Quarterback

Jackson is sure to be popular coming off his 324-yard, five-touchdown passing performance at Miami in Week 1. That said, the Dolphins are pretty clearly just unbelievably bad so that it’s difficult to really evaluate how far Jackson has come as a passer. What I do know is that if you had told me Jackson would have just three rushes for six yards last week and Mark Ingram would run for 100 yards and two touchdowns, there’s no way I would have played Jackson. Go figure.

Unsurprisingly, DraftKings has jumped the price tag up on Jackson this week, but I think we could be in for another 30+ fantasy day against Arizona. The Cardinals secondary looked awful at Detroit on Sunday, getting shredded by Matthew Stafford for 385 yards and three touchdowns, making it clear the absence of Patrick Peterson is going to be a huge issue. Clearly they tried to try to mask some of that concern by blitzing the, which led to Stafford seeing pressure on a Week 1 high 47.1% of his dropbacks. That’s not going to work against Lamar Jackson.

If Arizona looks to deploy a similar strategy this week then they’re going to have problems. As we saw, rookie Marquise “Hollywood” Brown has speed for days, and Mark Andrews is no slouch at the tight end position either. Remember, this is a Cardinals team that just got torched by T.J. Hockensen in his NFL debut. All of this doesn’t even take into account the fact that we haven’t seen Jackson do what he arguably does best—run. I’m not inclined to believe we see another big passing performance, but instead this profiles as a matchup where Jackson can show us the full range of his skills en route to a huge fantasy day.

Priced-down a few hundred dollars from last week, Goff is arguably in a better spot on Sunday against the Saints. Last season the Rams hooked up with New Orleans at the Superdome and Goff and Drew Brees combined for over 700 yards and seven touchdowns through the air. Fortunately, little has changed for these two teams on either side of the football.

As evidenced on Monday night, New Orleans secondary is still a mess. But the offense is loaded with Brees, Alvin Kamara, Michael Thomas and now a healthy Ted Ginn, not to mention newcomers Latavius Murray and Jared Cook so this game profiles as another track meet.

I’m a big fan of Goff coming in at a discount to Drew Brees, especially because New Orleans was much better against opposing rushing attacks last season than what we saw against Houston on Monday night. Add in a very in-flux running back position for the Rams and this is a game where Goff and the receivers should flourish.

Coming off a blowout loss to New England, the Steelers return home to face a Seattle team that escaped Week 1 with a win, but clearly has some issues in the secondary. Of late, the Seahawk defense has been living largely off reputation, and that was never more apparent than on Sunday when they surrendered 418 pass yards and two touchdowns to Andy Dalton and an A.J. Green-less group of wideouts.

While New England’s secondary is beginning to be recognized as one of the elite units in the NFL, the Seahawks are decidedly not. To a certain extent, this play hinges on a healthy JuJu Smith-Schuster, who is dealing with a toe injury. As long as he’s active and a full go on then Roethlisberger should have no trouble carving up the Seahawks. Without him, this receiving corps may not be up to the task.

Over the course of his career, Roethlisberger’s home-road splits are also well documented so it’s nice to see him getting back to Pittsburgh in a plus matchup with a non-conference foe. Keep an eye on Smith-Schuster’s status on Sunday. As long as he’s ready to roll then a sub-$6,000 Big Ben at home has the look of a steal.

It feels gross to be recommending Derek Carr, but we here we are in Week 2. There’s certainly plenty of risk here, but I’m hopeful he can be at least as competent as untested rookie Gardner Minshew was for Jacksonville coming off the bench in his NFL debut.

Carr actually looked pretty good on Monday night, which may wind up being more of an indictment of Denver’s defense than anything else, but that remains to be seen. What we can say for sure is that Kansas City is still planning to try to outscore everyone again this season because they certainly are stopping anybody. The Chiefs opened the season by allowing a combined 350 passing yards and three touchdowns to Minshew, Jags starting quarterback Nick Foles, and one of the most inexperienced receiving corps in the league. It’s a troubling start for a Kansas City team that fielded one of the worst secondaries in the NFL last season.

