacks (28) in the NFL. The Jets are a stout run defense allowing a 3.3-yard average which is second-fewest in the NFL. They are going to force the Dolphins to throw the ball, and they will generate production through volume.
It is conceivable to see the Jets up and utilizing the running game to grind out the clock while forcing the Dolphins to throw the ball to hang in this contest. That means great things for this stack, and it has a chance to shine on Sunday, making it an excellent option for GPP play in Week 9.
Matt's Thoughts: Even if Waller's first-half production will command more attention to him from opposing defenses, the Raiders use him in-line, the slot, wide, and at a variety of route types. He's a great option and Carr has earned the protection he needs to deliver production. See more of my thoughts on the Raiders below.
The Jets lose Leonard Williams but Miami is a mess and Darnold rebounded somewhat from the pre-Halloween spookfest against the Patriots with a two-touchdown (and three-interception) performance against the Jaguars last weekend. Miami is absolutely a get-well game for the Jets offense and with Bell meeting with Adam Gase because he was displeased with his low-touch count the week before, look for Bell to deliver this weekend.
3. Jeff Haseley's FAntasy Overview TAckles Favorable Schedules
This week's Fantasy Overview gets down to business with a look at the teams with the best stretch-run schedules for the remainder of the fantasy season. He splits these up by position and shares his thoughts on the players most likely to benefit from them. Here's one that I find most compelling:
QUARTERBACK
Over the last four weeks, Oakland, Houston, Detroit, Tampa Bay, and Atlanta have averaged at least three passing touchdowns allowed per game. All except for Tampa Bay are also allowing over 300 yards passing per game.
Oakland: DET, LAC, CIN, at NYJ, at KC
Who stands to benefit: Matthew Stafford Week 9, Philip Rivers Week 10, Ryan Finley Week 11, Sam Darnold Week 12, Patrick Mahomes II II Week 13
Matt's Thoughts: Oakland's offense is a lot better than last year, thanks to the additions of Richie Incognito, Trent, Brown, Darren Waller, Josh Jacobs, and Tyrell Williams. This unit has allowed Jon Gruden to maximize Derek Carr's skill at pre-snap reads and accuracy when protected. Yes, Carr is among the leaders in quarterback rating against the blitz, but blitz and pressure are two different things. Carr isn't feeling the effects of pressure the has in years past.
The offense's rise is helping Oakland stay in games while the back-seven of its defense continues its rebuild. Game scripts should be beneficial for all quarterbacks facing Oakland and we know that Finley and Darnold will be available on some waiver wires down the stretch if you get desperate.
4. Ryan Zamichieli's Sharp Report: Nick Chubb
Zamichieli profiles the top DFS player selections from the week that was as well as the coming weekend. This week, Zamichieli has the crosshairs on Browns running back Nick Chubb:
In week 9, the Cleveland Browns head to Denver to take on the floundering 2-6 Broncos. The Broncos will be led by Brandon Allen, the team's backup quarterback, after the original starter, Joe Flacco, went down with a back injury. Thanks to the change under center, the Browns enter this game as over three-point favorites in the game, which typically leads to a run-heavy offensive attack. Chubb is one of the most talented and most used running backs in the NFL, with at least 20 touches in 6 out of 7 games this season.
So far this season, Chubb averages an impressive 5.5 yards-per-carry on the season, and a matchup against Denver's middling run defense is unlikely to provide much resistance next weekend. DraftKings finally made significant adjustments to player prices at the running back position this week, with Christian McCaffrey reaching the $10,000-mark and Dalvin Cook close behind at $9,500. Both of those top-end running backs are true bell-cow running backs for their respective teams, and in close games, like this game is projected to be for the Cleveland Browns, Nick Chubb joins that list of heavily-utilized running backs.
At just $7,300, Chubb offer significant savings relative to the other top-priced running backs, and he has proven capable of producing impressive rushing numbers against almost any defense in the NFL. Last weekend, Chubb ran for over 130 yards on the New England Patriots' top-ranked run defense, and aside from his two uncharacteristic fumbles, he posted one of the most impressive rushing days of his young career. Expect the Browns to turn to Chubb early and often as they look to go on the road and secure a much-needed victory against a struggling Denver Broncos team hampered by injuries all over the field on both sides of the ball.
Matt's Thoughts: I enjoy Ryan's feature because he shows his previous sharp picks and the amount of value delivered to the expected cost. So far, Ryan hasn't had a pick deliver below his expected value and there are seven players that delivered at least 1.5 times their expected value. Five of those picks were on fewer than 50 percent of the rosters in GIANT formats.
Pretty cool.
I am concerned that the Cleveland Browns coach staff doesn't know how to fix this offense. It has behaved as if 2,000-yard talent Chubb (you read that right) is an 800-yard J.A.G. staff hasn't realized that placing Baker Mayfield under center actually helps the offensive line begin its blocks from run sets and generate a better push while also helping Mayfield execute play-action and quick-hitting plays with greater efficiency.
The effort to run the ball against New England is a good sign that Cleveland is conceptually getting its head together about its offense. Despite these concerns, Chubb remains a strong RB1, so whenever you can get him at a discount in DFS, you give him a shot.
