Fantasy football strategy, rankings, and podcasts

Each fantasy football season we can begin to map out and analyze player trends after 3 games are in the books. Heading into Week 4 of the 2022 NFL season, Dave & Jason will take a look at 6 player's trajectories based on results they have compiled from Weeks 1-3. Will Russell Wilson return to form in a new offense on the Denver Broncos? Are the Trevor Lawrence led Jacksonville Jaguars for real? Toss in a couple of controversial RBs and WRs and some sweet & sour add-ins and you get a great recipe for a podcast. See ya there.

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This video features the songs and artists listed below, available under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial license: - Various original music by David Biggs

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Jason’s analysis:

Trevor Lawrence (QB, JAC) Wk 4 @ PHI - Lawrence is busting out in his second season - right when you want to see a QB take the next step. Lawrence has increased his fantasy output every week so far this year, with 14.4, 18.5 and then 25.18 points. His team has scored more points every week, he’s had more completions every week, and he’s increased his passing TDs every week. 

His ADP was somewhere around QB19 and he’s the QB10 on the season. Coming off a big win on the road, Lawrence must have tons of confidence with a new coach and a 2-1 team. I think this is the beginning of Lawrence’s breakout season. The Jags have outscored their opponents 62-10 over the last two weeks, and I expect Lawrence to be a low end QB1 - a definite starter in 2 QB leagues.

Dameon Pierce (RB, HOU) Wk 4 vs LAC - As a rookie, Pierce was always going to be eased into the regular rotation on the Texans offense. It seems like perhaps that process has been accelerated. He’s increased his carries each week, increased his overall yardage, and most importantly, gone from about 30% of offensive snaps in week 1 to 60% in weeks 2 and 3. He’s scored 4.4, 8.2, and 17.10 points. He’s also increased his receiving yards each week, though those are pretty minor overall. 

I think Pierce will continue to play well, though for a rookie RB, it will not be as consistent as someone like Lawrence. This week is a good matchup, though. Pierce will face the Chargers defense who have given up the 5th most points to opposing RBs, surrendering a TD every week so far. Pierce already has 65% of his team’s rushing attempts, so it looks like he is in line to be somewhere between a featured back and a bell cow back. Side note on this game, the Texans have the worst rushing D in the league through 3 games.

Brandin Cooks (WR, HOU) Wk 4 vs LAC - Cooks has had a very quiet start to the season, and was certainly expected to do better as last year’s WR20 finisher. He had 3 great games when he started in the last 4 weeks of the 2021 fantasy season. This year, he has 22.3 points over his first 3 games (11.7, 7.4, 3.2). Cooks is being held back by Davis Mills being an OK QB at best. Perhaps he can start to break out a bit if the running game in Houston can get going, as mentioned earlier. 

Cooks is the focus of all opposing defenses for now, and he needs someone else to take at least a bit of their attention. Each week Cooks has gone down in both targets, receptions, and yards - as well as going down in catch %, pointing to the fact that he’s being covered even more. It’s not like he forgot how to catch the ball. This week is a good place for that to start, with the Chargers giving up the 6th most fantasy points to opposing players. I think that Cooks is worth sticking with for this week at least, but the Texans offense is far from a juggernaut. Cooks won’t be a drop, but he may be tough to be an every week start going forward. You may just focus on good matchups unless the Texans offense can start overachieving.

Dave’s analysis:

Russell Wilson (QB, DEN) @LV - Wilson finished the 2021 season as the 16th best fantasy QB, but a lot of us still seem to remember him as the guy that finished as QB5 back-to-back in 2019 and 2020. What happened to him? 

Trending down so far since week 1, Wilson scored 17.8 points against his former Seahawks, 12.06 vs. Houston, and then 9.06 just last week against the 49ers. The Broncos ended up punting 10 times on Sunday, and had a total of 8 3-and-outs. He seems unable to find his footing and put up a decent effort scrambling, which used to be his forte, and the Broncos only have 2 passing TDs in their 3 games so far this season. Enough trash talk? Maybe.

Broncos’ rookie head coach Nathaniel Hackett has certainly not done himself any favors so far, attempting a 64-yard field goal instead of going for it on fourth-and-5 in their loss against the Seahawks in week 1. But this team needs to help Wilson by providing better targets (Sutton seems to be the only consistent receiver with Jeudy banged up and hyped tight end Albert Okwuegbunam (say that 3 times fast) only recording 45 receiving yards so far). Hackett needs to lead with an offense more grounded in rushing like Wilson was successful with in Seattle to give him more time for downfield attempts and prevent the defense from concentrating on taking away Jeudy and Sutton.