While Antonio Brown’s saga in Oakland finally came to an end last week, Carr and company showed no ill-effects in their road win at Denver. Tight end Darren Waller looks every bit as good as the reports we heard throughout the offseason and training camp, while Tyrell Williams gives Carr a downfield weapon he’s lacked in recent seasons, and rookie running back Josh Jacobs already looks like a legit three-down player. Perhaps most important here is the Raiders’ revamped offensive line, which unlike the past couple seasons, looks like it may be able to provide enough protection upfront to make pieces of this offense viable in good matchups. Few matchups could be better than this week.

Running Backs

Without participating in training camp or even a full week of preparation leading up to last week’s home opener against the Giants, Zeke still managed to rack up 64 yards and a touchdown on just 14 touches on Sunday before giving way to Tony Pollard in the second half of a blowout win.

This week Elliott should be all systems go on the road at Washington, a team he’s totaled eighty or more rushing yards and at least one touchdown against in four of his five career games. Now that Elliott got paid, this is going to be a spot where he shows everyone why. While I do have some faith in Washington’s defensive front, I have more in Elliott’s talent and the Dallas offensive line.

New offensive coordinator and play-caller, Kellen Moore, clearly designed much of last week’s game plan assuming a limited role for Elliott at best. And despite the second-half collapse at Philadelphia in Week 1, I expect the Redskins secondary to put up more of a fight than the Giants Swiss cheese unit did against Dak Prescott and company. Either way, Elliott is going to get his in this one and I doubt we see him at sub-$9000 on DraftKings for long.

Alvin Kamara ($8,200)

I’m not usually one for comps, but if there’s a player that compares favorably in his usage and play style to Christian McCaffrey, it’s Alvin Kamara. Because Kamara has the benefit of being surrounded by more established offensive weapons, his touches don’t often approach the gaudy level of McCaffrey’s. Still, he draws a matchup with the same Los Angeles Rams team that surrendered 209 total yards and two touchdowns on 29 touches (19 carries and 10 receptions) to CMC in Week 1.

Kamara got busy on Monday night himself against the Texans, turning 20 touches (13 carries and 7 receptions) into 169 totals yards in a back and forth contest, though he failed to find the end zone. That should change here, as the Saints visit the Rams on Sunday afternoon and will need to keep pace on offense. If we learned anything about the New Orleans defense in the opener, it’s that the secondary is still an issue. As noted with respect to Goff, I expect this game to go much the same way as last season’s shootout in New Orleans so loading up on Kamara feels super safe here.

I often worry about players coming off unexpectedly big games, as Ekeler is, but much as we discussed on the podcast last week, this is again going to be a matchup that favors his skill set.

I continue to believe that for as long as Melvin Gordon holds out, Justin Jackson will have a role in the running game. That didn’t play out last week, as a back and forth game with Indianapolis forced the Chargers into using Ekeler on 75% of their offensive snaps to just 25% for Jackson according to Lineups.com.

This week could be more of the same, as the matchup with Detroit isn’t ideal for Jackson against their stout defensive front. Most of David Johnson’s success against this team last week came on outside runs, as well as through the passing game. In my mind, that points to another Ekeler game unless Los Angeles can get up big in the early going.

An ugly opening day performance against Tampa Bay keeps Matt Breida’s price in check for another week, and the 49ers starting running back could see an expanded workload with Tevin Coleman lost to injury for at least a few weeks. As it is, Breida saw 15 carries and a target in Week1, although he did little with them, as two of San Francisco’s touchdowns came via the defense.

While the 49ers offense was lackluster in Week 1, they get another good matchup this week taking on the Cincinnati. While the Bengals held Seahawks running back Chris Carson somewhat in check last week, he still managed to find the end zone twice and added six receptions for 35 yards and a score to some subpar (15-46-1) rushing numbers. It’s not unreasonable to think Breida could put together a similar day here if San Francisco opts to rely heavily on him in Coleman’s absence.

Kudos to DFS Shark Tank co-host Mike Oliva, who had a $3,600 Singletary as a recommended GPP play on the podcast last week, correctly predicting that he was the back to own right from the start in Buffalo. The snap count told the same story, with Singletary seeing 70% of the Bills running back snaps to Frank Gore’s 28%, but strangely the two backs split the touches almost evenly. The production was anything but, as Gore posted just 20 rushing yards and zero receptions on 11 touches, while Singletary rushed four times for 70 yards and added five receptions for 28 yards through the air.