5. Adam Harstad's Regression Alert: Yards Per Target
Harstad's weekly column is a good place to go if you want to learn something about fantasy football data and how to best apply it:
For those who are new to the feature, here's the deal: every week, I dive into the topic of regression to the mean. Sometimes, I'll explain what it really is, why you hear so much about it, and how you can harness its power for yourself. Sometimes I'll give some practical examples of regression at work.
In weeks where I'm giving practical examples, I will select a metric to focus on. I'll rank all players in the league according to that metric, and separate the top players into Group A and the bottom players into Group B. I will verify that the players in Group A have outscored the players in Group B to that point in the season. And then I will predict that, by the magic of regression, Group B will outscore Group A going forward.
Crucially, I don't get to pick my samples, (other than choosing which metric to focus on). If the metric I'm focusing on is yards per target, and Antonio Brown is one of the high outliers in yards per target, then Antonio Brown goes into Group A and may the fantasy gods show mercy on my predictions. On a case-by-case basis, it's easy to find reasons why any given player is going to buck the trend and sustain production. So I constrain myself and remove my ability to rationalize on a case-by-case basis.
Most importantly, because predictions mean nothing without accountability, I track the results of my predictions over the course of the season and highlight when they prove correct and also when they prove incorrect. Here's a list of all my predictions from last year and how they fared. Here's a similar list from 2017.
This week, Adam broaches yards per target, delivering a worthwhile explanation of what it is and what it isn't:
...people think of yards per target as an efficiency stat. Yards, they believe, measure a receiver's production, while targets measure his opportunity, so yards per target is simply a receiver's production per unit of opportunity.
But a target is not the unit of opportunity for receivers. A route is the unit of opportunity. If five receivers run a route on a given play and the quarterback throws to one of them only to have the ball fall incomplete, the player who earned the target probably played the best of those five receivers. He either got the most open, or if nobody got open then he was the guy the quarterback most trusted to make a play despite being covered. When we calculate yards per target, however, an incomplete pass goes down as a negative for the targeted receiver and as nothing at all for the other receivers.
Adam also illustrates why the location of the receiver's target s has a massive influence on the statistic:
The other major problem with yards per target is that it is very strongly influenced by where the receiver is being targeted. Quarterbacks complete roughly 60% of passes when targeting a receiver 10 yards down the field. Ignoring yards after the catch, 10 yards * 60% completion rate would give us an average of six yards per target. Quarterbacks complete about 45% of passes when targeting a receiver 20 yards down the field. Ignoring yards after the catch again, 10 yards * 45% completion rate would give us an average of nine yards per target.
The deeper down the field quarterbacks are throwing, the more yards per target they average. You see a bit of this variation in yards per attempt (which is just yards per target from the quarterback's perspective), which is slightly biased in favor of deep passers. But ultimately NFL quarterbacks have to throw the ball all over the field to keep the defense honest, so the variation in how deep quarterbacks throw is relatively small.
But wide receivers don't need to run routes all over the field. Instead, you frequently see specialists who are primarily running deep routes, and other specialists who are primarily running short routes, and even if both players are exactly as good the former will average many more yards per target than the latter just because of the structural bias in the statistic.
Indeed, if we know a player's average depth of target (or aDoT) we can predict next year's yards per target average better than if we instead knew this year's yard per target average. (Which is a pretty fantastic proof that yards per target does, in fact, regress to the mean.)
He then shares why yards per target doesn't regress like interception rate or yards per carry and that target depth (aDoT) is only part of the driver behind the statistic. As a result, he forms a conclusion that should generate a massive amount of respect from all of us when we consider the demand for simple answers in our media analysis:
Even if I adjust for depth, of the top 50 receivers in the NFL in terms of targets per game, 74% are *still* outperforming expected yards per target. Six receivers are averaging at least 6 targets per game and at least 2 more yards per target than expected: Stefon Diggs, Tyler Lockett, Amari Cooper, Chris Godwin, Michael Thomas, and Davante Adams. Six receivers are averaging at least 6 targets per game and at least 0.4 fewer yards per target than expected: Curtis Samuel, Robby Anderson, Auden Tate, Preston Williams, DeVante Parker, and Mike Williams.
Yeah, that first list is a much better group of receivers. It's not your imagination. Yards per target over expectation strongly correlates with player quality, which means the best players in yards per target over expectation are simply better players than the worst players in yards per target over expectation. So if I make a prediction that pits the best performers against the worst performers I'm predicting guys who probably genuinely do have lower "true performance levels" to outperform guys who genuinely do have higher "true performance levels". Which isn't how regression to the mean works.
I think the three most valuable words a fantasy analyst can say are "I don't know", so that's what I'm going to say here. Yards per target regresses (again, remember, depth of target predicts yards per target better than yards per target predicts itself). But this column is set up to automatically generate a list of underperformers and pit them against a list of overperformers, and I simply don't know how to automatically generate such a list here. The adjustments that I've tried have still left me in a situation where all of the "overperformers" are actually just great players who aren't really overperforming at all.
...I'm not giving up on the statistic entirely. Maybe someday I'll come up with a satisfactory way to generate a list of overperformers and underperformers that doesn't just give me a list of good players and bad players. At the moment, though, I just wanted to be up-front about how I used to believe something (deviations from expected yards per target were largely noise), and now I know that I was wrong about that.
Matt's Thoughts: I value analysts who can explore something and conclude, "I don't know." You should, too, especially with someone who does the quality of work we've seen from Adam over the years. It engenders trust.
Good luck this week!