The Broncos do have the pieces there for a team that can make a run at it, but I think that without focusing on the run game with Javonte Williams and Melvin Gordon first and foremost, and finding another working piece for the passing game (KJ Hamler is not working out and we’re seeing Okwuegbunam trend negatively to start the season as mentioned earlier), it will continue to be a dream just beyond the horizon. Unfortunately, the smart move is to move away from Russell Wilson and any other pieces of this offense besides Javonte Williams and Courtland Sutton. He’ll continue to underperform, though it’s not completely his fault.

Clyde Edwards-Helaire (RB, KC) @TB - CEH started the season on fire with 2 receiving TDs in the first match against Arizona, and there were a lot of high-fives out there from those that selected him at his RB27 ADP in this year’s draft. We really weren’t sure how he might be utilized by this new Chiefs offense that underwent such radical change by shaking up the WRs. It turns out that the Chiefs intend to do much of the same at the RB position as they did last year, turning to a committee that will get called upon to follow the script each individual matchup might dictate. 

Edwards-Helaire scored 20.9 points in week 1, 13.8 in week 2 against the Chargers, and 12.4 in week 3 vs the Colts. In each game he had similar rushing attempts (7/8/7) and has been heavily involved in the passing game since the beginning of the season (100% catch rate, targets trending up from 3, to 4, to 5 from weeks 1-3). He won’t be phased out of this offense, by any means, but there are two things working against him as we look at what future trajectory makes sense to predict: 1 - McKinnon leads the Chiefs’ backfield (comprised of Edwards-Helaire, McKinnon, and Pacheco) with a 28% snap share, and 2 - rookie Isaiah Pacheco is starting to get more attempts and build more confidence and rapport with Mahomes and Co. 

In other words, Edwards-Helaire is a huge sell candidate after putting up some decent numbers over the first few weeks, but this is mostly backfield catches and touchdown dependent point scoring. Both other RBs are vying for opportunities in this offense, and are getting early down, third down, and goal-line work, and CEH is only averaging around 12 touches per game (with 0 rushing yards coming from his 7 week 3 carries). This is a trap, and it’s great to celebrate getting some points from a mid round draft pick but owners are about to find out very quickly that this is smoke & mirrors, and the last opportunity to sell high is right now. Definitely don’t start CEH this week against a Tampa Bay squad allowing the least amount of points to opposing RBs, and expect a sour future ahead for the 3rd year RB.

Justin Jefferson (WR, MIN) @NO - Jefferson has really fallen from grace in the eyes of fantasy team managers so far this season - he has gone from scoring 34.9 points in week 1’s routing of the Packers, to 7.8 in week 2’s loss against Philadelphia, to finally scoring just 2.9 points last week versus Detroit. His receptions have fallen from 9, to 6, to 3 over that span. So why the downward trend, and what kind of insights can stats from the last few games give us about the rest of the season moving forward? 

Well, speaking plainly about the game vs. the Lions, Cousins spread the targets out evenly among Thielen, Osborn, and Jefferson, and a lot of that was because of the clever way that Jefferson was defended by the Lions’ secondary. Cornerback Jeff Okudah was in man coverage almost the whole game, but with a high safety over the top, a bracket safety leaning towards Jefferson’s side in the slot, and the opposite safety on top for most plays was also spying Jefferson to prevent any crossover plays from developing. 

Because of this, we saw Thielen and Osborn soak up a lot more targets than they have been this year (8 each, season highs for both), as the Vikings were forced to spread out the ball to secure a win. They did just narrowly defeat the Lions, but we will certainly see similar schemes from other secondaries, focusing on Jefferson down the stretch. The Eagles also double-teamed Jefferson, and he was limited in his success in week 2, though not by as much. Head coach Kevin O’Connell has repeatedly made clear that they will continue to change their scheme and “[give] Justin different aspects of lining up in different spots, different personnel groupings, whatever I need to do to help him”.

Things will improve for him, though,  and the Vikings were able to create a good showcase in week 3 of why teams should not concentrate their whole secondary on stopping Jefferson. There are other playmakers on this squad and ignoring them can still result in a loss. I predict that Jefferson will reverse this trend, and his fantasy points should creep back up toward last year’s 16.3 points per game average - but with the enhanced coverage he has been seeing may end the season with a finish a few spots lower than last year’s WR4 overall.