From a simple eye test perspective, Singletary adds a whole new dimension to the offense, and the hope here is that this what the Buffalo coaches envisioned when they let LeSean McCoy go. Despite this week being another road game, it marks the second week in a row the Bills will suit up at the Meadowlands, and they’ll look to go to 2-0 against the Giants. Keep in mind this team just got blown out in Dallas and surrendered 494 yards of offense and five touchdowns to the Cowboys. This could be Singletary’s coming out party, and he’s priced at just $4,200.

The minute Adrian Peterson was ruled inactive on Sunday morning, Thompson became a viable DFS play on DraftKings given the predicted game script that had Washington trailing for most of the afternoon. That took a while to develop though, as the Redskins jumped out to 17-0 lead to open the game before Carson Wentz and the Eagles made a comeback in the second half.

Ultimately, an injury to starting running back Derrius Guice and Washington’s second-half deficit had the team turning to Thompson out of the backfield. The passing downs work should shift even more significantly in this direction now that Guice has been ruled out and Peterson will be the starting running back this week. In his NFL debut, Guice was targeted three times and caught all three for 20 yards. As the starter last season, Peterson only saw 26 targets total across his 16 games.

I don’t expect we’ll see the Cowboys start flat the way the Eagles did in the first half of the opener. And despite Washington’s strong showing in that game, I continue to believe this will be one of the worst teams in the league and will likely struggle against Dallas this week. With that in mind, I’m expecting a second-half deficit that leads to heavy snaps and targets for Thompson at a bargain price.

Wide Receiver

Michael Thomas ($8,000)

In this matchup with Rams last season, Michael Thomas had the late back-breaking touchdown catch that put New Orleans in the driver’s seat and saw him post a massive 12 catches for 211 yards and a touchdown, on fifteen targets. He also picked up right where he left off the 2018 season, notching ten receptions for 123 yards in the opener as Drew Brees’ favorite target on Monday night.

Expect more of the same against the Rams in what has all the makings of a shootout in Los Angeles. In fairness, the Rams are healthier in the secondary than they were at any point last season, but it still won’t be enough to slow Thomas. In fact, the presence of a healthy Ted Ginn (he missed last season’s game) as a deep threat and Jared Cook at the tight end position should actually lead to less attention for Thomas in the secondary.

Yes, Drew Brees has some prolific home-road splits throughout his career and is working on a short week. Nonetheless, this is the type of game where he should lean heavily on his best play-making receiver and I expect a huge game from Thomas.

Originally I had JuJu Smith-Schuster here against a bad Seahawks secondary, but I do have concerns about his not being 100% so I’m recommending Watkins instead at a similar price. If we get more clarity on JuJu and the reports are positive, by all means, roll with him, especially in instances where you’re playing Roethlisberger at quarterback.

Back to Watkins, who absolutely WENT OFF in Week 1 against what was supposed to be a pretty good Jacksonville Jaguars secondary. Even more impressive was the fact that he basically torched both A.J. Bouye and Jalen Ramsey for touchdowns. It’s almost like we forgot that when healthy Sammy Watkins is a very good NFL receiver.

With the injury to Tyreek Hill, Watkins becomes the WR1 in Kansas City. And as good as he looked in Week 1, he should thrive in his second season playing in an Andy Reid offense and catching passes from Patrick Mahomes.

As a reminder, Watkins was the fourth overall pick for the Bills in 2014, and before the injuries really started taking their toll, he caught 125 passes for 2,029 yards and 15 touchdowns over his first two NFL seasons (29 games) in Buffalo. Perhaps more impressive is that he did it with some pretty marginal quarterback play as well. He faces an Oakland defense without a shutdown corner this week in a game with a 52 point Vegas projected total. With Hill out, he should be a lock for 100+ yards and a score.

In his return from last season’s torn ACL, Cooper Kupp looked far better than expected. Even more encouraging was the fact that he played on 90% of the Rams offensive snaps in Week 1 according to Lineups.com.

It’s no secret that the Saints secondary struggled to contain DeAndre Hopkins on Monday night, but to be honest, most secondaries do. But slot corner P.J. Williams graded out at just 46.6 in the opener according to Pro Football Focus and was in on nearly 80% of the snaps, including the Kenny Stills go-ahead touchdown that looked like it would be the game-winner. He’ll draw the difficult assignment of Cooper Kupp on Sunday, which is good for Kupp and bad for the Saints.

