Key PPR findings this week:

Changes for this week: For some of the analysis, I’ll be adding my thoughts to make the conclusion (or lack thereof) from the data more clear.

QB:

Derek Carr and Case Keenum — Are outliers in our projections this week, relative to other sites. Let’s look at both.

I’ll start with Derek Carr. His main counting stats for the past 16 games are below. The trend line is a frown face, which sums up his performance. Baltimore has been giving up two passing TDs a game. If Baltimore keeps up with that trend, I think we’ll end up on the right side of this projection. You can see Baltimore’s stats in the second graph below.

My thoughts: He is worth a flier in daily if his price is right and you can get an upgrade somewhere else from the savings. In a typical weekly league, I don’t think you start him unless you need a bye week fill in or in a super deep league or have a bunch of sharks that own every other QB.

Case Keenum’s turn! I’ll use the same two graphs for him. From the first graph: If you take out the game against Arizona where they didn’t need Keenum to do anything, he has been throwing the ball over 30 times per game. Against Pittsburg, this could be another game where Keenum has to throw a ton. The second graph shows the quality of the Pittsburg’s defense.

My thoughts: It’s hard to like the matchup, especially with how Pittsburg’s defense has been trending with regards to total yards and TDs for opponent’s QBs.

WR:

I am going to keep with the theme from the QB section and start with two players. Let’s look at Antonio Brown and JuJu Smith-Schuster.

Antonio Brown is top tier, so we’ll look at some data to see if we can justify the point total. An interesting point in the first graph below, his number of receptions is way down this year vs. last year: a second interesting point, his consistency with TDs. ~25 points don’t seem unreasonable. Denver also got lit up last week against the Chargers (second graph).

JuJu Smith-Schuster has been averaging more yards than Antonio Brown over the past three games but lacks the TD consistency enjoyed by Brown. The second graph shows the targets by all the WR on Pittsburg, it’s crazy how closely Brown and Smith-Schuster follow each other. If you think Brown is going to get his points, you can feel good Smith-Schuster will get his.

Tyler Boyd is a compelling case because AJ Green might be back in some capacity this week. A few points:

Boyd didn’t see a spike in yards in AJ Green’s absence (graph one below) Boyd had a spike in targets last week (graph one below) The Browns have been giving up a ton of receiving yards this year (graph two below) In targets, John Ross might have benefited the most from AJ Green’s inury. I am not posting his graph, but he had six and seven targets in the two games AJ Green was out.

My Thoughts: Boyd is going against a bad Defense. The number of targets last week has me feeling right about our rankings. AJ Green might not play this week, and even if he does, his production will likely be down making Boyd’s value little changed.

Second Thoughts for DFS Players: If AJ Green is out, John Ross will be a sneaky play given his targets.

Honorable Sterling Shepard mention. The first graph shows the opportunity against the Eagles defense that has a ton of injuries in the secondary. The second graph shows his usage. His targets are down while his overall amount of snaps played has been consistent which tells me the opportunity is there. Here is a list of the Eagles player that are out:

RB:

Every week I mention what happens on the early games to show positive or negative results. This week it is Alvin Kamara and Mark Ingram . We had him significantly lower than most sites, at ~16 points. He only scored 8. We also had Ingram at 9 points; he ended up with 8.

. We had him significantly lower than most sites, at ~16 points. He only scored 8. We also had at 9 points; he ended up with 8. James Conner is the most glaring outlier this week. Conner has been making gains in the receiving department recently while trending down in the rushing category. The first graph below shows this trend. Denver has a stout run D. The second graph shows this. These two points lead me to think the likelihood of him getting sub 20 points is not out of the question (20 points is about the average I see on other sites).

LeSean McCoy is going against a great D. The first graph below shows inconsistent results which might be a function of his touches. His rushing yards per carry this year has been excellent when he gets enough touches to get a meaningful sample. The weeks he averaged under 3 were also weeks he averaged under ten total rushes. His matchup is terrible, the second graph outlines how bad. Marcus Murphy also makes me nervous; his usage has been trending up the past two weeks.

My thoughts: McCoy has a tough matchup. Their defense is top notch and like Jacksonville, probably won’t score many points. If they keep the game close and he gets touches, I feel like he will get his points.

Marlon Mack- Isn’t on our list but we had projections earlier in the week which had him significantly lower than other sites. I’ll try to explain why. The first graph below provides insight into his performance. The concern I have for Mack is his lack of utilization in the passing game. The offset to this concern is MIA is bad.

My thoughts: I tend to prefer favorable matchups for guys like Mack who needs to find success with the touches he gets. Mack’s usage this year reminds of Jay Ajayi on the Eagles last year. After the Eagles acquired Ajayi, he either had 10–15 carries or 23–28 and nothing in between. Given that, if IND is blowing out MIA (the likely case), he’ll get the upper-end touches and the points that will likely follow that amount of usage.

TE:

Cameron Brate — I usually neglect TE. I’ll continue to do that with the exception of Cameron Brate. If we look back to 2017, Brate had productive weeks with a string of TD and lots of targets. I can’t comment on the skill difference between the two he could be a good fill in for O.J. Howard and Brate so i’ll consider them close to equal. Plug the projections for O.J. Howard in for Brate (maybe reduce by 10%) and you get a TE that can start on your team.

PPR