Week 6 rolls along with some serious shake-ups in the league, including the demolition of the Giants' passing offense (Marshall and Beckham both out for the season and Shepard in a walking boot). We're still seeing some offensive weapons in fantasy that are remaining stagnant, and now is the time to consider cutting bait with them and moving on. Let's focus on the players that should provide your team with a boost this coming week - some of those guys include: Derek Carr, Mark Ingram, Elijah McGuire, Emmanuel Sanders, Amari Cooper, Austin Hooper, and the Baltimore Ravens.
It's the end of another exciting week of football which means it's time to put your claims in for available free agents in your fantasy league to strengthen your team. I'll be going over who I think are the top five picks for you to target this week so don't miss out on them. Good luck!
Note: %owned is based on Yahoo! leagues at the time of publication.
5) Marlon Mack (IND) - 9% owned - Mack should have earned himself more playing time after putting up 93 yards and a touchdown. There will probably be an even timeshare of carries between him and Frank Gore for the time being, but he has a shot to overtake Gore if he continues to play well.
4) Elijah McGuire (NYJ) - 17% owned - McGuire could be poised for a significant workload this week against the Patriots as both Matt Forte and Bilal Powell are injured with little expectation to be ready to go. McGuire has played well in his limited opportunities this season running for 5.2 yards per carry.
3) Javorius Allen (BAL) - 58% owned - Allen is coming off a very productive game racking up 85 yards 4 catches and a touchdown after Terrance West went down early with a calf injury. West isn't expected to be ready this week so Allen should be in line for another high volume of touches.
2) Mike Wallace (BAL) - 33% owned - Coming off back to back productive games it would appear Wallace is getting more involved in the Ravens offense. At the moment he looks to be a boom or bust deep threat, but Flacco has proven to be able to hit the deep ball in his career.
1) Aaron Jones (GB) - 57% owned - Jones has emerged as the lead back for Green Bay with Ty Montgomery sidelined. It's expected that Montgomery will miss multiple weeks which makes Jones a must start until he comes back.
OK, last week was just bad. I would like to offer my apologies…and so should the Steelers!
But again, your lowest score is removed so let’s also remove it from our memory – still plenty of season to play!
Week 6 – HERE WE GO!!!!
(HOME TEAM IN CAPS)
14 – DENVER over New York Giants – The Denver defense is already referred to as the “No Fly Zone.” Should be a pretty easy day when Eli Manning will basically be throwing to waterboy level wideouts.
13 – ATLANTA over Miami – The Dolphins have officially been “Jay Cutler’d” It will be a rough rest of the season in South Beach.
12 – HOUSTON over Cleveland – Houston took two major blows to their defense last week…but they’re playing the Browns…sooooo….you know.
11 – BALTIMORE over Chicago – The Mitch Trubisky show hits the road for the first time. Pretty easy to see that the outcome won’t change with the time zone.
10 – TENNESSEE over Indianapolis – To say that the Titans 2017 have been disappointing so far would be an understatement. Lucky for them Andrew Luck isn’t back just yet.
9 – New England over NEW YORK JETS – Can’t say that I expected to see two teams over .500 in this game. What will be expected is the outcome though.
8 – WASHINGTON over San Francisco – Traveling across the country in search for your first win this season isn’t exactly the best way to go about it.
7 – KANSAS CITY over Pittsburgh – The Chiefs are clearly the best team in the league so far. But the fact that the Steelers ended the Chiefs season last year drops them down a few points in this game.
6 – JACKSONVILLE over Los Angeles Rams – Sooooooooo with how the first quarter of the season played out, this could be considered a possible Super Bowl matchup…just gonna let that sink in for a bit.
5 – OAKLAND over Los Angeles Chargers – The Raiders are just a different team with Derek Carr under center. If Carr plays, you can bump them up a few spots.
4 – CAROLINA over Philadelphia – Thursday Night gives us what should be the most exciting game of the week. My BOLD PREDICTION for this week is that EVEN AFTER THEIR SLOW START, THE PANTHERS WILL WIN THE NFC SOUTH.
3 – Green Bay over MINNESOTA – What is it about the Packers and Aaron Rodgers that makes you think they won’t have a chance to win every game they play?
2 – NEW ORLEANS over Detroit – I wouldn’t be surprised if the Adrian Peterson trade is very beneficial for the Saints. Peterson’s attitude may have been a bit of a distraction. At least it would be enough to win this week.
1 – ARIZONA over Tampa Bay – Obviously the trade was beneficial for the Cardinals. Finally they have someone after the David Johnson injury that will allow Carson Palmer not throw the ball 83 times a game.
And the winner for the 2017 NFL Survivor killer goes to the Pittsburgh Steelers. Last week they laid an egg at home against the Jacksonville Jaguars, driven by a 5 interception day from Ben Roethlisberger. In doing so they claimed another 127 victims in my pool and got the remaining entrants down to 157 from the original 1008 at the beginning of the season. When you pair this game with their week 3 loss to the Bears, I think it's safe to say nobody will be a bigger disappointment this season. I had high points on them in my confidence pools but fortunately for myself I went with the Eagles last week who crushed the Cardinals 34-7.
This week sees 3 teams favored by over 10 points and another 3 favored by over a touchdown. So basically, take a dart and throw it at the schedule and you should make it through this week safely. For me I was split between the 3 favored by 10, the Broncos, Texans, and Falcons. The Broncos coming out of the bye week with the best secondary in the league playing against the Giants who last week lost their top 3 receivers to injury and have no ability to run the ball, are the lock of the century. Go ahead and pick that if you want to feel warm and fuzzy. I however started looking further down the schedule and see other opportunities for a Broncos selection in later weeks. The same is true for the Texans, plus there is the added wild card of a winless Browns team fielding a new starting QB in this game. Who knew a failing Notre Dame QB would continue to fail on last year’s worst NFL team.
This brings me to my survivor selection, the Atlanta Falcons. So far this year the Falcons look poised to return to the Super Bowl and avenge last year’s second half blunder. When I look at the Falcons schedule this game is by far their easiest match-up and their remaining schedule sees all their tougher match-ups at home and quote un-quote easy games on the road. Coming out of their own bye week, I see them making easy work of the offensively inept Dolphins at home. Basically, score 20 points and the Dolphins will have no shot.
Cheers!
Drink Five