With the Rams in control for most of the afternoon at Carolina, Jared Goff only attempted four total red-zone passes according to Sharp Football. Inexplicably, two of them went to platoon tight end Tyler Higbee, with Robert Woods and Brandin Cooks splitting the other two.

That’s unlikely to be the case this week against New Orleans, as the Rams face a more formidable run defense and may not be able to pound the rock the way they did against the Panthers. But Kupp should have no problem shaking loose from Williams, and through the first two years of his career he’s drawn 34 red-zone targets in just 23 games. I’m calling for a big Cooper Kupp week.

Note: All three Rams wideouts are great GPP plays this week. Brandin Cooks should bounce back from a rough Week 1 against his former team and Robert Woods continues to be the steady weekly targets leader. My preference for Kupp here is purely my thinking that he has multi-touchdown upside and that he will likely be the lowest owned of the three.

Tyrell Williams ($4,400)

With Antonio Brown gone, we saw on Monday Night Football that Williams is now the WR1 in Oakland. That means he’s an absolute steal at his current price in favorable matchups. And Kansas City is certainly that.

Carr and the Raiders passing game should have to play catch-up against the Chiefs, or at the very least, keep pace with Mahomes and Kansas City’s high powered offense. It’s difficult to envision a game script that has Oakland throwing fewer than thirty-five times this week, and we saw Williams get targeted seven times in the opener, just one fewer than tight end Darren Waller, with Carr attempting just 26 passes.

Finally, Williams simply profiles well in this matchup. He’s similar from a tools perspective to D.J. Chark, who dropped a 4-146-1 stat line on the Chiefs in Week 1. A size-speed freak with the ability to win downfield, he’s the kind of player that can keep Oakland in this game with the type of splash plays the Raiders will need.

Prior to Week 1, McLaurin’s biggest accomplishment was showing enough this preseason to make Washington comfortable with releasing former first-round pick Josh Doctson. In reality, he probably still has a ways to go from a development perspective, but you can’t teach raw speed, and this kid has it.

The argument for McLaurin has less to do with last week’s production and more to do with his current situation. Jordan Reed was supposed to anchor the pass catchers in Washington, but has sustained yet another concussion and has no timetable to return. Second-year back Derrius Guice sustained a knee injury and also has no timetable for a return. The only real established veteran in the Washington receiving corps is Paul Richardson, and both McLaurin and second-year wideout Trey Quinn out-snapped him last week, playing 93% and 97% of the snaps respectively, to Richardson’s 78% and rookie Kelvin Harmon’s 22%. In short, there’s a serious commitment to the youth movement in Washington so these kids are going to play.

Against the Cowboys, the game script should be in McLaurin’s favor and he’s clearly the big-play threat in this offense. I don’t think he’ll come up with another line like last week’s, but I do think he can get on top of a $3,800 price tag relatively easily if he is, in fact, the Redskins WR1.

Call it a wish or maybe just a hope, but the Steelers really need to pull the plug on the Donte Moncrief experiment and make Washington their WR2 going forward.

Both players failed to impress in Week 1 against the Patriots, but Washington pretty clearly looked like the better player. Despite appearing to run out of bounds on what could have been a touchdown opportunity, his 45-yard catch was the Steelers’ biggest offensive play on an otherwise forgettable night.

Pittsburgh faces a Seattle secondary that just allowed 158 yards and two touchdowns to John Ross in their home opener. Playing at home this week I think Washington can come up with a big play or two against the Seahawk corners at a bargain-basement price.

Tight End

Unsurprisingly, Kelce is still the most expensive tight end on the board this week because he’s still the best tight end in football. Despite hardly being needed in a Week 1 victory at Jacksonville due to the Sammy Watkins heroics, Kelce still managed three catches for 88 yards and would have had a score if Mahomes hadn’t tried a goofy look away throw to a wide-open Kelce in the end zone and completely missed him.

With Tyreek Hill out, Kelce is the top option in the Kansas City offense. He’s pricey, but his targets should be all but guaranteed in Hill’s absence. Kelce also faces a Raiders team that allowed the fifth-most fantasy points (PPR scoring) to the tight end position last season per FantasyData.com and didn’t exactly upgrade that coverage unit with the addition of Vontaze Burfict and Brandon Marshall. Kelce should feast here.

The hype for Andrews was high this summer, as most reports had him pegged as Lamar Jackson’s top target for this season. Then, “Hollywood” Brown came out and caught two bombs for touchdowns to start off Week 1 and suddenly Andrews eight catch, 108-yard, one-touchdown performance went somewhat overlooked.

This week Andrews will face an Arizona Cardinals defense that just surrendered 131 yards and a touchdown to rookie tight end T.J. Hockenson in his NFL debut. While historically the Cardinals have defended the tight end position well, this team looked awful in coverage across the board in Week 1. They’re also going to face a whole new dimension in Jackson’s running ability this week, which is likely to open things up for Andrews underneath. He makes a nice pivot off of Brown, who’s massive Week 1 performance threatens to see him go over-owned in Week 2.

Darren Waller ($3,300)

Waller led the Raiders in targets on Monday night with eight, catching seven of them for 70 yards, and prompting John Gruden called him “special.”

Special or not, he’s clearly going to be one of the focal points of the Oakland offense now, and he’s a size-speed nightmare for defenses to contend with. Whether on the outside or over the middle, he routinely ran by Bronco defenders and helped open up deep routes for Tyrell Williams.

I expect the Raiders to continue to utilize him heavily in their passing attack again this week, and the matchup couldn’t be better. Only the Texans allowed more fantasy points per game (PPR scoring) to tight ends last season, and Waller sits at the same $3300 price tag as he did going into Monday night. It’s an absolute smash spot for him this week.

T.J. Hockenson ($3,000)

This is not necessarily a good matchup, as the Chargers did a solid job of shutting down Eric Ebron and Jack Doyle last week, and have actually defended the tight end position quite well dating back to last season.

In Week 1 T.J. Hockenson was $3100 going into his NFL debut against the Arizona Cardinals at home. In that debut, he was targeted nine times by Matthew Stafford and caught six passes for 131 yards and a touchdown, good for 28.1 DraftKings points.

In Week 2 T.J. Hockenson’s price has been adjusted…down…to $3000. Yes, he’s a tight end, but he’s likely the best $3000 play on the slate, matchup be damned.

Defense

Houston Texans ($2,800)

The Texans are my top defense this week in all formats, drawing a matchup against Jaguars quarterback Gardner Minshew in his first NFL start. While Minshew looked good in relief of Nick Foles last week, he’s still a rookie NFL quarterback playing in his first road game.

Minshew also benefitted last week from facing the Kansas City Chiefs, who very well may have the NFL’s worst secondary. This week won’t be so easy, as J.J. Watt and company will be in Minshew’s face on a regular basis and the Houston secondary will be out to prove that their Monday night collapse against Drew Brees was not indicative of who they are.

I don’t actually hate the Minshew as a tournament play this week, but there are sure to be ugly moments on Sunday. The hope is that Houston can capitalize on the turnovers and potentially generate a defensive score.

Denver Broncos ($2,700)

Denver had to be a bit embarrassed about their Monday Night Football performance, as division rival Oakland came in and mostly dominated the football game from the jump. Still, this pick has less to do with Denver’s defense and more to do with another embarrassing performance in Week 1—this one by Chicago Bears quarterback Mitchell Trubisky.

Despite playing at home in the opener, Trubisky looked flat out awful against the Packers on Thursday night. He wasn’t helped by head coach Matt Nagy’s play-calling, but to be honest he missed plenty of reads all on his own. With that in mind, the idea of heading to Denver to face a Broncos team coming off a bad division loss should be concerning.

Bears fans are hopeful there’s a better version of Trubisky, and that he’s slated to show up in Week 2 after watching Derek Carr and the Raiders dismantle Denver on Monday night. In reality, I think it could be that despite being surrounded by plenty of talent, the former first-round pick simply isn’t a starting-caliber NFL quarterback.

Good luck this week!

The views expressed above are my own personal takes on the games and strategies I’ve highlighted and I may sometimes play on the platforms and in the games on which I offer advice. With that in mind, please note that I also may employ different players, tactics, and strategies than what I have recommended here.

For more great DFS insight, make sure you’re subscribed to our weekly DFS podcast, the DFS Shark Tank, featuring Kalib Drake (@DFF_Guru), Mike Oliva (@MikeCOliva) and me, Warren Kiessling (@RotoCoach). We’re a proud part of the Dynasty Football Network and available on iTunes, Stitcher, Spotify, and Podbean.

Share this: Tweet



